"The sign was wrong. I saw it the first morning. The moccasin tracks pressed too deep at the heel. A man who has worn boots all his life walks hard on the heel, even when you put him in moccasins. And the arrows in the steer were fletched with glue, not bound with sinew, and the shafts were cut from a lumber pile, not from a cane brake. Someone had made Apache arrows from a picture in a book. I told Callum. He wrote it down. I told Holloway. Holloway said I was seeing what I wanted to see."
He stopped while Birch set the splint. When he could, he went on.
"On the third day the tracks went into Cañon Quemado. Holloway sent the six soldiers south to cut for sign along the old road. That left only him, Callum, and me. That night Holloway said he would ride ahead alone and look. I followed him. I am a scout; following is what they pay me for. At the head of the canyon there is a camp. Twelve men, maybe fourteen. Two freight wagons with crates. Pots of red earth and lampblack. Horsehair cut and braided to hang from a hat. I watched Holloway ride into that camp and get down and shake hands with a man in a buffalo coat. They called him Tull."
Asa's face did not change, but his hand closed on the brim of his hat.
"I went back and told Callum. He was very quiet. Then he said, I need to see the crates. I need to see whose name is on them. I said no. He went anyway. A guard saw him. He was shot in the leg, high, here." Nalté touched his own thigh with his good hand. "I carried him out. There is a seep under the rocks at the south rim, a place my grandmother's people used when they came for walnuts. I put him there with water and his coat and my blanket. He gave me the star. He said, they won't believe you, Nalté. Show them this. Then they'll have to."
The scout turned his head and looked at the star in Iona's hand.
"He was wrong," he said. "They didn't believe the star either."
Iona said nothing. There was nothing that would not have been a lie.
"At first light I rode for here. Holloway was waiting on the trail where it leaves the rocks. He had his rifle across his saddle. He said my name. Three years, he has never said my name. He says Jim. This time he said Nalté. Then he put the rifle to his shoulder and shot me in this arm." Nalté was silent a moment. "He has won the troop's shooting prize four years running. I was forty feet from him. He shot me in the arm."
"He meant to miss," Iona said.
"He meant not to kill. That is a different thing. He said, ride, and don't stop. If you stop, Tull's men will find you. If you talk, they'll hang me. Choose." Nalté closed his eyes. "I chose."
"When is the wagon company meant to die?" Asa said.
"Tomorrow. Holloway knows the company rolls at dawn for Quemado, because you sent word with the courier that it would. The wagons enter the canyon by midmorning. Tull's men come down from the walls painted. They take the stock, burn the wagons, kill who they kill. They leave the arrows and the tracks. A week later, three companies of cavalry ride up Cibecue Creek, and the beef contractor sells beef to the army for a whole campaign, and the newspaper in Tucson says it was always so." He opened his eyes. "My daughter is four. She has never seen a soldier angry."
Asa put his hat on. "Why did you come back here?" he said. "To us. You knew how they'd look at you at the gate. You'd seen it for six years."