Apache Death Page 11

  "Looks like you ain't got it anymore," Edge said, throwing his body up into a sudden arch which tossed the brave clear of him. The man rolled once and then disappeared from sight over the lip of the canyon. He screamed, but the sound maintained an even pitch, without diminishing and Edge crawled forward and peered down, his features forming into a cruel grin. The screaming brave was suspended in mid-air, hanging on with his good arm to the bow, the other end of which was hooked over a patch of brush growing out of the side of the canyon wall.

  "Quit hanging around," Edge muttered as he reached down and slashed through the bowstring, sending the brave plummeting to the floor of the canyon to enraged whoops from the Apaches who watched from below. Then he turned to the other brave, who was still writhing on the ground as he cradled the side of his face in bloodstained hands.

  "Pity you ain't a horse," he told the unhearing man. "Could shoot you then. Guess you'll just have to suffer."

  He took one final glance down at the Apache camp and saw the braves hurrying toward their ponies, then moved quickly to where his army mount was ground hobbled. He heeled him into a fast gallop, heading toward the natural trail he had come up by, even though he knew it led to only one place. But he considered the high walls of Fort Rainbow were better protection than unfamiliar foothills when the Apache nation was on the warpath.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  The evening sun was changing color from dull, yellow to vivid red as Edge rode at full gallop down Rainbow’s main street toward the gates of the fort. The hanks of his horse were lathered white and his own body was running with sweat which pasted, his shirt to his back. It had been a long, hard ride with the leading group of Apaches close on his heels all the way from the canyon to the, crest of the northern ridge. Only a small party had ventured after him on the frantic, half-running-half-sliding descent down the face and it was the group of' braves who thundered in his wake as he entered the town. But a change came over the Indians as he led them closer to the fort. Their enraged yelps and horrendous-whooping warcries faltered and then ended and as Edge glanced over his shoulder he saw the braves were dropping back. But Edge continued to ask his mount for everything the animal's stout heart could produce and as the fort gates were flung wide he went through at a full gallop, wheeling in a tight turn as they were slammed closed behind him. A volley of rifle fire rang out from the top of the wall, halting the pursuing braves who spent a few moments venting their frustrated rage before turning to leave.

  As Edge dismounted, drawing in deep breaths, he stroked the neck of his exhausted horse and watched the approach of Colonel Murray who strode across the compound from his quarters.

  The officer regarded Edge with small pleasure. "You decided to come back."

  Edge turned on his cold grin, "It was a joint decision. Me and a few hundred Apaches."

  "We have better uses for our ammunition than to protect reckless adventurers," Murray snapped. Edge studied him more closely and recognized in the haunted eyes and drawn lines of his pallid face the sign of a man nearing the end of a short tether. Then he glanced around the fort lit by the fading light of a dying day and saw a variety of similar expressions upon the faces of both soldiers and civilian townspeople as they moved about the compound. And not only was it in the faces of the men and women that their fear was evident. It was apparent in the cautious manner they moved and the quick, suspicious turning of heads and reaching for guns that was triggered by each sound not immediately recognizable.

  "You expecting it to hit the fan soon?" Edge asked when he had finished his survey.

  Murray suddenly developed a nervous tic in his right cheek and he quickly raised a hand to try to conceal it. He looked up and over the western wall of the fort and drew in his breath for a long sigh. "My guess is tonight. Fort Lawrence—twenty miles north of here—was overrun last night and every man was slaughtered. Then at dawn today the town of Rocky Haven was wiped out—that's the next town east on the stage trail. The army has been put on to a war footing. Where did you have your run-in with the Apaches, Mr. Edge?"

  Edge ran a finger down the flank of his horse and brought it away cloaked in a sweat foam. "Two hours hard riding from here. Don't reckon anybody could do it in less."

  "How many of them?"

  Edge picked up the reins and began to lead the animal across the compound toward the stables. Murray fell in beside him.

  "Three hundred and maybe more. Not less."

  "Any rifles?"

  Edge spat. "They weren't using them on English."

  Murray looked at him sharply. ''The Apaches captured Fallowfield?"

  "Yeah. And they've got a white girl as well. Seems she was the girl of the chief s dreams until she got out of line. Now she's a kind, of nightmare with big boobs."

  "Weren't they killed?" Murray asked, then snapped a command to a nearby soldier who sprang forward to take care of Edge's mount.

  Edge relinquished the responsibility gratefully. "Maybe."

  "What is that supposed to mean?"

  Edge shrugged and nodded toward the stockade in one comer of the compound, its spiked topped fence and substantial gate patrolled by two armed guards. "Little Cochise still in the pokey, Colonel?"

  "Of course. He's our insurance. What do you mean; maybe?"

  "Indians were playing some kind of Apache roulette with English and then the girl riled them. I tangled with a couple of braves and that sort of interrupted the proceedings. I had to beat it. English and the white squaw weren't very healthy when I left, but they were still breathing. My guess would be that English, at least, is still alive. But I bet he's not making with the smart lip anymore."

  Murray's haggard face took on a thoughtful frown. "Was Chief Cochise at the camp?"

  'Wasn't close enough to ask him who he was," Edge answered. "But the braves who jumped me tried to take me alive and kicking."

  ''They want hostages?"

  "Exchange is no robbery," Edge pointed out.

  Murray scowled. "I'm not about to give up an Apache sub-chief for a no-good British gambler."

  Edge grinned at him without humor. ''If you want the rank you got to be prepared to make the decisions, Colonel," he muttered. "Any chance of a bed and a bath?"

  "Use my washroom," Murray allowed without enthusiasm. "You can sleep in the men's quarters. There's plenty of room. We’re at less than half strength."

  "What about the townspeople?"

  "You saw what was left of them," Murray reminded. "We also found a man with only half an arm left and another with his eyes gouged out."

  Edge spat into the dust. "They say there's worse trouble at sea."

  Murray eyed him with abject bitterness. "Don't you have any feelings, mister?" he asked scornfully.

  "Yeah," Edge replied, moving away toward the Colonel's quarters. "I feel dirty and tired."

  The rooms in which the fort's commanding officer lived were austere and impersonal, fitted out to army regulations. Like the man who lived in them, they were cold, hard and lacking anything not dictated by the book. But Edge took no note of the decor or furnishings and did not concern himself with their function as a pointer to the psychological make-up of Colonel Murray. He moved directly through the quarters to the small washroom and chose to, take his bath in cold water rather than go to the trouble of heating it. After he had soaped the dried sweat from his body he luxuriated in the water for a long time, allowing its cool caress to ease the tension out of him. Then, when he felt fully relaxed, he was able to apply a cool and analytical brain to the million dollars-worth of Mexican gold and how to get it. And, he soon came to realize, in such ideal circumstances, the answer to the problem was ludicrously simple.

  Wyatt Drucker was reputed to be the richest rancher in southern Arizona Territory. All Edge had to do, therefore, was locate Drucker's ranch and wait patiently for its owner to return with his illegal fortune. Or maybe Drucker had already found his prize and was back at his spread counting the take. Whatever the timing, the method of getting
the gold would be the same—painful for Drucker. Very painful: for in Edge's experience, the richer the man, the more resolute was he to keep his money.

  As Edge enjoyed his bath and considered his ridiculously simple plan the sun was completely swallowed up by the western horizon and the final crimson rays of its light were extinguished by the stealthy hand of a moonless night. The sentries on the high walls tightened their grips on the new Winchesters and struggled to adjust their tired eyes to the darkness as they stared out across the ruins of the ravaged town which still gave off a nauseous odor of death and burning.

  But the soldiers were looking in the wrong direction. As their eyes raked the empty street and deserted buildings and their brain struggled to quell vivid mind-pictures of Apache braves flitting among the deep blacks and grays which patterned the town, the raiders crept along the foot of the towering ridge and gathered in the angle where the sheer rock face met the three foot thick adobe wall of the fort's eastern defenses. There were twenty of them, on foot and with faces and naked upper bodies devoid of war paint which might show up against the black cloak of night. They had approached in pairs, carrying between them ten trunks of young trees, each some twelve feet long; and one member of each two man team had a length of rope coiled around his shoulder. Working quickly and silently, two of the trunks were lashed together, end to end. These were rested against the wall of the fort and then slid carefully upwards so that a third trunk could be upended and lashed into position. With the addition of each new trunk the lengthening prop grew heavier and more braves were required to inch it up the wall.

  Although Murray expected a frontal attack and had concentrated the main guard to watch at the town side, the flanks of the fort had not been left completely unprotected and at regular intervals the braves had to interrupt their task as the two man patrol sauntered toward the section of wall under which they were positioned. The Apaches needed only eight of the ten trunks to reach to just below the top of the wall, the long, crudely formed ladder canting at a thirty degree angle and bowing at its center. With a speed and order that told of careful planning, the braves began to shin up the trunks in parties of three, finding easy hand and footholds on the trunks which had not been stripped of their bark. At the top of the trunks the advance trio snaked over the wall and crouched in the inky darkness, looking along the wooden staging toward where the two sentries were turning for the return of their guard patrol.

  A low whistle warned the other raiders to hold their position but did not reach the two soldiers who were talking in soft tones, glancing only occasionally out into the sea of darkness which stretched out eastwards from the fort. More often, they looked down into the compound which was a comforting oasis of light supplied by spluttering kerosene lamps.

  "When I get out of this man's army, I'm for the easy life. Gonna find me a rich woman with a big house in New York where there ain't no Injuns. And I'm gonna eat and sleep and count her money all day and every day."

  The speaker was an old sweat, a busted sergeant who made a new plan each day and talked about it every waking moment. His companion was much younger, a soldier for sixty days with a fresh face as yet unshaven and a determination to become the best trooper in the United States Cavalry.

  "No screwing?" he asked with a shy smile. The profanities, which were as much a part of a soldier's life as saluting officers and griping at the food, did not roll off his well-schooled tongue and he seldom ventured beyond the outer threshold of profanity.

  The older man grinned at him. "Rich women ain't ever fair of face, son," he said. "And I ain't about to go feeding my meat to no other pussies so me rich wife gets riled and tells me to go to hell."

  "Hell, isn't any reason ..." The young soldier broke off the sentence and sighed softly as the Apache brave gently encircled his throat with the crook of an arm and sank the knife into his left breast. The old sweat died with a low croaking sound, curtailed by cold steel digging deep into the side of his neck and penetrating his jugular vein.

  The braves withdrew their knives and lowered the two bodies into the pools of blood already forming on the staging. The third Apache whistled softly and within seconds the whole group were crouching at the top of the wall, peering down across the compound to where unsuspecting townspeople and off-duty soldiers were forming a line outside the cookhouse. The raiders were all young, with powerful, supple bodies and intent strongly featured faces. With bodies crouched and faces set in expressions of resolute determination, eighteen of the braves watched patiently as the two who had made the kills sliced off the scalps of their victims. Then all twenty filed down the stairway into the compound, their moccasined feet padding silently on the treads. The fort's arsenal was adjacent to the stables and was locked but unguarded because Murray considered Fort Rainbow impregnable to anything except a full-scale frontal attack. The stockade, which was patrolled, was at the opposite comer of the fort from where the raiders had gained access and the party split into two groups, one of five and the other of fifteen. The smaller group moved off first, stealing one at a time through the shadows, keeping out of the cones of flickering light thrown by the oil lamps, ever watchful for a sign of alarm from the men and women filing into the cookhouse. Then, as soon as the last man had reached the comer of the stockade, the rest of the braves set off from the foot of the stairway, ducking into the open door of the stables.

  The unarmed hostler had just finished attending to Edge's horse and his eyes and mouth snapped wide in terrified surprise as he turned and saw a half circle of grim-faced Apaches ranged, about him. "Keeeerist!" he exclaimed, and fell sideways, reaching for a pitchfork leaning against one of the stalls.

  Fifteen braves snaked knives from their breechcloths and released them simultaneously. Fifteen blades buried their points into his body, their handles bristling from his flesh in two lines from neck to groin. The man went backward into a water trough, the blood from his multiple wounds staining the contents crimson. His death was signaled by a low moan and a loud splash, neither of which attracted attention from outside. Brown, grimed hands drove into the bloodied water to withdraw the instruments of death and as five of the braves went into the stalls and began to systematically slash the throat of the trapped animals, the other ten , moved to the arsenal side of the stables arid started to pry loose the boards of the dividing wall. One came free, then another. The blood-stained knives dug into the wood and more boards were lifted clear until a large hole, some five feet by four, had been ripped in the wall. Then five of the braves ducked inside.

  Not a word had been spoken since the raiders had reached the outside foot of the wall and they continued in silence as the five braves scrambled through the hole and moments later began to pass cases of Winchester rifles and boxes of ammunition out into the eager arms of those who had stayed in the stables.

  Out in the compound one of the guard’s on the stockade reached the comer around which the other five Apaches were hiding. The man began to swing his body into an about-turn but was suddenly jerked backward, into the shadows, by a hand which grasped the edge of his tunic jacket. His yell of surprise was curtailed by an evil-smelling hand which fastened over his mouth and nose. His arms and legs were pinned to the ground by other strong hands and he was held so firmly that only his eyes could move, flicking to left and right in naked fear as he saw the shadowed figures bending over him. But within moments his vision was blurred as the air trapped in his lungs went stale. In a last desperate attempt to cheat death he willed his muscles to turn his limbs to jelly. But the Apaches were not fooled. They knew how long it took a man to suffocate to death and did not release their hold until the soldier was asphyxiated. Then nimble fingers unfastened his tunic buttons and unbuckled his belt. In less than a minute since he died, his uniform had been stripped from him and donned by one of the raiders. Then the brave elected to carry out the impersonation shouldered the guard's rifle and ambled out from the shadows to start along the front of the stockade.

  Edge emerged from C
olonel Murray's quarters and breathed in deeply of the cool evening air. Freshly bathed and shaved, he felt relaxed and pleasantly weary, with only the gnawing stomach cramp of hunger forcing itself to the forefront of his priorities above the need for sleep. But a man who lives with danger must, if he is to survive, have an built-in physical mechanism which swamps all other considerations when the mental faculty of his sixth sense signals trouble.

  Colonel Murray was coming across the compound from the cookhouse, carrying a tin mug of steaming coffee and looking less tense after the sedative effect of a good dinner. He was about to call a greeting to Edge but no sound emerged as his mouth dropped open, and he came to an abrupt halt, spilling the scalding coffee down his pants leg. For, with an almost hunting animal movement, Edge had swiveled his head, stared toward the stockade for an instant and then thrown his rifle up to his shoulder. The shot cut across the silence of the, compound with an ear-splitting report that drew the shocked attention of every person in a position to witness the result. It was followed by the scream of the bogus soldier as the bullet smashed into the side of his head, and a round of startled gasps from the watchers.