Northwoods Nightmare Page 8

  Fargo touched her shoulder. “Thanks for the warning. I’ll keep my eyes skinned.” He uncurled and was set to tap his spurs when she gripped the stirrup.

  “There is more.”

  Fargo waited.

  “One of those young warriors is my brother. My heart would be sad if anything happened to him.”

  Fargo almost said, “Then he shouldn’t go around killing people.” Instead he responded, “The odds of me running into them are pretty slim.”

  “Perhaps not,” Teit said. “They watch the trails and this is one the whites use a lot.”

  Now Fargo had more to worry about. He rode alertly down to the valley floor. There, he paralleled the grassy bank of a swift stream to a sawtooth ridge. A game trail brought him to the crest. Below lay Fraser Canyon. He had come out north of the canyon mouth and the settlement of Yale.

  Fraser Canyon was a turbulent tear in mother earth. In parts it was over three thousand feet deep. Sheer cliffs overlooked some of its serpentine length. Elsewhere, steep slopes, many with timber, many without. The narrow trail, which Fargo could see from the rim, was treacherous. A single misstep, and a person plunged to his doom. Word had it that more than a dozen people had done just that.

  Fargo dismounted. He wrapped the reins around a tree limb. Moving to the edge, he spotted several men leading pack mules up the canyon toward the next settlement. As best he could recollect, the next one was called Spuzzum. Sixteen miles past Spuzzum was the Havards’ destination, the last place Kenneth had been: Boston Bar.

  Fargo pushed his hat back on his head. He would be glad when this was over. A full poke and a week or two in San Francisco promised a time he wouldn’t soon forget.

  The prospectors, if that was what they were, never looked up. One of the mules was being contrary and the man leading it had to keep pulling to get it to move.

  A short way ahead of them was a stand of pines.

  Fargo was watching the antics of the mule and not the stand, so he almost missed the movement. Someone was in the trees. Several someones, in fact. More prospectors, he figured, and didn’t give it any more thought until one made the mistake of stepping into an open space between trees. The black hair and the buckskins told Fargo that those in the trees were Indians.

  The white men with the mules were getting closer.

  Now the warriors were spreading out, both above and below the trail. It was an ambush.

  Fargo cupped his hands to his mouth. “Look out!” he shouted at the top of his lungs. His voice bounced off the cliff opposite, and echoed. “There are hostiles in the pines!”

  The prospectors looked up but kept on walking as if everything were perfectly fine.

  Fargo figured the echo had made it hard for them to understand. He tried again, bellowing, “Indians! Ahead of you!”

  One of the men shielded his eyes with a hand.

  “Hostiles!” Fargo tried yet again, waving his arms. He motioned at the pines.

  The men kept going.

  Fargo wondered if maybe they couldn’t hear him because of the rapids below. Several of the warriors in the trees had glanced up and were talking among themselves.

  Whirling, Fargo dashed to the Ovaro and yanked the Henry from the saddle scabbard. He levered a round into the chamber, ran back to the edge, and wedged the stock to his shoulder.

  By now the prospectors and the mules were less than fifty feet from the pines.

  Fargo couldn’t see any of the warriors. But they were there, waiting for their unsuspecting victims to get within arrow range.

  Fargo aimed at a point on the narrow trail about ten feet in front of the first prospector. He stroked the trigger and the Henry kicked. Down below, a geyser of dirt testified to his accuracy. He lowered the rifle.

  The men had stopped and were looking up.

  Fargo jumped up and down and waved his arms again. “Indians in the trees ahead! Watch yourselves!”

  The last man in line raised a rifle and fired.

  The spang of lead striking rock caused Fargo to jump back. The lunkheads were shooting at him! Fargo poked his head over the rim and tried once more. “Hostiles! Don’t go any farther!”

  Another shot whizzed past.

  “Damn idiots.” Fargo was at a loss. If they kept on, they would be slaughtered. But how could he stop them when they were shooting at him? He risked another look.

  The three men were twenty feet from the stand and looking up at the rim, not at the trees.

  “Indians, damn you!”

  The lead man brought his mule to a stop and the others did the same. They talked back and forth, and gestured. The second man pointed at the river and then up at Fargo and put a hand to his ear.

  “Hostiles in the trees!”

  All three were looking up but they didn’t raise their rifles. Fargo showed himself and jabbed an arm at the pines. The last man said something, and the man in the middle raised an arm and waved.

  “Hell,” Fargo said.

  They moved toward the stand.

  Fargo started to curse.

  The first prospector and his mule entered the pines. Then the second, and the third. Fargo couldn’t see any of them. He listened for war whoops and shots but the canyon was quiet, save for the river and the wind.

  Fargo dropped into a crouch. “Where the hell are you?”

  A mule came out of the other side of the stand. Then the second animal. But not the third. Both were trotting.

  Then a prospector staggered out, his hands over his belly. Ropy coils of intestines were spilling out. The prospector weaved. He cried off. He looked up at Fargo, and stepped off the trail into space. He screamed all the way down.

  Fargo swore some more. Something brushed the back of his head. A fly, he thought, and swatted at it.

  But it wasn’t a fly.

  It was a gun barrel.

  11

  If the Knife warrior had simply snuck up on him, put the muzzle of the rifle to the back of Fargo’s head, and pulled the trigger without saying anything, Fargo would have died then and there. But Fargo was in luck; the warrior wanted to take him alive. Instead of shooting, he commanded, “Not move, white dog.”

  But even as the warrior spoke, Fargo sidestepped and whirled. He moved so fast that although the warrior instantly fired, the slug tore through empty space instead of Fargo’s head.

  Fargo dropped the Henry but only so he could grab the barrel of the warrior’s rifle and wrench it from the surprised man’s grasp.

  The Knife sprang back and resorted to his blade.

  Reversing his grip, Fargo swung the rifle like a club. It was an old single-shot flintlock, heavy and long. The warrior ducked, or tried to; the stock clipped him across the temple. Stunned, he staggered back, gave his head a few hard shakes, and recovered.

  A vicious snarl twisted his features.

  “I’m not your enemy,” Fargo said, doubting it would do any good. He was right.

  The Knife hissed and attacked, coming in swift and low, his blade spearing at Fargo’s groin. Fargo swung at the man’s wrist to knock the knife from his hand, but the warrior sprang to one side and circled.

  Fargo did some swift thinking. The warrior must be with those below. Maybe he was their lookout. Or maybe they had horses hidden for a getaway and this one was watching the horses.

  Fargo did the unexpected. He threw the rifle at him. The man skipped aside and the rifle missed, as Fargo knew it would. But throwing it bought him the split second he needed to draw his Colt and thumb back the hammer. He almost fired. But then he remembered Teit saying that one of the young warriors was her brother, and how sad she would be if anything happened to him. The odds were slim that this was the one. But Fargo had learned the hard way that life had a habit of springing unwanted surprises. “Are you Teit’s brother?”

  The young warrior had turned to stone when the Colt materialized in Fargo’s hand. He glanced from the six-shooter to Fargo’s face and his dark eyes glittered hate. But he didn’t attack. “You k
now Teit?”

  “I met her and her grandfather, Chelahit. They’re coming back from visiting his brother.”

  Uncertainty replaced some of the hate. “I not her brother.” He began to back toward the trees.

  “I can’t let you leave,” Fargo said. “Your friends killed white men down in the canyon.”

  “We kill all whites!” the warrior boasted. “This land ours. We not want whites here. Leave!”

  Fargo extended his arm. “Not another step.”

  With supreme contempt, the warrior turned. “You want kill, shoot me in back.” And with that, he jogged into the woods.

  Against his better judgment Fargo let him go. He had a feeling he would regret it. Unhappy with himself, he let down the hammer and twirled the Colt into his holster.

  Fargo remembered the men down below and ran to the edge. There was no sign of anyone. The two mules were hurrying up the trail. There was no sign of the third or their human masters.

  “Damn it.”

  Fargo picked up the Henry, brushed dust from the receiver, and hiked a short way long the rim in both directions. It was as if the earth had opened up and swallowed the Nlaka’pamux.

  That was all he could do for now. Fargo forked leather and headed back.

  The others were just entering the last valley.

  McKern was riding point and greeted him with a wave and a smile. But the smile faded when Fargo drew rein. “Say there, hoss. You look as if you were stung by a scorpion.”

  “Any trouble while I was away?”

  “Not a lick, if you don’t count Theodore and Edith squabbling over something or other, and Allen saying as how all these evergreens are bad for his complexion.”

  “He said what?”

  “Those are his exact words. I heard him with my own ears.” McKern gazed at the thick forests that thronged the high slopes. “Beats the hell out of me what he’s talking about. Folks don’t go around rubbing trees on their faces.”

  Fargo gazed the length of the long line. “Keep them going. I want to reach the canyon by nightfall.”

  “We’re close, I take it.”

  “So is a Knife war party.” Fargo gigged the Ovaro and soon came to Theodore and Cosmo.

  Reining the Ovaro around so he could pace them, Fargo related what he had seen in the canyon.

  “Those stinking savages!” was Theodore’s reaction. “The world would be a better place if every Indian was wiped out.”

  “Some of them say the same about white men.”

  “Yes, and how ironic is that? The inferior wanting to wipe out the superior.”

  “You are one bigoted son of a bitch.”

  Theodore went rigid with resentment. “Here now. With what I’m paying you, I deserve a little respect.”

  “Damn little.”

  Cosmo said, “Don’t take it personal, Theodore. Mr. Fargo has lived with Indians, as I recall. He regards them differently than we do.”

  “You, too?” Fargo said.

  “I don’t hate them on general principle, if that’s what you’re asking. But they are savages. They live in dwellings made of animal hides and wear animal skins for clothes.”

  Fargo looked down at his buckskins.

  “Before the white man came along they spent all their time making war on one another. They are at best a nuisance and at worst a menace, and either way, yes, I agree with Theodore. We are better off without them. The common saying that the only good Indian is a dead Indian is exactly right.”

  “And you so cultured and all.”

  Cosmo showed a rare trace of irritation. “What are you implying? Can you speak three languages? Can you cook a soufflé ? Can you discourse on the theater and fashion and politics? I take great pride in being cultured, thank you very much.”

  “All that, and modest, too.”

  “Now you are merely being a bore. If you have nothing more enlightening to say, go be a bore elsewhere.”

  “Don’t mind if I do.” Fargo rode to where Edith was glumly regarding the world and brought the Ovaro next to her. “How are you holding up, Mrs. Havard?”

  “What do you care?”

  “I’m only being polite,” Fargo lied. It was about time he had his hunch about Theodore confirmed. “I tried talking to your husband and Cosmo but they didn’t want my company.”

  Edith’s glower deepened. “Look at them. Together, as always. My husband and that thing.”

  “Is that what you call your butler?”

  Edith glanced sharply at him and shook so violently, she appeared to on the verge of throwing a fit. “Butler, hell. Are you blind? He’s an abomination.”

  “I take it you don’t like Cosmo.”

  “I hate him. I rue the day he came into our lives. Him and his constant fawning over Theodore. He doesn’t fool me. He doesn’t fool me one bit.”

  “He doesn’t?” Fargo prompted when she didn’t go on.

  “Cosmo is after Theo’s money. He hopes to be in Theo’s will and receive a large inheritance. So he babies my Theo. And Theo, the idiot, treats Cosmo as if Cosmo walks on air!”

  “You don’t say.”

  “I saw right through Cosmo from the start. His oily smiles and little gestures. He disgusts me. Why, there are times when he acts more like a woman than I do. Can you imagine?”

  “It’s a strange world,” Fargo said.

  “Mine was an orderly world before he came along. My world was proper. Theodore and I weren’t always the most compatible of couples but we had a good marriage. Then this man came along and drove a wedge between us. I wish Cosmo were dead.”

  “I had no idea,” Fargo said with a straight face.

  “That’s because you’re not female. Women have a sense about these things. We’re not as easily duped.”

  “I’ll be sure to remember that.” Fargo touched his hat brim and moved down the line to the next pair.

  Angeline and Allen were talking but stopped when he brought the Ovaro around.

  “What do you want?” Allen immediately snapped.

  “To warn you there is a war party hereabouts.”

  Angeline held her chin higher. “Maybe you can ask your Indian friend if she will talk to them about leaving us be.”

  Allen snickered. “That’s a good one, sis.”

  “I have it figured out,” Fargo said.

  They looked at each other, and Angeline asked, “Have what figured out, pray tell?”

  “Why Kenneth left home.” With that parting shot, Fargo went on past the rest until he came to Teit and Chelahit. She smiled up at him.

  “I am glad you made it back.”

  “I almost didn’t.” Again Fargo told about the war party, only in more detail.

  Both became troubled. Chelahit bowed his head as if in great shame.

  “I am sorry for what they have done,” Teit said sincerely. “Unless they are stopped there will be another war.”

  “They’re your people. Why don’t the Nlaka’pamux stop them?”

  “A Knife never harms another Knife, and that is what it would take. Their hate is too strong. They will not stop killing until they are under the ground.”

  “That won’t be long if they keep it up.”

  Teit sighed. “It is too bad people cannot get along. Think of how wonderful life would be.”

  “I’m not one for fairy tales.”

  The last rider was, as usual, Rohan, leading the pack animals. He grinned as Fargo came up.

  “You and your hair are still together.”

  “I had to work at it.” For the last time Fargo explained about the war party. He left out the part about letting the one warrior live.

  “They don’t worry me none.” Rohan patted his shotgun. “So long as they let me be, I’ll let them be.” He ran a sleeve across his mouth. “I’m more interested in reaching Yale so I can wet my throat.”

  “I like my liquor, too,” Fargo admitted.

  “There are days when I like it too much. I wake up under a table, wonderin
g how in hell I got there. Or the time I came around in a stable loft, as naked as the day I was born.” Rohan laughed. “You should have seen the looks I got when I walked out of that stable with a handful of straw over my private parts.”

  “How are the packhorses holding up?”

  “Fine. Just fine. I take good care of them. Horses don’t lie and cheat and leave you for another man who isn’t half the man you are.”

  “You had a wife once?”

  “If you can call her that. She drank worse than I do and had a roving eye. The only reason I ever said ‘I do’ is that I was too drunk to know who I was ‘I doing.’ ”

  That evening they camped on the canyon rim. Fires were started and everyone settled down. There were enough of them that an attack seemed unlikely but Fargo added an extra sentry anyway. He was sipping coffee when McKern hastened out of the dark.

  “I thought you should know. They’re gone.”

  Fargo didn’t ask who.

  “They slipped away while we were setting up camp. I was busy or I’d have noticed sooner.”

  “I expected it,” Fargo said.

  “Here’s something you didn’t expect. Theodore Havard has given orders that from here on out, we’re to shoot any and all Knife Indians we see on sight. Allen spread the word.”

  “Like hell we will.”

  The patriarch and his cultured shadow were by the tents. Fargo dispensed with the niceties and waded right into them.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  Theodore was watching Cosmo polish his shoes. “I gather that you are referring to my edict about the Indians?”

  “Many of the Nlaka’pamux are friendly. Start shooting every one you see and you’ll kill some who never harmed a white. You’ll also bring the whole tribe down on our heads.”

  “Better safe than sorry,” Theodore said without looking up from his shoes.

  Fargo grabbed his arm. “Listen to me, damn you. The British won’t like it, either.”

  Cosmo said, “Let go of Theodore.”

  “They’ll throw you out of British Columbia and you’ll never find your son.”

  “Didn’t you hear me?” Cosmo stood. “I told you to let go of him.”

  “He’s hurting my arm,” Theodore said.