Redwing's Lady

“Does Aaron ever go down to the meadow?”

“Sure. He goes there a lot. To visit the horses. And it’s also his job in the evening to feed them their grain. This trail ends at a small barn. That’s where we keep our saddles and tack. Aaron plays around there at times. But I went as far as the barn and called for him. He wasn’t there.”

Her voice trembled as she answered his questions. As Daniel watched her swallow and struggle to compose herself, it was like having a knife stuck in his chest, and the blade just kept twisting and turning. The reaction to her pain was enough in itself to scare the hell out of him.

He didn’t really know Maggie Ketchum all that well. He’d talked to her three, four, maybe five times on the telephone during the Rider investigation. Also, during those long weeks, he’d had two rather lengthy interviews with her. But even those visits had not given him much insight into the beautiful woman behind the sad blue eyes. Yet from the very first time he’d seen her, he’d felt an overwhelming attraction that had only grown over the past few months.

“What about the horses?” he asked. “Did you see all of them?”

“No. At the back of the meadow there’s another grove of trees. When it’s hot, the horses are usually back there for shade. But I didn’t look, I took it for granted that they were there.”

Daniel glanced down at her feet to see she was wearing a pair of sandals. “Maybe you’d better go change your shoes to something sturdier. I think we need to walk down to the meadow and take a look.”

“All right. But what…what are you thinking? Do you think he’s left on one of the horses?”

“If I were still a little boy and I wanted to run away, that’s how I’d do it.” Taking her by the shoulder, he turned her toward the house. “Get ready. I’m going to go use the radio to call in more help. I’ll meet you back here in a couple of minutes.”

Nodding, she ran toward the house. Daniel hurried back to his vehicle to radio the sheriff’s department back in Aztec.

A few minutes later he found Maggie waiting for him by the gate. She was wearing a pair of cowboy boots and had a crumpled straw hat on her head. He was glad to see she was composed enough to think of shielding herself from the elements.

“Three more officers are coming. They’re going to comb the outer perimeters of the ranch, just in case he decided to go to a neighbor’s place,” Daniel told her.

Unlatching the wooden gate, he ushered her through. As they walked single file down the winding trail with Maggie in the lead, she said, “I just can’t believe Aaron could be so spiteful. He’s never given me any sort of problem. Not about obeying me…not with school…not anything.”

“Maybe this time he was more hurt than you realized,” Daniel suggested.

She didn’t reply. But Daniel could see her hand swiping the region of her eyes. The sight touched him, and as they hurried down the trail, he prayed the boy would show up soon.

When they reached the barn, they could see the horses grazing some two hundred yards away in a far corner of the meadow. It took Maggie only a moment to scan the herd and announce that Aaron’s horse, Rusty, was not among them.

“Let’s see if his saddle is missing, too,” Daniel suggested.

Maggie raced into the barn and jerked opened a wooden door to a small room where several saddles hung from ropes attached to the rafters. Bridles, bits, spurs, reins and other riding paraphernalia hung in neat rows along the walls. A stack of folded blankets and saddle pads filled one end of a crudely made counter running along the back wall of the small room.

“His saddle is gone,” Maggie grimly announced. She went over to the stack of blankets and ran her hands along the folds. “So are his favorite blankets. Dear God, he’s taken off on horseback! By himself!”

The idea that he’d gone off alone without her permission stunned Maggie, and all she could do was stare in disbelief at Deputy Redwing.

“Well, better that than going down to the county road and trying to hitch a ride with a stranger,” Daniel told her.

He walked out of the barn and looked down at the hard-packed earth. There were very few discernable tracks, but as he moved out away from the structure, the soil became looser and he eventually spotted small boot tracks accompanied by a set of four matching horseshoes.

Careful to stay out of his way, Maggie followed a few steps behind him and tried to keep her tears at bay. She was more than frightened now, she was angry that her son could have done something so defiant and hurtful.

“It looks like he mounted up here and rode off toward the north,” Daniel declared after a few moments. “Is there anything in that direction he might be going to? Like a cabin?”

Maggie shook her head. “No. There’re only more mountains in that direction. Ross Ketchum, my brother-in-law, runs a few cattle up there in the dead of summer when the grass is on, but other than that there’s nothing.”

Daniel glanced up at the sun. “Aaron probably left when he told you he was going to see Skinny. That means he’s been gone for hours. On a horse, he could have gotten far.”

Maggie closed her eyes for a brief, painful second. “I know,” she said hoarsely. “What are we going to do?”

“I think the best thing we can do is to saddle up a couple of your horses and try to follow his tracks. Are you up to it?”

The question prompted her to look at him. She’d only met Daniel Redwing a few months ago and she still wasn’t sure whether she liked the man or not. He had a spare way of talking that often left her trying to read his mind, and when he looked at her with those dark-brown eyes of his, she felt very unsettled, almost feverish. But he was a good lawman. She’d heard Jess, her brother-in-law, praise him many times and right now her son’s well-being depended on the man.

“Of course!” she answered. “But do you think we can catch up to him before dark?”

“Hopefully. If not, we’ll get dogs and lights. We’ll find him one way or the other, Maggie. Trust me.”

Yes, she had to trust him. Right now he was the best hope she had of finding her runaway son.

Daniel quickly whistled up the horses, and in a matter of minutes they had saddled two mounts and were headed north into the mountains. Maggie was careful to ride a few steps behind the deputy as he leaned over in the saddle and scoured the ground for any signs of Rusty’s tracks.

Most of the time the imprints were faint, and a few times they disappeared altogether, but somehow Daniel seemed to anticipate the route her son had taken and would manage to pick up the signs again.

As they climbed higher into the rough mountains, Maggie grew even more frightened for her son’s safety. Especially with the sun dipping lower and lower in the western sky.

They continued to push the horses up the steep grade, and Maggie voiced her fears to Daniel. “There’re bears up here, Daniel. If Aaron runs onto a cub and the mother is around, he’ll—” She couldn’t finish. The image was too gruesome to speak aloud.

“Bears are usually frightened by horses. I wouldn’t worry about them too much.”

She knew his words were meant to comfort, but they did little to relieve her fears. Deputy Redwing didn’t have a wife or children. He didn’t know what it was like to lose a spouse. Aaron was all she had. Now that Hugh was gone, he was the only thing she lived for. If something happened to him, she didn’t think she would want to go on, or even could go on.

Up ahead of her, Daniel suddenly pulled his horse to a stop and held up his hand in a gesture for her to stop.

Maggie pulled on the mare’s reins. “What’s wrong? Have the tracks disappeared?”

“No. Something happened here. I need to get down and take a look.”

Fear rose like bile in Maggie’s throat, but she tried her best to swallow it down. “What do you mean something happened?”

Daniel climbed out of the saddle and Maggie quickly did the same. Keeping a tight hold on the mare’s reins, she stood, waiting for him to explain. Instead he ignored her question as he stepped away from her and the horses and began to examine a nearby spot on the ground.

As she watched him squat on one knee and brush at the fallen leaves, she gritted her teeth and tried to be patient. But after a few more moments of silence, she said, “I hate to sound critical, but this isn’t the Wild West anymore. Indian scouts and trackers have been replaced with technology.”

Rising to his feet, he gave her a brief glance before he walked to another spot and carefully studied the ground. “Is that so?”

Her throat was unbearably dry, and she swallowed uselessly as she swiped a hand against her sweaty brow. “You know that it’s so.”

He came back to stand a few steps from her. Maggie breathed deeply through her nostrils as she studied his striking bronze features: the high cheekbones, the hawkish nose, the wide forehead and the strong squared jaws. He had to be somewhere near thirty, but when she looked into his eyes she saw a much older man, a man with all sorts of thoughts and secrets and dreams.

“Maggie, this land—these mountains have not changed in a hundred, even two hundred years. The horse your son is riding is still the same as the ones that outlaws and cowboys rode when New Mexico was still just a territory. Tell me, please, how technology is going to help out here, right now?”

Pink color tinged her cheeks. “Well, there are all sorts of things…like a helicopter.”

Daniel shook his head. “I’ve already thought of a chopper. The forest is too thick, they’d never get a look through the canopy of trees.”