Louis L'Amour - The Lonely Men

The first thing I noticed was the silence. There was no fire, of course, and there was little light. It was late afternoon, and under the trees it was already shading down to dusk.

For a moment I lay quiet, listening. Raising my head, I looked around. Over yonder there was a saddle -- I could see the faint shine of it. I could see nothing else, nor could I hear any sound but the soft rustling of the leaves overhead.

My right hand moved for my rifle, closed around the action. A shot fired here would bring Apaches around us like bees from a kicked hive.

Carefully, I eased back the blanket, moved my feet out, and then drew them up and rolled to my knees. Glancing to where John J. Battles was lying, I could see his body under a blanket. He was asleep ... at least he was not moving.

Rocca was nowhere in sight, his bed was empty. We had purposely scattered out to sleep. It gave us that much more of a chance if the camp was attacked.

A moment longer I waited, then came up swiftly and with one long step was molded into the shadow of a tree. And still nothing stirred.

Nevertheless, I knew it wasn't just a case of worry with me. Somebody or something was prowling our camp, and we were too close to those Apaches for comfort. At the same time I know that the Apache, generally speaking, won't fight after dark. He has the feeling that the soul of a man killed in the night wanders forever in darkness. Of a sudden, something moved near me. There was no light but that of the stars. Here and there a tree trunk stood out, or a leaf caught the shine of a reflection.

It was a haunted place, this camp of ours, a corner among the crags, a place where cliffs reared up or fell away, where broken rocks lay among the trees.

There were so many shadows that one saw nothing clearly.

Slowly I lowered the butt of my rifle to the ground. At my belt was a bowie knife, sharp enough to shave with -- in fact, I often did shave with it. But it was my hands on which I would depend this time, hard work had made them strong, had built muscles into my arms and shoulders. For little softness had come into my life, little but hard riding and harder work. I waited, my hands ready.

The movement was there again, not a sound so much as a suggestion. Then it was the breathing that warned me ... only breathing, and I reached out with my hands.

Something slipped through my hands like a ghost. My hands touched it, grasped, and the thing wasn't there ... a faint grasp, and my fingers clutched only hair ... Then it was gone!

Battles sat up. "Tell? What is it?"

"A ghost, I think." I spoke softly. "Whatever it is, I wish it would believe we're not enemies." But whatever it was, was gone. A couple of hours later, by the light of day, we found tracks enough. Tip toe tracks of a small foot I felt a shudder go through me, and Rocca noticed it. "What?" he said. "You are afraid?"

"I was remembering ... someone who is gone," I said. "But these tracks are not hers. They are small, like hers, and the steps are quick, like hers ... but she is dead."

Tampico Rocca crossed himself. "She haunts you?"

"No ... it is only a memory. Her name was Ange, and I found her trail first, like this. I lost her again, like this. But Ange is dead. She was murdered," I said, "up in the Mogollon country."

"Ah!" That was Spanish. "You are that Sackett!" He looked at me thoughtfully. "I heard talk of it. I was in Cherry Creek then, but everybody knew the story ... and how your family came to help."

He looked at me over the tip of his cigarette, and I could guess what he was thinking. In the western lands where all news came by word of mouth, men quickly became legend, they became larger than life. It was so with Ben Thompson, Wild Bill, Mike Fink, or Davy Crockett. The stories grew with telling.

"The boy we're hunting," I said, "is my brother Orrin's boy. Orrin was one of them who rode to the Mogollon."

"I never had a family," Spanish said. "I was always alone."

John J. tamped tobacco into his pipe. "Most men are alone," he said. "We come into life alone, we face our worst troubles alone, and we are alone when we die."

"It was the girl we tracked," I said. I'd been looking around while we talked.

"She needed grub. She's taken some bread and some dried apples, and maybe a little jerky."

And then we were quiet again.

We knew what we had to do, and the waiting was hard, for we were men who preferred action. Our way of life had been to act ... there was rarely need for contemplation. We were men who moved swiftly, surely, and we lived or died by the success of our movement. So to wait now came hard. To wander in the mountains added to our danger, and to wait here was risk, but a man who does not move leaves no tracks.

So we watched and waited, for it was all we could do, and even just watching worried me for men who are being watched become aware of it.

The white boy we had seen appeared again, more than once, but always with Indian boys around him. And then, after another long day of watching, I saw him take a spear and go alone along a trail between some rocks. Like a cat I was off the rock where I watched, nodding to Rocca as I passed him.

Spanish went up to watch from where I had been, and John J. went to the horses -- we saddled them each morning -- to be ready in case of need.

Tampico Rocca was a ghost on the trail, moving without sound. We snaked down among the rocks, crawled over great boulders, and came down to where we could await the boy.

Was he changed? Had he become an Apache? If so, he would shout when he saw us.

Only he had no chance. Soundlessly Rocca dropped to the trail behind him, put one hand over the boy's mouth, and lifted him into the brush, where we crouched.

He looked wild-eyed with fright, then seeing we were white men he tried to speak. Slowly Rocca took his hand from his mouth.

"Take me away!" he whispered. "My name is Brook. Harry Brook."

"How long have they had you?"

"Two years, I think. Maybe not that long, but a long time."

"Where are the other white children? The Creeds and Orry Sackett."

"The Creeds? I have heard of them. They are in the next rancheria." He pointed.

"Over there."

"And the Sackett boy?"

"I do not know. I never heard of another boy. There is a girl with the Creed boys, but she is only five ... very small."

Well ... something seemed to drain away inside me. Had they killed him then? Had they killed Orrin's son? Battles asked the question.

"Nobody was killed," the boys said. "I was in camp when they brought them in, the Creed boys and the girl."

Squatting down on my heels, I asked, "Can you get to those others? I mean, will you ever see them?"

"You ain't takin' me along with you?" There were tears in his eyes.

"Not right now. Look, if we took you now we'd have to run, wouldn't we? All right, we leave you here. You be ready." I pointed toward a high rock. "Can you see that from camp?"

"Yes."

"All right ... when you see a black rock atop that, you come to this place, right here. We've got to get those other youngsters."

"You'll get killed. They're in Kahtenny's rancheria."

"Kahtenny? He's alive, then?"

"He sure is. An' all them Apaches yonder take a back seat for him. He's a big man among 'em."

We left him then, worried for fear the Apaches would come scouting to see what he was doing. They trusted no prisoner, even if he seemed to accept their ways.

Only thing was, they didn't figure anybody could get away from the Sierra Madres ... or that anybody would dare come in after them.

The first thing I did was hunt a piece of black lava rock to use when the time came. I placed it handy under a bush, and we went back, mounted up, and followed a trail out of there, skirting a cliff that fell away so sharply you felt as if you rode on a piece of molding along a wall.