The Trailsman 317 by Jon Sharpe Page B

to the conclusion she was his. Now she had become a pawn in their bid to reclaim one of their own. “Is this your notion of honor?”
    â€œHonor?” the old warrior repeated.
    â€œIt is the white word for having a good heart,” Fargo said. “Is your heart good that you do this?”
    The old warrior did not like the slur. He thumped his chest with a fist. “I good man. My people good. But Skagg bad. His men bad.”
    â€œI am not one of Skagg’s men,” Fargo immediately made it clear. “You should not involve me or my woman in this.”
    â€œYour woman?” Mabel said.
    The old Untilla drew himself to his full height. “Me chief. Must do what must do.” He spoke to the other warriors and two of them came up and stood on either side of Mabel. “You go. She stay with us.”
    Mabel covered herself as best she was able with her arms. “You can’t do this!” she objected. “I have never done anything to you.”
    â€œI sorry,” the chief said, but he did not sound sorry.
    â€œI refuse to let you take me,” Mabel persisted. “If you try I will scratch your eyes out.”
    The leader addressed one of the warriors, who promptly trained a barbed shaft on Mabel’s leg. “Scratch us, we hurt you.”
    Mabel appealed to Fargo. “Don’t stand there like a lump! Talk to them! Do something!”
    There was not much Fargo could accomplish, under the circumstances. “Do you want us both dead? Go with them for the time being. I will find the chief’s daughter and swap her for you.”
    â€œBut what if something happens to you?” Mabel brought up. “What if Skagg kills you? Where does that leave me? I’ll tell you where it leaves me. At the mercy of these savages.”
    The old warrior beckoned. “You come.”
    â€œI will not!” Mabel defied him. “Do your worst. But I would rather die here and now than let you have your way with me.”
    â€œHave our way?” the chief said, evidently trying to divine her meaning. It was a full minute before he responded, and then he did the last thing Fargo expected: he laughed. “We not want you, white woman.”
    â€œYou are saying you will not rape me?”
    The old warrior laughed louder. “Never do that.”
    Mabel asked what Fargo regarded as just about the silliest question he had ever heard. “Why not? What is wrong with me?”
    â€œYou white.”
    It took a while to sink in, and for Mabel to reply, “Hold on there. Are you saying you won’t touch me because I am a white woman? That it makes me inferior somehow?”
    â€œYou white,” the chief said again.
    â€œI can’t say I like your insult,” Mabel said, completely oblivious to the fact she had done the same thing not a minute ago. “And besides, I am in my bare skin.”
    â€œSorry?”
    â€œI don’t have any clothes on. I refuse to go with you like this. I don’t know about your kind, but white people do not go anywhere without their clothes.”
    â€œYou silly,” the old warrior said. “Skin is skin.”
    â€œMaybe your kind doesn’t mind going around buck naked but my kind does,” Mabel informed him. “Get me some clothes or kill me where I sit.”
    The old warrior looked at Fargo. “She speak straight tongue?”
    â€œYes,” Fargo said. The chief had been right; she was silly. Silly enough to let them kill her over it.
    â€œWhites much strange,” was the old warrior’s judgment. Turning, he addressed the others and a younger warrior promptly lowered his bow and ran off down the mountain.
    Mabel sat up. “Where is he off to?”
    â€œTo fetch your clothes,” was Fargo’s hunch.
    â€œWell, that is something at least.”
    A strained silence fell. The Untillas were statues, the arrows of the bowmen fixed on Fargo. From high up in the mountains