Wild Splendor

* * *

Kit Carson awakened with a start. He rose up on an elbow, finding his nightshirt drenched with perspiration. He glanced at the nightstand beside his bed, where a candle wick floating in the melted wax still burned. His nose wrinkled at the scent of medication from several half-empty bottles on the table.

Then he was aware of something else—a woman on the other side of his bed, her hand now cool against his brow.

He turned to her, eyes wide. “Sally?” he said. “Good lord, Sally, how long have I been here like this? My recollections are vague about everything right now.”

“You’ve been slightly out of your head with a raging fever,” Sally explained softly. “But now it’s gone. Your flesh is finally cool. You asked how long you have been so ill? I’ve even lost track of time. I have hardly left your bedside. It was a way to say thank-you for everything that you’ve done, not only for me and Adam but also for Leonida and Sage.”

Kit’s eyes widened and he bolted quickly to a sitting position, knocking Sally’s hand clumsily away. “God,” he said. “Sage!”

He gave Sally a quick look. “I left orders for Sage to be left alone,” he said, frowning. “I hope Harold heeded them.” He nodded toward the door. “Sally, go and tell Harold that my fever has broken and that I am lucid again. I need to talk with him. It’s urgent.”

“Sir, Harold’s been gone almost as long as you’ve been raging with fever,” she murmured. “He took a good portion of the soldiers with him. It is rumored that he might be going to look for Sage. I must admit, this was another reason I stayed so steadfastly at your bedside. I desperately wanted to get you well again. You are the only one who can stop Harold. But still, Kit, you are not well enough to ride, even if your fever has broken. You must be so weak.”

Kit’s face reddened with rage, his eyes narrowed, and his nostrils flared. “That goddamn idiot,” he said, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. “That bastard! Doesn’t he know a direct order when he hears it? What does he think he’s doing, refusing to listen to reason about the Navaho? But I must remember—it’s not the Navaho who made him leave the fort in a frenzy. It’s Leonida. He just won’t let go.”

Sally rushed to her feet and went to the other side of the bed, gasping when Kit tried to stand, then fell back onto the bed as his knees gave way.

“Kit, you’re too weak,” Sally said, going to him and trying to steady him as he again determinedly placed his feet firmly on the floor. “You can’t go anywhere in this condition.”

“Nothing’s stopping me,” Kit growled. He brushed her helping hand away, smiling grimly when he finally succeeded at standing on his own. “I’m going after Harold. If I have to search up one side of this land and down the other, I’m going to find the scoundrel. If I have to be tied into the saddle to continue the search, damn it then, so be it. I gave Sage my word. No one is going to make me a liar.”

“Kit, let me send for a soldier,” Sally said, wringing her hands nervously. “Tell him where to go. Please don’t try to do this yourself. You are already weak. The sun will kill you.”

“Hand me my clothes,” Kit said, leaning his full weight against the bedpost at the end of the bed. “Then leave. I’ll manage just fine after that.”

Sally scrambled around the room and gathered up his clothes, gave them to him, and left in a flurry.

Kit dressed shakily, yanked on his knee-high boots, slapped his guns and holster around his waist, then flopped a hat on his head.

He grabbed his rifle and sauntered from the room, weak but yet holding on by sheer will. He welcomed some bread and cheese that Sally gave him as he walked without stopping toward the door. Eating these, he went out in the courtyard.

Soon he had enough men rounded up to travel. He left scarcely enough there to protect the fort, yet he saw no other choice in the matter.

Sally and the women filled all of the saddlebags with enough food to last several day

s and hung large canteens of water over the saddle horns of the saddle.

Kit mounted, gasping for breath with the effort. He shook off a moment of light-headedness and settled himself in the saddle, then saluted the soldiers who were being left behind and left.

Among this entourage of soldiers was a Navaho scout who was paid well for his services to the army. He knew this land, surely as well as Sage, Chief Four Fingers, and all renegades. If anyone could find Harold and the soldiers, he could.

The Indian scout led the soldiers, and Kit forced himself to sit square in the saddle, even though waves of weakness kept washing over him.

Hours passed. Day turned to night. They stopped to eat and get a few winks of sleep.

Early the next day they traveled on. The morning came in muted pinks, oranges, and grays. The desert stretched out before Kit in the hazy light.

He did not question the scout about traveling now in the desert. He seemed to be an expert at tracking as well as scouting and to know where he was going.

As the sun rose to high noon beating down upon Kit, dizzying him, he thought he saw something ahead through the haze of heat, something stretched out along the sand, unmoving.

Suddenly the scout raised a hand for everyone to stop. He rode back and edged his horse closer to Kit’s. “Death lies in the sand ahead,” he said in a monotone.

“Do you think it’s . . . ?” Kit began, but the scout interrupted him. “I will ride ahead and see, or you can accompany me there,” the scout said.

“I’ve come this far,” Kit said. “I may as well go the extra mile.”