Strongheart (23 page)

The outlaw just could not get it out of his mind that the crazy half-breed had traveled all those miles and fought so many men only to keep a promise. He just could not understand that kind of thinking. He had never been so frightened in his life, and he did not understand why. He'd known plenty of tough men.

The problem was, though, Harlance had never in all his years, with all the toughs he'd known, met a man with the heart and emotional toughness of Joshua Strongheart. Harlance hated the man, maybe because he could never be like him, not in a day. Not in a million years.

The outlaw started being more sensible with his horse. He had been riding the owlhoot trail too long to ride such a good mount into the ground. He decided he would take it easy, at a brisk but careful pace, in the climb back up to the Wet Mountain Valley. He would stop at the saloon in Westcliffe and have a whiskey. Heck, he thought, he would have a bottle of whiskey. Then he would either head over Music Pass into the San Luis Valley or maybe he would have to go Cotopaxi and go west from there.

After McMahon had heard the shooting stop and wondered if Strongheart was saddling up to pursue him, the tall warrior had lain on his back as people emerged from buildings. Blood dripped out of several gun holes in his body. The right side of his head was misshapen, and his right eye was swollen completely shut. He continued to lie on his back as wide-eyed citizens walked up slowly, and all that moved was his long, shiny hair blowing across his rugged face.

One merchant said, “I saw. The bloke killed six of them, by himself. What a shootist! What a man!”

Another looked at Strongheart and said, “What a fool. He's dead, ain't he? What's amazing 'bout that, partner?”

11

The Haven

Joshua Strongheart saw a bright light that was so brilliant it might have been blinding. However, it was not. Instead, it attracted him the way a gasoline lamp attracted moths. It kept drawing him closer, and he felt a peace that he had never felt. He also felt a very deep happiness that he could not explain. Unexplainable to him was the sense of knowing and the sense of understanding he was feeling. It was like he had the answers to many questions that would normally nag him from time to time. He felt confidently wise and discerning. It was a wonderful feeling, a true euphoria he had never felt before. Suddenly, he remembered the gunfight, and he remembered how he started laughing in it. That made him feel happy, too. It was a feeling that the gunfight itself was not important at all, but his laughter was.

Then the light beckoned him again. He looked at it and smiled softly, feeling that he would find even more contentment and love inside that light. He moved toward it, and his feelings of wonderment magnified sevenfold. The closer he got, the better he felt. Then he suddenly stopped, still looking at the light. The euphoric feelings subsided momentarily, as he felt unsettled. He wanted that tranquility in the light, but a sense of duty pulled him back away from it. He had to give Annabelle her ring, and he had to protect her, but from what? Joshua became restless. He started feeling very restless. And then he heard it. The voice. Her voice. Annabelle was calling him.

“Joshua, please come back! Joshua do not leave me now before our love is realized,” came the tearful pleas.

It was hard, but he had to open his eyes. The right one hurt badly. He felt her presence and smelled her.

“Doctor!” Annabelle yelled close by. “Doctor, he smiled!”

He tried again to open his eyes and the left one opened. He saw Annabelle's back and the back of her head, but only with his left eye. He could not open his right eye. He smiled again, and suddenly he felt himself falling, swirling back down into that murky abyss of darkness and comfort.

The doctor came into the room and held Annabelle by the shoulders as she sobbed. She threw herself against the kindly gray-haired man. He looked at the Pinkerton agent, then Lucky came into the room behind him. Annabelle had dark circles under her beautiful blue eyes, now flooding over with tears of relief.

She pulled back, saying, “Doctor, Lucky, he smiled. I told you both he would live.”

The doctor said gently, “Miss Ebert, I didn't say he wouldn't live. I said it would be a miracle if he did. Look at him.”

Lucky hated doing so himself.

They all looked at Strongheart lying on Annabelle's bed, where he had been for days now. His right eye was still swollen almost shut, and the ugly bruise from the bullet that had torn across his temple, hairline, and eye was no longer black and blue but was now yellow and brown. The swelling had gone down considerably though. His torso and legs were bandaged, and the young warrior was a magnificent specimen of muscles and sinew, but now covered with scars and new ones forming.

His legend was spreading everywhere and grew with each telling. It was the story of a man who refused to be a mongrel, but was a mighty warrior of two races. His tale was being told in the lodges of his people, the Lakota, but also in the lodges of their allies, the Cheyenne and the Arapaho, and even in the lodges of their enemies, such as the Crow. At the same time, the story was being carried from one saloon to the next, to church meetings, and other rendezvous. Everywhere, the tale of Strongheart, a man of two hearts, a will of iron, and principle of pure gold, was being told. A story of how he hunted down a simple wedding ring, a keepsake, because of one reason, a pledge to the widow of a hero, a cavalry officer who lost his life in the line of duty. Strongheart had bested many men in search of that ring, and then, attacked by six armed thugs, he did not run. He did not hide. He shot it out with six men at once, killing them all, and getting filled with bullet holes himself.

The widow now had her ring back because of his incredible courage and unquestionable integrity and tenacity. And the great young man lay lingering near death, while she tirelessly cared for him. People far and wide prayed for him. Neighbors in Canon City, like the Rudd women, took over her café and kept her recipes and good service going, while she stayed by Joshua's bed. The Pinkertons, through Lucky, gave her money, which she tried to refuse, to care for him. A saloon owner in Westcliffe and a storekeeper in Cotopaxi had come to see the young man in near funeralparlor repose, and before leaving, they had each placed large sums of money on the widow's table just to help with expenses. There was no hospital around Canon City.

Joshua rode atop Gabriel, and his hair streamed out behind him, a bald eagle tail feather attached to it, with a beaded base. He wore his Levi's and moccasins, his father's knife and his stepfather's pistol, and in his hand was his beautiful Winchester '73, but he now had it decorated with horsehair, dyed porcupine quills, and an eagle feather attached to the front stock and two red-tailed hawk feathers attached to the rear stock, near the receiver. Instead of his saddle, he sat atop a Hudson's Bay blanket, while Gabe galloped across a high mountain meadow and Joshua's father, Claw Marks, and his mother rode before him, each on matching Golden palominos. He was trying to catch up, but far behind him, he heard Annabelle's voice again, pleading. He looked wistfully at his parents and reined the mighty pinto back and looked behind him. Somewhere in the thickness of the trees was the woman he loved calling for him.

“Joshua, please come back!” came her distant cries, and they grew louder as he rode closer to the woods. “I love you Joshua. I cannot lose you, too! Come back please.”

He felt a presence. He was in a room and opened his eyes. In the firelight he saw the beautiful features of Annabelle Ebert, looking away, tears running down both perfectly formed cheekbones. He smiled again and his eyes closed.

Joshua felt warm, and the smells of the cooking fire were wonderful. He smelled bacon, egg, potatoes, apple pie, coffee. It made him so hungry he thought his throat had been slit.

He opened his eyes, and it was a sunny morning. Joshua could see from both eyes now and suddenly realized that. His eyes looked around the room. There was a table with clean sheets and towels and bandages on it. There was a washbasin and a pitcher next to it, and a bar of soap. Everything sat on lace doilies, and the room was very clean and smelled nice. He could see into another room where there was a fireplace, and he saw the edge of a table. He was in a comfortable feather bed and was covered by a down comforter. He moved it and looked down. Joshua saw several obvious bullet wounds, now unbandaged and scabbing over.

Then he heard Annabelle's voice in the other room, saying, “Oh, Joshua, will today be the day you wake up and join me?”

He said as loud as he could manage it, “Yes!”

It did not come out too strong, but he clearly heard her stop. Footsteps, and there she was as beautiful as ever in the doorway, wearing a bright dress and apron, with a smile a mile wide and the prettiest blue eyes he had ever seen set off by her jet black hair. The eyes glistened with the brand-new tears he was watching form.

“Oh, Joshua!” she exclaimed and ran forward, unable to contain herself. “I knew this day would come.”

He smiled and said softly, “Did you get the ring?”

She said, “Oh yes. God bless you. Thank you so very, very much. How are you feeling?”

“I am starved! My stomach is rubbing a blister on my backbone,” he mused.

She laughed and walked over to prop him up on several pillows from the bedside.

Bidding him to be patient, she returned with a small table with shortened legs, which she placed across his lap. Then she brought in a plate heaping with bacon, three eggs sunny side up, sliced potatoes, and biscuits. She then brought him a large cup of coffee. Strongheart ate two helpings that first meal, while she just watched him eat and smiled nonstop.

“How long have I been here?” he asked.

“Weeks!” she said enthusiastically.

“Dr. Barry Greenfield was in a store in Florence the day of the fight and was one of the first to find you. He got your bleeding stopped right away, and several told me that was what saved you,” she replied.

“How did I end up here?” he asked.

She said, “I told them to bring you here and I would take care of you.”

She looked down now, having embarrassed herself.

Strongheart said softly, “Thank you.”

Annabelle said, “You are welcome. I have been speaking to you for weeks, trying to get you to awaken. They all said you would die.”

Joshua said, “I tried to, but I think I heard you. It made me want to stay.”

“You think you heard me?”

“Yes, several times. Did you yell one time that I was smiling?”

“Yes, weeks ago. The doctor was here and your boss, Lucky. I saw a smile on your face and knew you would live,” she answered.

He said, “Your back was turned, but I opened my eyes, well one of them, and saw you.”

She said, “You did? Oh, I wish I would have turned around. Yes, you would not have seen from your right eye then. It was terribly swollen for a long time. A bullet hit you in the temple right next to your eye and tore the skin along your temple and into your hair. It is healed now, but there is a scar. It was horribly swollen on that side of your head and around your eye. Even your other eye was black and blue from it.”

Joshua said, “What about those owlhoots I had the disagreement with?”

“You killed them all! You were magnificent, folks said who saw it,” she replied. “They said you were shot to doll rags and were walking towards them shooting, and they all said you were laughing.”

He chuckled and accepted a third cup of coffee. She brought him a generous slice of apple pie.

Strongheart said, “Annabelle, you make the best food I have ever tasted. This pie is the best I have ever eaten.”

She blushed and played with her apron. She replied, “That is just because you were so hungry.”

“No,” he replied immediately. “It is because you are such a great cook.”

There was a long, awkward pause.

Finally he said, “How have I lived without food? How did I get so clean? I have so many questions.”

She said, “I have had to force-feed you mashed up food and water. I have kept you bathed.”

Joshua said, “You have seen me naked?”

She really blushed now, but then chuckled and said, “Joshua, I did not give you baths with your clothes on. It defeats the purpose.”

He laughed, and it was his turn to blush. Then he got very serious.

“Thank you for saving my life. I must have cost you a ton of money. I will pay you when I am up and about.”

She started laughing, and he wondered why. She told him about Lucky, Jerome Guy, and Zack Banta, about receiving money from all three men. She told about the women who ran her café for her, and Joshua was simply amazed that people who did not even know him had helped so much and cared so. He really felt humbled.

Joshua suddenly felt a strong urge to void his bladder and bowels. He tried to get up and his head started swimming.

Embarrassed again, he said, “I guess eating all that after so long of not eating.”

She did not say a word, but brought a bedpan over to him and a washrag. She left the room and closed a large curtain behind her in the doorway. He heard her go outside and was grateful.

Joshua slept most of the rest of that day, but the next day, with Annabelle holding his upper arm, he walked into the other room and sat in front of the fireplace in a rocking chair, wrapped in a quilted blanket. She made him hot chocolate. He ate liver for lunch and steak for dinner, and within two more days, he was feeling more alive and healthier. Strongheart wanted to try walking outside, but he saw snow on the ground.

Annabelle came in with an armload of firewood, and he said, “It is wintertime?”