That’s why Titus determined he would stay in the saddle as long as possible. He was nowhere near as quick and nimble on foot as his strong, young enemies would be. And he would have a decided advantage over the wounded man if he was able to run Red Coat down with his horse. Besides, he told himself as the five began to drift apart, no longer in a tight bunch, this painted pony beneath him might just serve as the finest shield of all for one or maybe two lead balls fired his way when things got close and deadly. When the guns of these enemies started to roar and their muzzles spewed jets of yellow fire back at their pursuers.
Closer and closer they got to the Blackfoot as the five continued to drift apart, two going to the right and Slays in the Night reining away with them. The other three he followed with Bear Who Sleeps. Red Coat turned to look over his shoulder, fear beginning to show in his eyes for the first time.
“You remember me, don’t you?” he screamed at the warrior.
Red Coat stared a long moment at the white man, blinked.
“Yes! I’m the one going to kill you!”
As he turned back around, Red Coat shouted something to those who rode at his side. Buffalo Horn Headdress and Yellow Paint Elkskin were busy a moment pulling at something attached to the front part of their bodies. Figuring they were dragging pistols from their belts, he prepared to duck the moment they twisted around to fire at him … but then he watched the two companions with Red Coat bring their hands to their faces. They hadn’t brought pistols!
In a moment they turned to peer back at their two pursuers, and Bass saw both had put whistles between their teeth. The sort of eagle wingbone whistle that many warriors wore from narrow thongs around their necks as they went into battle. Holding it between their lips as they charged into battle, blowing those shrill, high, keening notes of the majestic warbird, calling upon its spirit, invoking its courage and strength, perhaps praying that the cry of their whistle would turn an enemy’s knees to water.
“Not today, boys,” Titus muttered grimly. “Nothing gonna turn me away from this last fight.”
The faintly shrill sounds of those whistles drifted back on a brutal gust of wind as winter’s fury snarled past his ears with a mournful death howl—
Suddenly Buffalo Horn Headdress yanked back on his reins and brought his frightened pony around so savagely that the horse almost toppled with its rider into the soggy, icy bog of this grassy meadow, where beaver would thrive and a new generation flourish come the floods of spring. The young man’s face was one of determination as he blew on his whistle, lowered his short-barreled English smoothbore at the two advancing enemies, then slammed the heels of his thick winter moccasins into his pony’s sides.
“A brave one—this!” shouted Bear Who Sleeps.
“I only want Red Coat!” Titus screamed.
“Yes!” Bear Who Sleeps replied as he brought out his heavy flintlock pistol and raked back the hammer. “This coup is for me!”
“Shoot straight!” Titus roared at the warrior. “And your heart will be sure to follow!”
“My bones are the rocks of this earth” Bear Who Sleeps sang his high-pitched song, “and my eyes are doors to the sky! I will live always with those rocks and the sky!”
With a quick jab of the heels, Titus sharply reined his pinto to the right, away from the Crow, his eyes searching for the Shoshone and the other two Blackfoot. He found that Green-Stripe Blanket had dismounted and dropped to one knee, bringing up his rifle. But Slays in the Night was quick enough, good enough at that deadly range—firing before the Blackfoot could, tumbling the warrior onto his back as the Shoshone rode on over the dying man after that shot, pursuing Painted Robe on into the thick stands of reeds so tall they could almost hide a man on horseback.
Gunfire roared to his left, a little behind. Two shots so close together they could have been the two halves of a man’s heartbeat. Twisting around, Bass watched Bear Who Sleeps bound backward onto the rear flank of his pony, his arms flung wide as he pitched off the horse into a shallow puddle of ice-rimed meadow water. Buffalo Horn Headdress immediately leaped his horse over the body of his enemy and reined around sharply, the pony’s hooves sending up cockscombs of dirty spray at the edge of the shallow beaver pond. The eyes of the Blackfoot were trained on his next enemy as he suspended the empty firearm from the front of his saddle by a leather loop tied through its trigger guard. His other arm was already reaching behind his shoulder, pulling a bow and a handful of arrows from the wolfhide quiver strapped across his back.
Those intense, black-cherry eyes widened as Bass raced directly for him, bringing up his old flintlock as Buffalo Horn Headdress nocked an arrow against the twisted rawhide string and started to muscle it back. Scratch sensed the buck of his rifle as it fired—the half-inch-thick ball catching his enemy midchest. The bow and its lone arrow went spilling one way, the rest of the short arrows and the warrior toppled off the far side of the horse.
Yanking back on his reins, Bass skidded to a halt right over the body. The luster was gone from the eyes that peered up at him, the lips slowly releasing the wingbone whistle he had clamped between his teeth … mouthing something in silence. Then the lips moved no more.
Titus quickly jerked around, looked over his shoulder, and spotted the backs of the other two as they pushed their ponies behind the stolen horses up the long, low slope at the side of this beaver meadow, making for the saplings and stunted cedar. With a moment’s hesitation, he reluctantly opened his left hand, watching the long-cherished flintlock tumble into the icy scum of black water.
“You been a good girl,” he whispered, his eyes burning with remembrance and regret. “‘Ol’ Make-’Em-Come’ … you brung me all the way through the years ’thout ever lettin’ me down. Appears I gotta do the rest of this on my own now.”
Freeing a wild cry that raked his throat like the shards of a broken china mug some trader might use to dispense his watered-down whiskey, Titus Bass wheeled his wide-eyed, lathered pony and pounded his legs into its ribs—setting off after the last two. Stuffing the thick braid of buffalo-hair rein between his teeth, the old man yanked out both pistols from his belt.
A muffled shot rang out somewhere to his right. Must have been Slays in the Night, he figured. With a quick glance, he realized could not see anything of the others. Only the two left in front of him. They were all that mattered now. His old friend was finishing his business with these men who had stolen and killed what had mattered most to the Shoshone. Slays was having his finest moment—a redemption long coming to a man who had chosen the wrong path so many winters ago. A man who had climbed back onto his feet and owned up to his trespasses … stepping back from the brink of dishonor.
No matter now, Bass thought, Slays in the Night will die a warrior, an honorable man. His will be a life redeemed before his Creator, here in these glorious final heartbeats of a man’s existence.
That’s what it was. Redemption—
There! Yellow Paint Elkskin was leaning off his pony ungainly, suddenly lunging to the side, frantically grabbing a handful of Red Coat’s sleeve as the warrior Bass had wounded back in the Crow camp slowly keeled to the side. Try as he might, Yellow Paint Elkskin could not prevent the wounded man from falling off his horse. Red Coat flopped to the snowy slope in a patch of cedar, rolled onto his back, and kicked his legs a little. Then lay still.
With that same awkwardness, Yellow Paint Elkskin wheeled his pony above his dying companion, then faced the oncoming enemy. The warrior slowly dismounted to kneel over Red Coat. As Bass thundered down on him the Blackfoot struggled with something at the front of Red Coat’s blood-soaked sash. Yellow Paint Elkskin’s arm became a blur as it shot up in an arc, a long yellow tongue of flame spewing from the weapon in the Indian’s bare brown hand.