The Cavalry's Call

Artemus West looked out at the thick cedar forest and despaired. He'd ridden Baccarat hell for leather to get here, but where in this vast, tree-filled landscape was the 'drowning place' that he had very little time to locate? He needed to find his brother-in-law, not his brother-in-law's corpse. Jimmy was out here, somewhere, hopefully still alive but the clock was running out for him. How was Tem going to find one concealed cistern before it was too late?

God, please help me now! he prayed. If ever Tem had ever felt the need for prayer it was at this moment, faced with an impossible task to perform that he dared not fail at. This wasn't about avenging his father's death now – this was about saving the only family he had left. It was too cruel to think that Jimmy might be close by but would die because Tem failed to see him. Might he be near enough to hear if Tem called out to him? That seemed to be Tem's only option at this point, and it was a dangerous one. If any of the smuggling gang's henchmen had stayed behind to make sure Jimmy drowned, Tem would be alerting them to his presence and making him and Jimmy both easy gun targets. On the other hand, if Tem caught one such henchman, then the slimy slug should be able to point out the 'drowning place' to him. Tem couldn't wander the entire forest and hope to stumble upon the cistern by luck. It was a chance he'd have to take. Drawing his 'borrowed' pistol to be ready for anything and scanning the distance, he called out Jimmy's name as loud as he could.

Tem waited for the response. Nothing. No smuggler took a potshot at him, but he didn't hear a response from Jimmy either. Was he still too far away? Nudging Baccarat forward another twenty yards or so, Tem tried calling out for Jimmy again. Again, nothing. Was he too late? Tem's heart began to sink along with Jimmy's chances, but then he noticed something – the slight movement of Baccarat's furry, black ears. Tem, the human, might not be hearing anything, but the black stallion had heard something. Could it be the sound that Tem was searching for? Horses were prey animals in nature, after all. It stood to reason they would have keen hearing, and Baccarat could tilt his ears toward sound in a way no human could. Daring to hope, Tem headed Baccarat in the direction the horse's ears pointed. If they were moving toward a dangerous predator, the stallion would let him know.

"Help me find him, boy," Tem leaned down to whisper to the horse. "I know I'm not the rider you wanted, but help me find him and . . . ." Tem hesitated. What kind of a reward could he promise such a fidgety, contrary animal? "And . . . I'll let you bite me as much as you want, okay? Jimmy's a good kid and he doesn't deserve what's being done to him." Tem didn't know if the stallion could understand anything he was saying, but he meant every word of it. "Please," he begged.

Tem sat up straighter in the saddle and, holstering the pistol to cup his hands in front of his mouth to amplify like a speaking trumpet, called out as loud as he could.

"Jimmy! If you can hear me, yell! I'm trying to find you!"

This time, Tem thought he heard something – a distant cry for help. Could it be . . . ? Tem wasn't sure which direction the sound had come from, but Baccarat was. Unbidden, the horse began walking forward in a straight line with Tem's hands off the reins. "Jimmy! Keep yelling! I'm coming!" Please, God, please! Another cry in response, weak but closer. Baccarat continued to stride in the direction of the voice. Now as Tem called out, he heard a shout of his common name answer back – it was Jimmy! Tem still couldn't see anything that looked like a cistern cover or a pit in the ground, but he knew he was getting closer. If only Jimmy could last long enough . . . .

"Jimmy! Keep it up! Help me find you! I'm almost there!"

For a terrifying moment, Tem heard nothing again, and then as if to make his heart skip a beat, the cries for help resumed – "Hurry!" Baccarat, as if obeying the command, trotted forward a bit faster in the direction of the sound, and as the stallion did so, Tem got the first glimpse of what he'd sought – a metal and brick grating in the forest floor. Reining the horse to a halt, Tem leaped out of the saddle and ran to the structure. The grate was heavy, but not locked or padlocked in place, and with a mighty effort he wrenched it aside and looked down into the pit below. Available light wasn't brilliant either, but looking in, he could see the sight which filled him with joy and dread at the same time. Jimmy was here, he was alive! But the water in the cistern was already up to his neck and if Tem didn't manage to get him out of there, and quickly, it was clear he wouldn't last much longer. The younger man was struggling just to keep his head up out of the water, and Tem guessed that Jimmy was already treading water as far as the shackles on his wrists would allow.

"Help me!" Jimmy called up to him. "Please!"

You don't have to beg, Tem thought. But Tem had better come up with a plan fast. He needed to climb down there – rope, yes, he had rope in his saddlebags – and pick the locks on Jimmy's wrist shackles, tie the young man onto his back in case Jimmy was too weak to hold on and . . . .

Problem. Tem had studied Archimedes in school, but even if he hadn't, he'd have known that picking the locks on the cuffs wasn't the most pressing difficulty – displacement was. If Tem climbed down into the water to free his brother-in-law, his added body mass alone would raise the water level over Jimmy's head and possibly drown him before Tem could get him loose. Tem ran to get the rope and bind a loop of it around the nearest big tree as he thought furiously what he was going to do. There had to be something . . . .

And then as if by magic, or divine inspiration perhaps, Tem remembered that there was something else he'd stashed in his saddlebags. Racing back toward Baccarat and grabbing onto the one saddlebag so furiously that the horse almost sidestepped him, Tem found what he was looking for – a rubbery cross between a horseshoe crab and a hot water bottle. Kicking off his boots and socks, grabbing and pocketing every lockpick he had with him along with one that he opted to hold between his teeth, and stuffing the 'artificial lung' down the front of his shirt, Tem began the climb down the rope into the smugglers' intended watery death trap.

"Hang on! I'm coming!" Tem mumbled, starting down the rope, although it came out more as "Hng ng M cmg!" around the lockpick in his mouth. Jimmy really had no choice but to hang on anyway, not while he was shackled to the wall of the cistern. Tem climbed down as quickly as he could, and just as he'd feared, his entrance into the water raised its level above Jimmy's nose and mouth, though not above the younger man's terrified eyes. Without sparing a word for explanation because he really didn't want to drop that lockpick, Tem pulled the artificial lung out of his shirt, unfolded it from its crumpled up position to the usable one, and put it on over Jimmy's nose and mouth as he'd seen Jimmy demonstrate. Tem hoped to heaven the device worked, since he hadn't taken the time to field test it yet. The ten-minutes of air figure Jimmy'd told them it had might not be accurate for a user who was hyperventilating from fear and exhaustion, though.

Treading water and working quickly, Tem removed the lockpick from his mouth and got to work on the shackles. The locks on them were crude things – thankfully not the kind of restraints that needed to be blasted or burned through, since that wouldn't have been possible in this waterlogged place. It was a more slippery job than Tem was used to, but not for nothing had Jim West taught the art of underwater lockpicking to his son. Accomplishing this with a frightened, moving prisoner added to the level of difficulty. As soon as Jimmy's first wrist was free, the teenager flailed about with it before Tem could grab on and wrap Jimmy's arm around his shoulder.

"It's okay! It's okay! You're going to be all right!" Tem tried to calm his brother-in-law as best he could. "I'm going to get you out of here!" Tem couldn't even imagine how awful the past few days had been for the younger man, and he couldn't blame Jimmy for being a little hysterical now. Thankfully, the words had the effect he'd hoped. The panicky thrashing stopped. The sheer terror faded from Jimmy's eyes to be replaced by something that looked like rational thought, and slower, more regular breaths took the place of ragged hyperventilation. Supporting Jimmy on one side, Tem got to work on the other cuff. He managed to pop that one open too, and now he maneuvered Jimmy around toward his back and got him to hold on to Tem like a limpet while Tem used the bottom part of the length of rope to tie the younger man onto his back. Tem had explained, while freeing Jimmy's hand, how he intended to climb the rope and get them both back up to terra firma. With Jimmy's head now up out of the water once more, the artificial lung could be removed, giving Jimmy a chance to speak again, though he had yelled himself hoarse earlier and had little to say now, except for one thing.

"You're alive," Jimmy croaked, hugging on to him tighter.

"We both are," Tem said. Thank God! Though looking up, Tem realized he might need God's help again if he were really going to get them both out of this wet hell-hole. The cistern was made up of brick walls, parts of which were slimy, but other parts of which might provide footholds, rough ones, for his bare feet to help him propel them up farther along the rope. But Jimmy wasn't the only one feeling exhaustion. Tem's arms still ached dully from his own experience in shackles over the alligator pit, and now he had a good twenty-five or thirty foot climb up a damp rope with the full weight of his brother-in-law strapped to his back. Jimmy was in no shape to manage the climb out on his own – he'd fall from the rope and start drowning if he tried. That meant it was all up to Tem to save them both. He had to do it. Failure was not an option. Bracing himself and telling Jimmy to hold on as best he could, Tem latched onto the rope and started up. Muscles that had been rough-housed and trained over the course of twenty-four years strained the seams of Tem's shirt and pants as he brought them all into play. Hand over hand, inch over inch, foot past foot, he tackled gravity, determined to keep it from winning.

Lord, I know I'm asking a lot today, but just a little more help, please . . . ?

Tem had done exercises sort of like this at the Secret Service training academy in Denver. He'd climbed on ropes over obstacle course walls with heavy, weighted sacks strapped on to his back. But he hadn't loved any of those sacks like they were his own flesh and blood. As he pulled them both up the rope, Tem could feel his arms burning, almost screaming for respite, could feel the sandpaper-like surface of the brick cistern wall abrading the soles of his feet. His body was one big, part-bruised mass of soreness. It might have wanted to give up, but Tem couldn't let it. Not until they were out of this 'drowning place.' The sky seemed so close and so far at the same time. Keep on, keep on! Don't stop now! Tem squinched his eyes shut for a moment, not wanting to look up at the taunting sunlight as he felt or heard the pounding of the blood in his ears. Had he ever been this tired? Had his arms ever felt so sore? He couldn't remember. But he had to keep going. His family needed him. Needed him to be the true son of James West that he knew he was. He wouldn't quit now, couldn't quit now. With ruthless determination, he kept on climbing higher, kept on inching his feet along the brick wall, one grip to the next. Dripping sweat freely in spite of the cold bath he'd just taken below, lungs burning, expanded chest muscles popping off a couple of the buttons on his shirt, he kept on. Upwards, ever upwards, that was the ticket . . . . As if he needed any reminders of what was at stake, he could feel his poor brother-in-law shivering, clinging against his back.

Please, Lord, help me save him . . . .

Tem thought he must be getting close to the top by now, though with his eyes still closed in sheer concentration and exertion, he couldn't be sure. What if he did open them and he was wrong? The despair would be crushing. He'd come so far, gotten through so many dangers to rescue the precious life at his back, he just couldn't stop, no matter how tired he was. He kept his grip on the rope and felt its direction curving right in front of him, taut, toward some unseen object. It had to be the tree he'd tied the rope around. He and Jimmy had to be near the edge of the cistern's top where he'd moved aside the grate covering it. They had to be close now, so close . . . .

Gasping to get more air into his lungs, Tem felt something, or rather someone, latching onto his drenched shirt and tugging him upward. He felt rather than saw the lip of the cistern entrance. The hands – woman's hands – like the rope were pulling him toward it with a desperate kind of strength of their own. He thought he knew who those hands belonged to, and that thought gave him the strength to make that last little bit of the climb that he hadn't known he had in him, heaving himself and his brother-in-law back over the ledge of the precipice and onto solid ground. Tem was covered in filthy water and slime and sweat, limbs screaming at the injustice he'd subjected them to, chest heaving, blood pounding. He felt like he was going to be ill. Barely able to see a thing as he opened his eyes again, eyes that were stinging from sweat and seeing grayness and dark spots as his strained circulation system tried to compensate, weight still heavy on his back and moving, he let those other, familiar hands tug him away from the edge of the cistern, crawling as best he could to help.

And then, just that suddenly, the ordeal was over. Amanda, his lovely, wonderful Amanda, had her arms wrapped around him and Jimmy both, holding them tight and kissing them, with tears running down her cheeks. The three of them were slumped together in a filthy mess on the forest floor. Tem wanted to say something to her, tell her how much he loved her, but he was utterly spent and couldn't get any sound to come out while his tired body sucked in oxygen as fast as it could. But life was sweeter in that moment than he could remember it feeling for a long, long time. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you . . . .

Were they saved yet? Tired and aching, Tem longed to stay here in his wife's embrace, head resting on her shoulder. For several minutes he did just that and she didn't argue either. They were together again. His family was together again. 'Here' wasn't exactly the same thing as safe, though, especially if the weapons smugglers came looking for them. He and Amanda both knew it, and Jimmy was still shivering and shocky. They all needed to get back to Wanderer II to rest, recover and plot their next move. Tem knew where at least a large chunk of the gang was quartered now. He intended to use that knowledge to put a stop to their operation and apprehend as much of it as possible before the smugglers could pull up the stakes again. First things first.

As soon as Tem caught his breath and had strength enough to stand up, he and Amanda both rose, supporting Jimmy between them. Tem hadn't the energy yet to ask his wife how on earth she'd managed to find them. He was just grateful for her presence. She'd brought the auto-mobile too, and it was close by on a dirt-and-gravel road leading into this forest that Tem hadn't even spotted. With a bare minimum of spoken communications, they maneuvered Jimmy into the vehicle and wrapped him in the picnic blanket and tarp Amanda had used to cover up a small arsenal's worth of devices of their own in the back seats. Amanda wanted Tem to squeeze into the car beside him as she got behind the driver's wheel. Bone-tired and sore as he was, it was tempting, but . . . .

"Not without my horse." He shook his head. Tem wouldn't dream of leaving Baccarat behind in a place like this – not the magnificent horse who had saved Jimmy's life! But Amanda had to agree there wasn't enough room, even with the contents jettisoned, for a 16-hand stallion. She might not like it, but she understood. That was the most wonderful thing about their relationship – they both understood one another. A thousand unspoken words passed between them as they clasped hands after agreeing to meet back at Wanderer II.

"Promise?" she whispered, her normally strong actress' voice gone shaky.

"Promise." He squeezed her hand for another moment of silent conversation before letting go reluctantly to trudge back to his horse while Amanda sped off in the motorized conveyance. Jimmy needed first aid, and Tem wouldn't have minded a little of that himself, but first he had an equine 'partner' to take care of.

Baccarat was pawing – or rather, hoofing – the ground impatiently as Tem made his way back to where the stallion waited beside the open cistern. Had the horse thought he'd be abandoned here? Ruefully, Tem realized that given his own behavior earlier, the stallion might be thinking exactly that. It made Tem ashamed to remember how close he'd come to mistreating this wondrous beast. Without Baccarat's help, he never would have located Jimmy on time. Speaking of which . . . . Tem winced as he remembered the reward he'd promised Baccarat. The last thing he needed after all else he'd endured was to get himself chewed to ribbons by an annoyed mount. But a promise is a promise, as his parents always told him, and he supposed it was the least he deserved.

"Okay," he said wearily as he approached Baccarat. "You kept up your end of the deal, now I have to keep mine." Without yet attempting to mount, Tem stood in front of the big black stallion and held himself, his arms and hands out so the horse could bite him however much it wanted. God, he was tired. Not wanting to see if his own assigned steed had hatred and contempt for such an owner and fatigued beyond words, he closed his eyes, more than half expecting to feel the teeth of the temperamental stallion clamping down on him at any minute. Instead, he felt the warm whuffle of Baccarat's muzzle sniffing him all over, as if the horse didn't know quite what to make of him, but it wasn't going to be a light snack. Then the sniffing sensation stopped – still no biting. Tem was startled to hear for the very first time his horse make a soft whickering sound. Was Baccarat laughing at him? He opened his eyes and saw something more amazing than the sound. The horse was kneeling down in front of him to make it easier for his exhausted rider to get in the saddle. Tem, too stunned and weary to refuse such an offer, mounted and gently rubbed Baccarat's soft, miraculous ears before taking the reins as the stallion rose back up.

"You," he said, "are the most wonderful horse in the whole world."

Horses couldn't talk, but Tem would have sworn that Baccarat's answering whinny was the stallion's way of saying "Of course I am!"

Laughing, Tem wheeled his horse away from 'the drowning place' and they headed back to the train at a canter.