Ralph Compton - Down on Gila River

“I am an Injun,” the man said. “Kiowa. Black Crow’s band.”

Sam extended his hand and the Indian took it.

“Name’s Sam Sawyer, down from Spur Lake Basin way.”

“Call me James,” the Kiowa said. “Down from nowhere.”

“When do you get out?” Sam said. “You seem sober enough.”

The Indian was a small man with a great beak of a nose and a wide, narrow mouth. His black hair hung over his narrow shoulders in two thick braids and he wore a white man’s coat and flat-brimmed hat.

“I get out soon,” James said. “I go with you.”

Sam’s laugh was thin. “Then you’ll be a long time a-waiting. I can’t get out until I pay twenty-five dollars I don’t have.”

“I go with you,” the Kiowa said. “Sheriff Moseley say so.”

“I’m not catching your drift,” Sam said.

“I help you return the skewbald pony. We go to the cabin of Dan Wells, the Injun-eater, and steal back the skewbald hoss.” James thumped his chest with his fist. “Kiowa good hoss thieves. Everybody say so.”

Sam’s anger flared, directed at Moseley, not the Indian. “What did that no-good tinhorn of a sheriff promise you?”

“He promise me nothing,” James said. “He only say that if I don’t go, something mighty bad will happen to my wife and daughter.”

“But he can’t do that,” Sam said. “It’s agin’ the law.”

“White man’s law don’t stretch to Indians,” James said. “Bad thing, but there it is.”

“Dang Moseley’s eyes,” Sam said. “That . . . that—” He couldn’t find the words to express his feelings, and said instead, “Where is your missus and the kid?”

“Live in shack, edge of town. Good Lipan Apache woman.”

Sam figured out Moseley’s angle, and his anger grew. “Here’s how I figure it. The sheriff is scared to go anywhere near Dan Wells and his cannibal clan. That much is obvious. Even to me.”

The Kiowa grunted his agreement. “Maybe so,” he said.

“But he figures that if he gives me forty dollars and a hoss, I’ll keep on riding. And he’s right about that.”

Sam stabbed a forefinger at the Kiowa. “You’re Moseley’s ace in the hole. He reckons you’ll keep an eye on me and stop me from making the big skedaddle. Well, that’s what he figures anyway.”

James clenched both hands to the bars and pushed his face closer to Sam.

“Sheriff Moseley likes to hurt women,” he said. “He beat up a girl three months ago and the town covered it up. She was only a Mexican girl working the line and nobody cared. But I did care. She was nice to me, gave me whiskey and a dress for my wife.” The Kiowa reached out and grabbed Sam by the front of his shirt. “Listen to me. If we don’t come back with the skewbald pony, Moseley will murder my wife and daughter. I will not let that happen.”

“When you get out of here, why don’t you gun him down?” Sam said.

“No good, Sammy. Sheriff is very fast with a gun. The only way I can beat him is shoot him in the back. Then I’ll be hung for sure, and what happens to my wife and daughter then?” James waited a heartbeat, then said, “My wife and my child will starve.”

“Tarnation, James,” Sam said, “I’m mad at you. You’ve made me look at myself, like you was a mirror of my soul, and all of a sudden I don’t like what I see.”

He turned away from the Kiowa and stepped to the front bars of the cell. “Moseley, you buzzard, come here!” he yelled. “I want to talk to you.”

Chapter 10

“You ever seen an uglier kid in all your born days?” Sam Sawyer said.

“Fat,” James said. “She had the eyes of a pig.”

“And she could squeal like a pig, couldn’t she? Her face got red as a trail cook’s fire, and with all them yellow ringlets, man, it was a sight to see.”

“She kicked you,” the Kiowa said. “Then kicked her ma and her pa.”

“Yeah, I know. I still have the bruise on my shin.”

“She wanted the sheriff to go after her pony, not an Injun and an old man.”

“I’m not an old man.”

“Girl said you were, not me.”

“She said you was a no-good, drunken, skinny redskin.”

“Well, she was right about that,” James said. He nodded ahead of him. “River coming up, Sammy.”

A few minutes later they crossed the Gila River where it branched west toward Black Mountain and the Arizona border, then rode through the still morning, the mountains of the Pinos Altos Range rising to their east, their peaks gilded by the first rays of the rising sun.

The air smelled of pine and summer wildflowers and the day was not yet hot. It was a morning for a courting couple to hold hands and look at the sky and whisper words tied into love knots.

“Dang saddle is scouring my rear,” Sam said, grimacing as he shifted his weight.

“McClellan saddle was made to favor the hoss,” James said.

“How do you know that?”

“Soldier tell me that one time. I don’t remember when.”

The Kiowa rode bareback on a swaybacked paint that was probably worth five dollars for its tallow and hide. Sam’s mount wasn’t much better, a hammerheaded mustang with a punishing gait, a mean eye, and a wheeze.

Sam nodded to the battered Sharps .50 the Kiowa carried across the withers of his pony. “You any good with that?”

“Nope.” The Indian touched the butt of Sam’s Colt. “You any good with that?”

“Nope.”

The Kiowa nodded, but said nothing, his face like stone.

“Up on the Spur Lake Basin, I heard men talk about Dan Wells and his brothers,” Sam said after a while. “They say them boys can skin iron quicker’n scat and hit what they’re aiming at.”

“The Injun-eater has killed many men,” James said. “Both white and red. He is good with the gun.”

“Then what are we doing here?”

“We’re going to bring back the skewbald pony,” the Kiowa said.

“Well, we ain’t got it yet,” Sam said. Then, his irritation growing, he said, “How come a Kiowa don’t know how to shoot a rifle gun? Every Injun I ever knew could draw a bead real good.”

“I never could get the hang of it,” James said.

“How about a bow an’ arrow?”

“Never could get the hang of that either.”

“Then we’re in trouble,” Sam said.

* * *

The Kiowa drew rein and pointed to a forested peak to his southwest.

“That is McClure Mountain,” he said. “The one Sheriff Moseley spoke of.”

“Well, we swing northeast here,” Sam said. Then, depression settling on his shoulders like a black raven, he said, “Not that it matters. We’re both gonna die anyway.”

The Kiowa smiled for the first time since Sam had met him.

“I am not a great warrior like Satanta or Big Bow,” he said, “but I know how to steal a hoss.”

Sam’s shortsighted gaze scanned the rugged terrain of the Pinos Altos. What he saw was mostly a blur of blue and dark green, the white sky lying on top like frosting on a cake. In other words, he saw nothing at all.

As though reading Sam’s mind, James said, “Moseley says there is a canyon beyond the hills where Wells has his dugout.”

“A dugout is gonna be hard to find in this wilderness,” Sam said, aware that he sounded like a grumpy old man.

“I’ve heard of the place,” the Kiowa said. “His dugout sits on a rock ledge above the Gila and he has more, a saloon, a store, and a house for his women.”

He turned in his saddle and looked at Sam. “Miners go there, I’m told, and sometimes Apaches.”

“Apaches?” Sam said, surprised.

“They trade Mexican women for rifles and cartridges. But not all the Mescalero do this. Some fear Wells because he is an Injun-eater.”

“James,” Sam said, “have you given any thought to how dangerous this is gonna be? I mean, getting the skewbald pony back.”