Buck was too cold to actually feel the rawhide ties biting into his wrists, but they angered him. It was not the first time he'd been tied, and each time he had resented it as an insult and an injustice. He preferred unfair odds when he was getting beat up in a back alley to the indignity of bindings. He was caught, outnumbered, injured, and had nowhere to go, yet these things were not enough for his captors; they had also to hobble him like an unruly animal.
In his head, Buck knew they were being careful, and that any group of men believing themselves to have captured a murdering horse thief would have done the same. But his heart was not interested in what his head knew, and his heart raged against a cage of any kind.
Making matters worse were Lee and Amos Glassner, who seemed to have a concentrated dislike for Buck that they just couldn't keep to themselves. Buck had eventually gathered that Amos was the father of Billy, whom he'd met the day before. That's when it started to make sense. Billy had said Indians had burned the livery his father owned, and apparently Buck was to be blamed for it.
Apparently the fact he'd been late to the Waystation on account of the spotted mare throwing him and running in without him was sufficient to convince the whole mob he'd had the time (not to mention the inclination) to go off stable burning, and that maybe setting the fire was what had spooked the mare and caused her to throw him off. It was absurd, but then mob hysteria always was.
Hank, who'd helped them run him down, apparently felt obligated to return to his station. He left the mob with the advice to keep a tight hold on any horse they put Buck up on, warning them that there wasn't anything an express rider couldn't do with a horse once on its back, with or without reins. He wasn't far wrong about that either. All the Riders had come with a bag of tricks, to which Teaspoon had added hearty contributions, and they had additionally pilfered and perfected each other's tricks.
But they weren't putting him up on an express pony, which was something of a key ingredient.
You could be the greatest rider in the world, but you couldn't make a horse do something he didn't know how to. Many of the express ponies had learned hard and fast mere weeks out of the wild, but they learned well, and (as far as Buck was concerned) were cleverer than any cart horse or cow pony, so you could teach them on the fly. And you had to. What an express rider didn't know about riding wasn't worth knowing, but what an express pony didn't know about being ridden couldn't be taught.
"Get up on that horse," Lee demanded.
The horse Lee had returned with was more than a full hand taller than the biggest of the express ponies, a huge overgrown black Thoroughbred of a horse with nervous ears and worried eyes. Buck didn't want to be near him, never mind on him. One rattle of a snake's tail and that horse would throw his rider and bolt for home, probably hit a branch on his way back, trip, fall and break his own neck. Buck had never been scared to get on a horse before, but this animal was enormously bigger than any he'd ridden, and him with no way to control it once he was up there between his bound hands and near worthless left leg. He looked at the horse, then at Lee, then at the horse again uneasily as it sidled its hindquarters back and forth even as Amos held it by the head.
"I said get!" Lee said, grabbing Buck by the shirt collar and shoving him into the horse's flank.
With a squeal, the horse danced sideways and tried to bolt, dragging Amos a few inches before being stopped, while Buck staggered, tried to keep his balance, shifted too much weight to his bad leg and fell to the ground. Rather than calculate that he wasn't handling this very well, Lee turned on Buck and lit into him like it was his fault they were trying to put him on a spookish giant. The beating probably would've continued indefinitely, but the mob's commander had noticed it.
"That's enough!" the man exclaimed, but Lee ignored him so he grabbed Lee and hauled him back. "I said stop it!"
Lee backed off and went in search of his hat, which had fallen off, snarling. "He don't wanna get up on that fool horse, Charlie. I was just tryin' to lick some cooperation into him. It's a long way to Ditchford to have him fightin' with us the whole way.
"And a lot longer since you decided to bring Nero," Charlie told him with a nod towards the black horse. "He's the only horse in Ned's string savager than an Indian."
Still on the ground, wiping blood from his split lip with the back of his hand, Buck rolled his eyes. That horse wasn't savage, he was scared out of his mind at the slightest leaf blowing, and probably lashed out when he was cornered because of it. Apparently Charlie Harlow didn't know anything more of horses than he knew of Indians. If anyone had asked him, Buck would have preferred a vicious horse to a fearful one. A vicious horse could be depended on to keep his head in a fight for his life. A spooky one could get you killed before the fight ever even started.
"You help Amos hold that horse, boy," Charlie instructed Lee. "I'll get him up on it."
Charlie went to pick Buck up, but Buck twisted out of his grip and glared fire at him, preferring to get himself off the ground than let one of these men touch him. Charlie, at least, respected that much. It wasn't so easy for Buck to get up, considering every muscle was stiff, every joint sore, and he'd just taken a fresh beating that put bruises on top of the bruises he already had, but especially where the pinto had kicked him. Jolts of pain shot hip to knee in that leg, and he could feel his own heartbeat throbbing where the hoof had impacted muscle and bone.
Noticing the way Buck favored that side, Charlie opted to humiliate him by pointing it out, even if for a good cause, turning to Lee and saying. "With that leg, he probably can't get up on Nero by himself. Did you ever think of that? Or is your blood so hot for revenge you can't think at all?"
"I still say it'd be easier to just hang him right here," Amos said, chiming in for the first time.
"Easier in the moment, perhaps," Charlie snapped. "But how many nights would you lie awake after, wondering how you ever let yourself sink down to his level? No, we're going to Ditchford, and he'll stand trial there for what he's done. He'll be hanged soon enough, but it'll be done legal."
Buck snorted and looked away from the men to avoid saying something that would just get him thrashed again. Legal, lynching, what was the difference to him? Either way, they were sure to hang him and feel good about it while they did it.
Charlie might've been older and a bit too heavy for his own good, with gray and thinning hair, but he still had what it took to practically lift and throw Buck into the saddle of that black Thoroughbred once they got the animal to stand still, and then Lee tied him onto the saddle horn.
"Let's go," Charlie told Amos. "Before your brother finds a new way to waste time. If we get a move on, we should be able to get to Ditchford before nightfall."
The first they knew Buck was in trouble back at Sweetwater was the next morning.
"Rider up!" Kid called, holding Lou's black mare for her as she swung up into the saddle, then stepping back so Lou could turn the mare and gallop out to meet the incoming Rider, who ought to have been Buck but was instead Travis Pimms, a rare Rider to stop in Sweetwater because of how close his station was. Usually he made a variety of fussy, odd, short runs rather than the standard long ones.
Kid caught his breathless horse for him when he came in. "Where's Buck?"
"Probably about to Ditchford by now," Travis answered as he slid off the back of his bossy roan horse. "Your boy's in a heapin' mess of trouble."
For a long moment, Kid stared at Travis, as if to be sure he wasn't making fun, before yelling out, "Teaspoon!"
A few minutes later, everybody was out listening to the story Travis had brought them, a story Travis had picked up from a Waystation keeper after he'd been sent out to find a missing mochila and, if possible, the Rider meant to be accompanying it. He'd found a dead pinto and a torn up gully with a mochila buried in it, and gone to the nearest station for a fresh mount to continue the journey of the mail. He'd allowed himself to be delayed by the keeper, who told him that the express rider that had been on that pinto had been arrested, and was on his way to Ditchford for a fair trial.
"Buck really is in trouble," Teaspoon mused once Travis finished the account. "Fairest thing he'll find in Ditchford is the weather."
"How do you mean?" Jimmy asked.
"Well, why do you think they didn't take him back to the fort or town where he allegedly burned a stable?" Teaspoon answered the question with a question.
"Dunno. That's why I'm askin'," Jimmy replied.
"Because at the fort they know express riding. Knowing where he'd come from and when would tell them whether or not he'd've even had time to set a fire, never mind any reason. Folks in the town where the fire happened might include a witness or two that could clear him, or know somebody else who might have motive to set the fire and frame him," Teaspoon said, then shook his head. "Not in Ditchford. In Ditchford, well… they're apt to convict him before they try him."
"On account of his bein' Kiowa?" Jimmy guessed.
"Jimmy, not everything wrong in the world is about white men and Indians," Teaspoon said a trifle impatiently, then sighed. "No, it'd be on account of his not bein' local."
"I don't follow," Jimmy admitted.
"I'd say it's about the same thing," Kid observed before Teaspoon could answer. "Us versus Them, right? Just they draw the lines differently than we do here."
Teaspoon started to tell him that sounded about right, but was distracted noticing Ike leading a saddled horse out of the barn. The horse was reluctant to leave its snug bed, and Ike wasn't exactly playing nice as he dragged it along behind him.
"And just where do you think you're going?" Teaspoon inquired.
Ike didn't bother gesturing, instead giving him a meaningful look.
"Hang on, Ike," Kid said. "I'll go with ya."
"Oh no you don't," Teaspoon said. "You've got a run comin' up soon, and if the weather turns we might not get back down here until it clears. And, Ike, you're too hot under the collar. You'd make more trouble 'n Buck's got already. Jimmy, go saddle you a horse."
"Right," Jimmy said, hurrying off the porch and towards the barn.
Ike scowled, gesturing angrily at Teaspoon.
"Yeah, I know he's your friend," Teaspoon drawled slowly. "But, son, right now you're seein' red. Could be this is all just a misunderstanding, but if you ride into town all fired up for war, you might light a match that don't need to be lit."
Tucking his chin, Ike pointed off towards the barn and Jimmy, asking what Teaspoon was bringing their most trigger-happy Rider along for if he wasn't out to find trouble.
"In case I'm wrong," Teaspoon admitted.
Kid decided to intervene, leaving the shelter of the bunkhouse to go and turn Ike with his horse back to the barn manually. "C'mon, Ike. Teaspoon knows what he's doing. He'll bring Buck home."
"And so will I." They all turned to where Cody was standing, checking the sight on his rifle.
"And just what makes you think I'll let you go along any more than Ike or Kid?" Teaspoon demanded.
"Because," Cody reasoned, lowering his rifle, "That run shoulda been mine. If Buck's in trouble, it's because of me, and that makes it my responsibility to get him out."
Teaspoon looked as if he'd try to straighten Cody out of that warped thinking, but Kid spoke up first. "He's got a point there, Teaspoon. Besides, if it turns out there is trouble, you'll be happy you brought a good shot along with you."
They didn't make Ditchford by nightfall, and it was only a little bit because Buck was laid over his horse's neck in pain, and mostly because the horse itself was jumpy as a jackrabbit and picked a fight with anybody who was trying to lead him along.
Finally, Charlie Harlow decided to call a halt and camp for the night. The men heated up some beans over the campfire, but even though he was told to feed the prisoner, Lee didn't. Buck didn't notice or care, too wracked with pain to notice much of anything beyond it.
Every step that fool horse took had sent a fresh jolt through him and he'd been on it so many hours that he still fancied he could feel it moving under him even though he was on the ground now. Now and then he shook with it, or maybe that was just the cold. They'd at least given him a blanket to put between himself and the ground, but none of them either noticed or cared that he was the only one among them without a coat. He couldn't blame them for it. It wasn't as if they'd taken the coat off him.
Morning dawned with thick, still air. The ground was frozen solid, and snow was surely coming. If any of his captors noticed it, they didn't comment on it. They were about to be quite a long way from home without an easy route back once the snow started falling.
And no closer to finding whoever had actually burned that barn, killed whoever it was who'd died, or stolen whatever horse it was that had been taken, giving whoever that was more time to get away.
Buck hoped that someday they'd find out they'd been wrong. Having to live with knowing that in their rush to judgment they'd let a barn burning, horse stealing murderer go free would have to be punishment enough, because it was probably all they were going to get.