The Wildest Heart

“I hardly think we’d have friends in common, mister. And I’m not making this trip to make new friends.”

He scowled, deflated. I think he would have said something else if he hadn’t noticed the unfriendly looks that Emma Jensen and I directed at him.

We traveled on in silence, while the sun grew hotter as it rose higher in the sky. There was a shotgun guard beside the driver because we carried silver on the coach. I could hear the voices of the soldiers calling to each other occasionally. I had traveled this road before and as it had been the first time, everything seemed peaceful. We were following roughly the course of the Rio Grande, the river that seemed to cut New Mexico Territory in two sections. This was cattle country too, the same kind of scenery I had grown accustomed to in our valley. I looked forward to arriving at the fort, to changing my clothes. I remember feeling thankful that I had not worn corsets in this heat. Why did women force themselves to put up with such discomfort in this climate? Perhaps I was fortunate that I was slim enough so that my figure did not actually need the tight constriction of whalebone and stays.

I remember thinking all these things while the sun rose higher overhead and even the swaying, jouncing motion of the coach seemed conducive to drowsiness.

One moment I had begun to nod, trying to ignore the perspiration which had already begun to bead my forehead. The next minute there was a loud thud against the side of the coach, which began to sway even more violently.

Almost simultaneously we heard shots and the shouts of the soldiers.

“What the hell!” the middle-aged rancher leaned forward to look out of the window, and I heard him give a strange choking sound. His body seemed to be flung backward, and Emma Jensen screamed, her mouth open. An arrow protruded from his throat, his eyes stared, and he continued to make those horrible, strangling noises for a few seconds longer.

“Better get down on the floor!” the older woman said and, hardly thinking, I dragged Emma off the seat, to crouch down as best we could in the cramped space.

The round-faced man was muttering to himself in a loud, wailing voice. “’Paches! Oh my God, my God!”

“No use prayin’—why don’t you get your gun out and start shootin’?”

It seemed as if the only calm and practical person in the coach was the woman who had been so silent.

Emma was still screaming; in fact I think she would have attempted to throw herself from the coach, which was now creaking and jouncing from side to side quite alarmingly, if I had let her. I tried to keep her still by throwing my body over hers, and now the other woman practically reached over and slapped the poor girl’s face.

“Only way to stop hysterics, and it ain’t going to help us any, her screamin’ her head off.”

I felt dazed myself. Meeting her eyes, I saw her give a slight shake of her head.

“Feel how fast we’re going? An’ the sound of shots is droppin’ back. Better brace yourself real good, because I think we ain’t gonna make the next turn in the road.”

“Woman, you don’t know what you’re talkin’ about!” the fat man panted, his eyes round with terror. “We’re gettin’ away from them!”

The dead man rolled off the seat onto him, spewing blood, and he screamed with fear.

“God!”

I think his voice was the last thing I remembered clearly for some time. One wheel must have hit a rock, or some other obstruction on the trail, for suddenly we were all bounced into the air, rolled helplessly against each other, and the next moment the coach tilted alarmingly. There was a tremendous crash, and I felt myself falling, rolling, screams echoing in my ears. The horses? Emma? Or had they been my own screams? I was never to know.

When had I closed my eyes? Why did my head ache so? Why hadn’t the screaming stopped? When I opened my eyes to a steady, monotonous screaming, I looked into a brown, expressionless face with painted stripes of black and white across it. I thought I was having a nightmare, and that if I closed my eyes again everything would disappear.

Someone said something in a deep, guttural voice, an

d even though I could not understand what he said I knew it was a command. And then there was another voice—female, urgent.

“For God’s sake, wake up! And try to pull yourself together, or they’ll kill you!”

I opened my eyes again and looked into the small black eyes of the Apache. His hair was black and lank, hanging to his shoulders. He wore a red headband. I noticed all this without taking my eyes from his face.

He said something to me and made a jerking movement of his head. I realized, even in my present dazed state, that he was telling me to get up. How many bones had I broken? I knew that I had fallen and had rolled for a long distance after the door of the coach burst open.

But I was alive. Why didn’t Emma stop screaming?

“Get up!” It was that other woman again. Why did she sound so angry?

I struggled to my feet somehow, feeling my hair slip heavily down over my shoulders. Oh, God—now they would scalp me. The Apache made a grunting sound and grabbed at my arm. Had they scalped Emma already? Was that why… and then, turning my head, I saw that it was not Emma who screamed in that terrible, animal fashion. Poor little Emma Jensen would never see her Johnny again. They had left her lying where she had been thrown, with a broken neck. But I would not—could not—believe what they had done to the men, two of whom were not yet dead.

I was thrown onto a horse, the Apache warrior who claimed me as his prize holding me with one arm around my waist. He had tied my wrists in front of me and I could smell the rank smell of his sweat and the oil he had used on his body.

My skirts were torn and bedraggled, I had lost my hat, and there were great splotches of blood all over me. Jewel was as badly off as I was, and she had a long scratch down the side of her face.