"But Inyo has a lot of prestige with them. He's a respected man. Why shouldn't they listen to him?''
"It's not in their way of doing things. They'd listen to him. They'd give him all the respect he's due. Then they'd go off and do as they please."
Harris turned to look away for a moment; he said, "Frankly, I can't say I blame him. If I was in the shoes of one of these Apache braves I'd probably make the same choice myself."
Brady said, "That kind of attitude wont get us anywhere right now."
Harris grunted. "All right. Will, can you think of anything else we can say?"
"No."
"That's what I thought. We've said our piece. Inyo has our offer. You might tell him it's a good offer, and we'll stand by it. It's no empty promise."
Brady translated the words into Apache and relayed them. Inyo said nothing. Harris turned his palms up, raising his shoulders in a sign of resignation. "That's it, then. Ask him if we'll have safe passage out of the mountains."
Brady asked the question, and interpreted Inyo's reply drily: "He says he can't guarantee it. He says his own men will respect our flag of truce, but he can't speak for the others in the mountains. He says maybe we ought to keep our eyes open."
"Thank him for the advice," Hanis said. "Make your goodbye speech. Will, and let's get going."
Brady did so, and afterward followed Harris outside. Tucker was standing patiently by the horses, trying to ignore a squad of small brown children who were keeping busy by taunting the horses and throwing pebbles. Brady grinned at them and shook his fist; the children became quiet and stopped throwing stones, but did not run away. Instead, they stood fast and glared with steady hatred.
"Let's get out of here," Harris murmured uncomfortably, and Brady turned to his horse.
Brady carried the white flag, high and conspicuous on a pole. He wondered skeptically how much good it would do if they happened to encounter a crowd of Indians who were not directly within Inyo's sphere of influence.
They rode back through the country of high cliffs and wide mesas, under the continuing discomfort of the steady drizzle. There seemed no end in sight to the sky's weeping. Tucker, alongside with the pack horse, was decidedly nervous. It was not the kind of nervousness brought on by fear; rather it was an angry wariness, the impatience of a man growing anxious for action. It was product and culmination of the gradual gathering bitterness that marked Tucker's progress through life-Brady remembered Tucker's diy comment, that he had seen too many doors close in his face.
Noon came and went-time gauged by Harris' pocket watch, not by the sun; there was no sun. Time traveled on in gray and leaking lethargy; the ground, once dusty, was turned soggy, muffling the sound of hoofbeats. The cold on these windswept, dripping heights was biting. Dim, gray light washed all warmth out of the various color-tones of the land, giving everything in sight the appearance of a uniform hostility.
They traveled with deliberate haste, now galloping, now trotting, now walking; alternating the pace in that manner to save the horses, they covered ground at a good rate. The trail Brady chose was one that kept them in open country much of the time, thus minimizing the chance of ambush. Now and then they had to cut through a tangle of badlands or a narrow-sided canyon, and in these places Brady's hand stayed near his gun and his. eyes swept the nearby places of concealment with heightened alertness. And then, walking the horse across a long flat plateau of rock and scrub growth, his head lifted sharply and his hand raised in restraining signal.
They reined in on that barren flat; Harris said, 'Whaf s the matter?"
"I think I heard something—gunshots."
Harris frowned and turned to Ksten against the wind. There was the steady light patter of rain against their oilskin ponchos; there was the sound of Tucker's led horse shifting its feet. "I don t hear anything," Harris said.
Brady shook his head. His eyes were narrowed. "I didn't imagine it. Keep your eyes open. Let's keep going."
They moved forward again, each man frowning with new, taut awareness toward the surrounding jagged peaks. "Timber country coming up soon," Brady said. "Watch the shadows."
Harris squinted upward toward the clouds. "Not a break anywhere in that sky. It's going to be a long | summer-a tough campaign. The only way we'll get ' these Apaches out of the mountains will be to pick them off one by one."
"That sounds like fun," Tucker said morosely. He, too, considered the sky; presently he said, "Will?"
"What?"
''Does that offer still stand?"
"Sure."
"I think I'll take you up on it," Tucker said. His face looked sour. "I've had enough campaigning to last me quite a spell."
Harris turned his glance toward the sergeant. His voice carried a rough good-humor. "This is a hell of a time to desert me."
'The army's full of sergeants. Captain. I'm tired."
Harris's eyes were level, holding Tucker's. "I can't say I blame you," he said.
"Thanks," Tucker said dryly. "We're not out of this yet, though. I'll keep my gun greased till we hit the desert. Which is still two days away."
"So it is," Brady murmured, scanning the juniper slopes ahead. The path he chose dropped them through a long field of altitude-stunted greenery, lifted them over a rocky saddle of ground between two somber bald-topped peaks, and took them by easy stages downward, and finally, at midafternoon, entering a stand of timber with startling abruptness. Rain dripped unsteadily from the laden tree-tops, adding to their discomfort. Along the way they scared up an antelope, a solitary animal prowling the forest for graze; startled, it wheeled and fled, the humping signal spots on its rump showing white in alarm. When Brady looked at Tucker he saw that Tucker had his sixgun halfway out of its holster. Tucker rammed the gun back with a grunt of disgust and folded his slicker back over the holster. "A trip like this would make a wooden Indian jumpy."
"A fact," Brady murmured in agreement. He, too, felt the nerve-tightening pressure of their constant danger.
Single file, they threaded the forest, steadily descending. Late in the afternoon the rain quit, although the cloud cover continued to blanket the sky from horizon to horizon. Nightfall came early; it caught them still in the depths of the tall timber country. Brady said, "We may as well rig a lean-to and make camp. There's no hurry-if the Indians want us, they'll get at us whenever they please."
And so they built a quick shelter beneath the dripping pines, staked the horses out, and spent the night in relatively dry discomfort, taking turns standing guard. No incidents marred the night. At dawn long red splashes of light streaked the eastern sky. "Clouds are breaking up," Tucker observed thankfully. They broke camp and were once again on the move by six o'clock after a quick cold meal. Harris said, "How far is it to Yeager's?" 'Three hours," Brady said positively. "If the place is still standing."
"Now," Tucker observed in his customary dour tones, "there's an encouraging thought. I rise to remark that you're about the most contrary skunk I know, Brady. Maybe I'll reconsider that horse-wrangling job."
Brady's chuckle relieved a good deal of pent-up strain; he was grateful even for Tucker's bit of sour humor. They traveled forward at a steady gait across the damp-matted carpet of soaked pine needles, now and then cutting tlirough a rocky clearing and once passing the edge of a long bum, wth nothing remaining but the fire-blackened stumps and charred, lifeless trees, the only aftermath of a forest fire.