Rusty could have told him there were not enough rangers to be everywhere and protect everybody. The war back East had drawn away too many of the state’s fighting-age men. The ranger desertion rate had risen to alarming levels, partly out of fear of being conscripted into Confederate service and partly because the state treasury was as bare as Mother Hubbard’s cupboard. Even on those rare occasions when a paymaster visited the frontier companies, he never brought enough money to pay the men all that was due them.

It was futile to try to explain that to a man who had just lost so much. “We’ll bury your dead,” Rusty said, “then I’ll send a couple of men to escort you and your boys to Fort Belknap.”

The farmer set his jaw firmly. “We’ve got nobody at Belknap. Everybody we have is here, and here we’re stayin’.”

“You’ve got no roof over your head.”

“We saved part of the cabin. We can rebuild it. You just stay on them red devils’ trail.”

Rusty saw only the man and the two boys. Fearing he already knew, he asked, “What about your womenfolks?”

The farmer cleared his throat, but his voice fell to little more than a whisper. “They’re here.” He knelt beside one of the covered forms and lifted the scorched blanket enough for Rusty to see a woman’s bloodied face. The scalp had been ripped from her head. “My wife. Other one is our little girl. The Comanches butchered them like they was cattle.”

“How come they didn’t get the rest of you?”

The farmer looked at the two boys. They still carried water to throw on the cabin though the fire appeared to be out. “Me and my sons was workin’ in the field. The heathens came upon the cabin so quick they was probably inside before Annalee even saw them. I hit one with my first shot, and they drawed away. All we could do for Annalee and the baby was to drag them outside before they burned.” He looked at the ground as if ashamed he had been unable to do more.

Rusty was undecided whether settlers like Haines who remained on the exposed western frontier were brave or merely foolhardy. Either way, he would concede that they were tenacious.

Ruefully the farmer turned his attention back to his wife and daughter. “Conscript officers decided to pass me by on account of my age and my family.” He cleared his throat again. “I wish they’d taken me. My family would’ve moved back to East Texas and been safe.” He gave Rusty a close scrutiny. “You’re a fit-lookin’ specimen. Why ain’t you in the Confederate Army?”

“I figured I was needed more in the rangin’ service.”

The Texas legislature had fought and won a grudging concession from the Richmond government to defer men serving in the frontier companies. But the agreement was often ignored by conscription officers who raided the outlying companies and took rangers whether or not they were willing to go. Those drafts had increased as the Confederacy’s fortunes soured and its military ranks were decimated by battlefield casualties. So far Rusty had avoided the call, though he had a nagging hunch that time was closing in.