News of the World(27)
Johanna, get back!
The girl ignored him. She was edging along the caprock to his right. She ducked in and out between the great tabular sections of red sandstone, holding on to the unforgiving rock with her bare hands. She peered over, she ducked back. She carried the stove lid lifter in one hand and now she began to lever at the base of a flat layer of stone. She had pulled the back hem of her skirts between her legs and tucked it into the dainty belt at her waist in front so it looked as if she were wearing big Turkish pantaloons. She was still barefoot. She looked like the engravings he had seen of Circassian children in their rags and bandoliers fighting the Russian troops somewhere in the Pontus. This was clearly not her first gunfight. Mao sap-he, she said. Caddos. The Ring-in-the-nose people. They will die. She didn’t care if he did not understand her, it was simply important to say, They will die.
The Captain turned back to his notch and through the leaves on the left he saw the Caddo’s black hair glinting as he dodged from rock to rock, down the ravine, going for his rifle. He fired again. A yell, then whimpering. One wounded. How bad he didn’t know. Sweat ran from under his hat, from the tattered sweatband and into his eyes and he wiped his eyes on his shoulder one after the other, quickly. He was surprised when he saw he had to reload. He had not thought he had fired so many rounds. His hands had flour on them from the box of shells.
Johanna was still levering at the base of a slab of stone with the lifter. To his amazement she tipped it up, and then over, and it rolled end over end like a flat plate on edge, leaping downhill, smashed in half on an outthrust boulder and then shattered and fell in pieces upon somebody. There was a deep shout, almost a grunt, and a man fell forward out of concealment and rolled.
Good girl, he said. Demon child! He laughed as he fired again and again, careless of the expenditure of ammunition. Then he was furious with himself; the man was in his sights and yet he could not hit him. Then the man disappeared.
TWELVE
HE HAD TWENTY cartridges left. He clicked out the cylinder and reloaded.
He smiled at her as she came back. You are most amazing, he said.
She acknowledged this with a grave nod and turned her attention back to their enemies.
Another rifle round shattered stone in front of him like an explosion. He bent his head against flying chips and felt a strange electrical pain all over his skull, a nerve pain, then he couldn’t see out of his right eye. He wiped at it quickly and it cleared and he watched for the smoke. He saw it down to the right, again. She had probably hit the man with the handgun. The stream of water chattered busily down the ravine and here and there shone like glass. The Captain wiped again at his eye and then looked at his hand. It was wet with blood. A blade of stone blown off the rock had struck him over the right eye but he thought it would stop bleeding in a minute or so. He must not be incapacitated, he must not be killed because he knew very well what they would do with the girl. Some people were born unsupplied with a human conscience and those people needed killing.
He tried to think how many of them were wounded. He might have shot the Henry rifle barrel out of alignment. He thought he had hit the man on the left but how badly he didn’t know. Johanna had wounded another by tipping a rock down on him.
He bent his head to his knuckles. His shirt was spotty with blood. He considered his choices. They could run for it, riding double on Pasha. Get Fancy loose and she would follow them. If they gained enough distance from Almay and the Caddos he could stop long enough to put her on the mare, but Fancy was a dear slow creature with her out-of-alignment front leg and prone to stumble. They could try to reach that distant smoke on the horizon.
Johanna crept forward and brought the leather water bottle to him. The Captain rolled onto his back and poured it down. Some ran down the sides of his mouth. He capped it. Almay and his evil minions had the spring water trickling down the ravine but he and Johanna had only this one canteen. He handed it back to her.
Useless thoughts again and again of why he had not carried more ammunition, why he had not bought more. Because they left Dallas in the middle of the night, that’s why.
Then the girl held out a wet cloth to him and he took it and wiped his forehead and eye. Lucky it was his right eye because it was his left eye that he aimed with. It was a shallow cut but the blade of stone seemed to have hit a nerve because it made a crawling sharp pain all over his scalp. It didn’t matter. He could see out of both eyes now. His vision was very good. The animals down below probably thought he was half blind with old age. Well surprise surprise. He turned over on his stomach. After this little silence they would be eaten up with curiosity. He caught a glimpse of a rifle barrel within range of the revolver. He laid the long eight-inch barrel in a notch; he fired carefully and listened happily to another shout of pain.
Kep-dun, she said.
He looked into her worried dark blue eyes. My dear, he said. Let’s face facts.
He flipped open the cylinder of the revolver and turned his hand so that she could see it was empty. In his other hand he held the remaining fourteen rounds.
She reached out for the shotgun and looked at him.
No good, he said. No. He showed her one of the shells. Nothing but light Number Seven bird shot. It would not even carry very far. He pointed toward Pasha. Then he pointed to her. His bay saddle horse stood stiff as a china figure with fright and his ears were rigidly fixed at full cock toward the ravine. The horse might prove difficult, but among the Plains Indians, even young children could ride and ride well.