Badlands Bloodsport

The Chiricahua Mountains, Arizona, 1861—where gold and guns made for a deadly mix.

Skye Fargo heard the Apaches before he saw them, which was unusual. Apaches were as silent as wraiths when they wanted to be and they nearly always wanted to be.

Fargo could move silently, too. A big man, broad of shoulder and narrow at the hips, he wore buckskins, as did most scouts, along with a white hat turned brown from dust and a red bandanna that had seen a lot of use.

He heard yips and instantly drew rein. Some people might mistake them for the yips of coyotes or even the cries of a female fox trying to attract a male but he knew better.

They were made by human throats.

Fargo was crossing the northern edge of the Chiricahua Mountains. He was to meet in less than a week with an army officer to the east of Apache Pass. So far he’d been able to avoid being spotted by the most feared warriors in all the Southwest.

The yips were repeated. They came from over a rise to Fargo’s left. Common sense told him to ride on. But then he heard a cry of pain and he palmed his Colt and rode up the rock-and-boulder-strewn slope to just shy of the crest.

Dismounting, he flattened and crawled the last few yards and poked his head up for a look-see.

There were four of them. Stocky, muscular, bronzed, they wore breechclouts and headbands and the knee-high moccasins for which Apaches were noted. They were Chiricahuas. Only one had a rifle. The others had bows. They were smiling and enjoying themselves, as well they should be, since they were doing what Apaches liked to do just about more than anything; they were torturing an enemy.

In this instance it was a white man. His shabby clothes, the pack mule tied nearby, marked him as a prospector. An ore hound who had been brave enough, or stupid enough, to dare the haunts of the Apache in his search for gold and silver. And they had caught him.

The warrior with the rifle yipped yet again. The rifle, a Sharps, had a rope sling and was slung across his back. In his right hand was a knife with an antler hilt. In his left hand, held in his open palm, were the prospector’s eyes; the warrior had just pried them from their sockets.

The prospector wept and groaned and writhed. He was staked out, wrists and ankles. Blood and gore leaked from the dark holes where his eyes had been. He let out a loud sob. “Kill me, you bastard! Kill me now and be done with it.”

The warrior who held the eyeballs looked down at him and sneered, “Not yet, white-eye. You suffer much, eh?”

“You son of a bitch, Red Dog,” the prospector said.

Fargo focused on the warrior. The name was familiar. Red Dog hated whites with a red-hot hate. Rumor had it his wife had been raped and killed by freighters, and ever since, Red Dog had waged an extermination campaign against anyone with white skin. And since a lot of whites referred to Indians as “red dogs,” he’d chosen it as his name in defiance and contempt.

“You know not come our land, Peder-son,” Red Dog said.

He stuck the tip of his knife into one of the eyeballs and wagged it under the old prospector’s nose. “Want eye back, Peder-son? Here it be. Can you smell it?”

Pederson swore bitterly, then said, “Get it over with, you red wretch. I’ve never done you or your people any harm.”

Red Dog uttered a bark of a laugh. “You white. I red.” He dropped to one knee. “You hungry?”

“Eh?” Pederson said. He groaned and coughed. “What do you mean?”

“Have something you can eat,” Red Dog said, and poised the eyeball over the unsuspecting prospector’s open mouth.

“You wouldn’t.”

Red Dog laughed.

Fargo had seen enough. He extended the Colt, taking aim at Red Dog’s head.

Red Dog bent and lowered the eyeball until it was practically brushing Pederson’s lips.

Thumbing back the hammer, Fargo was set to squeeze the trigger when fate played a trump card. One of the other warriors must have caught the glint of sunlight off the Colt because he suddenly pointed and shouted a warning in the Chiricahua tongue.

Just like that, Red Dog exploded into motion. One moment he was hunkered next to the prospector, the next he was up and running, weaving as he ran to make it harder to hit him.

Two other warriors did the same but the fourth brought up his bow. He already had an arrow nocked and drew the sinew string to his cheek to let fly.

Fargo shot him.

The slug caught the warrior in the sternum and smashed him back. He tottered on his heels, flailed his arms, and crashed down.

The rest had disappeared.

Fargo scoured the terrain. Apaches had an uncanny ability for melting into the earth. He’d witnessed it time and time again. Warily standing, he whistled and the Ovaro came up the slope. He snagged the reins, climbed on, and descended.

In all the commotion the prospector’s mule placidly dozed.

“Who’s there?” Pederson called out. “God in heaven, be a white man.”

“Be still,” Fargo cautioned. He rode in a circle, seeking sign of the Apaches. The ground was too rocky to bear tracks. Off a ways, large boulders offered plenty of hiding places.

The skin on his back crawling, Fargo climbed down. He made it a point to hold onto the stallion’s reins as he squatted. “Pederson is your handle?”

The old prospector nodded. “Who are you? Did you kill that bastard, Red Dog?”

“I killed one but he and the rest got away,” Fargo replied. “Don’t move. I’ll cut you loose and get you out of here.” Dipping his hand into his boot, he palmed the Arkansas toothpick he carried in an ankle sheath.

“I’m obliged,” Pederson said, choking with emotion. “I didn’t catch your handle.”

Fargo introduced himself as he cut, keeping one eye on the boulders. He expected Red Dog to try and pick him off with the Sharps.

“That miserable son of a bitch has hankered to get his hands on me for a coon’s age,” Pederson said. “Always before I had my rifle handy so he thought twice about it. Today he took me by surprise.”

“That’s your Sharps he has?”

“It is,” Pederson said. “But I forgot to load it after I shot a rabbit last night. He doesn’t know that.”

“He might by now.” Fargo was surprised that the prospector wasn’t throwing a fit over his eyes. Most folks would be in hysterics. “How much pain are you in?” he asked.

“Not much at all,” Pederson said. “But it’s goin’ to take some doin’ to get used to this dark.”

“I’ll put bandages on when we’re in the clear,” Fargo offered.

“My mule, Mabel,” Pederson said anxiously. “Did they slit her throat?”

“She’s yonder, half-asleep.”

“That’s my gal,” Pederson said. “She doesn’t let anything rattle her.”

Fargo sliced through the rope on the right wrist and switched to the rope on the left.

“It’s my own fault,” Pederson said bitterly. “I let down my guard.”

“What are you doing in Apache country, anyhow?” Fargo asked, keeping one eye on the boulders. It would only take an instant for an Apache to pop up and let fly with an arrow.

“What else?” Pederson rejoined. “I’m an ore hound, ain’t I?”

“But Apache country,” Fargo stressed.

“That’s just it,” Pederson said. “Where better? You must have heard the rumors.”

Fargo had. Word was that the Apaches knew of gold and silver veins on their land and guarded the secret with their lives. How else to account for warriors who occasionally showed up at trading posts with pouches of gold or silver, eager to trade for a new rifle or knife or geegaws for their women.

“If a man’s careful enough,” Pederson was saying, “he can slip in and out of Apache land without them catchin’ on.”

Fargo stared at the empty sockets where the man’s eyes used to be and didn’t say anything.

“I know what you’re thinkin’,” the old prospector said. “But it’s worth it.”

“It’s worth your eyes?”

“To have more money than a body knows what to do with? To live high on the hog?” Pederson nodded and smiled. “What else matters?”

“A sunrise over the prairie,” Fargo said. “A high-country lake at sunset.”

“What the hell are you? One of them poets?”

“A scout.”

“Ah,” Pederson said. “A gent who always has to see what’s over the next ridge.”

“That pretty much pegs me,” Fargo admitted, and cut through a loop.

“What pegs me is gold,” Pederson said. “More than silver. More than anything.” Wincing, he lowered his arms and commenced to rub his wrists. They were raw and bleeding and would need doctoring, too.

Fargo turned to the rope around the left ankle. The Apaches hadn’t bothered to strip off the old man’s boots so he could cut without having to worry about hurting the old man.

“Yes, sir,” Pederson said. “Red Dog might think he got the better of me. But I’ll show him.”

“You should take it easy,” Fargo suggested.

“Why? Because I lost my eyes? I ain’t goin’ to let a little thing like that stop me.”

Fargo almost said, “You can’t prospect blind.”

Again, as if he could read Fargo’s thoughts, the prospector said, “I’m not licked. I can have others be my eyes for me.”

“There aren’t many who will come into Apache country,” Fargo mentioned.

“It only takes a couple,” Pederson said, and chuckled as if at a private joke.

Fargo wondered if maybe the old man’s mind had been affected. It would explain how he was taking the loss so calmly.

“Yes, sir,” Pederson said. “I know just the pair to help me. I’m already cookin’ up a way to have the last laugh on Red Dog.”

The reminder made Fargo look up. He’d taken his eyes off the boulders.

Not twenty feet away a swarthy Apache had risen from behind a boulder and was drawing back a bow string with an arrow nocked to fly.