As they continued riding the rest of that day, Karla kept eyeing the knives her captors wore in belt sheaths, ankle sheaths, sheaths hanging from leather lanyards around their necks, down their backs, or protruding from boot tops. One man even wore a small bone-handled knife in his hat, Karla noticed when he’d doffed the low-crowned sombrero to wipe sweat from the band.
Most of the men wore at least two knives, prominently displayed. Who knew how many more they were wearing, secreted away in their clothes?
With that many knives around, Karla should be able to get her hands on at least one.
She mulled the idea until the group stopped at noon the next day. She was freed to tend to nature and, squatting down behind rocks, saw something bright lying in the red gravel ten feet away, between two scraggly pinions. When she finished her business, she glanced around and, seeing that the man instructed to keep his eye on her was smoking and talking to another man to his right, stole over to the object and looked down.
Her heart skipped a beat.
What she found herself staring at was an Indian arrow—sun-bleached and cracked but with a razor sharp, flatiron head. She glanced around again. The two men behind the rocks were still talking. Quickly, she crouched down, plucked the arrow off the ground, and broke it over her knee, making the break as close to the head as she could.
She stood, slipped the sharp tip and four-inch length of broken arrow into her right front pocket, pulled the long shirttails from her jeans, and arranged them over the pocket, concealing the elongated lump. Turning, she strode back to the horses.
The chinless, stubby-nosed man assigned to watch her stared at her suspiciously, his carbine crossed in his arms. “What were you doing over there?”
“What do you think?”
“What was that cracking noise?”
“I stepped on a twig,” Karla said, rolling her eyes as she brushed past the man, whom she’d overheard being called Snipe. “Don’t get your shorts all in a knot.”
When the group stopped again that night, bivouacking in a deep sand gorge, the girls were again tied in a string at least a hundred feet away from the men. As the altitude was higher here, the nights colder, Willis had been ordered to build them a small fire. Water was more plentiful here, too, so each girl was given a cup of coffee to wash down her serving of the antelope, which a couple of the scouts had shot earlier.
After they’d each been freed to tend to nature, and when their fire had been banked and they’d each been given a blanket, they all curled up and went to sleep. All except Karla.
She lay awake listening to the men getting drunk and singing and laughing around their fire on the other side of the gorge, just beyond some rocks and brush. They’d run into more whiskey traders earlier, so if things went like the last time they’d traded scalps for whiskey, they’d probably all be sleeping like March lambs within a few hours. One man had been sent to guard the girls, but he’d apparently had a good portion of mescal over supper. Sitting against the high rock wall to Karla’s right, he was having trouble keeping his head up. He took frequent sips from a small flask he’d produced from his boot well.
Lying on her side, curled beneath her single blanket, Karla watched him through slitted lids. Even before the other men had turned in for the night, the guard was sound asleep, chin on his chest, hat fallen onto the rifle resting across his thighs.
When both fires had burned down, and the men’s snores competed with the coyotes’ yammering, Karla rolled onto her left side. During the last time the men had untied her, she’d hidden the arrowhead up her right shirtsleeve. Jostling her arm until the arrow fell into her palm, she nudged Billie with her other elbow.
The girl groaned but remained asleep.
“Billie,” Karla whispered, nudging her again, “wake up.”
The girl’s eyes opened, and she tensed with alarm. “What?”
“Shhh,” Karla said. “I have a plan to get us out of here. Are you awake enough to listen?”
Billie turned to face her, blinking. “What’re you talking about?”
“I promised Marlene I’d get her back to her family, and I aim to keep my promise. Are you ready?”
“What . . . how . . . ?”
“I found an arrow sharp enough to cut through the ropes.” Karla turned a glance at the guard, who had now rolled onto his right shoulder, snoring.
Turning to Billie again, and keeping her voice down, Karla said, “They’re all drunk. Once we get all the girls untied, we can put bridles on the horses and ride out of here. If we’re very quiet, I think we can do it.”
Billie rose up on her left elbow. “How will we know where to go?”
“We’ll head north until we find a ranch or a town . . . anyone who’ll help us get back to the border.” Karla spared another glance at the guard. “These drunks’ll probably sleep until dawn. By the time they find us gone, we’ll be a good five or six hours away.”
Billie turned from Karla to regard the camp beyond the brush and the rocks. The fire had died down, but enough flickering light remained to silhouette the men slumped along the base of the rock wall. Not far from the firelight, the towering walls enshrouded the gorge in chill velvety darkness.
Billie turned to Karla. “All right.”
“Roll over,” Karla said, “and extend your wrists as far back as you can.”
As Billie rolled one way, giving her back and tied wrists to Karla, Karla rolled the other way, giving her own back and tied wrists to the girl. Sliding as close to Billie as she could, Karla took the girls hands in her own, traced the rope with her fingers, then took the arrowhead between the thumb and index finger of her right hand, and began sawing at the rope.
It was a long, tedious process, for the rope was stout, and the arrow wasn’t as sharp as a good bowie or skinning knife, like those worn by the hardcases. Lying with her back to what she was cutting, with her hands tied, cut off the blood flow. Her fingers stiffened quickly and she had to clasp the arrowhead in her palm several times, and rest. Precious time was wasting. She hadn’t thought it would take this long.
She was about two-thirds through the rope when the guard snorted suddenly. Karla had been staring at the ground as she worked, jaw tensed, but she lifted her gaze to the man now. He’d lifted his head and seemed to be looking this way. It was too dark for her to see him clearly, but she thought his mouth opened.
“I told you the money was good in that little bank,” he grumbled thickly. “Didn’t I tell you, boys?”
Karla lay still, clasping Billie’s hands in her own to keep her quiet. Karla could hear her heart beating. She stared at the hardcase. A minute later, his head collapsed, and a half minute after that, his snores resumed, blending with the others on the other side of the canyon.
Karla went back to work on Billie’s rope, and a minute later, her fingers stiff and swollen, she sawed through the last of the hemp strands. The rope gave, and Billie’s wrists sprang free.
“You did it!” Billie whispered.
Karla relaxed her tired muscles, resting her head on the ground, catching her breath. “Now free me,” she whispered to the girl behind her. “The arrow’s in my hand.”
Billie scrambled onto her knees and plucked the arrowhead from Karla’s right palm. Billie placed one hand on Karla’s shoulder and sawed at the rope with the other—choppy, uneven strokes. The knots were too tight for even the hardcases to work loose with their fingers; they always cut the rope. Billie grunted and gasped with effort, jerking Karla’s shoulders back and forth. But since she had full use of her hands, it wasn’t long before Karla felt the rope give.
Scrambling onto her knees, she ripped off the remaining rope from both wrists, then tugged and pulled and squeezed until she had her ankles free, as well. She squeezed Billie’s arm. “I’ll be right back.”