Comanche (13 page)

Finding the first of the dogs, Ysabel studied its body and noticed that it showed the same type of contortion as Jose at the moment of death. So did all the others, pointing to an obvious conclusion that all died as a result of the same poison.

Although unsure of what he sought, Ysabel gave the site of the village a long search. He found nothing to help him solve the mystery, for the starving dogs devoured every shred of the
awyaw: t
Jose tossed into his tepee. At last, puzzled as much as ever, he mounted the grulla and followed the tracks of the travelling band.

Fire Dancer had watched Ysabel talking with Raccoon Talker, then speak to War Club and ride back towards the village. Anxiety welled in the Mexican woman and she wondered if she had made some mistake which might lead to her discovery as the one behind Jose and Raider’s death. Having received training in their line, Fire Dancer knew something of the powers of a Comanche medicine woman. Once her interest or suspicions were aroused, Raccoon Talker possessed sufficient knowledge to be able to ask inconvenient questions. Fire Dancer knew that she carried enough evidence in her packs to prove her guilt and justice would some swiftly should the incriminating item be found. Rather than take a chance, she decided to dispose of the evidence as soon as possible.

The chance to do so did not come while on the march. However, the deaths at the old site did not call for a lengthy journey and, after following the banks of the stream on which they camped for about two miles up-river, Long Walker gave the order to halt and settle down.

Without wasting time, the women started to work on re-erecting their homes. Setting up a tepee called for the combined efforts of at least three women, so those like Fire Dancer, who had no family, had to wait until help came. After assisting with the erection of their homes, a trio of
naivis
came to lend the visitor a hand to raise her tepee. With the girls’ help Fire Dancer soon had everything set up and her property installed. After thanking the girls for their help, she watched them head for their homes. Then she turned to make a start at destroying the evidence to connect her with the events of the previous night.

Taking up the medicine bag, she carried it from the tepee and walked slowly through the village. Everybody had enough work on their hands, so that little or no notice was taken of the woman. Even the few who saw Fire Dancer passing paid no attention to her and, if they gave the matter any thought at all, decided that she must be going to make medicine away from the village’s noise and confusion.

Unfortunately she caught the eye of the one man she ought to have avoided. Returning from his search of the old village site, Ysabel saw Fire Dancer leaving at the other side of the new location. Normally he would have thought nothing of it, but his findings at the old site gave him a lively interest in the woman’s actions.

Leaving his grulla stallion in the care of Long Walker’s
pairaivo
, he started to follow the woman on foot. While passing through the bushes which bordered the stream, Fire Dancer kept a watch on her back trail. She saw nothing of Ysabel, for he could keep out of sight when he wished; as proved during Loncey’s sheep hunt. After walking for almost half a mile Fire Dancer found what she wanted. At that point the stream rushed through a narrow, deep gorge, its white-foamed water tearing over and around jagged rocks. Halting, she looked around and when sure that nobody observed her, opened the medicine bag. Taking out an
awyaw: t
of pemmican, she tossed it into the centre of the raging current. With an expression of relief, she closed the bag and retraced her steps to the village. Although she did not know it, she passed within a few feet of the well-hidden, thoughtful Ysabel.

Rising silently from his place of concealment, Ysabel rubbed a hand across his jaw. While a woman almost invariably carried at least one
awyaw: t
of pemmican among her property, its storage place was never in the sacred confines of a medicine bag. The fact made the disposal of the
awyaw: t
suspicious, not seeing her throw it into the river. Any woman who found pemmican to be inedible would get rid of it in such a manner if possible, so as to prevent the tainted food falling into the hands of the village’s children.

Despite his lack of formal education, Ysabel could think and form conclusions from what he saw. The destruction of the
awyaw: t
, combined with the place in which Fire Dancer carried it and the incidents of the previous night, gave him an insight as to why two men died. Everything began to fall into place; Fire Dancer clearly sought revenge and used Jose as an innocent dupe to deliver poisoned pemmican to her proposed victim. Only she failed to take into account the young brave’s healthy appetite and taste for pemmican. From that Ysabel could see the rest of the affair. Failing with the poisoned pemmican, Fire Dancer played on Raider’s grief and sent him to wait in the tepee. Only it had been Loncey who entered, not Ysabel.

Although he knew about the attempts on his life, Ysabel realised that he could prove nothing. If he had known what the medicine bag held, he might have been able to prevent the destruction of the poison-loaded pemmican. After that, it would be for the elders of the tribe to give justice. Now it was only his theories against her word and he knew that the elders would tend to listen more to a medicine woman then a brave.

Ysabel shrugged his broad shoulders and walked back towards the village. Coming from the feuding Kentucky hill country, he could understand Fire Dancer’s motives. Against a man the remedy would be simple, but not when dealing with a woman. He decided that he would keep a very careful eye on Fire Dancer in future and also that in future it might be best if he took Loncey along whenever he was to be away from the village for any length of time.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

LIFE took on a new and fascinating aspect for Loncey after the killing of Raider. No condemnation came his way and all his young companions looked upon him with open admiration. Loncey had achieved the ultimate aim of every well-raised Comanche boy, to kill an enemy in a fair fight. During the few days between the killing and leaving the village on his first smuggling trip, Loncey began to hear himself called by a different name.

Although a Comanche might be given one name at birth, he did not always keep it throughout his life. A brave deed, a special talent, even a mishap or piece of foolishness, could give him a new name. When becoming
tuivitsi
most young
Nemenuh
sought for a change of name, regarding it as a sign of manhood.

Having noticed the affinity Loncey showed for handling the knife, it took only his use of that weapon to kill an enemy for people to know what his man-name should be. At first only his companions spoke the man-name openly, older heads being content to wait and see if he lived up to the title. To the boys of his particular band, Loncey became
Cuchilo
; which was Spanish for knife.

For the first time upon the trip, Loncey saw how the white men lived and wondered how they managed to change village sites when dwelling in such huge wooden tepees. At first he felt shy, nervous almost, but his adaptable nature soon drove such alien feelings from him. At that time in Texas, the term ‘squaw man’ had not come to be derogatory. Nobody held Ysabel’s marriage against him, nor Loncey’s Indian blood. Such boys as he met in the small Texas towns soon came to admire him, especially when he demonstrated his Indian-trained skills.

Not that Loncey spent much time in the small towns. After selling a consignment of hides and skins, Ysabel pushed on to Jack County. Four Mexican prisoners helped him in his trading. Captured as boys, they no longer wished to return to the life of a peon below the border and gave willing assistance. In Jack County the party picked up supplies, including the home-brewed whiskey for which the area became famous, and other goods much sought after in Mexico.

Then began the boy’s long, rewarding association with the Mexican people. He already spoke some Spanish, most Comanches did, and soon became fluent in accent or dialect as needed. During the three months the boy spent in Mexico, he made many friends and became an especial favourite of Don Francisco Almonte. While visiting the Don’s hacienda, Loncey was encouraged to make the place his home. From Almonte he received added instruction in the art of using a knife and learned all Casa Almonte’s secrets. Loncey had cause to be thankful for the Don’s instruction in the finer points of knife-fighting and would one day repay his debt to the Mexican.*

Returning to the
Pehnane
country, Loncey slipped once more into the flow of village life. In a way he felt cheated, for the entire trip had been profitable and uneventful, producing no adventure nor chance to distinguish himself.

Watched over by Ysabel and Long Walker, to whom the white man confided his suspicions, Fire Dancer failed to make any further attempts at revenge. When the war lodges gathered for the pre-winter buffalo-hunting season, she transferred her tepee to the Owl lodge and started to act as medicine woman. On the few occasions that they met, Loncey and No Father formed a mutual dislike. However, at that time No Father was under a disadvantage, for he could not show a single exploit to come close to the deeds by which Loncey won his fame.

For almost three more years Loncey ranged the Rio Grande with his father, or travelled among the
Pehnane
. During that time he came to know the big river intimately, learning its secret fords and dangerous areas. Among the other white men involved in the smuggling, Loncey started by being called Sam Ysabel’s kid and in time that became shortened to the name by which he would gain considerable fame, the Ysabel Kid. The Mexicans of the border learned to know him and named him
Cabrito
, Spanish for a young goat, but spoke the word with respect as they saw his way when crossed. When first addressed as
Cabrito
, Loncey took exception to the name. Fortunately for the man who said it, the boy was prevented from making his objections too strenuously; for Loncey fought like a Comanche, to the death.

They were hard, dangerous years ideally suited to moulding Loncey into the deadly efficient fighting man he became. Everything he had learned among the
Pehnane
came in useful. Not every trip went smoothly. Sometimes there would be long chases to avoid capture by revenue-enforcing soldiers, or outlaws wanting to snatch the smuggled goods by force. Three times in brushes with the latter, Loncey had to kill a man, but using his rifle, not the knife. In the end Mexican bandidos and white outlaws learned it did not pay to attempt robbery against the Ysabel outfit. Ambushes failed, due to the Comanche-trained alertness of the boy called the Ysabel Kid; and any outfit which came within long rifle range soon wished it had not, for Loncey fulfilled his earlier promise as a marksman.

In the early afternoon about a week after what would have been his fourteenth birthday, Loncey rode at his father’s side through wooded country not far from the Rio Grande. Following their usual procedure, they travelled about a hundred yards ahead of their Mexican helpers and well-laden pack horses. Seeing a couple of riders approaching, Ysabel made a signal which caused the Mexicans to swing off the trail beyond the approaching duo’s range of vision and take cover.

‘Lawmen!’ Loncey grunted, fingers coiled around his Mississippi rifle ready to use it. ‘Do we fight?’

‘Not agin that pair, boy,’ Ysabel answered. ‘It’s Hondo Fog and Branston Blaze from over Rio Hondo way.’

While Loncey knew the names, he had not yet met the two men in question. One area all smugglers steered well clear of was Rio Hondo County. Owned and controlled by three fighting Texas families, with clear title granted to them for services rendered to the State, Rio Hondo County could claim the most efficient law-enforcement west of the Mississippi. Brave, skilled with their weapons, incorruptible, Sheriff Hondo Fog and his deputy, Branston Blaze, kept the peace. Nobody with a smidgin of good Texas sense tangled with them.

‘Howdy Hondo, Branston,’ greeted Ysabel, having continued riding towards the two men. ‘You’re a fair piece from home.’

‘Could say the same about you, Sam,’ replied the sheriff. ‘This your boy?’

‘Yep. Say howdy to the sheriff, boy.’

Loncey gave a grunt which could have meant anything. Then he found himself forming a liking for the big, powerful looking, blond sheriff. Dressed in a wide-brimmed black hat; buckskin jacket, pants tucked into riding boots, with a Dragoon Colt holstered at his right side and a Colt revolving rifle across his saddle, Hondo Fog struck Loncey as being very much a man. Branston Blaze too, tall, red haired, dressed and armed in the same manner as the sheriff, seemed more pleasant and amiable than most peace officers the boy had met.

‘What brings you out this way, Hondo?’ Ysabel inquired after the boy gave a greeting.

‘Montego,’ the sheriff answered.

‘Figured somebody’d get around to looking for him one of these days,’ grunted Ysabel, knowing the name to be that of a notorious
Comanchero
and
bandido
. ‘What’s he done this time?’

‘Called on the Hobills.’

Something in Hondo Fog’s quiet tones brought Ysabel’s eyes to the sheriff’s face. ‘Bad?’ asked Ysabel.

‘Killed Ma, Pa, and the three boys.’

‘How about lil Mary-Sue?’

‘They killed her,’ Blaze put in, not hiding his emotion as well as the sheriff. ‘After—’

‘He’s a bad
hombre
,’ said Ysabel quietly. ‘Always has been. And you pair aim to go in there to tangle with him and all his bunch?’

‘There’s a company of U.S. Mounted Rifles following us,’ Hondo explained. ‘The Yankees’ve decided to shake the bull-droppings from their socks and call time on skunks like Montego.’

‘Reckon you can find him for ‘em, Hondo?’

‘I
thought
we could. They split up into small bunches after hitting at the Hobill place. Bran and I took after one bunch, lost their trail back that way a piece and hoped to find it again down here.’

‘They’ve not come this way, that’s for sure,’ Ysabel stated. ‘Can them Yankee soldier boys find
you
?’

‘Ole Devil sent Kiowa along with us,’ Hondo answered.

Knowing the man named was half Indian, Ysabel admitted he might be able to lead the soldiers to the sheriff. ‘Go find that trail for the sheriff, boy,’ he said.

Loncey had sat silent, but his mind turned over everything he heard. While he did not care for the idea of helping the law, he felt that for once he might stretch a point. Without having it explained, Loncey could guess what had happened to the Hobill family. He knew them, having visited their small ranch on more than one occasion and always been made welcome. So, realising what the cryptic words about the Hobills’ fate meant, he paused only a moment before moving to obey his father’s command.

‘Where’d you lose their tracks?’ he asked before moving.

‘We’ll take you there,’ Hondo answered.

‘My girth’s come loose,’ Ysabel remarked casually. ‘Ride on, I’ll fix it.’

‘Sure,’ agreed the sheriff. ‘Tell your boys to swing west and stay clear of the trails, there’re more than one patrol out.’

‘Never could stand a smart-aleck lawman,’ grinned Ysabel and rode directly to his concealed men without troubling to make a pretence at tightening a perfectly satisfactory girth.

On being taken to the point at which the sheriff realised the trail had been lost, Loncey started to circle around. Working in an ever increasing circumference, he at last picked up the sign of passing horses. No mean hand at reading sign himself, Hondo Fog decided that he rated low on the scale when compared with that tall, slim, baby-faced boy. Admiration showed on the sheriff’s face as he watched the Kid track for the first time. Little did either of them know that in the future Hondo would be able to call upon the Kid’s services regularly.

For three miles the boy followed sign which only his father could read most of the time. It said much for Hondo Fog’s trust in Ysabel that he accepted the boy’s lead even when unable to see any reason for going in that particular direction. However, after the second mile Hondo received proof of the boy’s accuracy when the track grew more plain due to another segment of the gang joining the one they followed. Two more groups joined in soon after and the sign showed more plainly.

Drawing his horse to a halt, Loncey looked around him with some interest. ‘Obregon’s place is just over the rim there, ‘
ap
.’

‘You’re right, boy,’ Ysabel answered. ‘They’ll likely be inside.’ While Hondo Fog had heard of Obregon’s cantina, he could not have said for sure whether it lay near or far from their current position. However he accepted the boy’s word and followed as Loncey dropped from the horse and advanced on foot up the slope ahead of them. For a white man, and peace officer to boot, Hondo showed considerable knowledge of certain basic matters Loncey believed only a Comanche appreciated. Coming up on foot, the sheriff moved silently and kept well below the head of the rim as he and the boy peeped over. From what met Honda’s eyes, he judged that the boy led him well. Out in the floor of the valley lay Obregon’s cantina, a pair of really fine horses stood tied to its hitching rail. In the adobe-walled corral, some twenty good mounts moved restlessly.

‘The whole bunch’s there,’ Hondo breathed, watching a tall, well-dressed and heavily-armed Mexican walk from the cantina to the horses at the hitching rail.

‘That’s Montego,’ Loncey informed the sheriff.

‘It figures, boy. Let’s go talk to your pappy.’

Hondo did not need discussion to see the difficulty in capturing Montego’s band. Taking the cantina would create no serious problem. A notorious hide-out for the worst kind of border thieves, it could be reduced from the rim by the lightweight 12-pounder howitzer carried sectionally on mule-back with the soldiers. That would be the only way in which the cantina could be taken without considerable risk and loss of life, for it was built in the centre of the valley and insufficient cover prevented any chance of a large body of men moving in close. Even using the howitzer would not be of much more use. At the first shot, Montego’s bunch would be running for their horses. The Rio Grande glinted about a half mile away, offering a safe refuge to the Mexican nationals once they crossed it.

‘They’ve sure picked a swell place,’ Hondo concluded, after explaining the situation to the other two men.

‘We couldn’t catch up to them before they’d be mounted and over the border,’ Branston Blaze complained bitterly.

‘Which same’s why Obregon’s place is so popular,’ Ysabel drawled. ‘He’s got a lousy cook.’

‘There has to be a way—’ Honda growled.

‘You could nail them afore they hit the river was they afoot,’ said Ysabel.

‘Only they won’t be,’ the sheriff pointed out. ‘That corral’s gate faces the cantina. Even if we put down the guard they’ll have on it and let the horses out, Montego’s bunch would start running for the border.’

‘If they knew the hosses had gone, they would,’ Ysabel agreed, looking to where Loncey now stood listening. ‘How’d you like to try your hand at raiding, boy?’

‘Would I just, ‘
ap
!’ enthused the boy.

The old Comanche pursuit of raiding meant appropriating horses, any other loot gathered being merely a secondary consideration. Every properly constituted
Pehnane
boy lived for the day when he could make his first essay into the noble art. Having studied the corral, Loncey could foresee no great difficulty. In fact he regarded the adobe walls as a positive asset rather than a danger.

‘How soon do you reckon those blue-bellies’ll be here, Hondo?’ Ysabel asked.

‘Could likely bring them in by dawn, if Branston goes and guides them here,’ the sheriff replied. ‘Kiowa can’t track in the dark.’

When they get here, can you hold them back until everything’s set; happen they come afore we’re through with the hosses?’