“You know what the infantry always says about the cavalry, Sergeant?” The captain unsheathed his saber.

  “About never seein’ a dead horse soldier, sir?” Florence said.

  “That’s the one, Sergeant. Well”—the captain drew in a deep breath, and let it out with a bit of a cough, or maybe it was an amen to a prayer—“today, Sergeant, I’m afraid there will be a lot of dead horse soldiers. God willing, more in blue than gray.”

  That would be unlikely, Florence knew. J.E.B. Stuart had maybe two brigades. The Yanks ahead of them had to number three divisions—ten thousand soldiers, maybe as many as twelve thousand—with better than two dozen artillery pieces. Against what was left of the finest light cavalry in the world, General J.E.B. Stuart, the South’s most dashing hero, and five thousand men.

  Sabers came out. Florence spit out his tobacco.

  “Charge!” came the command, and thousands of horses bolted toward the ramshackle little building. Rebel war cries filled the air. The Yankees answered with shots from their fast-shooting Spencer carbines.

  It was right around noon.

  Along the low ridgeline next to the road, saber met saber. Horses screamed. Carbines and pistols left the woods and road shrouded in a fog that smelled of sulfur and brimstone. Hell, indeed.

  A man rode past Florence—who couldn’t tell if the man were North or South—screaming, reins dragging as the poor, wretched man gripped his right arm with his left. Blood spurted from where his right forearm had been sliced off with a saber. He kept riding until, mercifully, bullets riddled his body and ripped him out of the saddle. The horse rode on toward the Union lines.

  Charge and countercharge. Fall back and regroup. Charge again. Dead, men in blue, men in gray, and horses of various colors littered the field, the road, the woods, and even the porch of the abandoned inn. Smoke burned Florence’s eyes. They were back at the bottom of the hill. Riderless horses thundered one way and then another, confused.

  They had been at the slaughter for three hours. It felt like three days.

  “Charge, boys, charge! We can push the Yanks back with one more charge!” It was Stuart. His horse reared, and the general waved his hat. He led the way.

  Florence spurred his weary horse after him.

  The Confederates were winning. Somehow, they were winning the fight, despite the odds, despite the numbers, despite Spencer repeaters against carbines, Colts, and sabers.

  The Fifth Michigan came out to meet them. Reins held by his teeth, Florence deflected a saber with his own, and brought back the saber, surprised to find the bluecoat lifting a pistol in his other hand. Florence still held the Navy Colt in his right hand, and he brought it up, ducking as the Yank rushed his shot. The bullet burned the back of Florence’s neck and he squeezed the Colt’s trigger. The .36-caliber ball slammed into the Yankee’s chest. The man fell off his horse, the saber rattled onto the ground, and the bluecoat’s horse bolted south toward Richmond.

  Florence’s horse went down. Spitting out the reins and kicking out of the stirrups, Florence fell into the leaves and grass. He had thrown the saber away from where he was leaping, or falling, not wanting to be speared by the weapon. He came up, still clutching the Navy, and fired again at a charging Yankee who grunted and dropped low in the saddle as the horse carried him into the trees.

  Florence looked for a horse. Grabbed at the reins of one, but missed, and hit the ground. He came up, blowing the cylinder of the Colt, hoping to clear it of dust and trash. His hat was gone. He saw a man clutching his arm as it pulsated blood. The man fell onto his back.

  Florence shoved the hot Colt into his waistband and ran to the wounded man whose eyes were rolling back in his head. Quickly, the young sergeant ripped a long silk handkerchief from a pocket of his shell jacket, wrapped it above the soldier’s arm, and tied it quickly. Drawing the Colt, he tied the ends of the bandanna around the hot barrel, and twisted and turned and twisted and turned until the bleeding stopped.

  That’s when he looked down into the eyes of the soldier. The kid had awakened. He was a Yankee. He wore the blue.

  “Here.” Florence laid the arm across the kid’s chest. He put the other hand on the butt of the Colt. “Loosen it every now and then, boy. Let it bleed a little. Then tighten it. That’ll hold you, I hope. Till some Yankee or one of our sawbones can patch you up.”

  Florence stood, searched for a horse, another gun, anything, when a bullet slammed into his back. He fell, rolled over, cursed and groaned, and saw a Yankee slide his horse to a stop. The soldier worked another round into his Spencer and drew a bead on Sam Florence.

  “Hold it!”

  Another Yank stopped his horse between the Spencer-wielding back shooter and Sam Florence.

  “The war’s that way, bub,” the other one said. “In case you haven’t noticed, we’re retreating! Get to it!”

  The soldier lowered the Spencer, then slammed the barrel against the horse’s rear, and bolted away.

  The bluebelly officer slid out of the saddle. He found a rag in one of his pockets and placed it against the hole in Florence’s back.

  “Saw what you did there, Sergeant. You ought to be a Wolverine!”

  Then the Yankee was climbing back into the saddle of his horse. He smiled, saluted, and said, “You owe me a life, Reb.” He spurred the horse and disappeared.

  CHAPTER 32

  “Why?” Grat Holden asked as they rode across Arizona.

  “My business,” Sam Florence said.

  The lieutenant and the convicted sergeant cursed, sighed, and shook their heads in exasperation . . . but they kept riding south.

  Sam Florence sighed himself.

  He remembered lying on the ground with a Yankee’s handkerchief plugging up the bullet hole in his back. He remembered seeing J.E.B. Stuart fall from his horse, shot by some Yankee trooper as he was retreating. And he remembered the surgeons and officers coming, and watching them lift the great cavalry leader and take him away. Two riders swung off their horses, and Florence thanked God that they were First Virginia boys. They helped him away. They left the Yankee with the tourniquet. He always wondered what happened to that boy.

  In Richmond, J.E.B. Stuart had died the following day. That’s when Sam Florence had known the war was over. Lost.

  As he rode between Holden and Masterson he remembered more.

  Thirteen years after Yellow Tavern, he took a job as a civilian scout. Off duty, he was in a dark adobe hut better than two thousand miles from that part of Virginia when an officer slammed through the door, walked to the bar, and slapped his hat down.

  “The best you have, amigo,” the man said. “The best liquor. The best woman. Muy pronto, muy pronto.” He slapped a gold coin and turned around, and studied the men and women in this dusty place in the middle of a dusty territory. “The cleanest woman and whatever passes for whiskey will have to do.”

  When the officer’s gaze found Sam Florence, he stopped.

  Florence set his empty glass down. The red scarf reminded him of Yellow Tavern. All those Michigan boys wore red, just like their general, George Custer, who was given command of a division after Yellow Tavern. But it was the face, the eyes, and that long hair that held Florence’s attention.

  The man raised a hand as if he recognized Florence, but wasn’t quite sure.

  Florence wasn’t certain either. “Say somethin’,” he told the newcomer.

  That’s when the cavalry trooper smiled.

  “You owe me a life, Reb.”

  Sam Florence straightened. He also whispered a soft curse.

  “But for the time being,” Jed Foster said, “a bottle of tequila will suffice.”

  * * *

  Of course, the Yanks had not given Jed Foster the Medal of Honor for saving a Rebel sergeant’s life, but they had given him one for all he had done to help save the day, and win both battle and war at Yellow Tavern back in 1864.

  That afternoon in the adobe saloon at Dos Cabezas was the only time either Florence or Foster had brought up Yellow Tavern. Neither one spent much time thinking about the past . . . or at least talking about it. Florence never mentioned that he had served in the Confederate cavalry, although his accent likely dropped a few clues. The only person Jed Foster ever mentioned was George Custer, and that name had not come up too much since Little Bighorn.

  Holden, Masterson, and Florence rode out of the canyon at that moment. The scout shook off the memories and stared ahead at the Arizona desert. They had a long way to go yet.

  He spit out the tobacco and wiped his lips on his sleeve. “We can put our horses into a gallop. Limber ’em up some.”

  They rode.

  And when they slowed to give their mounts a breather, Florence had made his decision.

  “I’ll get you boys to Rancho Los Cielos. And I’ll introduce you to a person who can get you to El Cañon de Los Delores. Whether or not Soledad Tadeo will do that for a couple gringos, I don’t know.”

  CHAPTER 33

  Crooked Nose did not like what he was about to do, but some of his braves enjoyed it. It made them feel Apache, and even better, it made them feel Chiricahua Apache. His braves were young, and, if they lived long enough, they might begin to feel as he did. Old.

  He drew in a breath, exhaled, and walked toward the Mexican his braves had captured. It had been, Crooked Nose thought, a fine raid. A burro and three mules—one butchered, and the steaks were perfect. Some money. One woman whom Badger Killer had enjoyed several times before he had sliced her throat. Four Mexicans had been killed, two more captured and tortured which made his braves even stronger. They wanted to kill the middle-aged Mexican who wore a fine pale-eyes suit and glasses that made his eyes look bigger than they actually were. The man carried many books in his black bag, but those books were filled more with what the pale eyes called numbers and not their chicken-scratch marks they used to draw what they were thinking, and what was supposed to be in their hearts.

  The books interested Crooked Nose, which is why he had made Badger Killer and the other braves bring the captive along instead of killing him down on the road north to Agua Prieta, or better yet, torturing the man until he begged to be put out of his miserable existence so that Badger Killer and the other braves could take his spirit, his existence, and his bravery . . . if he had any . . . to make them all the stronger.

  The man with the glasses had been stripped naked and staked on the rise where Crooked Nose had led his braves and their squaws. The women kept sharpening their knives, waiting for the opportunity to do their best on the Mexican still living. Apache women, Crooked Nose knew, were much better at torture than Apache braves, even Badger Killer, who was quite handy and enjoyed it more than he enjoyed killing bravely in battle.

  The Apaches had left the man’s glasses over his eyes. This they enjoyed. It made the Mexican look funny.

  Where they were camped was the highest point for miles. It was cooler, filled with trees, and the rocks jumped up in several palisades, like many, many fingers pointing to the sky. White man’s fingers. Not Apache’s. But one did not question the wisdom of Ussen, the Apaches’ Life Giver, and well . . . white was one of the four sacred colors. The Mexican’s suit was black, which also was a sacred color among Crooked Nose’s people. His tie was yellow, yet another sacred color. And his vest was made of the cloth the pale eyes called blue. The fourth of the Apaches’ sacred colors. This meant something to Crooked Nose so he had brought the Mexican to their camp.

  Badger Killer had protested. He wanted Crooked Nose to hurry up and die. Badger Killer wanted to take over the band and lead them to . . . ruin, Crooked Nose figured.

  To Badger Killer’s thinking, even worse than taking a miserable Mexican who could not see without the help of those pieces of glass he wore over his ugly eyes was the fact that Crooked Nose had cut loose the rawhide thongs that bound the Mexican’s hands and feet, had let the Mexican see all that Crooked Nose had taken in raids, and had let him take his writing stick that he called un lápiz. Crooked Nose had even drawn his knife and sliced the stick so that the gray lead showed and allowed the Mexican to make his numbers and do what he called aritmética.

  The Mexican with the glasses over his eyes had counted all the coins, all the papers, everything Crooked Nose’s braves had stolen from that House On Wheels north of the border in the land of the bluecoats, things taken from the pale eyes and Mexican miserable beings who dug in the ground for rocks to sell to other miserable beings on both sides of the border between the Mexicans, the bluecoats, and the killers of Mangas Coloradas.

  Once he had counted everything and had carved with his lead stick a number at the bottom of the second page, Crooked Nose had brought one of the old rifles used by the bluecoats to the north. It was not the rifle that Bluecoat With Golden Hair Longer Than The Hair On Some Pale-Eyes Squaws was promising to give to Crooked Nose and his war party . . . providing Crooked Nose could offer more pale-eyes money than either the miserable Mexicans or The Pale Eyes In Gray Who Once Fought And Still Hates Our Enemy.

  Crooked Nose had tossed the old rifle, what the pale eyes called a Springfield trapdoor carbine, 1873 model, at the eyeglass-donning Mexican’s bare, bloodied feet covered with cactus needles and cuts from rocks.

  “¿Cuántos?”

  Beneath the glasses, the Mexican’s dark eyes had widened. The fool did not understand how superior the Apaches were to Mexicans. Of course, Apaches had learned the language of the Mexicans. Mexicans were too stupid to learn the tongue of the Apaches.

  “How many?” the Mexican had responded in his own tongue. “Do you mean how many . . . Maybe . . . you wish to know how many of these—“he had patted the stock of the rifle the bluecoats north of the border called a Springfield carbine—“you can buy for this.” He patted the deerskin bag that held all Crooked Nose’s men had taken from pale eyes north of there and the miserable Mexicans all over the Apache country. “Is that what you wish to know?”

  Crooked Nose had not answered. He had no use talking to a Mexican more than he needed to, and he had said enough.

  The Mexican had realized this. He had scratched his earlobe, the one Badger Killer’s youngest wife had not sliced off back on the road to Agua Prieta.

  Eventually, the man with the glasses had shrugged his shoulders and shaken his head. “No mucho,” he had answered. “Lo siento.” Then he had shrugged as if apologizing and said, “Diez, doce, quince a lo sumo. “¿Quién sabe?”

  Ten. Crooked Nose had sighed. No more than fifteen.

  He’d stepped away.

  Crooked Nose breathed deep. All of that work, all of the raids, all of that time spent not acting as Apache braves but as pale eyes and Mexicans, robbing for plunder, not for glory. All of this time wasted, for Crooked Nose’s war parties had not stolen enough money to buy enough new Springfield rifles with their sticking sticks to arm the twenty-four braves who rode with him, and that did not include the six women who, many wise Apaches thought, were much braver, smarter, and better fighters than Badger Killer or his friends.

  Badger Killer would be having fun, now . . . at Crooked Nose’s expense. If he had enough tizwin, the weak Apache beer, he might even start spouting off his silly talk that he should become leader of Crooked Nose’s men, that Crooked Nose should wander off into the Sierra Madres to die or just learn to cook maize with the old Apache women.

  Crooked Nose returned and knelt by the Mexican who had told him how many weapons Crooked Nose’s money would buy. He stared at the man’s big eyes made bigger by the glasses he wore over his eyes, and Crooked Nose reached down and touched the Mexican’s shoulder.

  “Lo siento,” he said in the miserable man’s own tongue.

  But deep down, Crooked Nose was not sorry. He rose and nodded at the squaws, who began shrieking with joy and ran toward the bound Mexican, naked and sweating and scared out of his mind. They began working their knives on him.

  The Mexican screamed, but his screams would be lost among the tall rocks and the endless sky.

  No, Crooked Nose did not enjoy that. It did not make him feel brave. But, well, the man would be dead soon. Besides, he was a Mexican. And Crooked Nose hated all Mexicans.

  CHAPTER 34

  “Well, hell,” Sam Florence said as he reined in the pinto horse. He stared at the canyon ahead, shifted the tobacco to the other side of his jaw, and leaned back in the saddle.

  Grat Holden nudged his Morgan up alongside Florence and drew the Winchester from the scabbard, planting the stock on his thigh and keeping his right hand in the lever, ready.

  The canyon before them was narrow, with high steep sides of craggy boulders and a few trees. The tops on both sides looked barren, but there were plenty of nooks and crevasses just below the ridgeline for Apaches or bandits to wait. Holden studied the bottom, seeing some dead juniper trees and a few places where boulders had toppled over. It was a straight path that began a descent about halfway through. Beyond the canyon the country likely flattened out for a while. A few miles farther lay the village of Rancho Los Cielos.

  “Is there another way around?” he whispered.

  “Sure. Plenty of ways to get there.” Sam Florence spit juice onto a cactus. “East and west of here. Main road, in fact, is over yonder about three miles.”

  “If I were an Apache,” Holden said, “I’d think this would make an ideal spot to set up an ambush.”

  “I would, too,” the old scout said, “and I’m not Apache.”

  Ben Masterson eased his horse alongside Holden’s. The one-time sergeant had his Springfield cradled across his lap, gloved finger in the trigger guard and thumb on the hammer. He said nothing.

  “We could take that main road,” Holden suggested.

  “Sure. We could take the main road or follow a coyote. Could make our own road, too. It’s not like you’re going to run into any fences or farmers who don’t want you crossing their property.”

  “Then why are we here?” Masterson asked.

  Florence leaned forward, and pushed back the brim of his hat. He turned and locked his gaze on Grat Holden.