Crooked Bear held his cupped right hand to his mouth and then brought his hand across to his right shoulder in the sign for river.

«Again?» Slater asked in disgust. «Her damned horse must be part fish.»

Crooked Bear shrugged, made a sign for wolf, and then for small.

Slater grunted. He had already had a sample of the girl’s cleverness at the card table. He didn’t need any further proof that she was as fast and wary as a coyote.

«Did you see that red dress of hers?» Slater asked.

Crooked Bear signed an emphaticno.

Slater looked at the clouds. «Rain?»

The Comanchero gave a Frenchman’s shrug.

«Crooked Bear,» muttered Slater, «someday you’re going to piss me off. Go over the ground again. Find her. You hear me?»

The half-breed smiled, showing two gold teeth, two gaps, and a broken tooth that hadn’t hurt enough to be pulled.

SHIVERING with a combination of cold and fear, Eve watched the Comanchero quarter the stream banks one last time, looking for her tracks. When he dismounted, she held her breath and looked away, not wanting to somehow call attention to herself by staring at him.

After a few minutes, the temptation to look was too great. Eve peered carefully through the greenery and rocks that studded the long slope between her and the stream. The low cry of the wind and the mutter of thunder from a distant peak shut out any sounds the men below her made.

Slater, Crooked Bear, and five other men were quartering the stream bank. Eve smiled slightly, knowing she had won. If Crooked Bear couldn’t find her tracks, no one could. The Comanchero was almost as famous throughout the territory for his tracking abilities as he was for his savage reputation with a knife.

It was an hour before Slater and his men gave up. By then it was almost dark, a light rain was falling, and they had thoroughly trampled whatever signs Whitefoot might have left coming out of the river.