Saddles creaked; men watched the hills. Sweat darkened the hides of the horses. The sun was hot. The uniforms of the men were stiff with ancient sweat and dust, and their lips cracked. Occasionally a low wind moved among them, cooling and fresh like a draught of cold clear water.

Sergeant Young mopped his face and looked over at Hondo "You think he's coming?"

"I know he is."

"How much time we got?"

"Three-four hours."

"Wished the Lieutenant was up."

Hondo Lane said nothing. He knew how the Sergeant felt. They were pitifully short of officers all along the frontier.

Lane dropped back along the column, then swept the hills behind them. No sign of anything yet, but it was too soon. But once the medicine was made, Silva would not wait long. He was dangerous, but too impatient. He would be relentless and ruthless, but less shrewd than old Vittoro had been.

Behind the column the dust settled and there were only the tracks, a plain trail that nothing could remove. Not even a bad storm would wipe out that trail and behind them would be the Mescaleros and their allies.

He looked around at the parched and lonely country, then swung the lineback. There was yet time, but to hole up and make a stand would be worse than useless. They must keep going, get near enough for a relief column to reach them.

He rode after the moving train, and they plodded on wearily, pushing toward the afternoon and the rim of distant hills beyond the post, still so far, far away.

There was a brief noon halt near a water hole whose waters swiftly dwindled and died as the horses drank. No man touched any water but that from his canteen, and sparingly. The horses were all-important now, and each horse drank.

Lieutenant McKay was delirious, talking of Richmond, of the Point, and of a girl somewhere who had said no, when she could not have found a better man.

The sun was high and hot. Fifteen minutes of halt, then the column moved out. Men slumped in the saddle, weary after miles, yet knowing what was yet to come. In the wagons the cursing man had lost consciousness, and a man with a broken collarbone and a bandaged skull was singing to a mandolin the good songs, the old songs...

In the hot stillness of the afternoon they came down from the hills, their dark bodies dusty with the trail and the column swung its few wagons into a tight circle and the rifles spoke. The Indians vanished, then came again, swiftly, some on horseback, but more upon foot. The Apache was a daring runner, and he trusted his feet.

Cold eyes looked down the barrels of rifles and then men fired. Dust leaped from the hillside. An Apache stopped in mid-stride as though he had run headlong into some obstruction, and then he fell, his shrill dying cry hanging in the stillness of the afternoon long after the man was dead.

The charge ended, the rush was gone, the hillside was a barren and empty thing, alive with death. Like ghosts, somebody said. Vanished, melted into the landscape, as was the Apache way. A rifle spoke. A trooper cried out and died. Hondo rode swiftly around the inner circle. He called his orders in a low, hard voice, Sergeant Young making the other loop. The rush came suddenly, and as it did the column sprang into life and went hurtling forward, wagons three abreast, horses racing, surrounded by cavalry.

It caught the Apaches by surprise. Most of them were dismounted, moving forward among the rocks. It caught them unprepared and the tight knot of wagons and men rolled out and over the crest and down the long sweep of the valley. A mile fell behind ... two miles. Whooping Indians came up behind, firing and missing, yet racing forward.

Hondo yelled at Young and the Sergeant gave a quick command. Ten troopers swung their horses into line and dropped to the ground, to their knees. An instant they waited as the Apaches charged nearer. The volley was a solid sound, a sound that struck, and melted the advancing Indians. Swiftly the kneeling men fired again.

Leaving chaos behind them, they swung into their saddles and were off after the train.

"We'll try that again!" Young yelled.

"Won't work again," Hondo said. "They'll be scattered out now."

But some of the attackers had gone on ahead, cutting across the hills, and now they came down, pouring over the crest like a dark flood, lit by flashes of color and flame The wagons rounded again into a circle and the troopers swung down from their horses. Hondo put the b.u.t.t of his Winchester against his shoulder and fired, his shots seeking out the Apaches, firing carefully, squeezing off every shot.

Attacks began and ended. The Apache was never one to trust a wild charge. He was a shrewd and careful fighter, knowing the value of cover, moving with care, never wasting time or shots. They moved in closer, then closer.

They were elusive, targets scarcely seen. A flash of brown against the desert, then no sign of life, no movement. Worming their way closer, they used scant inches of cover for their movements. When they came again it would be from close up, their charge only a few yards. Hondo worked his way around, warning the troopers to be ready. He scattered the few men with pistols in positions to cover every yard of s.p.a.ce.

A half hour pa.s.sed. The sun beat down from a wide and bra.s.sy sky. Sweat trickled down the faces and necks of the waiting troopers. Its salt made them blink. Their rifles were hot from the desert sun.

The Apaches knew the value of waiting, and as they waited, they drew nearer. A single rifle shot sounded. A trooper had seen a flashing brown leg and fired. His shot ripped the heel from the vanishing Indian.

Silence lay heavily upon the circle. Heat waves shimmered. A man coughed, a horse stamped at a fly. There was no other sound. Hondo shifted his Colt, drying a sweaty palm. They waited, hugging their sparce cover.

Suddenly fifty hors.e.m.e.n charged over the hill. Eyes lifted to them and rifles ... and in that instant, the nearer Indians charged also. It was perfect--except for Hondo's pistol men.

There were six of them in all, but their fire was point-blank. It broke the force of the charge, and the Indians that reached the barricades were clubbed down by battering rifle b.u.t.ts. And then the hors.e.m.e.n came.

Some had gone down, but a dozen leaped their horses into the circle. One big brave lunged his horse at Hondo, his lance poised. Hondo's side step saved him and his quick grasp of the lance wrenched the Indian from the saddle. The Indian hit on the small of his neck, and as he tried to roll over, Hondo kicked him under the chin, then shot him.

A horse was down, screaming. The inner circle was a whirl of fighting men. From the outer circle came the heavy bark of rifles to prove that Indians were still coming. Lieutenant McKay was on one elbow, firing his pistol.

Hondo swung his pistol barrel at a head, heard it crunch, saw a lance aimed for him and swung aside. And then in the swirl of dust and smoke he saw Silva.

The big Indian's face was a twisted mask of fury and he leaped his horse at Hondo. The animal's shoulder hit Hondo and he was knocked rolling. Silva swung down from his horse and sprang, knife in hand. Hondo came up from the ground and his kick caught Silva below the knee. The Indian stopped in mid-stride and another Apache swept by. Hondo struck out at him and saw the man fall, then caught up his broken lance in time to meet Silva's lance. He parried the blow, then gutted the Indian as the Indian had gutted the dog.

Silva went down, the lance ripping him up, and Hondo said, "Like my dog ... you die!"

As suddenly as it had begun, the attack broke. A swarm of Apaches swept round him, and then they were gone, carrying Silva among them.

And then there was only settling dust and the moans of the wounded and the dying.

Again the wagons rolled, only now there were more wounded, now there were empty saddles, now there were more bandaged heads.

Sergeant Young dropped back beside the wagon where Hondo rode. "That hurt 'em!" he said. "We hurt 'em bad!"

"They won't bother us."

"You don't think they'll attack again?"

"Another chief's dead. We'll make the fort before they have another leader."

Angie started to bandage a wound on Hondo's arm. He handed the reins to Johnny, who accepted them eagerly.

"He's never learned to drive!" Angie protested.

"By the time we make California, he'll be top teamster." He yelled shrilly at the horses, and they moved out.

Angie finished with the arm, and held it, and all up and down the column there was only the movement of wagons rolling, the sound of horses' hoofs, and an occasional low moan from a wagon.

From far back in the column a mandolin sounded and a rolling ba.s.s started the words of "Sweet Betsy from Pike."

A long time later, when the column rolled over the long hill and headed for the parade ground, Hondo looked up from the reins he now held. He could see the flap fluttering in the wind, the troops marching onto the field for retreat, and westward the land was bright with a setting sun, and a dull rose shaded the clouds and faded away against the higher heavens, and from the parade ground he heard a bugle, its notes bright and clear.

He heard Sergeant Young's command, saw the men form up, and saw them, battered and wounded and b.l.o.o.d.y, riding proudly to the parade ground.

He saw them go, and knew their fierce pride, and their glory. But he was remembering a long meadow fresh with new-cut hay, a house where smoke would soon again rise from the chimney, and where shadows would gather in the darkness under the trees, quiet shadows. And beside him a woman held in her arms a sleeping child ... a woman who would be there with him, in that house, before that hearth.

About the Author.

"I think of myself in the oral tradition -- of a troubadour, a village taleteller, the man in the shadows of the campfire. That's the way I'd like to be remembered -- as a storyteller. A good storyteller."

It is doubtful that any author could be as at home in the world recreated in his novels as Louis Dearborn L'Amour. Not only could he physically fill the boots of the rugged characters he wrote about, but he literally "walked the land my characters walk." His personal experiences as well as his lifelong devotion to historical research combined to give Mr. L'Amour the unique knowledge and understanding of people, events, and the challenge of the American frontier that became the hallmarks of his popularity.

Of French-Irish descent, Mr. L'Amour could trace his own family in North America back to the early 1600s and follow their steady progression westward, "always on the frontier." As a boy growing up in Jamestown, North Dakota, he absorbed all he could about his family's frontier heritage, including the story of his great-grandfather who was scalped by Sioux warriors.

Spurred by an eager curiosity and desire to broaden his horizons, Mr. L'Amour left home at the age of fifteen and enjoyed a wide variety of jobs including seaman, lumberjack, elephant handler, skinner of dead cattle, a.s.sessment miner, and officer on tank destroyers during World War II. During his "yondering" days he also circled the world on a freighter, sailed a dhow on the Red Sea, was shipwrecked in the West Indies and stranded in the Mojave Desert. He won fifty-one of fifty-nine fights as a professional boxer and worked as a journalist and lecturer. He was a voracious reader and collector of rare books. His personal library contained 17,000 volumes.

Mr. L'Amour "wanted to write almost from the time I could talk." After developing a widespread following for his many frontier and adventure stories written for fiction magazines, Mr. L'Amour published his first full-length novel, Hondo, in the United States in 1953. Every one of his more than 100 books is in print; there are nearly 230 million copies of his books in print worldwide, making him one of the best-selling authors in modern literary history. His books have been translated into twenty languages, and more than forty-five of his novels and stories have been made into feature films and television movies.

His hardcover bestsellers include The Lonesome G.o.ds, The Walking Drum (his twelfth-century historical novel) Jubal Sackett, Last of the Breed, and The Haunted Mesa. His memoir, Education of a Wandering Man, was a leading bestseller in 1989. Audio dramatizations and adaptations of many L'Amour stories are available on ca.s.sette tapes from Bantam Audio Publishing.

The recipient of many great honors and awards, in 1983 Mr. L'Amour became the first novelist ever to be awarded the Congressional Gold Medal by the United States Congress in honor of his life's work. In 1984 he was also awarded the Medal of Freedom by President Reagan.

Louis L'Amour died on June 10, 1988. His wife, Kathy, and their two children, Beau and Angelique, carry the L'Amour tradition forward with new books written by the author during his lifetime to be published by Bantam well into the nineties -- among them, four Hopalong Ca.s.sidy novels: The Rustlers of West Fork, The Trail to Seven Pines, The Riders of High Rock, and Trouble Shooter.

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[28 Aug 2002] (v1.0) proofed and formatted by NickL.

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