They'd long since told one another the stories of their lives, and he was starting to feel testy every time she asked him if he'd come up with any answers yet.
When it came, like most good answers, the answer was childishly simple. They heard a distant mouth organ wailing a plaintive tune about pretty quadroons, and Godiva gasped, "Good heavens, you don't think that's some Kiowa playing like that, do you?"
Longarm drew his six-gun and fired all five shots in the wheel at the cloudless sky above. So her ears were still ringing as he explained, "Time, tide, and trail herds wait no man. But at least that Running X outfit won't ride into any ambush."
Godiva clapped her hands and said she'd forgotten about that trail drive they'd forged on ahead from. Longarm went on reloading as he replied, "I hadn't. But I never expected them to make such good time."
The mouth organ music had faded away. Longarm climbed up on a sod sill to stick his head over the top of the south wall. Sure enough, he could just make out the gray canvas top of that chuck wagon against a settling haze of trail dust. So he called down to Godiva, "They've paused to consider their options about half a mile back along the trail."
He dropped down beside her to add, "No sense offering my head up yonder for target practice, now that I have everybody placed."
She glanced at the three sweaty but saddle-free ponies across the one grassy room as she asked whether he thought they ought to try running a blue streak for those nice Texican cowboys.
Longarm shook his head and replied, "Just said I didn't want to present them with tempting targets. I don't know about the younger riders with him, but that trail boss is an old-timer who knows he's on Kiowa Comanche range. Having heard way more shots than any jackrabbit hunter would let fly, he'll likely bunch his cows in that cottonwood we passed through just before we spied this soddy. Then he'll have his best riders scout ahead until they spot this soddy. By that time those Indians will have made up their minds whether they want to stand and fight or slip away discreetly. Don't ask me which choice is more likely. Next to Kiowa, Comanche and even South Cheyenne can be paragons of sweet reason. That buffalo war that got so many Comanche killed was started by Kiowa taking the bit in their teeth and challenging the whole U.S. Army to a stand-up fight on open prairie."
Godiva started to say she'd heard the poor Indians had been provoked into that suicidal uprising of the early 1870s by nasty white men. But recent events had given her a new perspective on at least some Indians. So she held the thought for now.
A million years went by. Then, through the rising heat shimmers, Longarm spied a Texan on foot with his own saddle gun at port atop that same rise the Black Leggings riders had been on earlier. So he let fly a cattle call and stepped out in the open, waving his hat until the cowhand spotted him and waved back.
Nobody ever figured out how those three dead bodies out back had managed to vanish in broad daylight. But by the time they had it all scouted safe around the soddy, the only Indian sign for miles seemed to be one feather and a whole lot of horse apples. The trail boss had to agree with Longarm that sometimes birds just flying over had been known to drop a feather that signified nothing much.
By now the sun was getting low, and old Harry Carver, as the trail boss introduced himself more formally, decided the timbered banks of Cache Creek, just to the east, were as handy a night campsite as he was likely to find. So Longarm and Godiva saddled their ponies and rode there with Carver and the four riders he'd chosen to scout ahead with.
That chuck wagon had crawfished down off the skyline along with the cows, of course. They'd wound up in the brushy draw that ran north and south in line with the drier trail. By this time the cook and his helper had rustled up a supper of sourdough bisquits, mesquite-smoked ham, and black-eyed peas.
Everyone had time to tend their riding stock first, and to her credit and despite her prissy sidesaddle, Godiva Weaver knew how to settle her mount in for the night, although she borrowed some oats from Longarm to do so. She said she hadn't been planning on the way to Fort Sill being so far.
Longarm didn't tell her you always had to figure on an easy ride stretching out some. For he could see she'd already learned that.
As the sun went down and the crickets started chirping in the trees and brush all around, they were seated side by side on an old fallen log, eating from tin plates and sipping coffee from clay mugs while, somewhere in the gathering dusk, that plaintive mouth organ began to moan about Aura Lee. Longarm nodded at the tailgate of the chuck wagon across the clearing and observed, "They're about to serve the last of the coffee, Miss Godiva. I'd be proud to fetch you another mug, if you'd like."
She shook her hatless head and replied, "I'm afraid I'll be too wound up to sleep tonight as it is. So much has happened all in one day, and I'm just now starting to relax. You did say it was safe to relax now, didn't you? It's so peaceful down here with all this company, and I've always loved this twilight time of the day."
Longarm glanced up at the gloaming sky through the cottonwood branches and replied, "Everybody seems to. This English traveling man who'd spent time in East India told me one time the Hindu folks call this time of day the Hour of Cow Dust, and I had to agree that sounds sort of poetical too, albeit I don't see why it ought to."
She nodded and said, "I do, now that all those longhorns have settled down amid the trees after a long hot day on the trail. The dust has just about settled now. But you can still smell just a hint of it as the cool shades of evening creep in all around us. Where am I supposed to sleep tonight, by the way?"
Longarm smiled thinly and said, "In those blankets lashed to your saddle, of course. I'd invite you to climb into my bedroll if I wanted my face slapped. Harry Carver ain't asked, but I'll have to offer to stand my own turn as night picket. Finish your grub and we'll see about finding some soft ground upslope to spread out our bedding."
She didn't argue, although she seemed a tad uneasy a few minutes later as Longarm indicated a shallow hollow between two trees as her best bet to get a sort of rugged night's rest. He noted her dubious look and said, "Forget anything you might have heard about piles of leaves. Dry leaves are dusty, don't really pad a hip bone worth mention, and they can keep you awake all night as they rustle every time you twitch. A couple of thicknesses of wool over bare dirt work way better."
She asked about the still-green leaves above that were ripe for easy plucking. He shook his head and told her, "Not as much padding as you'd think. Also, they draw bugs and stain your bedding. Half the trick of sleeping on the ground is sleeping on one side or the other with your knees drawn up. It's only where you grind a bone against the firm mattress that you wind up sore."
She dimpled and replied, "Thank you for not implying I was just a trifle mature across the hips. Where will you be reclining, on one side or the other, all this time?"
His own bedroll still across the arm that cradled his Yellowboy, Longarm pointed with his chin at another clear space a few paces off and said, "I was figuring on unrolling her yonder, past that clump of rabbit bush, unless you're worried it's too close for your own comfort, Miss Godiva."
She shook her head and softly replied, "It's a little far, as a matter of fact, should anything go boomp in the night around here. Isn't it funny how glades that appear so pretty in the glow of sunset can look sort of ominous after dark?"
He said, "The almanac says we'll get at least a half- moon later tonight. I'd best spread my own bedding before I go see when Harry wants me to stand guard."
It only took him a few seconds to unroll his own bedding at an angle on the wooded slope. But once he had, Godiva was already down atop her own blankets, moving her trim but soft-looking hips in an experimental way as she decided, "I see what you meant about bones."