Chapter 4 - Rattlesnakes Don't Strike Twice
By three in the afternoon, the wind turned northeast, smelling of rain that would never fall. Ethan was down in the lower section of the south corral resetting a tamarack post that the steer had knocked out of plumb. The earth was packed caliche—white, limestone-hard clay that bounced a spade back into a man's wrists until his palms blistered.
A sharp, dry rattle came from the rock pile beneath the oak roots thirty feet up the ditch.
Ethan stopped his pry bar mid-lever. Out here, a Western diamondback was standard inventory, but this rattle wasn't the steady, nervous buzzing of an alarmed snake. It was three short clicks, a pause, then two longer strokes—rhythmic, metallic, deliberate.
He dropped the timber and stepped toward his horse, which was tied to the hitching rail with the Winchester in the saddle boot.
Before he took his third step, a shadow separated itself from the cedar trees.
Nahimana wasn't carrying her skirt like a woman; she had looped the fringe up into her woven belt to free her knees. In her right hand she held Ethan’s skinning knife, the eight-inch blade ground so thin the blue temper showed through the edge. In her left, she carried an old cavalry bridle with the curb chain dangling loose.
"Don't reach for the scabbard," she said without raising her voice.
"You're making a habit of giving orders on land you don't own," Ethan grunted, keeping his weight balanced on the balls of his boots.
She didn't answer. Instead, she swung the bridle by the cheek strap, letting the iron bit whistle through the air, and smashed it down into the hollow under the tamarack root.
There was a dry, wet thud. When she lifted the bit, a four-foot diamondback lay twitching, its head smashed flat against the gray rock, its yellow coils knotting and unknotting in the dirt. But she didn't look at the snake. Her eyes were fixed on the bridle bit.
Tangled in the iron ring was a square of greasy oilcloth, tied with horsehair string.
Ethan stepped past her, the shovel forgotten, his boot coming down hard on the tail of the dying reptile to pin it. He leaned down and cut the horsehair with his thumb knife.
Inside the oilcloth was a single paper cartridge, .44 caliber, and a brass token stamped with the number 7.
"The Dutchman’s store," Ethan muttered, turning the token between two dust-caked fingers. "That's an account slip from Luke Vogel’s dry goods in Tucson. They only give these to teamsters hauling contract freight for the Indian Agency."
Nahimana dropped the bridle into the dust. "They know where the cattle are. My father didn't send you north because the canyon trail was blocked. He sent you this way because this is the old salt road. Vogel’s freighters use it twice a month."
Ethan looked at her, his eyes narrowing into cold slits. "You knew this was down here."
"I knew the snake wouldn't be alone," she replied, her chest rising and falling beneath the buckskin. "A scout from the Agency came through before the dust storm. He left the mark under the stones to show the wagons where to turn. My father told them I was dead three weeks ago. He burned my mother’s wickiup to prove it. If they find me here with your cattle, Ethan Miller, they won't just hang you for a horse thief. They will burn this valley until there isn't a blade of grama grass left to feed a grasshopper."
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From down the draw, two miles toward the valley road, the faint, clear crack of a whip sounded against the hot air.
The freight wagons had left Tucson early.
