The Andre Norton Megapack - 15 Classic Novels and Short Stories

Ain’t no army gonna pull ’em out an’ make ’em fight white-man style.
    “ Don Cazar—he goes huntin’ ’em when they’ve come botherin’ him an’ does it right. But he knows you think Injun, you live Injun, you eat Injun, you smell Injun when you do. They don’t leave no more trail than an ant steppin’ high, ’less they want you should foller them into a nice ambush as they has all figgered out. Put Greyfeather an’ his Pimas on ’em an’ then leg it till your belly’s near meetin’ your backbone an’ you is all one big tired ache. Iffen you kin drink sand an’ keep on footin’ it over red-hot rocks when you is nigh t’ a bag o’ bones, then maybe—jus’ maybe—you kin jump an Apache. Comanches, now, an’ Cheyenne an’ Kiowa an’ Sioux ride out to storm at you—guns an’ arrows all shootin’—wantin’ to count coup on a man by hittin’ him personal. But th’ ’Pache ain’t wastin’ hisself that way. Nope—git behind a rock an’ ambush…put th’ whole hell-fired country t’ work fur them. That’s how th’ ’Pache does his fightin’. An’ th’ spit-an’-polish officers what come from eastward—they’s got t’ larn that. Only sometimes they ain’t good at larnin’, an’ then they gits larned—good an’ proper. Hey, Kells!”
    They were at the stable and Fenner lifted a hand, palm out, in greeting to the liveryman. “Here’s Ole Tar wantin’ his special grub—”
    Drew went on to Shiloh’s stall. Reese Topham, the Spaniard Don Lorenzo who had been in the cantina last night, the stout Mexican Bartolomé, and Don Cazar himself were all there before him.
    “Here he is now.” Reese Topham waved a hand at Drew. “This is Mister Kirby, from Texas.”
    “You have a fine horse there, Kirby—the mare, too. Eastern stock, I would judge, perhaps Kentucky breeding?” Rennie asked.
    Drew was taut inside. To say the wrong thing, to admit the line of that breeding, might be a bad slip. Yet he could only evade, not lie directly.
    “Yes, Kentucky.” He answered the first words his father had ever addressed to him.
    “And the line?”
    To be too evasive would invite suspicion. However, the Gray Eagle get was in more than one Kentucky stable.
    “Eclipse.…” Drew set back the pedigree several equine generations. Shiloh tossed his head, looked over his shoulder at Drew, who entered the stall and began quieting the stallion with hands drawn gently over the back and up the arch of the neck.
    “The mare also?” Don Cazar continued.
    “Yes.” The Kentuckian’s answer sounded curt in his own ears, but he could not help it.
    “This Eclipse, amigo ,” Don Lorenzo turned to Rennie for enlightenment—“he was a notable horse?”
    “ Sí , of the Messenger line. But a gray of that breeding—” Don Cazar’s forefinger ran nail point along his lower lip. “Ariel blood, perhaps?”
    Drew busied himself adjusting Shiloh’s hackamore. This was getting close. Hunt Rennie had lived in Kentucky over a year once. He had visited Red Springs many times before he had dared to court Alexander Mattock’s daughter and been forbidden the place. His visits to the stable must have familiarized him with the Gray Eagle-Ariel strain bred there. On the other hand, horses of the same combination were the pride of several other families living around Lexington.
    “A racing line of high blood,” Don Lorenzo said thoughtfully. “ Sí , this one has the pride, the appearance. You have raced him, señor ?” he asked Drew with formal courtesy.
    “Not on any real track, señor . During the war there were no races.”
    “He wasn’t a cavalry mount?” Don Cazar looked surprised.
    “No, suh. Too young for that. He was foaled on April sixth in sixty-two. That’s why they called him Shiloh.”
    There was a moment of silence, broken by a hail from the door.
    “You there—Rennie!”
    Drew saw the involuntary spasm of Don Cazar’s lips, the shadow of an expression which might mean he anticipated a distasteful scene to come. But the quirk disappeared as he turned to face the man in the blue uniform.
    “Captain Bayliss.” It was acknowledgment rather than a greeting, delivered in a cool tone.
    “I want to see you, Rennie!” The officer stamped forward a step or so, to stand in the full light of the first lantern. He was of medium height, and his blue blouse had been cut by a good tailor, though now it was worn. He was a good-looking man, though jowly about the mouth, above