Beads of sweat trickled into Shores’s eyes, making them sting. He blinked to clear them, but that only made it worse. A hand brushed his forehead, and he nearly jumped out of his skin.
“Brother John burn up,” Red Fox said.
“Stop touching me,” Shores croaked. He tried to draw the Smith & Wesson, but he was too weak even for that. Helplessness ate at him like an acid. Regret ate at him too. Regret he had given up his comfortable job with the Pinkertons to take the position at the Department of Justice. Why couldn’t I be content with what I had? Ambition and restlessness were to blame for his plight.
Dimly, through his feverish haze, part of Shores realized he wasn’t thinking lucidly. It was normal for a person to want to better themselves. He shouldn’t fault himself for desiring to make something of himself. But the thought of dying here in the middle of the godforsaken wilderness was as bitter to swallow as the Indian’s tea. His parents, his friends, would never know his fate. He would lie in a shallow unmarked grave, provided the Shoshone bothered to bury him, or become a feast for scavengers. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair.
“More tea, Brother John.” Red Fox had refilled the tin cup. “Drink all. Then sleep more.”
“I’m tired of sleeping,” Shores griped, but that was exactly what he did. When next he woke up, it was the middle of the night, and he was worse than ever. His teeth were chattering again, so fiercely his jaw muscles hurt. His clothes were drenched, and it still felt as if he were being burned alive. The crackling of the fire drew his gaze to its dancing flames and to the hunkered form beside it. “Don’t you ever sleep?”
“You bad sick, Brother John. Must watch.” Red Fox filled the cup again. With water this time, not tea.
Shores’s throat was parched. He gulped it down and asked for a second and then a third cup. He wanted more, but the warrior advised against it.
“Too much and belly hurt.”
“It’s my belly,” Shores said but let it go. The old man had a point. He attempted to roll onto his side, but his body refused. The blood in his veins was molasses. He barely had the energy to pull the blanket up to his chin. He shut his eyes, and the very next heartbeat he was out to the world.
A hazy series of vague impressions filtered through Shores’s consciousness: of drinking more tea, of having his brow mopped by Red Fox, of drinking water, of the sun and the stars taking repeated turns above him. Whenever he opened his eyes, he had the impression an age has passed since the last time.
The sun was blazing when Shores struggled up from the bottomless depths of a black well into the bright light of a new afternoon. His mouth was as dry as a desert, but the fever was gone, and he wasn’t sweating as much. “Water,” he rasped, but nothing happened. He looked toward the fire, which had gone out, and saw no trace of his companion. “Red Fox?”
There was no answer. Alarmed, Shores raised his head high enough to scan the basin. The only horse in sight was his claybank. “Oh God.” Shores fought down panic and found the strength to prop himself on his elbows. The Shoshone was gone. The old man had deserted him!
Shores looked around. His Winchester was missing from its saddle scabbard. His rope was missing too. Red Fox had left the coffeepot, but his canteen was conspicuously absent.
Easing onto his side, Shores crawled to the coffeepot. One shake was enough to show it was empty. “Damn that scrawny red devil to hell!” Mad enough to chew nails, he threw the coffeepot down and wished he hadn’t when waves of vertigo resulted. He collapsed, his stomach in upheaval. In his current condition, he wouldn’t last long. He needed water, and he needed food . . . and a lot of both.
Hooves clomped to the north. Fearing he had been found by hostiles, Shores fumbled at his Smith & Wesson. He wrapped his fingers around the grips just as a rider appeared. Astonishment transfixed him like a lance. “Red Fox! You came back!”
The old Shoshone was holding the Winchester. Slung over his left shoulder was the canteen. Behind him, tied to the paint with Shores’s rope, was a white-tailed buck. “Brother John need meat.”
Shores removed his hand from his revolver and slowly sat up with his back against his saddle. He felt like a complete jackass. “I was worried there for a bit,” he admitted.
“I be fine,” Red Fox misconstrued. Hopping down, he untied the buck and let it plop to the ground. He drew his tomahawk, bent over, and set to work.
Shores absently scratched his chin. The amount of stubble puzzled him, and he asked, “How long was I out?” He figured two days, three at the most.
Red Fox let go of the tomahawk to hold up all his fingers and thumbs.
“My God.” Shores was flabbergasted. At the rate they were going, it would take a year to find the Hoodoos.
Chapter Fourteen
Montana Territory
No one could ever figure out how the Hoodoos were able to be in Colorado Territory one day and Kansas Territory a few days later. Yet it was an indisputable fact that they somehow covered hundreds of miles far more swiftly than everyone else. Time and time again they were seen in one territory by reliable witnesses and a short while later spotted in another territory by others.
Rumors sprang up. Some claimed the Hoodoos knew of Indian trails no one else did. Others said their horses were bred especially for speed and endurance that far outstripped ordinary mounts. A few believed the Hoodoos dabbled in dark and fearsome magic, which explained not only their extraordinarily swift animals but the inability of the army and the law to end their vicious spree.
The true answer was much more down to earth. Brock Alvord had traveled widely. He had been as far west as California, as far north as Montana. He had fought Blackfeet. He had fought Sioux. He had survived encounters with Apaches and with Comanches. And it was from the Comanches, those dreaded scourges of Texas, that he had learned the trick to covering ground faster than most thought humanly possible.
The Comanches were infamous for their lightning raids deep into settled regions, after which they melted into the wilds with impunity. No one could catch them, and a lot of lives had been lost before their secret was discovered: relays. Warriors with strings of fresh mounts waited at designated points along the line of escape.
Brock Alvord was quick to see the potential. He had been called a lot of things, many less than flattering, but “dumb” wasn’t one of them. He rightly reasoned that the Comanche system would work well for someone in his chosen line of work. So, early on, Alvord had taken to keeping the best of the stolen horses for himself and his men, and to setting up relay sites.
The sites posed a challenge. They had to be near water. There had to be ample forage. There had to be shelter from the elements. But most importantly, the sites had to be where no one would find them.
Alvord searched and searched and found plenty of sites with water and grass but few that met all his requirements. Particularly the last. There was hardly a spring or water hole the Indians didn’t know about, and they would no more hesitate to steal horses from him than he would from them.
The solution was staring Brock Alvord in the face for months before it came to him one night when he was half-drunk and playing poker with Curly Means and John Noonan, the first two to join his horse-stealing ring. The subject of hostiles came up, and Noonan mentioned how an uncle of his had been tortured and mutilated by Comanches some years back. It reminded Brock of his relay scheme and how it had fallen through because he couldn’t find safe sites.