Wagon Train West by Lauran Paine

Author:Lauran Paine
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
Published: 2018-03-05T16:39:33+00:00

Chapter Ten

Kit urged his horse up ahead, far enough to be able to see the waving spring grass on all sides of the wagon train. If there were Dakota warriors hiding, he couldn’t see them. He rode like that the rest of the afternoon, and a dawning suspicion began to form in his mind. The Indians weren’t going to try and waylay them again on foot—at least not out in the open. He signaled for some of the emigrants to ride up toward him. When they came, he sent them out in sets of four, skirmishing far and wide, then he stayed where he was, watching. They didn’t scare up a single hidden buck Indian.

By the time Lige came back, looking full in the face and secretly amused about something, he was convinced his suspicion was right. “Lige, I’ve got a notion …” He stopped there, studying Lige’s beaming countenance with a slight frown. “What the hell have you been up to? Doggone you, Lige. Did you shoot off your lip back there to Allie?”

Lige’s face assumed an injured look, but his little eyes never lost their pleased, sly look. “What were you going to say, Kit?” he asked with unruffled calm.

Kit studied Lige for a moment and stifled an urge to swear at him. He straightened in the saddle and stared hard at the peaks. “I was going to say—blast your soul—that I’ve had the country up ahead scouted, and there’s not an Indian anywhere around.”

“So?”

“So I’ve got an idea that White Shield Owner and Big Eagle pulled them out.”

“Why?” Lige asked quickly. “Because they’re afoot?”

“That’s only part of it, I think. They all know they can’t match us when we’re mounted and they’re not. I’ve got a notion they’ve made tracks for the pass. They’ll have all day tomorrow to fort up there, then, when the train rolls between the bluffs, all hell will bust loose.”

Lige studied the mountains ahead somberly. He didn’t speak for a long time. Not until the sun was sliding far off center, then he shook himself like a dog coming out of a creek, took a short chew of tobacco, and spat.

“That’s about it. Well, like I said, she’s going to be hell in there, Kit.”

Kit didn’t answer.

They finished out the rest of the late afternoon riding side-by-side in deep silence. Red Houston came eagerly loping up to them with his boyish face split wide in an engulfing grin.

“Folks want to know when they should circle, Mister Butler.”

Kit raised an arm and pointed to a meandering creek that shone bloodred in the late sunlight. “Tell ’em when we get to that creek, Red.”

The boy loped back down the south wing of the wagons. Lige laughed. “Wish I was his age again.”

“Or had his feeling of adventure,” Kit said, smiling. “Well, let’s turn the leaders, Lige. They can circle when we hit the water.”

The lead wagons were ready to turn inward by the time Kit and Lige got back to them. The word had spread rapidly, thanks to Red Houston.

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