Preacher's Peace

by William W. Johnstone

  “Well, come on, Preacher,” he said. “You don’t have a pistol under the table now, do you? Oh, wait, I forgot. It was a fork, wasn’t it?” The leering grin left his face, to be replaced by an angry scowl. “Come on, you son of a bitch. I’m going to beat you to a pulp.”

  His head cleared, Art leaped up again and charged at McDill. He buried his head in McDill’s midsection, and both men went crashing to the ground.

  Art scrambled to his feet and grabbed McDill by the collar, then dragged him outside. He wanted to take this confrontation away from Jennie. By now a crowd, drawn by the screams and the commotion, had gathered just outside. They surrounded the two men, who were locked in a deadly confrontation.

  Among the people there were Matthews, Montgomery, and Hoffman, the big Hessian. They couldn’t believe what they were seeing. Here was their leader, returned as if from the dead. They were overjoyed to see him, but not in these circumstances. He was locked in mortal combat with the larger, loathsome McDill.

  The crowd cheered for Art and jeered McDill. Art, still exhausted from his long ride, and not yet fully recovered from all his injuries, stood still to catch his breath. That allowed McDill to get to his feet, and the big man charged like a bull. Art stepped out of the way, and McDill went hurtling into the crowd.

  Laughing at his awkwardness, the men in the crowd caught McDill and pushed him back into the circle of combat. The two men faced each other again, and Art punched him as hard as he could. McDill doubled over. Art landed a strong right to McDill’s jaw, straightening him out and sending him back on his heels. Art massaged the hand that had struck the blow.

  Caviness was watching with the others in the crowd. He wanted to go to the aid of his friend, but he dared not, for fear of retribution from the others. McDill was on his own now. Caviness melted away into the growing darkness. Even as the fight was going on behind him, he saddled his horse. If Art won, he might come after Caviness. If McDill won, he would want to know why Caviness didn’t help him. Under the circumstances, Caviness knew that this was no place for him to be.

  “Art,” Jennie said, coming out of her tent then.

  Art turned toward Jennie, then held his hand out, as if telling her to stay away. “Jennie, stay back, keep out of the way!” he cautioned.

  As Art looked away from McDill for just that quick second, McDill pulled his long-bladed hunting knife from its sheath and lunged at Art, the knife pointed at his guts. Now, enraged and humiliated by the beating he was taking from this younger and smaller man, McDill was more animal than human.

  Jennie saw McDill and called out to Art: “Look out! He has a knife!”

  Art turned just in time to see the blade flash in the flickering light of the nearby fires. He reared back to avoid the killing knife, then circled his enemy barehanded. Someone from the crowd tossed him a stick. Art used it as a defensive weapon, swinging it at McDill to keep him at bay. With one swing, McDill’s knife chopped the stick in half.

  “What are you goin’ to do now, Preacher?” McDill taunted, holding the knife out in front of him, moving the point back and forth slightly, like the head of a coiled snake. “You think that little stick is going to stop me? I’ll whittle it down to a toothpick, then I’ll carve you up.”

  Then Art realized he had no choice, he must fight this madman on his terms—no rules, any weapon at hand, and to the death. He drew his own knife, the same knife that had seen him through the past two months from the killing of Wak Tha Go, to the killing of the grizzly she-bear, and through his wandering and captivity. The same knife that had been returned to him by the Indians, when they granted him his freedom.

  Art held the knife up, showing it to Percy McDill, saying without a word that he intended to kill the man who had threatened Jennie, who had left him for dead, who had lied and cheated his way through a worthless life. Well, that life was about to end.

  Suddenly it seemed as if McDill had sobered up. The taunting, leering grin left his face and he became deadly serious and focused. With a steady hand he held his own knife up, challenging his opponent, his face now a mask of calm determination.

  “I should’ve killed you when I had the chance. You’d better start preachin’ your own funeral, Preacher,” McDill said. “It’s time for you to die.”

  Now, for the first time, Art grinned. It was neither taunting nor leering. Instead, it was confident, and it completely unnerved McDill. “I don’t think so, McDill,” Art said easily. “I think you are the one who is going to die.”

  “I’m going to kill you, and that damned mutt of yours,” McDill said with false bravado, trying now to bolster his own courage.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Art could see Dog, standing near Hoffman on the edge of the watching crowd. If it hadn’t been for the wolf-dog, McDill probably would have slit his throat and left him for dead some two months earlier.

  The young mountain man put aside all thoughts other than one: McDill must die for his crimes. Trying to hurt Jennie was the last evil thing this son of a bitch would ever do.

  The two men circled each other like gladiators in a Roman arena. The crowd became silent. Even Jennie, who watched in horror, could neither speak nor cry out. Dog stood at alert. He could’ve attacked McDill, but somehow seemed to sense that this was something Art needed to do by himself.

  McDill moved first. He swung his blade at Art, missing his face by only a few inches. Art felt the wind of the swift knife blade and jerked his head back. In almost the same movement, he swung his own knife low and hard, aiming for McDill’s belly. He missed.

  The big man then punched Art on the side of his head.

  Art was stunned, and for a second couldn’t see anything. He backed away quickly to avoid the oncoming McDill, then stepped to one side. As McDill shot past him, Art stabbed with his knife blade and felt it slip into McDill’s midsection.

  He pushed the knife in as far as it could go, then held it there. The two men stood together, absolutely motionless, for a long moment. Art felt McDill’s warm blood spilling over his knife and onto his hand.

  Howling like a stuck pig, McDill pulled himself off the knife. He stepped back several feet, then came back toward Art. But before he could even lift his own knife, he gasped, dropped his knife, and put his hand to his wound. Blood filled his cupped palms, then began oozing from his mouth as well. His eyes turned up in their sockets, showing the bloodshot whites.

  From her position by the front of her tent, Jennie looked at McDill’s eyes. They had caught the reflection of the campfires and, once more, she had the illusion of staring into the pit of hell. She shuddered, and wrapped her arms around herself as she realized that, within minutes, McDill would be there.

  “Damn . . . you . . .” McDill managed to gurgle through the blood and spit that filled his mouth. “Damn ...”

  Art took one step toward the dying man, then stopped. McDill’s big body shuddered, then collapsed in a heap on the ground. Beneath him the blood pooled darkly from his leaking wound.

  Jennie ran up, threw her arms around Art, and kissed him. He stood there unmoving, unable to take his eyes off the crumpled heap that had once been a man.

  His own men now came forward: Montgomery, Matthews, and Hoffman. Dog followed warily, his nostrils filled with the blood scent from the dead man.

  “Well, Boss, good to see you again,” Matthews said. The others clapped him on the back. There were tears in their eyes.

  Jennie said, “Yes, so good. You’re alive. You saved my life. If you hadn’t been here—I don’t know what might have happened.”

  Still, Art said nothing. His body and mind were spent. He didn’t feel good about killing McDill, even though the man was a bastard and nothing but trouble for everyone around him. He had never enjoyed killing for the sake of killing, but only killed as a last resort. In this case, it had been a necessary last resort—no question.

  Finally, he spoke: “I’m glad that you’re all alive and well. Where did Caviness go?”

  “I th
ink we will never see him again,” Hoffman said with his heavy German accent. “I saw him sneak away like a dog.”

  “Careful when you say that,” Art said, nodding toward Dog, who cocked his head at the big Hessian.

  They all laughed. Dog even wagged his tail, sensing that they were talking about him.

  “Let’s clean up this mess and bury it,” Art said.

  “I tell you, Art, that’s more than he would have done for you,” Montgomery observed.

  “Call me Preacher,” Art said.

  “Preacher? Yeah, I heard you’d picked up a new moniker. That’s what you want to be called, huh?”

  “Yeah,” Preacher said. “That’s what I want to be called.”

  Later that night Jennie washed off the blood and trail dust that clung to the man who would now, and forever more, be called Preacher. She coaxed him to eat some supper, then to sleep off the aches and pains of his long ordeal. She lay beside him until he fell asleep.

  The next morning Preacher set out early, before Jennie awoke. Dog followed him to the edge of the settlement. Preacher rode toward the ford. He would cross the Missouri and ride back to St. Louis to report to William Ashley as he had promised to do. It seemed a long time ago since that last trip to St. Louis. A lot had happened, and he felt like a different man now. It was good that he had a new name to go with this new man. Maybe he had grown up. He was still young, but he had been through more in the last few months than most men would go through in a lifetime.

  “Dog,” he said, “I want you stay here with Miss Jennie. She needs you. I don’t. I’m on my own now.”

  The wolf-dog stopped. Preacher stopped too, turned his horse, and faced his faithful companion. “You understand what I’m saying, don’t you?”

  The animal cocked his head and wagged his tail again. At this moment he looked more like a dog than a wolf, though you couldn’t separate the two canine natures. Dog seemed to speak; he barked twice, looked at Preacher, then slowly walked back toward the settlement.

  Now the lone rider, a man of the mountains who had left the only home he had ever known more than a dozen years ago, reined his mount around and headed toward the river.

  The man called Preacher would start a new chapter in his life—and he would be alone, as the men of the mountains always were.

  TURN THE PAGE FOR AN EXCITING PREVIEW!

  USA Today and New York Times Bestselling Authors

  WILLIAM W. JOHNSTONE

  with J. A. Johnstone

  THE GREATEST WESTERN WRITERS

  OF THE 21ST CENTURY

  The Kerrigans risked everything to stake a claim under

  a big Texas sky. Now one brave woman is fighting

  to keep that home, against hard weather, harder luck,

  and the West’s most dangerous men.

  A RANCH DIVIDED . . .

  After a long hard journey up the Chisholm Trail, Kate

  Kerrigan is in Dodge City, facing a mystery of murder.

  A cowboy she hired, a man with a notorious past, has

  been accused of killing a prostitute and sentenced to

  hang. Kate still trusts Hank Lowry. And when a hired

  killer comes after her, she knows she has struck a nerve.

  Someone has framed Hank for murder—in order to

  cover up a more sinister and deadly crime spawned in

  the musty backrooms of the Kansas boomtown . . .

  Back in West Texas, the Kerrigan ranch is under siege.

  A wagon train full of gravely ill travelers has come onto

  the parched Kerrigan range, being led by a man on

  a secret mission. With Kate’s son Quinn manning the

  home front, one wrong step could be fatal when

  the shooting suddenly starts . . .

  The Kerrigans, A Texas Dynasty

  JOURNEY INTO VIOLENCE

  Coming in August 2016,

  wherever Pinnacle Books are sold.

  Chapter One

  “She ran me off her property, darned redheaded Irish witch.” Ezra Raven stared hard at his segundo, a tall lean man with ice in his eyes named Poke Hylle. “I want that Kerrigan land, Poke. I want every last blade of grass. You understand?”

  “I know what you want, boss,” Hylle said. He studied the amber whiskey in his glass as though it had become the most interesting thing in the room. “But wantin’ and gettin’ are two different things.”

  “You scared of Frank Cobb, that hardcase segundo of hers? I’ve heard a lot of men are.”

  “Should I be scared of him?” Hylle asked.

  “He’s a gun from way back. Mighty sudden on the draw and shoot.”

  Hylle’s grin was slow and easy, a man relaxed. “Yeah he scares me. But that don’t mean I’m afraid to brace him.”

  “You can shade him. You’re good with a gun your own self, Poke, maybe the best I’ve ever known,” Raven said. “Hell, you gunned Bingley Abbott that time. He was the Wichita draw fighter all the folks were talking about. ”

  “Bing was fast, but he wasn’t a patch on Frank Cobb,” Hylle said. “Now that’s a natural fact.”

  “All right, then, forget Cobb for now. There’s got to be a better way than an all-out range war.” Raven stepped to the ranch house window and stared out at the cloud of drifting dust where the hands were branding calves. “I offered Kate Kerrigan twice what her ranch is worth, but she turned me down flat. How do you deal with a woman like that?”

  “Carefully.” Hylle smiled. “I’m told she bites.”

  “Like a cougar. Shoved a scattergun into my face and told me to git. Me, Ezra Raven, who could buy and sell her and all she owns.” The big man slammed a fist into his open palm. “Damn, I need that land. I want to be big, Poke, the biggest man around. That’s just how I am, how I’ve always been, and I ain’t about to change.”

  The door opened and a tall, slender Pima woman stepped noiselessly across the floor and placed a white pill and a glass of water on Raven’s desk.

  “Damn, is it that time again?”

  “Take,” the woman said. “It is time.” She wore a plain, slim-fitting calico dress that revealed the swell of her breasts and hips. A bright blue ribbon tied back her glossy black hair, and on her left wrist she wore a wide bracelet of hammered silver. She was thirty-five years old. Raven had rescued her from a brothel in Dallas, and he didn’t know her Indian name, if she had one. He called her Dora only because it pleased him to do so.

  Raven picked up the pill and glared at it. “The useless quack says this will help my heart. I think the damned thing is sugar rolled into a ball.”

  Hylle waved an idle hand. “Man’s got to follow the doctor’s orders, boss.”

  Raven shrugged, swallowed the medication with a gulp of water, and handed the glass back to the Pima woman. “Beat it, Dora. White men are talking here.”

  The woman bowed her head and left.

  “Poke, like I said, I don’t want to take on a range war. It’s a messy business. Nine times out of ten the law gets involved and next thing you know, you’re knee-deep in Texas Rangers.”

  Hylle nodded. “Here’s a story you’ll find interesting, boss. I recollect one time in Galveston I heard a mariner talk about how he was first mate on a freighter sailing between Shanghai and Singapore in the South China Sea. Well, sir, during a watch he saw two ironclads get into a shooting scrape. He said both ships were big as islands and they had massive cannons in dozens of gun turrets. Both ships pounded at each other for the best part of three hours. In the end neither ironclad got sunk, but both were torn apart by shells and finally they listed away from each other, each of them trailing smoke. Nobody won that fight, but both ships paid a steep price.” He swallowed the last of his whiskey. “A range war is like that, boss. Ranchers trade gunfire, hired guns and punchers die, but in the end, nobody wins.”

  “And then the law comes in and cleans up what’s left,” Raven said.

  “That’s about the size of it,” Hylle said.
r />   “I don’t want that kind of fight. Them ironclads could have avoided a battle and sailed away with their colors flying. Firing on each other was a grandstand play and stupid.”

  Hylle rose from his chair, stepped to the decanters, and poured himself another drink. He took his seat again and said, “Boss, maybe there is another way.”

  “Let’s hear it,” Raven said. “But no more about heathen seas and ironclads. Damn it, man, you’re making me seasick.”

  Hylle smiled. “From what I’ve seen of the Kerrigan place it’s a hardscrabble outfit and Kate has to count every dime to keep it going. Am I right about that?”

  “You’re right. The KK Ranch is held together with baling wire and Irish pride. She’s building a house that isn’t much bigger than her cabin. She’s using scrap lumber and the first good wind that comes along will blow it all over creation.” Raven lifted his chin and scratched his stubbly throat. “Yeah, I’d say Kate Kerrigan’s broke or damned near it.”

  “So answer me this, boss. What happens if her herd doesn’t go up the trail next month?”

  A light glittered in Raven’s black eyes. “She’d be ruined.”

  “And eager to sell for any price,” Hylle said.

  Raven thought that through for a few moments then said, “How do we play it, Poke? Remember them damned ironclads of yours that tore one another apart. ”

  “No range war. Boss, we do it with masked men—night riders. We scatter the Kerrigan herd, gun a few waddies if we must, but leave no evidence that can be tied to you and the Rafter-R. Stop her roundup and the woman is out of business.” Hylle smiled. “Pity though. She’s real pretty.”

  “So are dollars and cents, Poke. The Kerrigan range represents money in my pocket.” A big, rawboned man, Raven’s rugged face bisected by a great cavalry mustache and chin beard. He lit a cigar and said behind a blue cloud of smoke, “We wait until the branding is done and then we strike at the Kerrigan herds, scatter them to hell and gone before Kate can start the gather. Can we depend on the punchers?”