The Darkest Heart Read Online Free Page B

feelings were mixed and strong. On the one hand,he thought of seeing his mother again, his brother, his clan. God, it had been so long, and he had missed them.
    On the other hand, he had decided to leave three years ago, and going back would only stir up old feelings. He had become used to the path of his life—one he walked alone, torn between the two cultures.
    He had left after what was, for him, his last raid as an Apache warrior. He had been twenty-one years of age. A small raiding party of twelve warriors had gone south, looking for cattle to see them through the hard winter months. They had found three steers bearing Pete Kitchen’s brand and had slaughtered them on the spot. They were butchering the carcasses when a dozen of Kitchen’s hands had ridden up, taking them by surprise. A full-scale battle had ensued.
    And he had killed his first white man.
    They had been in hand-to-hand combat, and afterward—the man’s blood on his hands and face—Jack had gotten sick, retching violently. No one had seen, no one had known. That didn’t matter. He knew.
    He knew he could not ride with the people who had raised him and war on the people whose blood also ran in his veins. That night he told his wife, Datiye, that he was leaving—and he hadn’t been back since.
    The first town he had come to was Tucson. He had been called a breed right to his face, and he had pulled his knife furiously on that man—a white—and flipped him, prepared to cut his-throat. Usen, the Life Giver, did not preach “love thine enemy” like the white God, and his instinct was to kill. He was alone, in hostile territory. He realized this in time and caution intervened. He released the man.
    He had gone to the saloon—a one-room adobe shack with straw on the floor, a few broken stools and tables. An old Spanish woman refused to serve him whiskey until the hard look in his eyes compelled her to change her mind. Later he rode out—and hadn’t been back since.
    The adjustment had been slow and painful. He had left the Apache, yet the white people shunned him as a half-breed. Jack had always been proud of who he was—one of the fiercest warriors in the Territory—and now his pride became a hard and angry mantle that he wore defiantly in the white man’s world.
    One day in that first year he was pushed too far. He was referred to as a savage, almost but not quite to his face, and it was one time too many. The man who had defamed him quickly repented—at the feel of Jack’s knife against his throat. Moments later the saloon girl he was with asked him his name. With an amused, mocking smile, he had said, “Savage. Jack Savage.” And he had been going by that name ever since.
    As he drifted he gradually changed a few details of his dress—wearing a Stetson hat, exchanging the buckskin shirt for a cotton one, even trying to wear the white man’s boots, as painful as they were. Without the moccasins with their distinctive Apache style, he found he encountered less bigotry and hostility.
    He rode the Chisolm Trail, joining the cattle drive. He was a man, with social needs. At first he did not find any camaraderie among the crew. Their ostracism was blatant, as was their fear. Jack knew nothing about punching cows, yet he learned with fierce determination, and quickly. He worked twice as hard as any man there. Shortly after his first week on the drive, as he came in exhausted, covered with dust, slipping off his mount at the edge of the camp, prepared to eat alone, the ramrod came up to him and handed him a mug of coffee. It was a turning point. He had gained the boss’s respect, and that of the crew followed. While he hadn’t exactly made friends, and nor did he expect to, he was finally accepted.
    In Texas he did a brief stint as a scout for the army in their campaign against the Comanche. It was not uncommon for Indians of other tribes to be used as scouts against their traditional enemies. Word of Jack’s skill as a tracker spread