Dorothy screamed as the roar of the gun filled her ears.   In horror she saw Michaela stagger back from the impact of the bullet.  For the briefest moment, as Michaela miraculously remained standing, Dorothy prayed that she hadn't been badly hurt—that maybe the bullet had only grazed her.

     And then she saw Michaela put her hand to her breast and stare in disbelief at the blood on her fingers—blood that was rapidly spreading over the left side of her blouse.   As Michaela crumpled to her knees and fell to her side on the ground, Dorothy cried out her name.

     Momentarily forgetting about the danger, Dorothy instinctively tried to rush to the still form of her friend—just as the stranger spun around in rage and slammed the barrel of the pistol against her jaw.  Dorothy's head rocked back with the force of the blow, pain exploding in her cheek and temple.  She stumbled and fell, unable to move and barely able to breathe through the excruciating pain. A soft grayness began to seep in at the edges of her vision.  She realized she was very close to unconsciousness.

     With all her will, Dorothy fought to hold onto awareness.  She had to stay awake—it might be Michaela's only chance.   She lay curled in a ball, gritting her teeth against the pain yet welcoming the intense throbbing that prevented her from fainting.

     From her position on the ground, Dorothy could not see the figure of their assailant, but she could hear his movements as his boots shuffled through the leaves.  She heard him approach her, and felt his eyes boring down on her from above.  Suddenly, a new and crushing pain erupted in her side as he kicked her roughly with the toe of his boot.

     Consciousness threatened  to desert Dorothy again.  She had never known such pain—even her late husband Marcus, at his most drunken and violent, had never inflicted such punishment on her.

     Thinking of Marcus saved her.  As memories of his abuse flooded  her mind, she could feel a small, bright core of anger begin to burn inside her.  This man was a monster, just as Marcus had been, deriving sadistic pleasure from attacking and beating up women.  Dorothy understood men like that.  God help her, she had married such a man, and only her righteous anger at his years of abuse had finally driven her to fight back and free herself from the twin nightmares of Marcus and her marriage.

     She drew on her anger now, nourishing it, embracing it, clinging to it like a lifeline.  It was the one weapon she had to keep herself awake—and, perhaps, to keep Michaela alive.

     The pain was finally beginning to ebb, but Dorothy didn't move.  She sensed—or maybe it was only a prayer—that if their attacker thought he'd killed them, he'd leave them for dead and they would be safe.  She felt him move away from her, and then watched through slitted eyes as he went to examine Michaela's body.  For several seconds, he hunkered down at Michaela's side, his back to Dorothy.  Finally, apparently satisfied that Michaela was either dead or dying, he stood and walked to the middle of the clearing.

     "Eye for an eye," he repeated, stroking the gun lovingly, before sliding it into its holster.  As Dorothy covertly watched him, she saw a flash of red on his hand.  Blinking sweat and dust out of her eyes, she peered at his hand more closely.  It was a ring--large, heavy, gold—with a ruby that erupted in a blaze of crimson when it caught the light.  She wondered if he'd stolen it—she thought he probably had.  He hardly looked the type to be sporting such an expensive, distinctive piece of jewelry.  Finally, it seemed  they'd had a stroke of luck—a drifter wearing a ring like that would be far more easy to track down.

     The stranger took one more glance toward her, and then Michaela, and  then moved to their waiting horses.  Shouting suddenly, he slapped the horses' flanks and sent them charging off into the woods.  He stared after the animals for a moment, waiting for the noise of their exit to die away; then remained watching and listening for a sign of anyone else lurking about.   Detecting nothing alarming, he finally retraced his movements out of the clearing and vanished.

     Dorothy counted slowly to sixty in her mind, before she dared to move.  Finally, she lifted her head—wincing sharply as the side of her face throbbed in protest.  Her movement also awakened the intense ache in her side.  Slowly, painfully, she pulled herself to a sitting position.  Dizziness washed over her and she put her head between her knees, waiting for it to pass.  After several minutes, she was able to get up on her hands and knees.

    Inch by painful inch, she dragged herself toward Michaela, praying with every ounce of her strength that her dearest friend was still alive.

* * * * * * * * * *

     Sully moved swiftly through the underbrush, paralleling the course of the road while using the camouflage of the trees and bushes to mask his passing.   Long before he reached the mudslide, he suspected that some type of washout or similar occurrence had forced Michaela and Dorothy off the main route to town.  As soon as he came upon the slide, he cast his eyes toward the ground, searching for signs of tracks leading off into the trees.  He  was rewarded almost immediately by the sight of two sets of horse's hooves clearly delineated in the soft dirt.

     Sully knew this place.  He had traveled a hidden trail through these woods with Cloud Dancing more than once.  One night they had camped in a clearing secluded deep within the trees.  He remembered the beauty of the hidden glen, and the almost hallowed quality of the atmosphere, which made him feel as if he were standing on sacred ground.

     The instant the memory came into his mind, Sully *knew* that the clearing was his destination, the place where he would find Michaela.  The purity of the clearing had been desecrated—defiled by an evil act of violence against his wife.

     Sully began to run, his footsteps making barely a whisper of sound as he moved with alacrity through the tangled foliage.  Fleet-footed as a deer, he slipped in and out of  the trees, seeming no more substantial than a shadow.

     As Sully neared the entrance to the clearing he slowed to a stop.  Stealthily he crept the remaining yards, slipping behind the lightening-blasted trunk of a dead aspen for cover.  Cautiously he peered out at the clearing.

     His first sight of Michaela sent a despair blacker than any he'd known crashing over him.  Her limp form lay on the ground, like a rag doll tossed carelessly aside after an afternoon's play.  Dorothy huddled next to her, looking nearly as battered.

     His vision of Michaela—if that's what it had been—had warned him she was in trouble, had even brought him to the place she had fallen.  But it couldn't tell him if she was alive or dead—and his whole heart—his entire existence—rested on the answer to that question.

     A muscle twitched erratically in Sully's clenched jaw as his eyes raked the clearing.  Back and forth his eyes darted, alert to any sound, any movement, that would signal the presence of the assailant.

     As Sully thought of Michaela's nameless attacker, a new emotion began to displace the despair.  Rage began to fill him, surging through every fiber of his being.  His nerve endings hummed and vibrated with it—an anger so white-hot it frightened him with its intensity.   The rational part of him felt a brief moment of gratitude that the attacker had fled.  Not just for Michaela's and Dorothy's sakes, but for himself.  Sully knew in the depths of his soul that had he found Michaela's assailant here, he would have killed him—without hesitation, without regret, and without mercy.  And that knowledge was the most frightening to him of all.

     Finally satisfied the intruder had gone, he stepped out into the open. The strength seemed to drain out of his legs as he took one faltering step, then another, toward his wife's body.  Then half-running, half-stumbling, he closed the remaining yards and fell down on his knees beside her.

     "Sully?" Dorothy said with difficulty, her eyes dazed and disbelieving, as if she thought she were imagining him.  He saw a dark, ugly bruise coming out on her cheek and jaw, and she hugged her side with one hand as if she were in pain.

     "It's me, Dorothy—it's all right."

     "Sully—“ Dorothy spoke again.  "Michaela—she was shot . . . "

     "I know," he said.

      He slipped his arm beneath Michaela's shoulders and eased himself under her so that her head was cradled in his lap.  Gently he turned her face toward him.

     Michaela was pale and still.  Her skin had a waxy, transparent sheen.

     "Michaela," he whispered.  "Michaela, I'm here, Love.  I'm here now."  With a trembling hand, he placed his fingers against her throat, seeking a pulse.  After a second or two he felt it—rapid and thready.

     "She's in shock," he said.  He discarded his bag and canteen and quickly slipped off his coat.  Carefully he tucked it over her lower body, leaving the bullet wound exposed.

     "She's bleedin' bad," Dorothy said.  "I-tore off a piece of my petticoat and tried to stop it, but I couldn't . . .
Sully, I'm so sorry . . ."

     "No apology necessary, Dorothy—I know you tried to help Michaela best you could," he said gently.  "Can you tell me what happened?"

 "We--took this path through the woods—because of the mudslide," Dorothy began, watching as Sully took bandages from his bag and gingerly removed the blood-soaked material  from Michaela's wound.  "We stopped to rest—and then—there was this man . . .  He came out of nowhere and he had a gun—‘

     "Did you recognize him?" Sully asked, inwardly horrified at the amount of blood seeping from Michaela's body.  The anger surged up in him again as he carefully tried to sponge away the worst of the excess blood from the site of the bullet's entry.  With difficulty, he clamped down on his rage.  There was only room for Michaela in his mind and heart right now.

     "No—I never saw him before," Dorothy answered him.  "I don't think—Michaela had either.  But he knew Michaela—and he knew about you, Sully.  He was in the saloon—when Hank was talkin' about how you helped the renegades.  He--wanted to make you pay.  We tried to tell him—you were dead.  But he wouldn't believe us."

     Sully pressed a bandage over the wound.  With his knife, he cut another bandage into long strips.  Carefully he slid his hand under Michaela's back, probing gently for an exit wound.  He found none. "Bullet's still in her," he murmured.

      "What happened when he found you?" he asked as he carefully wrapped the strips of linen around Michaela's back and chest, tightly securing the bandage in place.

     "He said—he knew how to make you pay," she replied.  "He said—‘an eye for an eye'—like in the Bible.  And then, he—“

     Sully looked up at her.  His eyes were dark and dangerous.   "He shot her."

     Dorothy nodded, her eyes brimming with tears.

     "What did he do to you?" Sully asked, the anger seething inside him.

     Dorothy wiped at her eyes.   "After he shot Michaela, I tried—to go to her—but he hit me in the face with the gun.  Then, when I was on the ground, he kicked me—broke a couple of my ribs, I think."

     Sully swallowed with difficulty.  Looking away from her he said, "Before all this happened, did . . . he do anything else?  To you, or—“

     "Oh no, Sully," Dorothy said compassionately.   "He didn't hurt us—not that way."   She added cynically, "He's the kind that likes hittin' women."

     Sully's eyes closed as he let out a deep breath.  After a moment he looked at her and said, "I'm sorry, Dorothy.  I'm sorry he hurt you."

     "I'll be all right," Dorothy assured him.  "It's Michaela we got to think about."

     "You need doctorin' too, Dorothy," Sully told her.  "I'll take care of you—both of you," he amended.  Hugging Michaela close, he buried his face in her hair.  When he raised his head a moment later, Dorothy saw silent tears coursing down his cheeks.

     "This is all  my fault, Sully," she said.  "Michaela was uneasy about comin' this way.  I should have listened to her."

     "No Dorothy, it ain't your fault," he answered, swiping at his tears with the back of his hand. "I started this—months ago.  And now I'm gonna finish it."

     "What do you mean?" Dorothy asked him, apprehensive.  "Sully, what have got in mind?"

     Ignoring her question, he asked,  "What happened to the horses—did he steal them?""

     "No—he drove them off."

     "No time to track them," Sully  said, half to himself.

     "How are we gonna get help for Michaela?" Dorothy asked.

     "I'm gonna take her to Andrew—carry her all the way if have to," Sully said.  "Do you think you can walk?"

     "I—don't think so," she admitted.

     "Then I'll send back help for you," he told her.
 
     "Sully, if you show up in town, they'll arrest you!" Dorothy protested.

     "It don't matter," Sully answered.  "None of that matters anymore.  Michaela needs help and I ain't leavin' her."  He looked down at Michaela again, and was chilled to see how quickly the white of her bandage was turning to red.  He would have to change it again before he could move her.

     The trill of a mockingbird sounded from somewhere nearby.   Sully's and Dorothy's eyes met.  He raised a finger to his lips.  They waited in a listening posture.  Seconds later, the call repeated.

     Sully's raised his hands to his mouth and hooted in imitation of an owl.  After a brief pause, the trilling repeated a third time.
 
     They both looked toward the direction of the sound.   A moment later, Cloud Dancing stepped out from the screen of trees.

     "Ha ho," he said.