Nan Ryan (22 page)

The princess turned around and around. She wasn’t sure which way was south. She looked up at the sky, but the sun was no help. It was still almost straight overhead in the cloudless sky. She lowered her eyes, blinking.

She would just have to make a guess. Maybe the stallion would know the way and he’d guide her.

That prospect soon died.

Mounted on the mare, the princess yanked hard on the stallion’s reins, but Noche refused to budge. Well-trained and loyal, he was too smart to leave behind the only man who had ever been on his back.

Angry with the stubborn stallion and afraid he might wake the Ranger, Princess Marlena abruptly dropped his reins to the ground and whispered, “Well, then go to blazes, Noche. And take your dark master with you.”

The black bared his teeth and tossed his great head.

The princess ignored him. Taking a guess at which way was south, she gently, but firmly, pulled the mare’s reins to the left. The mare turned in that direction, just as Princess Marlena wanted, and walked away at a slow, comfortable gait. Behind them the black stallion reared his forelegs high into the air and whinnied loudly enough to wake the dead.

The princess hunched her slender shoulders, gritted her teeth, and made terrible faces, silently praying that the racket wouldn’t wake the Ranger.

It didn’t.

Virgil was so dead tired from the constant pain of his broken rib and the long sleepless night that he would have slept through a wild cattle stampede. He was sound asleep, and he stayed that way, as the nervous princess rode out of the stand of cottonwoods, crossed a long, shadeless plain, and finally dropped out of sight below the horizon.

23

Virgil slowly awakened
by degrees. His blue eyes opened slightly, then slipped closed again. He drew a deep, extended breath. He lay there on the ground, yawning and stretching, in no real hurry to get up. He rubbed his eyes, opened them again, and leisurely turned his head.

“Jesus God!” he roared and bolted upright. Swallowing hard, he shot to his feet and looked frantically around. “Red!” he shouted loudly, “Red, where are you? Come here this minute! Red, answer me!”

No reply.

Just the mourning sigh of the hot winds rustling the leaves of the cottonwoods.

“Damn her to hell!” he muttered and hurriedly gathered up the gear.

Virgil slammed his hat on his head and tried not to think about what might happen to her. On legs weak with fear he hurried to the horses. And saw only Noche. Angry with himself, needing to take it out on someone or something, he grabbed the black’s reins, jerked his great head down, and shouted into his ear, “Why the hell didn’t you wake me?” The stallion neighed plaintively as if to say he had tried. “All right, all right, I’m sorry,” Virgil apologized, as he swung up into the saddle. Noche immediately went into motion.

His whiskered jaw ridged with anger and fear, his eyes trained like a deadly weapon on the broad valley stretching before him, Virgil cursed the foolish woman responsible for his distress. How many times had he warned her that this was wild country where hostile Apache and Mexican
banditos
and ruthless renegades roamed at will. Hell, she should have known without having to be told. Everybody else in New Mexico knew.

He shuddered at the sudden recollection of having told her that the Apache might not bother her since they were afraid of lunatics. She might just be stupid enough to suppose they wouldn’t harm her. God Almighty, why the hell hadn’t he kept his mouth shut.

Quickly leaving behind the stand of cottonwoods, Virgil, leaning down from the saddle now, anxiously searching for tracks, spotted the mare’s hoofprints. She was headed southwest. If he couldn’t overtake her, his only hope was that she would safely reach Alamogordo.

Virgil carried no watch. He looked up at the sun and ground his teeth viciously. It must have been after three o’clock. She had at least a two-hour jump on him. He laid the spurs to Noche’s flanks, and the stallion shot away. Squinting against the hot sun, Virgil glanced at the ground every few seconds to make sure he was still on her trail.

It was a searing hot afternoon in the barren Tularosa Basin. So hot that the air shimmered, rising from the hard-packed soil in undulating waves. Sweat trickled down Virgil’s back and between his shoulder blades. It was uncommonly dry in the valley that summer. It hadn’t rained in weeks and might not rain for weeks or months. There was hardly a hint of shade as far as the eye could see. The only vegetation was a few scattered mesquites and the hearty cholla cactus and the prickly pears.

Virgil clenched his jaw tight. She had taken no water with her. Out there it didn’t take long to die of thirst. She’d be badly sunburned by the time she reached Alamogordo. If she reached Alamogordo. She had no hat, and as fair-skinned as she was, a few short minutes under this scalding sun would blister her unmercifully.

That worry was immediately forgotten when, yanking up abruptly on the reins, Virgil lunged down out of the saddle. His lips a thin, tight line in his darkly whiskered face, he crouched on his heels, stared unblinking, and saw that the gray mare’s hoof-prints had changed direction. Had turned due west.

Worse, other tracks joined hers. At least a dozen horses. And, none but the mare was shod.

Apaches!

His chest tightened, and Virgil felt as if he couldn’t get a breath. He was back in the saddle in the blink of an eye and riding west. As good a tracker as any Indian, Virgil rode hell-bent for leather, praying he would not be too late.

Horrible images filled his mind’s eye, and he couldn’t make them go away. Too vividly he could see the pretty, pale-skinned redhead lying naked under some greased, grunting brave while the others watched and laughed and impatiently waited their turn.

Virgil felt as if he were going to be ill. The light lunch he’d had two hours ago was threatening to come up. He was, for the first time in his life, literally sick with fear. The thought of something terrible happening to her was unbearable.

Like a madman Virgil spurred the big stallion across the valley under the hot blazing sun and the near constant winds. His eyes stinging, his heart hammering, he rode at breakneck pace that caused the thundering stallion to wheeze and his big sweaty body to lather with thick white foam.

The tracks passed a couple of hundred yards below the little village of La Luz. Virgil never slowed the pace. No use wasting time asking for help. Every minute counted.

After nearly an hour of racing westward, Virgil finally drew rein. The big-eyed stallion gratefully slackened the pace and soon stopped. Virgil dismounted, carefully studied the tracks he had followed for miles. From where he now stood, the tracks led directly up and onto a high, flat mesa not fifty yards ahead. A secret Apache stronghold, he assumed, one of many scattered across this sparsely populated desert.

Virgil slowly rose to his feet, turned his head to the side, and listened intently. He could hear the low hum of voices. Male voices. He felt the blood congeal in his veins, and he was chilled to the bone despite the heat of the sun beating down on him. Knowing he would have no hope of saving her if he walked into the stronghold armed, Virgil unbuckled his gun belt and looped it around the saddle horn. He took off his hat, hung it atop the gun belt, and ran both hands through his sweat-damp hair.

He gently touched the stallion’s shiny jaw and whispered softly, “Stay right here and rest up, old friend. I’ll be back.”

Virgil turned and walked away. The stallion stood dutifully still, not making a sound. Scaling the rocky-sided mesa as easily and as quietly as any Apache, Virgil neared the top in minutes. Terrified of what he would find, he reached the flat summit, climbed out onto an overhang of rock and, not daring to breathe, cautiously poked his head over and peered down.

His eyes widened and his mouth fell open.

More than a dozen Apaches were seated submissively in a circle around a slender, ginger-haired woman in too-large Levi’s who paced at its center. Stunned, relieved, Virgil shook his head and smiled foolishly. Air filled his starving lungs.

She was unbelievable.

Strutting around, speaking with that fraudulent foreign accent, pulling her queenly Miss High-and-Mighty act on the Indians. And they were obviously enraptured. Clearly in her thrall, they stayed obediently silent while she lectured them as if they were misbehaving children. It was nothing short of a miracle.

Virgil saw her glance up briefly as a billowing white thunderhead materialized from out of nowhere and sailed high above the cinnamon-hued bluffs of the dry wash.

Virgil’s gaze clung to her as she stepped directly in front of the biggest, ugliest Apache of them all. Virgil recognized the powerful giant. Chief Thunderfoot. One of the meanest hostiles alive. A crazed creature whose unspeakable torture of white captive women was legendary.

Virgil’s heart thumped painfully against his injured ribs, and he almost choked when the princess, looking into the flat, black eyes of the gargantuan young chief, said in a clear, level voice, “So it is rain you want?” Thunderfoot, staring at her, nodded, entranced. The princess threw back her head, gazed up, snapped her slender fingers, and regally demanded rain.

Sprinkles soon peppered the upturned faces of the bewildered Indians. They began to smile and murmur about this fire-haired woman who could make rain.

The princess spoke forcefully, in distinctive tones, as if they were her servants, “Don’t pretend you do not understand me! You are to escort me to the nearest city. Do you hear me?” She shook her finger in Tunderfoot’s broad upturned face. “Alamogordo. You must take me to Alamogordo. Do you know where it is?”

Afraid any second the enchanted Apache would have a quick change of heart, grab her up, and brutalize her, Virgil Black slowly rose to his feet. He called out to make his presence known.

All heads turned.

All eyes immediately fell on him. He descended down through the gently falling rain into the nature-concealed camp with his hands raised over his head. The Apache, chattering and pointing, were all now on their feet.

Ignoring the woman, except to shoot her a quick “keep quiet” look, Virgil went directly to the towering six-foot-six Chief Thunderfoot. Speaking in soft, low Spanish, he explained to the massive Apache chief that “as you have just witnessed, the fire-haired woman has strong powers.” He blinked as the raindrops peppered his face. “You do understand that it was she who brought you this rain.”

Chief Thunderfoot looked from Virgil to the princess. He smiled and shook his big head, causing his loose black hair to dance on his bare broad shoulders. He rubbed the cooling rain over his naked torso, and in Spanish he told Virgil that he wanted this pale woman for his own. And he told Virgil exactly what he wanted to do with her.

Sickened, Virgil kept his face totally devoid of expression. Still speaking in soft, low Spanish, he said, “This is not possible. The woman belongs to me, and even if she did not, she cannot be used that way.”

“You use her?” asked the chief.

Virgil reddened beneath his tan. “No. Never.”

“Then you a fool,” said Thunderfoot.

Dashing the rain from his matted eyelashes, Virgil reached out, took Princess Marlena’s arm, and slowly drew her to him. Continuing to look up into the chief’s broad face, he said, “Surely you can see that this woman is not like other women. She is a spiritual being who does not engage in physical pleasure. She has been kind enough to work her magic for you. Now she must go to other bone-dry areas and make it rain.”

For a long tense moment the big Apache stood there totally silent, deep in thought.

Chief Thunderfoot truly believed that the pale red-haired one had brought the rain. He believed as well that since she was some kind of spirit woman, it would be wrong and dangerous to touch her.

He smiled suddenly, his wide lips slashing across his coppery face. Wishing he could have the pretty white woman but happy to have the much-needed rain, the big Apache allowed the two of them to leave unharmed.

Chief Thunderfoot even gave the princess a present. A necklace made of beads and human hair. At Virgil’s gentle urging, she leaned over so the towering chief could place the necklace around her neck. Virgil thanked him and told the chief that their present to him was the gray mare and saddle. Frowning, the princess opened her mouth to contradict him; he tightened his hold on her, and she remained silent. Pleased with the gift, Chief Thunderfoot shook hands with Virgil, then reached for hers. He took her small hand in both of his own and held it, his glittering black eyes running admiringly over her face and body.

Virgil could tell by the expression in his black eyes what he was thinking. Then, warning her softly under his breath not to rush, not to run, Virgil led the princess back up the rocky embankment as the cooling summer rain continued to fall, soaking them, plastering their clothes to their bodies, their hair to their heads.

When they reached the rock summit overhang, they turned and waved in salute to the silent, staring Apaches.