The prisoner gasped, “Longarm, do you reckon there’s really a place like hell?”
“Don’t know. Never planned on going there if I could help it.”
“If there’s a hell, it’s likely where I’m headed, for I was birthed mean and grew up ugly. The good book says it’s wrong for a boy to love his mama, don’t it?”
“Hell, you’re supposed to love your mama.”
“all the way? I mean, like sort of fooling with her?”
“Are you telling me that’s what you and your pa had words about?”
“Hell, no, he never caught us. Ma and me was careful. We only done it when he was off hunting or something.”
“But you did commit incest, hombre?”
“I don’t know what we committed, but I purely screwed her every chance I got. She showed me how when I was about thirteen. Said I was hung better’n Pa. You reckon I’ll have to answer for that, where I’m headed?”
“Don’t know. What you want is a preaching man, old son. I don’t write the laws. I just see that they’re obeyed.”
“Well, couldn’t you pretend to be a preaching man, damn it? I mean, I’d take it kindly if you’d say a prayer over me or something. It don’t seem fitting for a man to just lie here dying like this without somebody says something from the good book.”
Longarm searched his memory, harking back to a West Virginia farmhouse where gentle, care-worn hands had tucked him in at night. He shrugged and began, “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want…”
By the time he’d finished, the invisible form at his knees had stopped breathing. Longarm felt the side of his prisoner’s throat for a pulse and there didn’t seem to be one. He sniffed and muttered, “Never thought I’d miss a poor little pissant like you, but you left me with a long, lonesome night ahead of me.”
But the night did pass, and in the cold gray light of dawn nothing moved across the way, though once, when the breeze shifted, Longarm thought he smelled coffee brewing. It reminded him he had to keep up his own strength, so he gnawed jerked venison, washed down with flat canteen water, as he watched for movement across the creek.
If they tried to talk some more it meant more precious time. If they didn’t, it meant more than one of them was working around behind him. How long would it take to work to the top of a strange cliff a quarter of a mile high? It was anybody’s guess.
The sun was painting the opposing clifftops pink when Foster showed himself once more. He called out, “Longarm?”
“We’re still here, as you likely figured. What do you want?”
“Timberline and some of the others are working up to the rim rocks above you. You haven’t a chance of holding out till noon!”
“I can try. What’s your play pilgrim?”
“I’ve been talking to Kim Stover and some of the cooler heads. If you give up now, we can probably work out a compromise. Frankly, this thing’s getting uglier than we intended.”
“I’ll stand pat for now, thanks.”
“Longarm, they’re going to kill you. Even if they don’t shoot to kill from up there, you’re taking foolish chances. We can’t control things from down here. Once men get to shooting…”
“I know. Why don’t you ride out with the gal before you both get in deeper? I can promise you one thing, Mountie. You won’t make it back to Canada with a dead U.S. Deputy to answer for!”
“I can see that, damn it! That’s why I’m willing to compromise! If you’ll come back to civilization with me now, I’ll abide by a legal ruling in Cheyenne about the prisoner. If they say he’s mine, I take him. If they give him to you, I give up. Agreed?”
“Hell, no! I got the jasper and possession is nine-tenths of the law. I don’t need no territorial judge to say who he belongs to. The prisoner belongs to me!”
“Longarm, you’re acting like a fool!”
“That makes two of us, doesn’t it?”
Kim Stover called over to Longarm, “Please be reasonable, Deputy Long. I don’t want my friends to get in trouble!”
“They’re already in trouble, ma’am! This ain’t coffee and cake and let’s-pretend-we’re-vigilantes! You folks wanted the fun without considering the stakes. I’ll tell you what I’ll do, though. You and any others who’ve had enough of this game can ride out peaceable, and I won’t press charges.”
“What are you talking about! You’re in no position to press charges! We’re trying to save your life, you big idiot!”
“Well, I thank you for the kind thoughts, ma’am, but I’ll save my own life as best I can.”
Foster yelled, “I’m moving Mrs. Stover out of range, Longarm. You’re obviously crazy as a loon and the shooting will be starting any minute now!”
Longarm watched them go back to their boulder, then rolled over on one elbow to gaze up at the cliffs above him. The prisoner’s face was pale and cold, now, and the eyes were filmed with dust. Longarm pressed the lids closed, but they popped open again, so he went back to watching the skyline.
His eyes narrowed when, a good ten minutes later, a human head appeared as a tiny dot up above. Another, then another appeared beside it. Longarm suddenly grinned and waved. One of the figures staring down at him waved back. Longarm went to the still-smoldering shale-oil smudge fire and, keeping his head down, used his saddle blanket to break the rising column of smoke into long and short puffs. The next time he looked up, the dots on the rim rock had vanished.
He crawled back to the breastwork, tied his kerchief to the barrel of his Winchester and waved it back and forth above the wall until Foster hailed him, calling out, “Do you surrender?”
“No, but you’re about to. Tell the folks around you not to get spooked in the next few minutes. Some friends of mine are moving in behind you and some old boys shoot first and ask questions later when they see Indians. Tell ‘em the ones coming in are Utes. They won’t kill nobody, ‘less some damn fool starts shooting!”
“What in the devil are you talking about? It’s my understanding the Utes are not on the warpath!”
“‘Course they ain’t. They’re on the Ouray Reservation, about a ten-hour ride from here, when they ain’t investigating smoke on the horizon. The Ouray Utes are wards of the U.S. Government, so I thought I ought to send for ‘em. Some of ‘em don’t speak our lingo, so make sure nobody acts unfriendly as they come in to disarm YOU.”
“Disarm us? You can’t be serious!”
“Oh, but I am, and so are they. I just deputized the whole damn tribe. You said eighteen-to-one was hard odds? well, I figure I now have you outgunned about ten-or twelve-to-one. So don’t act foolish.”
“My God, you’d set savage Indians against your own race?”
“Yep. Had to. Only way I could do what I aimed to be doing.”
“What’s that, get away from us with my prisoner?”
“Hell, I could have done that days ago. The reason I led you all down here was to put you under arrest.”
“Arrest? You can’t arrest me!”
“If you’ll look up the slope behind you, you’ll see that I’ve just done it.”
The Mountie turned to stare openmouthed at the long line of armed Indians on the skyline and the others coming down the trail on painted ponies. He saw white men getting up from behind rocks, now, holding their hands out away from their gunbelts as they tried to look innocent. A pair of Ute braves had Timberline on foot between their ponies and to avoid any last-minute misunderstandings, Longarm got up from behind his little fort and walked over to them, waving his Stetson.
An older moonfaced Indian on a stocky pinto rode it into the creek and waited there, grinning broadly as Longarm approached. He said, in English, “It has been a good hunt. Just like the old days when we fought the Sioux and Blackfoot in the high meadows to the north. What is my brother from the Great White Father doing here? Do you want us to kill these people? They do not seem to be your friends.”