Edge: Apache Death

"I hate jails," the Englishman said, falling in alongside him as the heavily armed escort brought up the rear. "They're always full of bums."

"Then you ought to enjoy it," Edge answered.

The Englishman sighed deeply. "I keep telling you: just a little odd, that's all."

Edge spat. "Just the same, I'm having the top bunk."

CHAPTER NINE

THE Apaches attacked at dawn, riding into the town from the east with the harsh glare of the sun at their backs, dazzling the frantic eyes of Rainbow's defenders as they came awake to the sound of blood-curdling warcries. The eight-man army patrol met the first assault, caught outside the last house at the eastern end of the cross street by fifty braves led by Little Cochise, brother of the tribe's chief. The patrol was headed by a tough sergeant, a veteran of the Civil War who immediately ordered his men toward the cover of the house as the first hail of arrows thudded into the ground several yards short. Six of the men did as ordered but the seventh, a young man, brave as he was reckless, knelt down on one knee and began to loose off rifle fire at the galloping braves. Two fell from their ponies with mortal wounds and a third went sideways with a hole in his shoulder but managed to stay mounted as he wheeled away. Then Little Cochise released his decorated lance with enormous power and howled his triumph as the barbed head thudded into the soldier's stomach and emerged dripping blood at the back. As the remainder of the patrol dived head-long through the windows of the house, Little Cochise grasped the shaft of the lance and dragged the dead soldier behind him, circling the house with the braves howling at his heels. The second wave of Apaches streamed into the town, loosing arrows toward houses from which rifle and small arms fire was beginning to sound.

Inside the house, as Fred Olsen struggled into his pants and his elderly wife hid beneath the bedclothes, the sergeant ordered each of his men to a window on both floors and then went down with an arrow through his throat as he cracked open the back door. A fountain of blood sprayed into the eyes of a corporal at the window and the man was still trying to wipe it clear when an Indian rode in through the open doorway, daubed face a mask of hatred. The brave released his tomahawk in a spinning throw and the soldier screamed as the blade buried itself in his chest. The brave howled with triumph and leaped from his horse, drawing his knife to claim two scalps. But in the next moment his head was no more than a crimson pulp clinging to gleaming bone as the half-dressed Fred Olson fired both loads in a double-barreled shotgun, aiming from the top of the stairs.

Outside, the dead soldier came free of the killing lance and his best friend, firing from an upstairs window leaned out for a better shot at Little Cochise. His aim was wide and an arrow thudded into his back. He fell headfirst from the window and was struck by six more arrows before his dead body smashed to the ground.  The braves continued to circle the house, closing the gaps as injured and dead riders fell from their horses; gripping their ponies with their legs so that they had both hands free to prime and fire their bows. They rode outside their ponies, offering less of a target, sometimes leaning forward and down to fire from below the animals' necks. Then, at a howled command from Little Cochise, the braves wheeled in toward the house in a rushed attack from all directions. Four Apaches fell as they attempted to dismount, but the remainder got through, three swinging up on to the porch to enter the upper floors. Two soldiers positioned in the sitting room at the front killed three painted braves as they dived in through already shattered windows but were themselves killed by other braves, one taking a tomahawk in his skull, the other  having his throat cut by a slashing knife blade. At the rear of the house Fred Olsen obliterated the faces of two Apaches and, then swung the empty shotgun around his head, cracking the skulls of three more before six overpowered him and scalped him alive before plunging a knife into his mouth opened in a scream.

The house became suddenly quiet, a nerve-rending haven of false peace against the distant gunfire and howls as the main fight moved to the center of town. Upstairs in the main bedroom the woman whimpered beneath the bedclothes as one soldier guarded the window, another the door. They were all that remained of the patrol and they sensed, in the silence, their impending doom.

"Where the hell they gone?" the man at the window said, a tremor in his voice.

"Not home for breakfast, that's for sure," his companion answered, sweating freely from fear but not revealing the terror in his tone as he stood squarely in front of the closed door, aiming his rifle.