"First, Eggie," he said, "we must do the decent thing and bury this dead person. However grave has been the provocation, an Englishman has certain obligations."
Meech snarled. "Drag the bastard out in the desert and let the buzzards have him!"
Drumm shook his head. "However depraved, the fellow was a human being. He must be put into the earth in a civilized way." Finding a shovel among the litter, he started to dig. Eggleston arose with a sigh to assist his master. A cloud passed over the sun, and a chill wind sprang out of nowhere. Drumm paused for a moment in his digging, looking toward the distant mountains over which hovered a ragged scud of cloud.
"It may rain up there," he muttered. "At this season sudden and violent storms are not unusual at the higher elevations, according to the Traveler's Guide."
Sullenly Meech watched as they dug.
"There!" Drumm said finally, wiping his brow. "Not so deep as it should be, perhaps, but we can pile stones on top to keep away the coyotes." In a satchel he found his Anglican Book of Prayer. While the valet stood with head appropriately bowed, he read the Service for the Dead.
"I don't believe this!" Meech grumbled, shaking his head.
Drumm took from the dead man's neck a small leather sack depending from a rawhide thong. The sack was ornamented with beads and small bits of glass, stitched in a complex pattern. Curious, he opened the sack and shook the contents into his palm: a handful of bluish grains, nothing more. Perhaps some kind of talisman, but it had not done the warrior any good. He poured the grains back into the sack. Sticking a broken Apache lance into the ground at the head of the grave, he hung the sack on it, watching it dangle in the wind while Eggleston filled the grave and piled stones atop it.
"That will do," Drumm decided. "Thank you, Eggie."
Meech regarded them both with disbelief. "I've heard of crazy Englishmen, but this beats all." He shrugged, washing his hands of the foolishness. "Well, we better get out of here! Tempus fugits! No telling when them varmints are likely to come back. There's three of us, and only two animals, but by riding double and changing around from time to time, we can make it to Prescott." He buckled the Colt's revolver about his waist and picked up the Winchester rifle.
Drumm pointed to the flanks of the distant mountain. The winks of reflected light were not now evident, but from the same approximate point showed a curl of smoke.
"We can hardly do that!" he objected. "The Apaches are waiting for us over there!"
After the confusion and disruption of the battle, the bony mare grazed peacefully in the reedy bottoms. Throwing his saddle over the back of the animal, Meech glanced at the distant smoke.
"Well," he said, drawing the cinch tight, "I don't know about you folks, but I've got business in Prescott, Apaches or no Apaches! My pay keeps right on going, even during an Indian war, and the home office expects me to earn it."
Incredulous, Drumm said, "But you're riding into danger!"
Pinching his nostrils together, Meech blew his nose into a nearby cactus.
"Wouldn't be the first time," he grunted. "It goes with the territory, as the drummer said." Climbing gingerly into the saddle, he let down his backside with caution. "You fellers ain't coming?"
Drumm shook his head. "I shouldn't like to risk traveling to Prescott right now, with the road swarming with Apaches. It's safer here, at least for the present. Anyway, there may be a stage passing soon, or freight wagons."
Meech shook his head and wrapped the reins around his knuckles. "I hate to leave the two of you here in such a situation, 'specially after you took me in and shared your grub. But I've got a job to do, and I mean to get about it." Raising a hand in salute, he said, "Pax vobiscum—that's Latin for 'good luck.'" Posting uneasily, he rode toward the distant smoke. A hundred yards down the road, he turned to call back.
"When I get to Prescott, maybe I can get a man to come out with a wagon and take you and your servant and what traps is left into the village—if you're still here, that is!"
Eggleston watched the detective go.
"I would hate," he murmured, "to be that criminal whom Detective Meech is looking for! I think he would ride through the portals of hell to bring back his quarry!"
For two days Jack Drumm and his man sweltered in a dug rifle pit behind an earthen wall, a canvas rigged on poles the only shelter from sun and wind. The clouds had vanished, and the weather turned bright and hot. During the day they saw occasional streamers of dust in the distance. Eggleston expressed a hope that they represented oncoming wagons and coaches from Phoenix, bearing news of the capture of Agustín and his roving marauders. But no wagon passed them on the Prescott Road. The bleak landscape took on an otherworld quality, a painted drop in a London theater. They started at each rustle of a bush, the flight of a desert wren, a lizard skittering over a flat rock. They started, and sweated, and waited.
"I would certainly prefer," Eggleston said, "to at last be safe in Prescott, or whatever the village is called. Do you think we could possibly start off for there at night, Mr. Jack, riding double on the mule, and—"
"Much safer to wait here, at least for the time being," Drumm told him. "Perhaps Lieutenant Dunaway and his troopers will finally pass by and escort us safely there."
"I wonder," the valet said, slicing a heel of bread and spreading on it the last of the ragout, "how that Detective Meech got on?"
"Probably scalped, and lying in some lonely ditch between here and Prescott." Drumm took the proffered sandwich. Most of the food had been carried off or destroyed during the raid; this was the last. Though Drumm's prized Belgian gun was useless, they still had his .53 caliber Schroeder repeating carbine, which was a needle-gun of good design, his custom Tatham pistols in their plush-lined case, and a Sharp's .50 caliber rifle. Eggleston in addition had the six-shot revolver purchased for him by Drumm in Great Russell Street before the trip, and there was plenty of ammunition for all weapons. "But I am still hungry," Drumm muttered.
Eggleston scoured the ragout pot with the last of the bread and asked, "Why do you suppose the good Lord ever made this accursed place?"
His master washed down the crust with murky water from one of the pools of the Agua Fria. "To give good men a glimpse of Purgatory, of course, and thus make them better Christians!"
Eggleston pursed his lips, looking at the jagged wound across Jack Drumm's cheek. It was black with caked blood and bordered with a greenish-yellow stitching of pus.
"I do not like the looks of that, Mr. Jack," he said. "Will you let me wash it—there is a little of that good Charente cognac left in a broken bottle, and I understand that alcohol is beneficial to such wounds—and put some kind of a bandage on it?"
His master shook his head. "The Drumms are a hardy lot. I am sure it will soon start to heal. I fear, however, it has somewhat marred my features." He touched it tenderly. "The rascal's knife cut away some of my mustache, as I noted in the mirror this morning. My chief worry is that after such bad treatment the hair will not grow again in a proper pattern."
Mopping perspiration from his bald head, the valet wandered disconsolately away among the reeds. Drumm watched him go, concerned. In a domestic way Eggleston was very capable. No one could make a better omelet, give a higher luster to the household silver, or keep such proper order below stairs at Clarendon Hall. Andrew had not wanted to give up Eggleston to serve as his younger brother's valet on the Grand Tour, but Jack Drumm in his insistent way prevailed. Now he had dragged poor Eggie over the better part of the circumference of the world. The valet had begun to look the worse for wear, though he complained little.