The Stranger at the Fence
The Arizona borderlands in August were not merely hot.
They were merciless.
At three o’clock in the afternoon, the land around Cold Springs seemed to tremble beneath a sky so bright that looking at it for too long made a man’s eyes ache. Heat shimmered above the alkali flats, creating false lakes in the distance. Mesquite bushes stood twisted and exhausted beneath the sun, their yellow leaves dropping onto cracked clay. Far beyond the ranch, the Dragoon Mountains rose like a broken wall of red stone, their higher slopes holding a thin line of pine that seemed impossibly distant from the furnace below.
Corvin Torne had learned not to complain about the heat.
Complaining did not make water appear.
It did not make cattle stronger.
And it certainly did not make the frontier kinder.
At thirty-eight, Corvin had already acquired the weathered appearance of a much older man. His face was narrow and deeply lined around the eyes. A pale scar crossed his left eyebrow, a souvenir from his years as a cavalry scout. His hair had begun to turn gray at the temples, and his hands were permanently rough from three years of cutting timber, repairing fences, handling horses, and forcing a living from land that most sensible men had refused to claim.
He owned three hundred acres north of the San Pedro River.
It was not beautiful land.
It was rocky.
Dry.
Difficult.
Broken by limestone ridges and patches of prickly pear.
But it contained something more valuable than gold.
Water.
At the center of Corvin's property stood a deep natural limestone sinkhole. Somewhere beneath it, an underground spring pushed cold water upward through layers of stone. Even during the worst droughts, the spring continued to feed his well.
That well had become the heart of his life.
His horses drank from it.
His cattle survived because of it.
And several neighboring ranchers secretly depended upon it when the creeks farther south dried into chains of muddy pools.
Corvin knew that.
More importantly, other men knew it too.
For nearly two years, Harlan Vance had been trying to buy Cold Springs.
Corvin had refused every offer.
Vance had begun politely.
Then he had become threatening.
Finally, he had become dangerous.
But Corvin had spent too many years around soldiers and killers to be easily frightened by a rich man in an expensive coat.
So he remained.
That afternoon, he was hauling another bucket of water from the well when his dun gelding made a strange sound.
Not a frightened whinny.
Not an alarmed snort.
A low, uncertain nicker.
Corvin stopped.
The rope was wrapped around his hand.
He slowly looked toward the western fence.
At first, he saw nothing unusual.
Then he noticed what appeared to be an abandoned animal hide lying against the bottom rail.
He narrowed his eyes.
The hide moved.
Once.
Then again.
Corvin lowered the bucket.
His right hand instinctively drifted toward his revolver.
He did not draw it.
Instead, he studied the surrounding ridges.
Nothing moved.
No dust.
No horse.
No rifle glint.
No birds suddenly taking flight.
The silence felt wrong.
Corvin picked up his Winchester and walked toward the fence.
With every step, the shape became clearer.
It was a person.
A woman.
She was lying against the pine rails, almost completely motionless.
Corvin stopped several yards away.
She was Apache.
He knew it immediately from her clothing and the distinctive turquoise necklace around her throat.
But he had never seen anyone like her.
She was enormous.
Even collapsed against the fence, she appeared powerful. Her shoulders were broad, her arms long and heavily muscled, and her hands were large enough to make Corvin's own calloused fingers look small.