Trail of the Hanged Man Page 4

  Yet.

  Picking him up, Lawless quickly carried him into the house. A vase of wild sunflowers sat on a plank table. Lawless swept it off and gently set the boy down. He unbuttoned Joey’s shirt and examined the wound. The bullet had entered his chest at an angle, just missing the heart. Turning Joey on to his right side, Lawless saw an exit hole under his left arm and felt relieved that he didn’t have to probe around for the bullet.

  Violet entered with an angry rush.

  ‘He’s alive,’ Lawless said, ‘barely.’

  Her rage faded. ‘Oh God, dear God,’ she sobbed.

  ‘Pull yourself together, girl. Your brother’s going to need you.’

  When she continued to sob, Lawless grasped her by the shoulders and shook her, hard. She snapped out of it and stood there, fighting shock.

  ‘I’ll r-ride into town,’ she blurted, ‘and fetch Dr Harlan.’

  ‘By then Joey will have bled to death.’

  ‘No! He can’t! He mustn’t!’

  Lawless’s grim silence seemed to stiffen her resolve.

  ‘Mister, my brother’s all I got and I’m not going to let him die.’

  Lawless looked around and saw a wood-burning stove in the corner. Moving to it, he opened the furnace door and saw the embers were still glowing. ‘Reckon I could cauterize his wound,’ he said.

  ‘You mean burn him?’

  ‘He won’t feel it.’

  Violet hesitated.

  ‘It’s our best chance to stop the bleeding.’

  ‘Do it,’ she said.

  ‘I can’t promise it’ll work.’

  Violet thrust her tear-streaked face into his. ‘You shot him, damn you. Now save him!’

  They piled wood into the stove and made a roaring fire. Lawless then stuck the blade of his hunting knife into the flames and when it was white hot, he pressed the steel against the entry wound in Joey’s chest. The stench of burning flesh as the wound sealed made Violet gag. But she hung in there, waiting while Lawless reheated the blade in the fire and then returned beside her. She then gently rolled her brother’s limp, shirtless body on to his side and gritted her teeth as this time Lawless laid the white-hot steel over the still-bleeding exit hole.

  Again the flesh sizzled. But this time the bleeding didn’t stop.

  ‘Hold him still,’ Lawless told her.

  While Violet held her brother on his right side, Lawless took a .45 cartridge from his gunbelt, gripped the lead between his teeth and pulled it from its brass case. He did the same with a second bullet. Then he poured the gunpowder from each case over Joey’s exit wound, went to the stove and lit a long kitchen match.

  ‘Don’t watch,’ he warned Violet. Without waiting to see if she turned away, he lit the gunpowder. It flared briefly and smoke curled up.

  Violet retched, clamped her hands over her mouth and ran outside.

  Lawless heard her vomiting. He took a swig from the whiskey bottle he’d found in the cupboard beside the iodine and bandages, and examined the wound. The blackened flesh had sealed, stopping the bleeding. He knew it might only be temporary but it was a good start. Uncorking the bottle of iodine he poured some over the wound before wrapping a bandage around Joey’s chest and tying it behind his back.

  When he was finished, he knew he’d at least given the boy a chance. Now it was up to a higher court whether he lived or not. Gently picking Joey up, Lawless carried him into the bedroom and placed him on the bed.

  As he was covering the boy with a blanket, Violet joined him. She began to apologize for running out on him but he cut her off. ‘Go heat up a big pot of coffee, strong as you can make it. We’re going to need it before the day’s over.’

  They took turns sitting beside the bed, keeping alert with mug after mug of coffee, watching, waiting to see if Joey regained consciousness. He didn’t. Day turned into night. Night turned into a chilling, misty gray dawn … and still the youngster lay as if dead.

  ‘Is he going to die, you think?’ Violet said.

  ‘That’s not for us to know,’ Lawless said.

  ‘He’s in God’s hands, that what you’re saying?’

  His silence answered her question.

  She looked at her brother, carroty hair all tangled, eyes closed, face pale beneath his freckles, lying still as a corpse – and made a decision.

  ‘Help me hitch up the team.’

  ‘Bad idea,’ Lawless said. ‘Even if the ride into town doesn’t kill him, which it most likely will, there’s nothing more the doc can do—’

  ‘We’re not going into town,’ Violet said. ‘I’m taking Joey to my neighbors, the Bjorkmans. They’re only a few miles south of here.’

  ‘What can they do that we already haven’t?’

  ‘Take us to the Mescalero reservation. Ingrid’s husband, Sven, knows the shaman, Almighty Sky—’

  ‘Whoa,’ Lawless said. ‘Back up the wagon. You’re pinning your hopes on an Injun medicine man? Goddammit, girl, you gone loco?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Violet said. ‘Maybe. But according to the Bjorkmans – and other folks, too – there’s a young girl on the reservation, a healer who supposedly has strange powers. There’s some even claim she can bring back the dead. I don’t know if it’s true or not – it probably isn’t – but right now, the way Joey is, it’s worth a chance. Anything is to save his life.’

  Lawless didn’t believe a word of it, but he said anyway: ‘I’ll watch your brother. Ride over and ask your neighbors to bring the girl here.’

  ‘They can’t. She’s sacred. Almighty Sky won’t let her leave the reservation. He most likely won’t let us see her either, not even if Mr Bjorkman asks him to. But I have to take that chance. If I don’t and Joey dies I’ll … never forgive myself. Now,’ she added crossly, ‘you going to help me hitch the team or not?’

  ‘Lead the way,’ Lawless said.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  While Violet cradled her unconscious, blanket-wrapped brother in the back of the wagon, Lawless kept the team at a smooth steady pace. The trail ran string-straight across the desert. It was barely wider than the wagon and full of pot-holes. But with the help of the morning light he avoided most of them and kept the wagon from bouncing around too much.

  The Bjorkmans’ ranch was only five miles to the south-west. It wasn’t much – half of Greenwater Canyon and 300 acres on which sat a stout, two-bedroom log house next to a barn, corrals and an old windmill to pump water into the well. According to Violet, Sven Bjorkman worked at the surveyor’s office in Santa Rosa. But his dream was to raise horses and sell them to the army stationed at Camp Furlong.

  For the first few years surveyor work had been plentiful and it seemed like his dream would come true. But then lack of rations and supplies had driven many of the Apaches from the reservation. Hiding across the border in the Sierra Madre, their marauding bands had all but shut down surveying parties and now, as Lawless drove the wagon past the corrals, he saw they were empty and that the barn and fences needed repairing.

  Ahead, the glow of a hurricane lamp showed in the window of the squat log-house. As Lawless reined up the team, the door opened and a man wearing patched working clothes and holding a scattergun, stepped out.

  He was a big robust man, not as tall as Lawless but much broader and thicker in the chest. He had friendly blue eyes and a blunt cheerful face that was half-hidden by a blonde beard inherited from his Norsemen ancestors.

  Not knowing Lawless, he quickly leveled the shotgun at him. But on recognizing Violet, his distrust turned to concern. Lowering the shotgun he quickly asked her what was wrong.

  Fighting tears, she explained that Joey had been shot. She didn’t say who shot him, which surprised Lawless, but instead described her brother’s condition and asked Sven to ride with them to the reservation to talk to Almighty Sky.

  He looked puzzled. ‘But Almighty Sky is a shaman – a shape-shifter who can supposedly predict the future – not a doctor.’

  ‘I know that,’ Violet sai
d. ‘But we need his permission to … to.…’ Tears choked off her words.

  Lawless leaned forward on the wagon seat until he was right in Sven Bjorkman’s face. ‘We brought Joey here, mister, because his sister thinks the only person who can save him is a Mescalero girl, some kind of healer who lives on the reservation. I don’t know her name, but—’

  ‘It’s Lolotea,’ a woman said, appearing in the doorway.

  Lawless looked at her. She had dressed in a hurry, missing some of the buttons on her blue cotton dress. He guessed she was on the good side of thirty. She was everything he liked in a woman – small, shapely, with brave blue eyes, a mouth made for smiling and tawny sun-streaked hair pulled back in a bun. He found her wholesomely pretty yet at the same time genteel – a rare quality in this harsh desert country – and couldn’t think why she’d settled here.

  ‘Y-yes, that’s her,’ Violet said, sniffing back tears. ‘Will you and Mr Bjorkman ride with us to the reservation? You’re acquainted with Almighty Sky. Maybe if you asked him, he’d let her help Joey.’

  ‘Go with them, dear,’ Ingrid said as her husband hesitated. ‘See what you can do.’

  ‘Be glad to,’ he said. ‘But I can’t promise anything, Violet. The Mescaleros have always been friendly toward us. But it’s not their nature to trust strangers. Nor have they ever let white men speak to Lolotea. They are afraid, I think, we might steal her gift.’

  Lawless, who found it hard to take his eyes off the woman, said to Sven, ‘More likely they’re worried we’ll find out she’s a fraud.’

  ‘She’s no fraud,’ Ingrid said. ‘No one off the reservation knows what her powers are, but she definitely can heal people.’

  Someone squeezed past her and stood looking up at Lawless. He saw it was a boy – no, a girl, no more than twelve, with short black hair as shiny as a crow’s wing and big, expressive, black eyes.

  ‘I seen her do it once,’ she said.

  ‘Hush, Raven,’ Ingrid said.

  ‘It’s true, Momma. Two years ago Running Wolf’s son, Lame Dog, was attacked by Comanches. They pinned him to a tree with a lance and left him for dead. The Apaches expected him to die. But Lolotea talked to the Spirit God and Lame Dog lived.’

  ‘You saw him cured,’ Lawless said doubtfully, ‘or heard about it? Which is it, miss?’

  ‘I saw it,’ Raven said.

  ‘You sure?’

  ‘I said so, didn’t I?’ Seeing doubt lingering in his eyes, she added angrily, ‘Can believe me or not, I don’t care. Who are you, anyways?’

  ‘Ra-ven!’ Ingrid chided. ‘Mind your manners.’

  Raven ignored her. Grasping her father’s hand, she glared defiantly at Lawless. ‘You heard him, Pa. He good as called me a liar.’

  ‘Hush,’ Sven said gently but firmly. ‘You know better than to speak that way to your elders. Now, go indoors.’

  As if God had spoken, Raven obeyed without argument. Giving Lawless a final glare, she squeezed past her mother into the house.

  ‘Please forgive her,’ Sven said to Lawless. ‘Raven doesn’t mean to be rude. She’s just set on speaking her mind.’

  ‘No harm done,’ Lawless said. ‘But if you aim on taking us to the reservation, better saddle up.’ He looked back at Joey, still unconscious in his sister’s arms. ‘I doubt the boy will hold on much longer.’

  ‘I’ll get my horse,’ Sven said, and ran to the barn.

  Ingrid looked long and hard at Lawless, trying to place him. ‘I don’t think I’ve seen you before.’

  ‘No, ma’am. I’m just riding through.’

  She nodded, understanding. ‘It’s a harsh and unforgiving land,’ she said. ‘I often wonder why anyone would not keep on riding.’

  Huddled in the rear of the wagon Violet fought down her tears. ‘I surely wish you’d come with us, Mrs Bjorkman. You and Raven. Then Almighty Sky couldn’t refuse us.’

  ‘Sven will be more than enough,’ Ingrid assured. ‘It’s his family the Mescaleros respect, not mine. Sven’s father, Johan, once saved Almighty Sky’s life. From that day on the Apaches have been our friends.’ Seeing Violet’s disappointment, she added, ‘Tell you what: I’ll fetch you some tobacco and coffee. Almighty Sky seldom gets any now that the Indian agent has cut their rations. It’s little enough as treats go, but it might help persuade him to let you see Lolotea.’ She hurried into the house.

  Lawless leaned back against the wagon seat and watched her through the open door. He found her pleasing to look at. She crossed in front of the lamp, its glow turning her tawny hair gold. Back now to him, she took a can of coffee from the pantry. Opening it, she poured some into a smaller can, capped it and returned the first can to the shelf. She then took tobacco and cigarette papers from a drawer. His eyes never left her. She moved with uncommon grace, seemingly unaware of her sensuality, and he ached to put his arms around her.

  The urge was so strong it surprised him.

  He’d known a few women in his life, but none was the permanent kind. That was to be expected. He’d never stayed in one place long enough to even get to know the whores he’d bedded, let alone the names of women he considered worth marrying.

  Besides, he’d always figured he would end up dying alone.

  He wondered if it was too late to change; if he could find a woman like this one, to settle down and raise young’uns. There was still time. He wasn’t sure exactly how old he was, but he knew he couldn’t be more than thirty-five or forty. If he really wanted those things, all he had to do was ride back to Borega Springs and work steady for Sheriff Tishman—

  He heard a mocking laugh. It interrupted his thinking, and when he looked around he realized the laugh had come from him.

  Marry?

  Settle down?

  Raise young’uns?

  Dream on, hombre.

  A horse came galloping up. Lawless looked into the rider’s honest face, a face full of strength and integrity – a face that promised a woman devotion and stability.

  ‘Let’s ride,’ Sven Bjorkman said.

  Lawless raised the reins, ready to slap the horses.

  ‘Wait! Take this with you.…’ Ingrid ran up to the wagon and offered him a small cloth bag containing coffee and tobacco.

  Lawless took the bag, feeling as he did her small strong fingers trapped under his. It felt like he was holding sunshine. He didn’t want to let go. But the love in her eyes was only for her husband and he grudgingly turned her hand loose.

  ‘Thank you, ma’am.’ He touched his hat politely.

  Ingrid smiled and turned to her husband. ‘Hurry back, dearest.’

  Sven blew her a kiss and spurred away.

  Lawless, knowing he would never hear those words, savagely whipped the team with the reins. The startled horses surged ahead, jolting everyone, dragging the wagon behind them.

  ‘Not so fast!’ Violet shouted. ‘You’ll start Joey bleeding again.’

  Lawless tugged on the reins, slowing the team. He had never known jealousy before. The strange emotion caught him off-guard, leaving him embarrassed and disappointed in his behavior.

  Apologizing to Violet, he silently vowed not to let it happen again.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  A warm, gold-blue morning had chased the dawn away by the time they reached the Mescalero reservation. There were no signs or fences indicating where Indian land began, but one look at the barren, sun-scorched earth that rejected cultivation and was home to rattlers, scorpions and Gila monsters told Lawless they were now on the reservation.

  Ahead, in a barren valley surrounded by bleached-white hills and towering sandstone cliffs, the main village stood alongside a shallow creek. The greenish, copper-tainted water moved sluggishly past a group of squaws scrubbing their clothes on some flat rocks. Others carried clay pots of water to their fires, where older women were boiling the water to make it fit for drinking. Squalor surrounded the cluster of grass-thatched, dome-shaped wickiups, most of which needed repairing. Grubby, half-naked children played
in the dirt outside each doorway. Nearby, goats and dogs nosed amongst the litter for anything edible.

  The sight depressed Lawless. He had no love for the Mescaleros, or Apaches in general. Over the years they had often ambushed him on both sides of the border and but for his accuracy with a rifle, would no doubt have lifted his scalp. But to see the once-proud nation dying a slow miserable death brought him no pleasure.

  He looked away, disgusted, and saw a herd of gaunt ponies grazing on the scrubland not far from the Indian Agency. The log-walled house, with its living quarters in back, stood alone on higher ground. Presently, it was not open and a long line of old men and women stood waiting outside a closed door marked: Food – Supplies. They watched impassively as Sven rode past, followed by Lawless, Violet and Joey in the wagon.

  Lawless met the gaze of several of the Apaches and saw nothing but defeat and humiliation in their dark solemn eyes. No wonder the braves keep breaking out, he thought compassionately. I’d sooner be a hunted renegade holed up in Chihuahua than stay here, half-starved and waiting to die.

  When they reached the outskirts of the village they were confronted by two mounted reservation policemen. Former army scouts who had fought for General Crook against Geronimo, both had graduated from Carlisle Indian University and spoke flawless English.

  The younger man, Charlie Horse Nose, blocked the wagon’s path with his pony while the other, a fierce-eyed Apache of forty wearing a red head band and a blue cavalry tunic over his shirt and breechcloth, rode up to Sven and demanded to know why he’d brought strangers on to the reservation.

  ‘These people are my friends,’ Sven said. He indicated Joey, adding: ‘This girl’s brother is near death. We must see Almighty Sky immediately.’

  ‘He is in council and cannot be disturbed,’ the policeman said.

  ‘Jim, for God’s sake,’ Sven said. ‘It’s urgent. The boy may die any moment. Please … take us to him.’

  James Tall Tree looked first at Joey and then at Violet, who gave him an imploring look. ‘Let them pass,’ he told Charley Horse Nose.