Apache Ambush

‘‘Tell me. Did Cranmeyer hire you to protect him and his wagons, or for another reason?’’

‘‘I am not a protector,’’ Stack said.

There Fargo had it. Timothy P. Cranmeyer was not the victim of circumstance he pretended to be. Grind and Cranmeyer had both hired killers—only Grind hired more.

As if Stack could read his thoughts, he said, ‘‘Don’t think poorly of Cranmeyer. He is in over his head.’’

Fargo began rolling up one of his blankets lengthwise. He placed it so one end was on his saddle, then draped another blanket over it. For extra effect he placed his saddlebags about where a man’s head would be and placed his hat on his saddlebags.

Stack watched with interest. ‘‘Are you expecting Fraco to pay us a visit in the middle of the night?’’

‘‘We can’t put anything past him,’’ Fargo said. The breed was deadly and devious, and would kill them any way he could. Satisfied with the ruse, he took the Henry and retreated into the dark a stone’s throw from the fire.

Stack arranged his blankets similarly and moved off in the opposite direction.

Finding a boulder to sit against, Fargo placed his rifle across his legs. Now all he could do was wait. He stayed awake as long as he could. Eventually his eyelids grew leaden, his chin dipped and he drifted off. He did not sleep well.

In the stillness before dawn, a nicker from the Ovaro snapped Fargo’s head up. He scanned the vicinity and cocked his head to the wind but saw and heard nothing. The stallion had its ears pricked toward the slope above them, but after a while it lowered its head and dozed.

Fargo did the same.

The next sound that awakened him was the screech of a jay. To the east the sky had paled, a harbinger of the new day. Fargo stretched and yawned, his stiff muscles protesting. Rising, he surveyed the mountainside. All was peaceful.

Fargo leaned against the boulder until half the stars were erased by the glare of the golden crown on the rim of the world. Kicking his legs to get the kinks out, he crossed to the fire. It took only a minute to rekindle the embers and fan them to flame with puffs of breath. Enough coffee was in the pot that he did not need to make more.

Stack came out of the scrub. ‘‘That was about as comfortable as sleeping on a cactus.’’

‘‘As soon as the sun is up, we will bury the husband and rejoin Cranmeyer,’’ Fargo proposed.

‘‘Coyotes and buzzards have to eat, too,’’ Stack said.

‘‘I will do it myself if need be.’’ Fargo went to reach for his tin cup and happened to set eyes on his blankets and saddle. For a few moments he was riveted in consternation, unable to understand why the blanket he had rolled up and covered was now on the other side of the saddle. ‘‘What the hell?’’

‘‘Aren’t those your saddlebags?’’ Stack asked, pointing.

Fargo looked, and suddenly his bewilderment took on darker hues of suspicion and dread. His saddlebags were a dozen feet away. Then it hit him. If the rolled-up blanket was not under the other blanket, why was there a bulge as if a body were underneath?

Stack was apparently wondering the same thing. ‘‘It can’t be,’’ he said. ‘‘No one could have snuck in and out that quiet.’’

Gripping the edge of the spread blanket, Fargo steeled himself. He had a pretty fair notion of what he would find. Or, rather, whom. He pulled the blanket off and could not resist a gasp.

Stack swore.

Harriet was on her back. She was stark naked. In life she had been pretty but there was nothing pretty about the way she looked now.

Stack said a strange thing. ‘‘I can never get used to this. No matter how many times I see it, I just can’t.’’

Harriet’s eyes had been gouged out. Her ears had been cut off. Where her nose had been was a jagged cavity. She no longer had breasts. And that was not all. She had been cut, a wound so deep, only a bowie or some other large knife could have made it. The cut started at her pubic region and went clear up and under her ribs.

‘‘Why would he do that?’’ Stack asked, more to himself than to Fargo.

Fargo shook his head.

The cut was gruesome enough, but what Fraco had done after he cut her was worse. The breed had pulled out her internal organs. Her intestines, her stomach, everything, were gone.

Fargo’s own stomach churned but he held the contents down.

‘‘I bet she was alive when he started in on her,’’ Stack said. ‘‘They say he loves to torture more than anything.’’

Fargo could imagine the torment and terror the woman had gone through. Right up to the very end she must have suffered abominably. He spread the blanket back over her and carefully wrapped her in it.

‘‘I don’t savvy,’’ Stack said.

Fargo was trying to shake the image from his mind but it was too fresh, too vivid. ‘‘Don’t savvy what?’’

‘‘The breed. He snuck in here right under our noses and placed her under your blanket when he could just as easily have finished us off.’’ Stack scratched his chin. ‘‘Why did he let us live?’’