One of the oldest of the caballeros knew something of bone-setting, and was able to set the leg when he stopped on the Pecos to water the horses. Billy yelled and screeched but didn’t faint. When he recovered, Katie tried to persuade him to ride his own horse, but nothing she could say would induce him to mount it.

“No,” he said, white-faced and grim. “That’s the horse the Tulip was talking about. She said one would fall on me if I crossed the North Canadian, and one did. I’d rather be hung right here than risk him falling backwards on me again.”

Katie made one of the caballeros switch mounts with Billy, and we were on our way.

“We need to hurry on over to Mexico,” Katie said. “Tully and half the territory will be after you this time.”

She didn’t know, at that point, about the Apache boy, or about the four mutes, her own half-brothers. It was my view that Isinglass would soon be coming, and Bloody Feathers as well.

But Katie knew enough to hurry. A terrible sandstorm blew in as we were near the Hueco Mountains; the sand felt as sharp as particles of glass, but Katie would hear nothing of seeking shelter. She put one of her men on each side of Billy to hold him on his horse during his faint periods—and on into the sand and the wind and the bitter night we went.

Long before we reached San Isidro the next day, I was only semiconscious myself—not since my stage ride across some of the same harsh country had I felt such paralyzing fatigue. I didn’t know we were descending into the Rio Grande until I felt the cold water rise above my thighs. I remember some confusion during the crossing—Billy fell off, but Katie somehow found him and towed him across the river, herself clinging with one hand to her horse’s tail.

I was so tired when we arrived in the village that I collapsed on my saddle the minute I pulled it off Rosy—I just dragged the saddle to the nearest tree and stretched out with my head on it, not even bothering to untie my blanket, which in any case was wet.

I must have slept through much of the afternoon, and then a night; it was the tinkling of the bells on the village goats that woke me in the clear dawn.

To my surprise, Katie Garza was sitting beside me, fully dressed, a rifle in her lap. She looked worried and was sipping now and then from a brown bottle of tequila.

“I’m too old for this chasing around,” I said. “No energy anymore.”

“They don’t care about you, Ben—you can nap for as long as you want to,” Katie said. “It’s Billy they want.”

“We’re in Mexico,” I reminded her. “Tully can’t come here.”