When the guard commander had gone through a formal report, the middle-aged man to whom he had reported had said, “Thank you, Leftenant Hamilton. You and your men may now return to your duties.”
With a salute, a stamp of the foot and a barked “Sah!” the younger man had spun about (a little unsteadily, Milo noted) and marched out of the room, closing the door in his wake.
Dredging up from his memory the rank denoted by the insignia, Milo than addressed the middle-aged man himself. “Colonel, are all your people as half starved as your garrison so clearly is?”
The officer addressed sprang up from his chair and leaned on his clenched fists, his face suddenly suffused, his veins abulge and throbbing with anger, but his voice at least under control. That was when Milo first noted that whereas the other two men in the small office wore what looked to be homespun recreations of battledress uniforms, the older man was clad in a Class A blouse—one that looked to be a much-mended original—and, of all things, a kilt and a sporran of a black-and-white fur that looked as if it had come off a spotted skunk—a rare beast this far north. He also was able to drub his memory and come up with the surname that most likely went with that kilt.
Speaking coldly, the officer said, “The conditions of my garrison and that of the people of the station should not be of concern to you, prairie rover. It might be better, all things considered, if I did not allow you to leave here alive.”
“I hardly think that an officer of your obvious gentility and training would violate the sanctity of a man who rode in bearing a flag of truce, whatever your reasons, Colonel Lindsay. And please believe me, I had no aim of angering you when I asked my first question. Perhaps, if the hunger of your folk is as severe as it looked to me, we two can be of some service, each to the other.”
“Which one of those loose-tongued fools gave you my name?” the officer snapped. “Their orders were to carry on no conversation of any sort with you, other than that necessary to bring you here.”
Milo shook his head and smiled to himself at his shrewd guess. “No one of those guards spoke to me of you, Colonel Lindsay. It was, rather, the sett of your plaid told me your clan.”
A good measure of the flush drained from the officer’s face, and his veins ceased to pump quite so furiously, even as his bushy eyebrows rose a few notches. “Is it so, then?” he said, wonderingly, while slowly sinking back into his chair of dark, ancient wood. “And what may your own clan and patronymic be then?”
“Clan Murray, Colonel Lindsay. My name is Milo Moray, but I’m not a Scot by birth, I am … rather would at one time have been considered to be an American, a citizen of the United States of America, that is. Only my heritage is Scottish, like that of a good many of my tribe out there on the prairie.”
“Say you so? Sit down, Mr. Moray. Emmett, drag one of those chairs over here for our guest and let’s at least hear him out about how he thinks we can help one another.
“Oh, don’t frown so, Emmett. This one seems at least head and shoulders above those others in intelligence, and he speaksa decent English, as well.
“Mr. Moray, I fear that I have nothing more substantial than cool water to offer you. We ran out of whiskey some time back, but of well water, we’ve plenty.”
He rapidly scribbled something short on a slip of paper with a quill pen and, after folding it, handed it to the other officer—a captain, Milo noted, probably the colonel’s aide—and spoke a few words in the man’s ear, words inaudible to Milo. The captain saluted and speedily departed, leaving Milo with the colonel and the man Emmett, who was about of an age with the older officer.
Colonel Ian Lindsay had first become aware of his daughter’s telepathic abilities when, as a child of five years, she had branded a well-meant parental lie the falsehood that it assuredly was and, when commanded by him to tell how she knew, had innocently divulged to him that she could “hear it in her head.” Other tests he had devised now and then had affirmed that with age, her rare talent had not faded away but had become both stronger and surer. But he had sworn her to silence and had never himself mentioned it to another soul. Upon a very few occasions, he had had the girl delve into the minds of men in cases in which it had been patent that one of two was lying. Just now, it was very important that he ascertain whether or not this prairieman was trying to lure him, lull him and then entrap or attack him and his weakened people. Perhaps Arabella could get to the full truth of the matter for him, and this was why he had sent for her. He was, of course, completely unaware that this strange man with whom he now was dealing was, himself, a trained and powerful telepath, with far more years of experience than Arabella or Colonel Lindsay, in fact, had of bare existence.
While the colonel talked and Milo sipped politely at the mug of cool water, he felt the first indescribable mental tickling that told him that another of telepathic ability was striving to read his thoughts.
Almost without conscious intent, he raised the barrier that shielded his mind from prying, while beaming out a strong, silent demand: “Who are you, telepath? What right have you to pry into my thoughts?”
Then, simultaneously receiving no reply and realizing that the mind that had made to enter his was open, completely lacking a shield, he penetrated it and read the answers in a matter of seconds.
Arabella, outside, in the hallway beyond the office door, leaned half swooning against the wall, her suddenly and unexpectedly violated mind in utter turmoil. What she had done to so many others over the years—both with and without her father’s leave—had now and with no slightest hint of warning been done to her! Even worse, her attempt to enter the mind of that prairie rover had been the most dismal of failures. It had seemed in a way as if she had flung herself into a brick wall.
But she was her father’s daughter, and she stood there in weak puzzlement for only a few minutes. Then she made her way down the hall to their shared quarters, armed herself and returned resolutely to the office, using the little-known, seldom utilized side door that looked from the office to be but a part of the hardwood paneling.
All three men—Colonel Lindsay, Emmett MacEvedy and Milo Moray—looked up in surprise when the secret door creaked agape and a gorgeous young woman with flaming-red hair and a worn but well-kept .380 revolver strode purposefully into the small room.
“Arabella,” began Lindsay in his best command voice, “what is the meaning of—”
But her torrent of words interrupted him. “Oh, Father, Father, he … this man, this stranger, he knows! He … he’s like me, just like me. I couldn’t get into his mind at all, but he … he got into mine! He must be killed, now!”
So saying, she held the heavy revolver at arm’s length just as she had seen her father and other officers do, then pulled the trigger, the heavy pull taking all the strength that her small hand could muster. The .380 roared and bucked so hard that she could not retain her grip on it and it fell to the floor. All three seated men were showered with granules of burning powder and so nearly blinded by first the flash of flame from the muzzle and then the dense cloud of reeking smoke from the black powder with which the piece’s cartridges had been loaded that for a moment only Milo was aware that a 130-grain lead bullet had plowed into the right side of his chest, exited below the right shoulder blade, and splintered into the backrest of the chair in which he sat.
Gritting his teeth against the pain, he silently prayed that neither of the other two men would notice that he had been hit, dealt what would have been a fatal wound to any other man in this time and place. But such was not to be. Even as many feet pounded up stairs and down corridors throughout the building, their shouts and commands preceding their arrivals, MacEvedy, furiously blinking his still-smarting eyes, gasped, “Sweet Jesus, Ian, she’s killed the poor bastard! See the powder burns on his shirt? And there’s a bleeding hole in his chest. Now what do we do?”