“I know.”

“He had a watch. It looked like the one you’re wearin’ around your neck.”

“I’m takin’ it home, too. Now, let’s don’t talk for a while. Let’s just ride.”

It seemed beyond reason to ride eastward when all his instincts tried to pull him south, but he recognized his brother’s wisdom. Fights with Bears would expect the escapees to flee southward. The false trail created by Steals the Ponies would bear him out.

Andy recognized that his brother was running some risk, but he felt that Steals the Ponies was wily enough to avoid being caught. At some point he would see to it that his trail came to an end. He would circle back to camp and be the picture of innocence when Fights with Bears finally returned empty-handed. By that time Andy and Billy should be beyond reach.

Daylight gave Andy his first clear look at the boy. Billy’s back showed quirt marks. His face was bruised and swollen.

“Treated you pretty mean, didn’t they?” he said.

“They wanted me to cry, and I did, a little. Pretty soon I found out that when I cried they hurt me more, especially that big ugly one. Never could figure out what his name was.”

“It’d take you a week to learn his Comanche name. In English you’d call him Fights with Bears.”

“He’s the one killed Granddaddy Vince. We didn’t know where they came from. All at once they were there. After that ugly one killed Granddaddy, I thought he was fixin’ to kill me, too. But he whipped me and tied me to my pony.”

“Figured on makin’ a slave out of you, or maybe a warrior if you showed enough fight.”

“Is that what happened to you?”

Andy searched his memory. “Pretty much. It was a long time ago.”

“You didn’t have anybody to come after you and take you back?”

“They tried, but they didn’t know where I’d be. I had some notion where I might find you.”

“I’m glad. I don’t want to live with the Indians. I just want to go home to Mama and Daddy.”

“That’s where I’m takin’ you.”

The creek gradually narrowed, its flow shallow and sluggish. Andy suspected by midmorning that it had about run its course. After several hours of traveling in a generally easterly direction he thought it should be safe to turn south. Even assuming the unlikely proposition that Fights with Bears had seen through the ploy, Andy figured he and Billy had a long lead.

He came to a bend where gravel had accumulated in times of high water. “Here’s where we’ll quit the water. We won’t leave much of a track.”

Billy said, “I’m hungry.”

Andy handed over a bit of pemmican his sister-in-law had given him. “It may not taste like your mother’s cookin’, but the hungrier you are the better it gets.”

Riding up out of the creek, Andy stopped for a long look around. He did not expect pursuit, but it would be dangerous to take too much for granted. Billy responded in kind to his concern.