Chapter 4

The next man in line was much more of a challenge. He was kneeling, instead of lying in the prone position, so he was in a position to swing his rifle around toward me if I was not careful. My approach had to be from far enough toward his back so that he would not see me out of the corner of his eye. The problem with that was there was a tree in the way. I studied the situation and realized that I could make the tree an ally, instead of an enemy.

I placed myself so that the tree was directly between the Indian and me. I had to move relatively slowly to be sure that neither of the other two Indians would notice me, but I finally was in position. I drew back the war club in preparation for a swing, then I leaned around the tree and swept the club around as hard as I could to hit the man just below his ribs on his right side with the head of the club.

I was afraid to hit him on the ribs because there was the possibility of a broken rib acting like a dagger and ending the man's life too soon. On the other hand, a blow where I had in mind should drive all the air from his lungs and paralyze him for a minute or so. One or more internal organs should rupture from the impact, so that all I would need to do is to keep him from attacking me or warning his friends. I didn't have much time, but my initial plan worked to perfection. I dropped as close to the ground as I could get to keep from being seen while I used my knife to blind him. That should keep him out of the way long enough for me to attack the next man in line.

The third Indian was also firing from the prone position, so I attacked him the same way as I did the first man in line. The results were the same, so I was now ready to take on the fourth man. This time, I did not have to worry about alarming someone else nearby, so I had more freedom of action. I wished that I knew which of these men was Yarno, as I would like to give him some special attention, but I did not have the time or the opportunity to inquire.

It now made no difference whether or not I used my gun, so I took that safer route. At this range, I was not going to miss. My first shot tore into his right shoulder and smashed the bone to splinters. Being right handed, the Indian was now functionally helpless, so I had time to shoot both knees and his other shoulder. He was now literally helpless, so I left him to his fate.

I reloaded my pistol before returning to my horse to swap the war club for the rifle. All of the Indians' horses were collected in the grove of trees, so I knew that they would not escape me. I drove the horses out into the surrounding fields where they would be all right, but would be difficult to recover in a hurry. Now I could concentrate on the eight remaining Apaches.

The other Apaches had not noticed me because I had not yet left the trees. Therefore, I had time to plan my attack. My biggest worry was that I might be shot from the house as I ran across open country. Well, I couldn't help that, and I would just have to trust to luck.

The simplest way for me to eliminate the remaining Apaches would be to start with the nearest one and to work my way from there, much as I had done with the four men in among the trees. The first man I went after was crouched behind a pile of cut logs, probably intended for the kitchen stove. When he was ducking for cover, he was on his hands and knees, and this made his ass an irresistible target. He rose to a kind of kneeling position to shoot and dropped to his four-point stance behind the logs.

I would have dearly loved to put a bullet up his ass hole, but even I am not that good a shot, especially since he was wearing a loin cloth that hid his ass. Nevertheless, I was only about 30 yards from him, so I decided to take a chance with my first shot. I assumed the prone position to steady my aim as much as possible, and I aimed for where I figured his ass hole should be. He moved just as I fired, dammit, so I missed his ass hole, but the bullet tore into his balls and cock instead.

The effect was the same from my point of view, so I didn't fool around. He fell to the ground and writhed in agony. I was certain that he was out of the fight for the duration, so I looked for my next target. This bit of carelessness almost cost me my life.

I had not given my latest victim enough credit. He managed to twist around and point his rifle at my general direction. He actually got off a shot, but he missed. Nevertheless, I was awakened from my false sense of superiority and shot him in his right shoulder. Of course, I could have just as easily killed him, but that was not a part of my plan. Just to be on the safe side, I shot him in the left shoulder, too. Now there was no way that he could shoot, and the wound in his crotch was going to keep him on the ground until he died.

The next man in line was hiding behind a small outbuilding, possibly the privy. He was standing and not at a good angle for me to shoot him anywhere except in his side. I put a bullet into his hip. From the way he jumped just as he fell, I think that the bullet must have deflected off the top of his pelvis and angled up into his abdominal cavity. I fired twice before I hit exactly where I wanted on his right shoulder. Another shot broke his left knee, so I was satisfied with that hit. I wrote him off as functionally dead and looked for my next victim.

Were it not for the powder smoke coming from a window, I would have had a lot of trouble spotting my next man. He was inside a shed and shooting through an open window. There were two windows, and he would move back and forth between the windows. I guess that was to escape the accumulating powder smoke. I have no idea how intentional it was, but he had made my attack difficult because he had closed the door when he entered the shed. That meant that I was forced to go in after him.

I was able to get to the back of the shed relative to the house without exposing myself to shooting from there, but this was the last time I was going to have such an easy time moving from place to place. My next trip was going to be across open ground about 100 feet to the next shed where an enemy was sheltering. I would have to signal the house before making that run, and I hoped that I would not give myself away to the Indians when I did it.

Fortunately for me, the entry door was facing away from the house, so I was able to reach it and stand beside it in relative safety. I propped my rifle against the wall and took my revolver in hand. I checked to make sure that there were six rounds in the cylinder before I went after the Indian inside.

I had no way of knowing where the Indian was as I went through the door, so I jerked it open and dove to the floor. I rolled along the floor until I could see where the Apache might be. Of course, he heard me coming in, so he had swung around to face the door and was pointing his rifle about waist high as he turned. Thank God, that was over my head as I rolled along the floor. I snapped off a shot when I finally saw him and managed to hit him in the gut.

The impact and pain from the .44 slug was sufficient to make him fall back against the wall and give me a chance to shoot him in the shoulder area. Unfortunately, in a way, my shot was a little too low and too far toward the center to count as a shoulder shot. The bullet smashed some ribs and entered a lung. With those two wounds, the Indian was in no condition for further fighting, so I could write him off.

Now my problem was what to do about the shooting from the house. I knew that no Apache was going to wear a White man's hat, and I hoped that the people in the house remembered that. I waved my hat in the open window and drew a bullet when I did. Fortunately, it missed, but I waved my hat again to see if the message got across. This time, no shot was fired in my direction, so I took a chance and stood in plain view in front of the window. I was trusting my luck, again, but it had not failed me so far. I saw a wave from the house, so I figured that I was safe enough from them. I waved at the next shooter and pointed to myself, and I got another wave from the house. OK, I could make the run.