Chapter 2

Abigail retrieved her rifle and went back to check on Abe. He was doing better than Abigail had feared, so she left her rifle with him while she set out after the third Yaqui. She reloaded her pistol before leaving; you never knew when you might need a bullet.

The third Yaqui had been a bit more cautious than the others. He had made some half-hearted effort to cover his trail, but Abigail had no trouble following him. He must have been the naturally cautious type because he headed for some trees and brush. Abigail could understand the trees, but it was almost impossible to use a bow effectively in thick brush. What did he have in mind? Did he plan his own private ambush with a knife attack? This seemed the only logical conclusion when she found him heading directly for the dense brush. She might have some problem countering a knife attack in the brush, but she figured that she didn't have much real choice if she was going to kill this Indian.

Abigail crouched low as she made for the brush. She held her Navy Colt in her hand, the hammer at full cock, and her finger on the trigger. This was a dangerous way to carry a pistol, but she expected to need to get off a shot in the minimum possible time, and it did take a finite amount of time to move a hammer to full cock. She was about one step away from the brush when it happened!

An arrow came whizzing by her cheek, missing her by no more than an inch. She knew immediately that the arrow had come from the trees off to her right, so she lifted her finger from the trigger and dropped to the ground. The bastard was too damned smart! He had set a trap! He had deliberately left a trail that could be followed in order to entice an over zealous Anglo into chasing him to the brush. Then he had dodged back to the trees where he could use his bow. She had been almost unforgivably lucky to be living and breathing right now. The question was, was she as good as she thought she was? Abigail would find out in the next few minutes.

She had caught a glimpse of motion among the trees when the arrow had snapped her attention that way. Still holding the gun in her hand, she inched her way into the trees. Now, the options for getting shot were reduced by the trees, though most of the trunks were not large enough for her to hide behind. The Indian had the same advantages and disadvantaged as her, except for one: he had to expose more of himself to get off a shot than she did. This should be enough of an advantage to let her live through this encounter.

Abigail had a starting point to begin her search, since the Indian had not had much time to move after she had seen him. Maybe, she could also parlay her relatively small stature into an advantage. The Indian would be accustomed to fighting men, not women, so she might be able to sneak in under his anticipated line of sight. If she remained crouched over, this might help even further. Until she got too tired to hold the posture, she would give the crouch a try.

Crouching as low as she could, while being able to move freely, Abigail set out to stalk her prey. She felt that darting from tree to tree would attract attention, since this is what she would be expected to do, so she tried, instead, to flow almost like water, slowly, from tree to tree.

There he is! Abigail snapped off a shot, though she really didn't expect to hit him. Nevertheless, it did make her feel better. The yelp of pain she heard was totally unexpected, but very gratifying. Her hope, now, was that her bullet had done more than warn him that she was alert.

Abigail started working her way toward the Yaqui's last known position. It took her over 15 minutes to get there, but she had some very good news when she finally reached that point. There was a big puddle of blood on the ground—she must have scored an important hit. Examination of the site made it look like she had actually hit the tree, instead of the Indian. But her bullet had knocked a big splinter of wood from the tree; it was almost certain that the splinter was what had wounded the Indian. If she had been lucky enough to cause a big gash, then she had gotten a lot of return on her investment of that bullet, and the amount of blood on the ground indicated that was what had happened. Furthermore, there was a trail of blood leading from the tree and heading deeper in among the trees.

She decided to take the time to reload; she really should have done it sooner, but she had been anxious to see the reason for the yelp of pain. She started off, following the trail of blood, but she was mindful, now, of the trickery with the trail earlier, so she didn't want to rush into danger. She checked both sides of her position in addition to straight ahead; she wanted to see him if the Indian tried to sneak in another shot at her.

Son of a bitch! There he was, leaning against a big rock. No, he's not leaning, he's lying across the rock! What the hell is going on? This was no time to do something stupid! Abigail holstered her Navy Colt and drew the Dragoon Colt from her waist where it was held by her belt. The Dragoon had a longer barrel, so it was likely to be more accurate for what she had in mind. She propped the pistol against the tree trunk and took careful aim, brought the hammer to full cock, checked her aim, and carefully squeezed the trigger. BANG! The recoil from the big pistol was kind of unexpected after firing a couple of shots from the smaller Navy Colt, but she still was in position to fire another shot if it was needed.

The Indian hadn't moved! Had she missed? At this range with the pistol propped against the tree, she couldn't have! But wait—the Indian should have reacted to the shot by trying to hide. Abigail was getting more confused by the minute. She returned the Dragoon to her belt and drew the Navy, before walking carefully toward the Indian. As she drew closer to the Indian, she could see that he was dead, but what had killed him? Now she could see the .44 caliber bullet hole in his chest; it had been a heart shot, but there was no blood! Therefore, he was dead before her last shot, but what had killed him?

She walked around to the Indian's side and saw the answer to her question: a big splinter was sticking out of his side! It looked like a major knife wound. She guessed that there was at least 4 inches of splinter sticking into this Indian's gut; man, that was a lucky shot! The man had bled to death, internally.

Shaking her head over her good fortune, Abigail headed through the woods back toward Abe to check on him and to tell him what had happened. She was walking near a tree and ducked to go under a low-hanging limb. Just as she ducked, an arrow flew past her back, tearing her shirt from right to left. God, she was lucky, again! If she hadn't ducked, the arrow would have caught her in the right side, probably penetrating to her lung. She probably would have suffered for 15 minutes or so before she died.

Abigail dropped to her knees and sheltered behind the tree as much as she could while she looked for the source of the arrow. She studied the terrain to her right and concluded that the arrow had to come from some rocks about 50 feet away. The only question left was how many Indians were hiding among those rocks.

Suddenly, she saw something move among the trees behind her and almost snapped off a shot, but she was able to hold up in time. It was Jack Austin, the third person to come this way after the original ambush. She waved her hat to get his attention and managed to draw another arrow in the process. Jack saw her and waved back. He had also seen the arrow come flying in her direction, so he knew to keep his head down as he joined her.

Jack asked, "What have ya seen so far? I ain't seen nothing."

She said, "Me an' Abe knocked down 3 Injuns, but he got hurt pretty bad, soz he's outta action fer this fight. I heard 1 shot a while back, soz I guess somebody got one. From what I seen and heard, I would bet on 4 dead Injuns, but we don't know how many we started with."

"I think ya're right. What've ya got here?"

"I've only drawn 2 arrows, so far, soz I don't know how many there might be in that there pile of rocks. It could be one, an' it could be a dozen, though I'd bet on 2 or 3. What do ya say we find out?"