“Wait just a damn minute!” a guard yelped. “You can’t ride past without our say-so.”
Luke fixed a cold, hard stare on him. “Well then, give it or reach for that gun on your hip, mister, because I’m damned if I’ll sit here and let my friend die while you flap your jaw.” He heeled his horse ahead, toward the ledge.
“Aw, hell. Get outta their way,” Hannigan said. “I believe him, and I don’t want to tangle with him.”
The other guards glared, but they moved aside reluctantly and allowed Luke and Aaron to ride onto the ledge and start up toward the top of the cliff. The muscles of Luke’s back tightened, but no shots roared out. The guards were willing to push the decisions on to someone else, as long as they believed they could get away with it.
The ledge, like the creek bed for most of the way they had followed it, was just wide enough for one rider. That made it a one-way trail. If anyone started down while they were going up, it might mean trouble. Luke didn’t hear any hoofbeats above them, however, so maybe their luck would hold.
Luck or no luck, he wasn’t turning back until he got Badger the help that the old-timer needed.
Turning his head to look over his shoulder, he told Aaron, “You did good back there. For a minute, I almost thought you really were loco.”
“I was so scared I was half-crazy. Does that count?”
Luke chuckled. “It should. Men do strange things sometimes when they’re frightened. An unpredictable man is almost always a dangerous man.”
“Are you calling me a man, Mr. Jensen?”
“Right now we’re partners. That’s the main thing. And call me Luke, blast it. Forget that other name.”
“Sorry, M—I mean, Luke. I’ll try to remember.”
“Be a good thing if you did. All our lives might depend on it.”
Luke had already given some thought to the chance that somebody he had captured and turned over to the law in the past might be at the Black Castle. That was certainly possible. It was a risk he had to run, though.
The ledge turned back on itself half a dozen times before it reached the top. Now that he had gotten a better look at it, Luke was more sure than ever that the trail was man-made. So was the opening at the end of it. Arched on top, it reminded him of the mouth of a railroad tunnel. Someone must have used dynamite to blast through the cliff, all the way to the high plateau on the other side. The stone walls that surrounded it, carved by the elements into the battlements he had seen from below, provided protection that even an artillery barrage might not be able to breach. No army on foot would be able to get in there very easily, either. The way the place was built, a small force could hold off a horde of attackers.
At the moment, the tunnel-like entrance seemed to be undefended. Luke figured there were guards, just none that he could see. He, Aaron, and Badger rode through it for about fifty yards, and when they emerged, Luke and Aaron laid eyes on the Black Castle for the first time.
CHAPTER 19
It was enough to take a man’s breath away. A massive pile of stone with two stories and guard towers on the corners, it looked even more like a real castle than the jagged ridges surrounding the plateau. The place was built of huge blocks that must have taken a score of men to maneuver into place with pullies and derricks and mules. Comparing the Black Castle to the Egyptian pyramids, as Luke had done mentally a short time earlier, wasn’t that much of a stretch.
“Lord have mercy,” Aaron murmured when they reined in. “It’s like something out of a storybook.”
“Yes,” Luke agreed. “There should be pennants and banners flying from the battlements, and it needs a moat, a drawbridge, and a portcullis. But other than that . . .”
Instead of the things Luke had named, the castle’s entrance had two huge wooden doors. Even though they weren’t open at the moment, he guessed they were thick enough to stop anything short of a cannonball. . . and they might stop that, too.
To the right was a long, low building made of logs, also sturdy-looking although nothing compared to the castle. Luke guessed that was a barracks of sorts. He didn’t know if any men lived there permanently or if Stockbridge drew his guards from the outlaws who showed up looking for sanctuary and that force was always changing. There were probably different levels of accommodation for those who sought to lie low for a while. Those who couldn’t afford to stay in the castle most likely bunked out in the barracks.
Looking around, Luke also saw a barn, corrals, a blacksmith shop, a smokehouse, and a couple of other buildings that were probably used for storage. The place appeared to be self-sustaining for the most part, although he didn’t see any gardens nor did he know what sort of water supply they had. He wondered if Stockbridge had managed to tap into that underground stream somehow. That seemed like something a man would do if he was ambitious enough to have built such a place. Supplies could be packed in on mules, and plenty of game—deer, antelope, mountain goats—roamed the hills to provide fresh meat.
A man could arrive there and never leave. Evidently, that was just what Henry Stockbridge had done.
Half a dozen men on horseback emerged from the barn and rode toward the newcomers.
Luke said, “Let’s just sit here and wait for them to come to us.”
“Look at that fella in the lead, Luke. He’s mighty big.”
That was true. Even on horseback, Luke could see how tall and broad-shouldered the man was. He rode in front of the others on a huge black stallion. He was hatless, and his long black hair blew in the wind. A thick black beard curled on his jaws and chin. He was dressed in black as well.
“This is just a wild guess,” Luke said dryly, “but I suspect that must be the Black Knight.”
“You’d best not joke with him,” Aaron warned. “He don’t look like the sort of hombre who’d take kindly to it.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll treat this occasion with the solemn dignity it deserves.”
“You recognize any of those other fellas?”
Luke was already studying the big man’s companions. They were all hardcases dressed in trail clothes, the sort of gunmen and killers who could be found in hundreds of places west of the Mississippi. He knew their breed, but he didn’t see any familiar faces.
When he said as much, Aaron responded, “Good. If you don’t know any of them, that means they don’t know you.”
“That’s right,” Luke said, continuing to be impressed by the sharpness of the boy’s mind. “We should be safe . . . for now.”
The black-bearded man brought the stallion to a halt when he was twenty feet away from Luke, Aaron, and Badger. Without any greeting, he rumbled in a deep voice, “I know that old man. He’s Badger O’Donnell.”
“That’s right,” Luke said. “We ran into him a couple of days ago, after he tangled with some Apaches. He’s wounded and needs medical attention.”
“And who might you be?” the man asked.
Luke heard vestiges of a British accent in his voice, but Stockbridge’s time in the United States had erased most of it. “They call me Luke, and this is Aaron. If you need to know any more than that, you’re out of luck.”
Laughter boomed out of Stockbridge’s barrel chest. “From my perspective, it’s you who would be out of luck, my friend, since you’re quite outnumbered and outgunned. If I were to say the word, you’d be dead in a matter of seconds, but as it happens, I respect a man’s desire for privacy. I never insist that my visitors give me their full names, or their true names, as far as that goes. So Luke and Aaron it is. Now, tell me, what made you believe you could simply ride in here and demand help for your friend?”
“We’re not demanding anything,” Luke said. “Badger fought beside us when that Apache war party attacked again. I’m not going to stand by and let a comrade in arms die if there’s something I can do to save him. He said to bring him here, so that’s what the boy and I did. We’ve fulfilled our obligation.”
Stockbridge cocked his head to the side and regarded Luke with curiosity.
“You sound like an educated man.”
“Self-educated, mostly. I got enough schooling when I was a boy to learn how to read, and I took the responsibility from there.”
“Whereas I learned my lessons on the playing fields of Eton, as they say. Regardless of the differences in our backgrounds, I believe we could have an interesting conversation, Luke. For that reason, and because I’m fond of that old reprobate, I’m not going to kill you.” Stockbridge lifted the reins and started to turn the stallion around. “Bring him along. There’s a doctor here.”
“An actual doctor?” Luke asked as he kneed his horse into motion.
“That’s right. As you Westerners call them, a sawbones.”
The men who had accompanied Stockbridge split apart so Luke and Aaron could ride between them, then fell in behind them and Stockbridge.
The black-bearded man looked over at Luke and went on. “I’m not sure we’ve ever had a child visit us here at the Black Castle before.”
“I may look like a kid, mister,” Aaron said, “but I’ve had to grow up fast.”
Stockbridge laughed again. “An excellent response, lad. I like a boy with confidence.”
“I got plenty of confidence . . . and a Henry rifle I know how to use.”
“You shouldn’t have to demonstrate that skill while you’re here. The Black Castle is a haven of peace . . . most of the time.”
Someone must have been watching from inside. The doors swung open before the riders got there. Stockbridge reined in and swung down from the stallion’s back. Luke followed suit and reached up to take Badger from Aaron.
A middle-aged Mexican woman came out of the castle. She was striking looking, with white streaks in her long, raven hair.
Stockbridge said to her, “Send someone to fetch Dr. Mitchell, and show our visitors to one of the empty rooms on the first floor.”
“Sí, Sir Henry,” the woman said.
“Sir Henry?” Luke repeated as the servant stepped back to usher them into the castle.
“Self-dubbed, in the absence of the queen, I’m afraid. But since I’m the closest thing to a knight in these parts . . .”
Luke shook his head and said, “It’s no business of mine, one way or the other.”
Badger was unconscious. Luke carried the frail bundle of rawhide and bone that was the old man’s body and followed the woman into a vast foyer paved with flagstones. Aaron came behind them, looking around warily as he held the Henry. Stockbridge strode along beside Luke. Their footsteps echoed from the high ceiling.
The woman led them down a hallway with walls covered by colorful tapestries of hunting scenes and pastoral landscapes. Luke figured that as a member of British aristocracy, Stockbridge must have ridden to the hounds as a young man, and those tapestries must remind him of home.
They went into a room furnished with a comfortable-looking four-poster bed. She hurried to take a blanket out of a chest of drawers and spread it on the bed to protect the comforter from getting bloody. Luke lowered Badger into that welcoming softness. The woman shooed Luke aside and moved in to start removing Badger’s clothes.
Aaron stood just inside the room and asked, “They’re gonna take good care of him, aren’t they?”
“We will,” Stockbridge answered from the hallway. “Mr. O’Donnell was welcome here as a guest in the past and has done nothing to disabuse himself of our hospitality. Everything possible will be done for him.” He paused. “In fact, here comes the doctor now.”
Stockbridge stepped aside so a short, stocky man with thinning, curly gray hair could bustle into the room. The man wore a gray tweed suit that had seen better days and carried a black leather bag. Luke caught a whiff of whiskey coming from him, but the medico was clear-eyed and didn’t appear to be drunk.
“I’m told there’s an injured man here.” he said.
Stockbridge waved a hand toward the bed. “There lies your patient, Doctor.”
The man’s eyes widened in surprise as he looked at the scrawny figure stretched out on the blanket. “That’s old Badger. I haven’t seen him around here for months. What happened to him?”
“A deep bullet crease in his right side,” Luke said. “It didn’t penetrate and do any damage to his internal organs, but he lost a lot of blood and now he’s developed a fever.”
The doctor grunted. “Infection has set in. This may be touch and go.”
“I tried to clean the wound with whiskey when I first found him and thought I had gotten it patched up well enough. But we ran into more trouble after that and he got banged around some. Since then we’ve never been able to keep the bleeding stopped consistently, and he’s gotten weaker and weaker.”
“I’ll clean the wound with carbolic and explore to see if there’s a source of internal bleeding. Other than that, all we can do is keep him comfortable. I’m Doctor Hiram Mitchell, by the way.”
“Luke’s my name. Do your best for him, Doc.”
“Of course,” Mitchell replied, sounding somewhat offended by the thought that he might do any less. “Now, you’ve done your part, so you can go on. If I need assistance, Paloma is here.”
The Mexican woman nodded gravely.
“Come to the main hall,” Stockbridge invited Luke and Aaron. “I’ll have coffee and food brought.”
“We’ll be much obliged to you,” Luke said. “You and I haven’t made any kind of financial arrangements yet, though, and from what I’ve heard about this place, I got the idea that’s pretty important to you.”
Stockbridge dismissed the idea with a wave. “We can discuss that later. Right now, I feel a certain obligation, a debt of honor, if you will, because you helped a former guest of mine. You should take advantage of my largesse.”
“We will,” Luke said. “Won’t we, Aaron?”
“Sure, I guess,” the boy said. “I don’t know what that fancy word means.”
“It means you’re now my guests, too, for the time being,” Stockbridge said. “If you don’t cause any trouble, that may last for a while.”
“Sounds good to me. I’m not lookin’ for trouble.”
Stockbridge smiled. “How seldom we look, but how often it finds us anyway.”
“Shakespeare?” Luke asked.
“No. A bit of philosophy of my own.” Stockbridge gestured for them to join him. “Please.”
He led them along the echoing corridor and then down another and through an arched entrance into a large hall dominated by a huge table that had been polished to a high sheen. Heavy chairs sat along both sides and at each end.
“I’m a little surprised the table’s not round,” Luke said.
“A clever reference,” Stockbridge said. “But despite the fact that I’ve read Le Morte d’Arthur numerous times, I’ve no wish to emulate the man. He came to a tragic end, you know, and I have no intention of doing so.”
Four men came into the hall through another door then, and Luke glanced over at them. They were more of the same sort of hardcases he had seen outside. Except for one, who was as roughly dressed as the others and packing an iron on his hip like them, but he hadn’t been able to grow much of a beard because of his age. The way his sandy-colored stubble stuck out in a few bristly, scattered patches testified as to how young he was.
Aaron saw the young man at the same time Luke did, and his response was instantaneous. He stared and exclaimed, “Thad!”
CHAPTER 20
Everyone in the room stopped short. Thaddeus McKinney looked just as shocked as his younger brother was. His mouth opened and closed a couple of times before he was able to get any words out.
Finally he spoke. “Aaron? Aaron, what the hell are you . . . Is it really you?”
Aaron handed the Henry to Luke and rushed across the big hall to throw his arms around his brother. “I was afraid I’d never see you again,” he said in a voice choked with emotion. “I figured you’d gone off and got yourself killed!”
“No, I . . . I’m fine,” Thad said as he awkwardly returned the hu
g and patted Aaron on the back. “But I still don’t understand what you’re doin’ here.”
Aaron stepped back, and his face flushed with anger. Without any more warning than that, he hauled off and punched Thad in the stomach. Thad was bigger, but Aaron put all the power he packed in his lean body into the blow. The punch took Thad by surprise, and as Aaron’s fist sunk into his belly, he gasped and doubled forward. His eyes got big and his face turned red, but in his case it was because he couldn’t catch his breath.
“You . . . you little bastard!” he forced out.
“Don’t you say things like that!” Aaron cried. “You’re insultin’ Ma when you do!” He swung again and landed a blow on Thad’s jaw.
Thad staggered to the side but caught himself. Then with a bellow of rage, he grabbed Aaron around the waist and lifted him off the stone floor. “You crazy fool!” he yelled.
Aaron tried to kick and hit him, but he was too close to put much into the blows.
“Stop it!” Thad said. “Stop it, or I’ll have to hurt you!”
Beside Luke, Henry Stockbridge chuckled. “Should we put a stop to this? One of them might do some actual damage to the other.”
“I don’t think so,” Luke said. “They’re brothers.”
“So I gathered. But it’s been my experience that sometimes the battles between brothers can be the most vicious of all.”
Luke had never known that sort of fraternal conflict in his life. He got along very well with his brother Smoke and their adopted brother Matt. Of course, he had gone years after the war without ever seeing Smoke, and he hadn’t even been aware of Matt’s existence until a few years earlier. When he and Smoke—Kirby—had been kids, they had squabbled some, of course, like all youngsters, but never anything serious.
Aaron had some deep-seated anger to express against Thad, so Luke decided Stockbridge might be right. It might be a good idea to intervene in their fight.
However, before he could do that, one of the men who had come into the room with Thad stepped up and grabbed Aaron from behind. He was taller than Thad, so Aaron’s feet were a good eighteen inches off the floor as the man wrapped arms the size of young tree trunks around his chest.
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