The Ghost of Apache Creek

Chapter 55

Mash Lake carried a burlap sack over his shoulder, bulging with the blackened cans of food he’d scavenged from the burned-out husk of the general store. He carried his rifle in his left hand.

Beside him, Jess had a couple of blankets tied to her back and she wore a battered hat Pace had given her.

“Change your minds,” he said. “You won’t make it.”

Lake shook his head. “Sam, I’ve fit Apaches afore and I reckon I’ve got their measure. We can’t stay here, boy. We’d starve to death if’n the cholera didn’t get us first.”

Pace looked at the woman. “Jess?”

“I’m going with Mash, Sammy. This is a terrible, cursed place. I can’t stay here a minute longer.”

Her face was strained, the plea in her voice almost a sob.

“Sammy, come with us. I’ll be a good woman to you, I promise.”

Pace smiled. “I reckon not. This is where I belong.”

Jess had realized hours before that further argument was useless. Now she accepted what was happening and gave up the struggle.

“Then take care of yourself, Sammy,” she said.

Pace nodded. “You too, Jess.”

Lake stuck out a hand. “Good luck, boy. Don’t go too crazy, you hear?”

“I’ll try not to,” Pace said. He held Lake’s hand a moment longer than a handshake demanded.

He watched them go, kept his eyes on them until they dissolved into shimmering distance and passing time.

Pace knew they wouldn’t make it to Snowflake alive.

He was sure Mash Lake, an old Indian fighter, knew as well.

Maybe Jess had a different idea, but he’d never been any good at reading women and couldn’t guess what was in her mind.

She’d lived a hard, degraded life and Pace felt she deserved better than that. But worst of all, her death would go unnoticed and unmourned, and that was the greatest tragedy of all.

He looked into the distance, empty now, and lifted a hand in farewell.

“Good luck, my friends,” he said.

Pace walked along the street, past blackened heaps of charred timber, all that was left of his town. Only the livery stable still stood. The fire had been content to scorch its roof and walls and do no other damage.

He looked inside and noticed a can of red paint, and that gave him an idea.

Pace kicked out a pine board from the stable wall, then found a paintbrush. He laid the plank flat on the ground, kneeled, and wrote DANGER CHOLERA WELL.

He stood and admired his handiwork. It would do just fine.

Pace walked back to the well and laid the board across the parapet.

He nodded, satisfied. Now nobody else would drink the damned water.

The sun began its climb into the morning sky as Pace walked down the street, past the livery and in the direction of the cemetery.

Now all he could do was wait, and there was no better place than a shady spot near his wife and child.

When he reached the site of the mass grave, he unbuckled his gun and let it drop to the ground. Then he sat, his chin on his knees, and began his vigil.

The sun left and the moon found him there.

Then the sun again.

But Sam Pace did not move.

He was waiting . . . for the return of the living . . . or the dead.