pounds. Females were smaller but still weighed between six and seven hundred pounds. A lot of meat was packed on their big bones, meat the settlers could use in the coming months if it was properly cured and salted.
Since it was summer, antlers had sprouted on the males, and it was easy for Fargo to pick a young one. At the shot, the young bull went down. But it was immediately back up and running as if the slug had just grazed it.
Fargo fixed a bead on its head. Working the lever as fast as he could, he banged off three swift shots and at the third the elk went down and this time it stayed down.
The rest went crashing off through the brush.
In no hurry, Fargo spent all afternoon skinning and carving and tying the meat on the roan. He packed on as much as he could but there was still plenty left. He wrapped as much as he could in what was left of the hide and covered it, intending to come back the next day.
Butchering was blood-drenched, gory work. Fargo was an old hand at it but he still got blood all over him and on his buckskins.
Once again the sun was balanced on the rim of the world when Fargo bent the Ovaro’s steps toward the valley far below. It was an uncomfortable feeling, riding back into a nest of vipers. He reminded himself that the farmers weren’t the snakes in the grass. They were innocents, caught up in God-knew-what. He would do what he could for them but it might not be enough.
Fargo never ceased to be amazed at how pigheaded people could be. He’d tried to talk them out of coming. Gore had tried to talk them out of coming. But would they listen? No. They had their minds made up and nothing anyone could say or do would change things.
Shadows dappled the pine-needle-strewn ground. A jay squawked and flew off. Later on a pair of ravens flew overhead, the beat of their wings clear and distinct.
Fargo breathed deep of the dank scent of the forest, and was for the moment content. Were it not for his fondness for whiskey, cards and women, he wouldn’t mind spending the rest of his days in the wild. He would as soon sleep under the stars as in a bed and eat roast venison over a roaring fire as eat a slab of beef at a restaurant.
Campfires glowed in the circle. Sentries had been posted. The women tended supper pots while the children played and the men rested from their labors, puffing on pipes or thick cigars.
Fargo’s arrival created a stir. Lester Winston took charge of the elk meat, saying, “We’re obliged. We won’t go hungry for a coon’s age, thanks to you.”
Fargo turned and found his way blocked by the usual three: Rinson, Slag and Perkins. Two other protectors were with them but standing well back, hands near their revolvers. “You’re in my way.”
“We need to talk,” Rinson said.
“Not now. I’m tired.”
“One of my men has gone missing. Clark is his name. And I figure you know what happened to him.”
“You figure wrong.”
“Oh?” Rinson nodded at where the farmers were untying the elk meat from the roan. “That’s Clark’s horse.”
“I wondered whose it was. I found it all by itself up in the mountains and brought it back with me.”
“You didn’t see hide nor hair of Clark?” Slag asked.
“Can’t say as I did, no.” Fargo gestured. “Now are you going to move or do I have to move you?”
Perkins chuckled. “I’d like to see you try.”
“Enough,” Rinson snapped. “No more of that. Not now. Not here. Understood?”
“I savvy,” Perkins said resentfully.
“You’re lucky, mister,” Skag said to Fargo.
Fargo was about to walk on when the sentry gave a shout and hooves drummed. Into the circle galloped Vincent Gore. In his excitement, Gore nearly rode a woman down. But it was what he shouted that galvanized everyone into rushing to their wagons and arming themselves.
“The Nez Perce are coming!”
14
Rifles bristled from wagon seats, from under the wagons, from behind the wagons. For over an hour the settlers were tense with dread, awaiting an attack. But the Nez Perce didn’t show. The sky darkened and night fell, and nothing happened.
“I don’t understand it,” Victor Gore said. “They chased me for miles. They were only a few hundred yards behind me when I reached this valley.”
“Maybe they know we’re here,” Lester Winston speculated. “Maybe they are off in the woods right this minute, watching us.”
Fargo was skeptical. The Nez Perce had no reason to fear the farmers, not if there were as many warriors as Gore claimed. “How many were there again?” he asked to be certain.
“I couldn’t count them, what with riding for my life, but I’d be willing to swear on a stack of Bibles there were seventy or more.”
“That’s a sizable war party,” Rinson remarked.
Too sizable, in Fargo’s estimation. The only reason a war party would be that large was if the Nez Perce were on a raid against an enemy village.
“Strange they haven’t shown,” a farmer mentioned from his roost on a wagon.
“They better come soon,” a woman said. “My nerves are frayed. I can’t take this waiting.”
“Someone should go see where they got to,” Rinson proposed.
“I agree,” Gore said. “And since I was the fool who led them here, I’ll go.” The old trapper turned toward his horse.
As they had done before, all eyes fixed on Fargo. Inwardly he swore but out loud he said, “It should be me who goes. I stand a better chance of making it back with my hair.”
Gore grinned. “This is no time for false bravery. I’ll gladly let you do it in my stead.”
Fargo made for the Ovaro. “Me and my big mouth,” he muttered, then realized he wasn’t alone.
“Be careful, Skye,” Rachel urged. “There’s no telling what they will do if they get their hands on you.”
Fargo hoped that Winter Wolf, the old warrior he had met, was with them. Winter Wolf might palaver rather than have him killed. Not that it would do much good. The Nez Perce weren’t about to let the farmers stay. “You were idiots to come here.”
“Here we go again!”
“If it were up to me, I’d run the whole bunch of you clear back to the Mississippi River.”
“How can you talk like that after we’ve let you stay with us and my ma has cooked your meals and all?”
Fargo hurriedly saddled. He was about done when Victor, Lester and Rinson drifted over.
“I’m sorry to have brought this on you,” Gore said. “I was scared. I didn’t think to try and lead them away.”
Lester said, “Don’t be so hard on yourself. Anyone would have done the same.”
Not Fargo, but he didn’t say so.
“If you want,” Rinson spoke up, “I’ll send a couple of my men with you. Slag and Perkins wouldn’t mind going.”>
That was all Fargo needed, a war party in front of him and two killers at his back. “I’ll go alone.”
Anxious faces were pale blots in the dark as Fargo brought the Ovaro to a gap between wagons and forked leather. The saddle creaked under him, and then his boots were in the stirrups. “If I’m not back by sunup—” He didn’t finish. He didn’t need to.
“It won’t come to that,” Lester said. “Not if you don’t let them get their hands on you.”
Was it Fargo’s imagination, or were there tears in Rachel’s eyes? He touched his hat brim and rode out. The Indians were at the mouth of the valley, Gore claimed. But Fargo didn’t head there. He reined wide to the right so he could come up on them through the forest. His skin prickling, he held the Ovaro to a walk. Less noise that way, and less chance of blundering into waiting warriors.
