Hired Guns

by William W. Johnstone; J. A. Johnstone

  Instead, he used the agony to fuel his anger. He had a tomahawk in each hand and whipped them around as he rushed toward Preacher and Horse.

  The stallion trumpeted shrilly. Horse would have reared up to fight back with slashing hooves, but Preacher didn’t want his trail partner to get hurt. He kicked his feet free of the stirrups, swung his right leg over Horse’s back, and dropped to the ground to meet the assault. He barely had time to let the empty pistols fall to the ground and yank out his knife and his own tomahawk.

  The wounded ambusher’s arms moved in a whirlwind of motion as he slashed at Preacher, but the mountain man’s reflexes were up to the task of avoiding the strokes. He darted and weaved, blocked some of the blows and ducked others, and then he closed in to launch an attack of his own.

  The knife in his hand flicked out and sliced through the inside of the man’s upper left arm. The blade cut deep, severing muscles and nerves, and the tomahawk in the ambusher’s hand dropped from suddenly useless fingers.

  The man swung the right-hand tomahawk, coming close enough to knock the broad-brimmed brown hat off the mountain man’s head. That was the highwater mark of his attack, though. It had left him open to a sweeping stroke of the tomahawk in Preacher’s left hand. The weapon smashed into the side of the man’s head with the crunch of bone. His knees buckled, and Preacher stepped back to let him topple forward onto his ruined face.

  Seeing no sign of anyone else about to attack him, Preacher turned to see about Charlie. The young man had drawn his pistol, and as Preacher watched, Charlie lifted the weapon and fired it.

  Then he exclaimed, “Blast it!”

  “He get away?” Preacher called with a dry tone in his voice.

  Charlie turned in the saddle to look at him. “Yes, he made it to a horse and rode off. Shouldn’t we go after him?”

  “Not sure it’d be worth the bother. You did for one of the varmints, didn’t you?”

  “I think so—”

  “Better be sure,” Preacher warned him. “Nothin’ more dangerous than a man you think is dead—but ain’t.”

  With a wide-eyed look of alarm on his face, Charlie hurriedly dismounted and drew his other pistol as he stalked into the brush. By the time he came back a minute later, Preacher had already started reloading his pistols.

  “The other one on this side is dead, all right,” Charlie reported. He swallowed hard. “I, uh, shot him in the head. I aimed for his chest, but I guess the shot went a little high.”

  “Got the job done, though, I expect.” Preacher tucked the ready pistols behind his belt again as Dog emerged from the brush with blood on his muzzle. Preacher nodded toward the cur and added, “So did Dog.”

  “Why did they ambush us?”

  “Those pelts,” Preacher said as he leaned his head toward the packhorses, which stood stolidly nearby, still attached by their lead ropes to Horse. “Some fellas think it’s a good idea to lurk out here on the trail and wait for somebody to come along with a load of furs they’re plannin’ to sell in town. This ain’t the first time I’ve been jumped by varmints like that.”

  “Highwaymen,” Charlie said.

  “Well . . . this trail ain’t exactly a highway, but I reckon it’s the same idea.”

  “What about . . . those men?”

  “The carcasses?” Preacher swung up onto Horse’s back. “I don’t feel like buryin’ ’em. Do you?”

  “Not really,” Charlie replied. “I can’t say as I do.”

  The two men rode on toward St. Louis as overhead, buzzards began to wheel slowly through the sky.

  Chapter 2

  They delivered their pelts to one of the still-operating fur companies and got a good price for them, although not as lucrative as Preacher had gotten in previous years. The man who ran this branch of the company had known Preacher for a long time, and he gave the mountain man the best price he could.

  As they left the business, Preacher commented, “I hate to think about it, but I can see a time comin’—and it ain’t too long from now—when fellas won’t be able to make a livin’ as free trappers anymore, Charlie. The demand for furs ain’t what it used to be even a few years ago, and all the companies want to hire a man to work for wages when he goes out trappin’.” Preacher shook his head regretfully at the very idea. “When that happens, I reckon I’ll have to look for a new line of work. I’ve hired on to do a particular job now and then, like goin’ west with a bunch of pilgrims who needed somebody to guide and look after ’em, but I don’t intend to collect wages regularlike.”

  “Nearly everyone in the world works for wages of one sort or another, Preacher,” Charlie pointed out.

  “Yeah, but I ain’t nearly everyone in the world,” the mountain man said. He weighed the pouch of gold coins in his hand, then opened the drawstring and took out a few of them. He held out the rest to Charlie and said, “Here. I’ve got as much as I need.”

  Charlie stared at him and didn’t take the money. “We agreed to equal shares,” he said. “You were already generous enough to set aside that much for Aaron’s family.”

  “I’ve got plenty to pay for a couple of days here in St. Louis and then to outfit me for a trip back to the mountains. I plan on goin’ back to that Crow camp and winterin’ there with Hawk and Butterfly and our friends.” Preacher smiled. “Any more gold would just weigh me down, son.”

  Charlie still hesitated, but after a moment he reached out and took the pouch from Preacher. “Thank you. I’m going to pass along Aaron’s share of the extra money to his family.”

  “I expected you would. You’re an honorable young fella, Charlie.”

  “You don’t know how much it means to me that you think so,” Charlie said, his voice thick with emotion.

  With their newly acquired funds, they went to a restaurant to have a couple of thick steaks with all the trimmings. Charlie had already put aside the share of the profits he intended to deliver to Aaron Buckley’s parents back in Virginia. He and Preacher had agreed that it would be a full third, even though Aaron had been killed before some of the pelts were taken, and now Charlie had the extra coins from Preacher’s share to divide, as well.

  Money was scant recompense for the loss of a son, as Charlie put it, but he couldn’t do anything else. The past couldn’t be changed.

  They ate at Trammell’s, a decent restaurant that didn’t go in for the sort of frills and finery that rich folks liked but served good, solid food at a decent price. The pretty, buxom waitress remembered Preacher from past visits, flirted shamelessly with him, and brought them cups of strong black coffee while they waited for their steaks, potatoes, and biscuits.

  “That girl likes you,” Charlie said when the waitress had gone.

  “Molly?” Preacher grinned and shook his head. “Naw, she just likes to josh around with me. It don’t mean nothin’. If I ever tried to take her up on any of the stuff she hints around about, she’d prob’ly run screamin’ into the night.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure about that.” Charlie sipped his coffee, leaned forward in his chair, and lowered his voice as he went on. “Now, look at that girl over there. The one sitting by herself in the corner.”

  Without being too obvious, Preacher looked. An attractive young brunette sat at the other table, well dressed but seeming to lack something of the decorum that a respectable lady ought to have. Of course, a respectable lady wouldn’t be sitting by herself in a public accommodation, either. She would be with her father or her husband or, at the very least, her brother.

  “Do you think she might like to join us, since she’s alone?” Charlie went on.

  “She’s nice-lookin’, all right,” Preacher said, “but maybe not the sort of gal you should be takin’ an interest in, Charlie.”

  “Why in the world not?”

  “You said it yourself. She’s alone.”

  Charlie stared at him for a second, then said, “Surely you don’t think that means anything. I never took you for the sort to be judgmental about a
nother person.”

  “I ain’t judgin’ nobody,” Preacher said. “Just tryin’ to look out for you, that’s all.”

  “And you know how much I appreciate that. We’re not in the wilderness now, though. I think I can take care of myself in a situation such as this.” With that, Charlie pushed his chair back and stood up to walk toward the girl’s table.

  Preacher watched as Charlie spoke to her. He couldn’t make out any of the words, but he saw the look of surprise on the young woman’s face as if she hadn’t expected anyone to talk to her.

  Then she smiled, and her already pretty face became even lovelier.

  “Well, if she’s fishin’, she just set the hook,” Preacher muttered to himself.

  * * *

  Lucy Tarleton introduced herself after Charlie took her arm and escorted her back to the table he shared with Preacher. The mountain man saw now that she had a small beauty mark on her right cheek, not far from the corner of her mouth. It just made her more attractive.

  “I’m pleased to meet you, Miss Tarleton,” Preacher said with his natural chivalry.

  “Oh, please, call me Lucy,” she said brightly. “I don’t believe in standing on a lot of formality.”

  Preacher had long since rejected any sort of formality for himself, but it bothered him to hear a young woman say such a thing. Ladies ought to consider proper behavior important, more so than hairy-legged ol’ mountain men did. He knew that his friend Audie, who had been a college professor before giving up that life to become a fur trapper, would call him a hypocritter, or some word like that, but he couldn’t help feeling that way.

  Lucy had plenty of charm to go with her looks, though. Preacher had to give her credit for that. And to hear her tell it, her being out and about alone didn’t mean anything scandalous.

  “I’m traveling with my aunt,” she explained, “and we have lodging at the hotel in the next block. She gets tired so easily, you know, and she decided she preferred to just go on to bed instead of getting something to eat. The hotel doesn’t have a dining room, but the clerk told me this was the closest restaurant and a respectable place, so . . . here I am.”

  “Here you are,” Charlie said. “And I’m glad you decided to come.”

  “Well, a girl has to eat. I’m just so thankful that you approached me, Mr. Todd, so I would have some company.”

  “Good fortune has smiled on both of us, I’d say.”

  “Indeed it has! And Mr. Preacher, too, of course.”

  “Just Preacher,” the mountain man said. “No mister needed or wanted.”

  “How did you come by such an unusual name? It’s not actually your name, is it?”

  Preacher shook his head. “No, but folks have been calling me that for so long I sort of disremember what my real moniker is.”

  That comment stretched the truth considerably. His ma had named him Arthur, as he knew quite well. But he didn’t feel like explaining that or how he had come to be called Preacher.

  When he resisted telling the story, Charlie said, “Let me. I’ve heard it plenty of times.”

  Preacher sighed and waved for him to go ahead.

  “When Preacher first began trapping in the mountains as a young man, he clashed with the Blackfoot Indians so often and so successfully that they came to regard him as one of their greatest enemies,” Charlie began.

  Lucy shivered a little. “Just the very idea of dealing with those bloodthirsty savages terrifies me.”

  “You can find plenty of good folks out there among the tribes,” Preacher said. That included his own son, the young Absaroka warrior Hawk That Soars, who now lived with a band of Crow hundreds of miles from here. Preacher missed the boy, who had fought at his side in numerous adventures after their first meeting when Hawk was nearly grown.

  “But not the Blackfeet,” Charlie said. He had his own compelling reasons to hate them. “And one time when they captured Preacher, they decided to burn him at the stake.”

  Lucy shuddered again. “Obviously, they didn’t. But what a horrible fate to be faced with.”

  “I wasn’t lookin’ forward to it,” Preacher said dryly.

  “Earlier, when he’d been right here in St. Louis, he had seen a man preaching the gospel on the street. So he began imitating that man. The Blackfeet hadn’t gagged him, so even though they tied him to a tree, he started preaching and kept it up the rest of that day and all through the night, never stopping even though he was exhausted and his mouth and throat were as dry as the desert.”

  Lucy frowned across the table at Preacher and asked, “What did you believe you would accomplish by that? Did you hope for divine intervention?”

  “I was hopin’ them Blackfeet would think I was touched in the head,” Preacher said.

  Charlie nodded. “You see, the Indians won’t harm a man they believe to be insane. They think it will bring down all sorts of bad luck on them. So even though they had Preacher in their power—a mortal enemy who has gone on to be a thorn in their sides for many years—they felt they had no choice but to let him go.” The young man sat back. “So they did. And when other mountain men heard what had happened, they started calling him Preacher. The name stuck and that’s what he’s been known as ever since.”

  “What a thrilling tale,” Lucy said with a breathless note in her voice.

  “Didn’t seem too thrillin’ at the time,” Preacher said. “More like scared and desperate.”

  “Well, I’m glad you survived.”

  “So am I,” Charlie said. “Preacher has saved my life on numerous occasions.”

  “The two of you are partners in the fur trapping business?”

  “That’s right. We just got back to St. Louis today with a season’s worth of pelts.”

  “What do you do with them?” Lucy asked with a curious frown.

  “Sell them, of course. That’s where beaver hats and beaver robes come from.”

  The girl laughed. “That does make perfect sense. I just never really thought about where such things come from. Have you already sold those . . . pelts, did you call them?”

  “That’s right. Yes, we sold them to one of the fur companies that has an office and warehouse here. We received a pretty penny for them, too.”

  Preacher wouldn’t have gone so far as to say that, but he supposed Charlie exaggerated in an attempt to impress the girl. Young fellas had been doing that since the beginning of time.

  “Well, I’ve learned a lot today, and enjoyed your company, as well.” Lucy drank the last of the coffee in her cup. “But I really should be getting back to the hotel so I can check on my aunt.”

  “I thought you said she’d gone to bed.”

  “She has, but the old dear might wake up and need something. She knew I was coming over here for dinner, but she might worry if she knew I wasn’t back yet.”

  “I hoped we could continue our conversation—” Charlie began.

  She gave him a dazzling smile and said, “Perhaps we shall. Are you going to be in town for a few days?”

  Charlie glanced at Preacher and said, “We hadn’t really made any plans yet.” He didn’t mention that he’d been figuring on heading back to Virginia as soon as possible.

  He might have changed those plans some, though, after meeting Lucy Tarleton, Preacher mused.

  “Good. I’m sure we’ll run into each other again.” Her brown eyes twinkled. “Say . . . for dinner here tomorrow?”

  “We’ll be here,” Charlie responded without hesitation. “Won’t we, Preacher?”

  “Sure,” the mountain man said. Let Charlie enjoy himself and end his Western adventures with a pleasant experience, he thought—although he didn’t believe for a second that Lucy Tarleton wanted any sort of serious friendship with the young man.

  But maybe he’d been wrong about the sort of girl she was, after all.

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  WILLIAM W. JOHNSTONE is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of over 300 books, including the bestselling series
Smoke Jensen, the Mountain Man, Preacher, the First Mountain Man, MacCallister, Flintlock, and Will Tanner, Deputy U.S. Marshal, and the stand-alone thrillers The Doomsday Bunker, Tyranny, and Black Friday.

  Being the all-around assistant, typist, researcher, and fact-checker to one of the most popular western authors of all time, J. A. JOHNSTONE learned from the master, Uncle William W. Johnstone.

  The elder Johnstone began tutoring J.A. at an early age. After-school hours were often spent retyping manuscripts or researching his massive American Western History library as well as the more modern wars and conflicts. J.A. worked hard—and learned.

  “Every day with Bill was an adventure story in itself. Bill taught me all he could about the art of storytelling. ‘Keep the historical facts accurate,’ he would say. ‘Remember the readers—and as your grandfather once told me, I am telling you now: Be the best J. A. Johnstone you can be.’”

  Visit the website at www.williamjohnstone.net.