As he dived from the bank, he shouted, “Now!” hoping his friends on the eastern bank would know what he meant.
CHAPTER 9
Preacher saw the muzzle flashes from the other side of the creek as Charlie, Aaron, and White Buffalo opened fire on the camp. He had heard Hawk’s shout an instant before that, followed by a big splash, so he knew his son was in the water, below the line of fire. Preacher hoped the prisoner was with him—if there actually had been a prisoner.
Either way, Preacher wanted those sons of bitches in the camp to keep their heads down until Hawk had a chance to get away. He pulled his pistols from behind his belt, leveled them at the dark area under the bluff, and pulled the triggers.
Orange flame spurted in the darkness as some of the men in the camp returned fire. Preacher had left his rifle across the creek, knowing he was bent on an errand that required close, quiet work, and since he had emptied the pistols and didn’t want to take the time to reload them while he was out in the open, he backed off quickly. A few rifle and pistol balls came close enough for him to hear them, but none found their target.
When he reached the spot where the fourth guard had been, he looked around until he found the body lying on its back with a tomahawk planted in the middle of its face. Preacher wrenched the weapon free, wiped the bloody blade on the dead man’s shirt, and faded farther into the shadows, away from the camp. Shots still rang out from both sides of the creek.
Preacher had crossed downstream where the water was shallower. He held his pistols and powder horn above his head as he waded across, then he headed back down the eastern bank toward the log where he had left White Buffalo and the two youngsters. When he got there, he saw two more figures kneeling behind the log—Hawk and the prisoner he had freed from the camp.
“Everybody all right?” Preacher called softly as he came up behind them.
Charlie yelped in alarm. “Preacher, you scared me out of five years of my life, sneaking up like that!”
“We’re fine,” Aaron said. “Since Hawk freed the young lady and they got back here safely, I think we should retreat while we have a chance.”
That was the reaction Preacher expected. He had said as much to Hawk earlier. But Aaron had a point. Judging by the amount of gunfire coming from the camp underneath the bluff, most of the men over there were still in the fight. Preacher and his companions were still considerably outnumbered. Circumstances hadn’t allowed them to strike a devastating surprise blow as they had hoped.
The mountain man was a little surprised, though, when Hawk said, “Yes, we should go while we can.”
Hawk was the one who had wanted to wipe out the gang of thieves, even if it meant that the prisoner would be killed in the fighting. Clearly, he had changed his mind, now that the prisoner was an actual, flesh-and-blood young woman, rather than just a possibility.
“All right.” Preacher picked up his rifle, which was right where he had left it. “Hawk, you head back to the horses first. Take the girl with you. White Buffalo, you go after them. The rest of us will follow, but we’ll keep those varmints across the creek occupied for a few more minutes.”
Hawk didn’t argue. Holding the former prisoner’s arm, he led her into the shadows under the trees. Horse and the other mounts were tied about fifty yards away, on the other side of the thick growth that protected them. As soon as Hawk and the girl were gone, White Buffalo fired a last shot at the enemy camp and then hurried after them.
Preacher, Aaron, and Charlie kept up a steady fire for another few minutes. The two young men had been coolheaded so far. Charlie cursed under his breath as a rifle ball from across the creek chewed into the log and sent splinters jabbing into his face.
“You all right?” Aaron asked.
“Yeah, yeah. I’m fine.” Crouching low, Charlie rammed a ball and patch down the barrel of his rifle. “Just a little tired of being shot at.”
“Reckon you’d better get used to it,” Preacher told him. “It seems to happen pretty regularlike.”
Finished reloading, Charlie raised up, thrust his rifle over the log, and squeezed off the shot. As his weapon boomed, he yelped again and fell over backward, landing hard on his rear end.
“Charlie!” Aaron exclaimed. “Are you hit?”
Charlie sat up, put a hand to his cheek, and said, “I’m bleeding!”
Aaron knelt beside him. “I can’t see very well, but I don’t think it’s too bad. A shot must have just nicked you.”
“You boys get on outta here while you can,” Preacher told them. “I’ll be right behind you. And keep your heads down!”
Aaron helped Charlie to his feet. They hurried off through the trees. Preacher waited until he had a muzzle flash to aim at, then triggered his rifle again. A howl of pain from the other side of the creek rewarded his patience.
Quickly, he reloaded the rifle, then leaned it against the log. He sat there with his back against the fallen tree for a moment while he reloaded both pistols, making sure they were heavily charged and double-shotted, as usual. It was a good thing he had so much practice at chores like this, he thought, because he didn’t have any trouble reloading in the dark.
When he was ready, he raised up and swung around to blast away with both pistols. Then he stuck them behind his belt, grabbed his rifle, and ran into the trees as return fire began to pelt into the trunks around him. None of the lead touched him.
Moments later, he reached the spot where they had left the horses. The others were all mounted, Preacher saw in the moonlight. He also noted that the girl was on Hawk’s pony, sitting behind the young warrior with her arms wrapped around his waist.
Preacher swung up onto Horse’s back and whistled for Dog. The big cur bounded out of the darkness.
“Which way are we going?” Hawk asked.
“We’ll head north first, then cross the creek and circle west,” Preacher said. “Those fellas are on foot, so it ain’t likely they’ll catch us, but we’ll put enough distance between us and them that we don’t have to worry about it.”
He heeled the rangy stallion into motion and took the lead with the others stringing out behind him. Preacher figured they would travel west for a day or two, then swing back south and make a big loop back to the place where they had cached the furs. He didn’t want to give up on all the work they had done to gather those pelts.
And when they stopped, he planned to have a talk with the young woman Hawk had freed. They might as well find out who she was and where she came from, so they could get her back home if at all possible.
* * *
Fury filled Jefferson Scarrow’s heart and mind, crowding out any other emotion and not leaving much room for rational thought. He wanted to lash out, to punish, to kill. That rage was directed at the strangers who had dared to venture right into camp and steal away the prisoner. Not only that, but six of his men were dead, as well, and a couple more wounded.
Hogarth Plumlee gave him that report on the casualties, then said, “You reckon those were some o’ the girl’s people who came to rescue her?”
Scarrow forced himself to calm down and think about the question Plumlee had just asked him. “I doubt it. I distinctly heard the man who invaded the camp shout in English to his allies, just before he and the girl dove into the creek.”
Plumlee grunted. “White men, then. Say, do you reckon it might’ve been the same bunch Lopez and the others were supposed to kill? They never came back, and you were worried they might’ve been wiped out, instead o’ the other way around. You thought those fellas might come after us if that happened.”
“It’s logical,” Scarrow said. “But how would they have known we had a prisoner? That has to be the reason one of them slipped into our camp. To free her.”
“Hemming,” Plumlee said. “They caught him somehow and made him talk. Probably tortured him plumb to death.”
“Serves him right for getting captured,” Scarrow snapped, then immediately thought that he shouldn’t say such things, at least no
t around the other men. It would be bad for morale. With Plumlee, it didn’t matter so much. Plumlee was doggishly devoted to him.
The two of them stood at the edge of the creek while the others tended to the wounded men and carried the dead ones out of the cavelike space underneath the bluff.
“I thought I heard hoofbeats in the distance after the shootin’ stopped,” Plumlee went on. “I reckon that means they rode off and took the girl with ’em. Well, she’s lost to us now, so there ain’t no point in worryin’ about it, I guess.”
Scarrow turned sharply toward him. “What do you mean, she’s lost to us?” he demanded. “We’re going after them.”
The words came out of his mouth without him actually thinking about them, but as soon as he realized what he had just said, he knew it was right. The outrage he felt would never be satisfied until he had reclaimed the girl and avenged himself on the men who had dared to take her.
Plumlee stared at him in the light of the fire they had built up. Disbelief was on the piggish face. “Goin’ after ’em?” he repeated. “Dang it, Jeff, we can’t do that. They’re on horseback, and we’re afoot. We’d never catch ’em.”
“In country this rugged, a man on horseback can’t move much faster than a man on foot,” Scarrow argued. “It’s not like they’re out on the plains. We can find them. We need to be persistent, that’s all.”
“But she’s just one Injun gal! We got a good start on a small fortune in furs, and there’s plenty more out there for the takin’. You can’t figure on throwin’ all that away just because of one squaw.”
“She’s more than just one squaw. She’s . . . a symbol of those men who dared to defy us.”
Plumlee shook his head. “Sorry, Jeff, but I don’t give a damn about symbols, and neither do the other fellas, I’m bettin’. If you just want her for herself . . . Well, hell, you shoulda taken her while you had the chance!”
Scarrow knew that, and he regretted his decision. But it wasn’t too late to set things right. Besides, he knew something that none of the others did.
“She’s not just a squaw,” Scarrow said quietly. “In fact, she’s not an Indian at all.”
Plumlee frowned and asked, “What in blazes are you talking about?”
“Despite her appearance,” Scarrow said, “that girl was every bit as white as you and I, Hog.”
* * *
They rode north a ways, swam the horses across the creek, and then headed west through rugged foothills. Towering peaks loomed ahead of them, blotting out some of the night sky, but Preacher knew a pass that would take them through the mountains. He didn’t think he would have any trouble finding it the next day.
He kept them moving at a fairly brisk pace for several miles. The terrain was so rough that often they had to dismount and lead the horses. Preacher didn’t like that delay, but he remained convinced the thieves wouldn’t come after them. Chances were, that bunch would hunker down and lick their wounds and decide it just wasn’t worth it to give chase and probably lose more men.
When he was convinced that they had covered enough ground for the night, he led the group up a slope onto a ridge that was topped by trees and littered with boulders. They would be able to fort up there if they needed to, even though he considered the likelihood remote.
“We’ll stay here until morning,” he told the others as he dismounted and gestured for them to do likewise.
Hawk took hold of the girl’s arm and helped her slip down from the pony’s back. He dropped lithely to the ground beside her.
Preacher joined them and asked Hawk in English, “Have you had a chance to find out anything about this girl?”
“I spoke to her in the Crow tongue, and she seemed to understand it,” Hawk replied.
Preacher nodded. In Crow, he told the young woman, “We are your friends, and we mean you no harm. This young man is Hawk. The others are Charlie and Aaron, and the old man is White Buffalo, an Absaroka like Hawk. I am called Preacher.”
“Preacher!” Clearly, the girl recognized the name.
“That’s right. If you’ve heard of me, you know that I’m a friend to the Crow people. You can stay with us for a spell. You’ll be safe, and when we can, we’ll take you back to the village you came from.”
She looked down at the ground and shook her head. In a voice almost too soft to be understood, she said, “There is nowhere to go. The Blackfeet raided my home. They killed all the warriors and many of the women and children as well. The others they took as slaves. I was forced to live among them until, finally, I was able to escape.”
“You were running away from the Blackfeet?” Hawk asked.
She nodded shyly.
“Then how did you wind up with that bunch of white men?” Preacher wanted to know.
Before the girl could answer, Hawk said, “She is tired. She should rest. There will be time for talk in the morning.”
“I want to know what we’re dealin’ with,” Preacher said.
The girl lifted a hand and said, “It is all right. I can speak. I was fleeing from the Blackfeet when I saw a campfire. Some of them were close behind me, so I ran, hoping the fire belonged to friendly hunters, Crow or Absaroka or some other tribe, who would help me.” She paused. “But the men were white. They were evil. They caught me and would not let me go.”
“What happened to the Blackfeet who were chasin’ you?” Preacher asked.
The girl shook her head. “There were only a few of them, scouts from the main party. They must have feared the large group of whites and turned back to get the others. They will come after me, if they have not started already.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because their war chief has decided that I am to be his woman,” she answered bluntly, “and he will not give up and turn back. When Angry Sky wants something, he will kill anyone who gets in his way.”
CHAPTER 10
“Angry Sky,” Preacher repeated.
Aaron and Charlie had been listening to the conversation, even though they understood only a few words of the Crow language. Aaron must have noticed something about the tone in Preacher’s voice because he asked in English, “Is something else wrong?”
Preacher rubbed his chin. “We got more to worry about than just that bunch we just took the gal away from. There’s a Blackfoot war chief named Angry Sky who wants to find her, and she’s convinced he’ll keep lookin’ until he does.”
Charlie said, “Angry Sky is his name? That sounds rather . . . ominous.”
“For good reason,” Preacher said with a nod. “I’ve heard of the varmint. Supposed to be one hell of a fighter, and when the Good Lord was handin’ out mercy, ol’ Angry Sky was behind the door and didn’t get nary a drop.”
“He sounds like a dangerous man,” Aaron said.
“From what I know of him, he is. And more than likely he’ll have a bunch of warriors just like him backin’ his play.”
Hawk blurted out, “We cannot let him get his hands on Butterfly.”
Preacher turned his head to look at his son and cocked an eyebrow. “Butterfly?”
“As I told you, we spoke some while we were riding,” Hawk said with a glare. “She is called Butterfly.”
“All right, fine,” Preacher replied. “Nobody said anything about leavin’ her behind for Angry Sky to find. We took her away from those other fellas, so I reckon she’s our responsibility now.”
The girl sounded scared as she asked in Crow, “What is all this talk?”
“Nothing for you to worry about,” Hawk immediately assured her. “We will not let anything happen to you. We will find a village that will take you in, where you can be safe.”
He looked at Preacher as if daring the mountain man to contradict him.
“We’ll talk about all that in the mornin’,” Preacher said. “For now, I reckon we should all get some rest. We’ll need to post guards, though.” Usually, he could count on Horse and Dog to function as sentries in such situations, but if an enemy w
ith a reputation like Angry Sky’s was out there somewhere, searching for them, Preacher was going to be extra careful. “Hawk, you and I will each take a shift.”
“Fine.” Hawk put a hand on Butterfly’s shoulder. “You should sleep. We will watch over you.”
“This is . . . so different from what those white men did. They kept me tied all the time, and the way they looked at me and spoke about me . . . Even though I could not understand most of the words—”
“Put those things out of your mind,” Hawk told her. “You are safe now, with us.”
Impulsively, she threw her arms around his neck and hugged him. Hawk stood there stiffly for a second, then raised a hand and awkwardly patted her on the back. He looked over her shoulder at Preacher and the others, and in the moonlight, Preacher could see the glare on the young warrior’s face. Despite the danger they were still in, he had to hold back a chuckle as he told Charlie, Aaron, and White Buffalo, “You fellas go ahead and turn in. Mornin’ will be here before you know it, and there ain’t no tellin’ what it’ll bring.”
* * *
As soon as streamers of gray light appeared in the eastern sky, heralding the approach of dawn, Jefferson Scarrow had his men unload the rest of the supplies from the canoes. Also on Scarrow’s orders, they carried the bundles of stolen pelts into the area underneath the bluff and stacked them against the rock.
“I don’t understand this, boss,” one of the men said as he paused in the work. “Shouldn’t we be puttin’ the supplies we unloaded last night back into the canoes so we can move on?”
“We’re not moving on,” Scarrow replied. “At least, not on the creek. We’re going to find the tracks of those men who stole the girl from us and pursue them.”
That was the first time any of the men except Hogarth Plumlee had heard what Scarrow intended to do. They all stopped in their chores and stared at him.
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