Just as he pulled the trigger, he saw twin plumes of flame erupt from Laura’s hands and realized that she was armed with a brace of pistols, too. And from off on Preacher’s left, another pair of muzzle flashes winked redly, with enough distance between them that Preacher knew two men had just fired rifles.
The Blackfoot flew off his pony like he’d been slapped by a giant hand. Preacher almost felt sorry for the bloodthirsty son of a bitch as lead tore through his body from three or four directions at once.
The varmint was killed good and proper, that was for sure. He crashed to the ground and didn’t move again.
That still left the matter of getting Laura to safety. Preacher heeled Horse into a run again, intending to sweep her up on the stallion’s back as he rode past her and carry her back to the trading post as fast as he could get there.
The defenders were going to have to close the gates pretty soon or risk the Indians getting inside. Preacher didn’t want to get caught on the wrong side of those gates.
On the other hand, he thought suddenly, maybe he ought to just grab Laura and take off for the tall and uncut. They could slip off into the foothills, away from the battle.
But that would mean deserting the Harts and Jake and all the other settlers and just leaving them to their fate, whatever it might be.
Preacher knew he couldn’t do that. Not even to save Laura Mallory.
So his mind shifted back to his original plan, to grab her and make for the stockade…
That thought was going through Preacher’s mind when something crashed into his head and sent him spiraling off into a darkness deeper than even the darkest night.
Damn the man’s luck!
Once again Preacher had moved just as Colin Fair-fax drew a bead on him and pulled the trigger. It was maddening the way Preacher managed to dodge death again and again, often when he wasn’t even trying to, as if he had some sort of beneficent fate guiding his actions.
Or a guardian angel, Fairfax thought, even though he had seen too much evil in his life to truly believe in such heavenly beings. Hell might well exist, but Fairfax had his doubts about Heaven.
Preacher dashed away on horseback, obviously unhurt, as the man on the parapet next to Fairfax yelled, “You damn fool! That weren’t no Injun! That was Preacher!”
Fairfax played dumb as he crouched down below the level of the wall made of sharpened timbers and began to reload his rifle. “Are you sure? It looked like an Indian to me.”
“Yeah, I’m sure. What the hell do you think you were doin’? Preacher’s on our side!”
Fairfax shook his head. “Sorry. I didn’t know.”
The stubborn bastard wouldn’t let go of it, even in the middle of a battle against marauding Indians.
“You had to have seen him,” he argued in a loud voice. “There was enough light. Looked to me like you were tryin’ to kill him.”
Fairfax’s lips drew back from his teeth in a grimace. This idiot was going to ruin everything if he kept yelling like that. People were liable to start paying attention to his accusations. Fairfax still had some faint hopes of salvaging his plan, but he couldn’t do it unless the man beside him on the parapet shut up.
Or unless someone shut him up.
“Listen,” Fairfax said as he stepped closer to the man, holding his rifle in his left hand and reaching behind him with his right, “I tell you it was an honest mistake…”
The settler glared and shook his head.
Fairfax brought the knife around and shoved it in the man’s belly, driving it deep. When the blade was buried all the way to the hilt, he twisted it and ripped to the side with it.
The man’s eyes opened wide and bulged out as the agony of his wound hit him. He didn’t let out a sound, though, as he sagged against the wall. Fairfax caught hold of his shirt and braced him as the man slid down the logs and came to a stop in a sitting position.
Other defenders weren’t far away on the parapet, but all their attention was focused outward on the attackers. Fairfax didn’t think any of them had noticed what he’d done, but as he straightened from the dying man, another settler called, “What happened?”
“He’s hit,” Fairfax answered without hesitation. “Nothing we can do for him. It’s too late.”
The man who’d asked the question gave Fairfax a grim nod of acceptance. Losses were inevitable in a fight like this. Probably, no one would even check on the dead man’s body until after the battle was over. Then they’d discover that he had been killed by a knife to the belly rather than a gunshot wound.
And if the Indians won…well, no one in here would care how the man died. No one would be left to care.
That was starting to look more and more likely. The fighting had spread all over the settlement. A cabin was on fire, and as Fairfax watched, another dwelling was put to the torch by the redskins.
He didn’t see Preacher anymore. Maybe the mountain man had been killed in the fighting. Fairfax wasn’t going to believe that unless he saw Preacher’s body, though, and that seemed unlikely.
In fact, it was beginning to seem unlikely that he would get out of here alive himself, unless he did it soon. The gates were still open, with riflemen trying to defend them as a few stragglers fled frantically into the stockade, but the Indians were coming closer. They might soon be inside the walls…
Fairfax looked over his shoulder at the trading post. The Hart cousins were standing on the front porch holding rifles. He couldn’t get in there and grab Deborah. It was just impossible, Fairfax realized.
He had to abandon the plan and concentrate on saving his life instead.
He began to move along the parapet as if looking for a suitable target, but he was really looking for a place where the fighting wasn’t as fierce. Most of the Indians were on the east side of the stockade, so when Fairfax reached the southwest corner he saw only darkness out there. No muzzle flashes.
And no other defenders close by either.
He slung his rifle over his shoulder and grabbed hold of the tapered end of one of the upright logs that formed the wall. He drew himself up and threw a leg over. The sharpened ends were supposed to make it difficult to climb over the wall, and Fairfax had to be careful not to impale himself.
But he managed to make it, awkwardly, and started climbing down the outside of the wall, using the rawhide lashings that held the logs together for handholds. When he was low enough, he let go and dropped the rest of the way.
His booted feet thudded on the ground. He almost fell, but caught his balance and stayed upright.
It was dark back there, wonderfully dark. Fairfax loped away from the wall, not really caring where he went as long as it was away from there.
Behind him, the battle continued to rage. Flames leaped high, guns roared, men shouted and screamed and killed and died.
Fairfax didn’t care about any of it. They could all wipe each other out as far as he was concerned. The only death that mattered to him was Preacher’s.
And if the mountain man somehow survived the bloody chaos behind Fairfax—as Fairfax fully expected him to—then he would be dealt with another day.
The fleeing man disappeared into the shrouding shadows.
As Preacher galloped toward her, Laura Mallory saw that she’d been right earlier when she thought she heard his voice. The lean, rugged mountain man was unmistakable. Even though he wasn’t supposed to be here, he was.
Then she let out a startled cry as Preacher’s hat flew off his head and he fell off the stallion to land in a limp sprawl, rolling over a couple of times on the ground before coming to a stop with his left arm bent under him at an awkward angle and his head covered with blood. He didn’t move after that.
Clearly he’d been shot, and from the looks of it, he was either dead or badly wounded. Even though she had known him for only a short time, somehow that seemed impossible to Laura. Preacher wasn’t supposed to get shot. He was the sort of man who always managed to cheat death.
But maybe n
ot anymore.
Then more hoofbeats drew her attention, and she turned to see who was riding toward her now. If it was more Indians, she would dash back into the cabin, slam the door, and try to reload before the savages could break in.
A feeling of relief washed through her as she recognized her brother. “Clyde!” she cried. She didn’t know the man riding with him, but she assumed he was the one who had arranged the alliance with the Indians.
Mallory raced up to the cabin, brought his horse to a stop, and swung down from the saddle. He caught Laura up in his arms and hugged her tightly.
“Are you all right, dear?” he asked as he stepped back a moment later.
She nodded. “I’m not hurt at all, just scared. What do we do now?”
Mallory turned and for a moment studied the battle going on around the settlement, then said, “We’re going to get you out of here.”
She clutched his arms. “Clyde, I saw Preacher—”
“I know. I saw him, too, and heard him trying to rally the settlers.” A look of regret passed briefly across Mallory’s face. “That’s why I had to shoot him.”
“You shot him?”
Mallory nodded. “That’s right.”
“But why?”
“We can’t afford to have him turning the tide of this battle. I’ve heard enough about him to know that he’s capable of incredible things. He might make a difference all by himself.”
He was right, of course, Laura told herself. She drew a deep breath and nodded. “I understand. But it’s a shame. I rather liked him, you know.”
“So did I,” Mallory said. “But in the end, he’s just an American, like all the others.” He took his sister’s hand and tugged her toward his horse. “Let’s get you out of here before anything else happens.”
He mounted first and then pulled her up behind him. She put her arms around his waist to hang on.
At that moment, several Indians raced up on their ponies. Laura stifled a scream as she saw their fierce, painted faces surrounding them.
“Don’t worry, darling,” Clyde said. “These are our friends. This is Chief Walks Like a Bear. You don’t know Mr. Flagg yet either.”
“Ma’am,” Flagg said as he gave her a curt nod. Then he spoke to the chief for a moment and went on. “Bear says they’re about to storm the stockade. You want to wait around for that?”
Mallory considered it for a second, then shook his head. “No, I want to get Laura to safety. That’s more important right now.”
“All right. I’ll ride with you folks.”
The whole group turned their horses and rode away from the cabin, which other Blackfeet dashed up to and set on fire behind them. Laura glanced back once. She couldn’t see Preacher anymore, but she knew his body lay there not far from the cabin.
Even though she hadn’t argued with her brother, she knew that Clyde was wrong about one thing…Preacher wasn’t just like the other Americans. Preacher wasn’t just like anyone else.
There was only one Preacher, and Laura felt a pang of loss at the knowledge that he was dead.
Chapter 19
Searing pain was the first thing Preacher became aware of as consciousness seeped back into his brain. At first, it was one overwhelming agony, but gradually it split into two. He realized that part of the pain was centered in his head, and the rest of it came from his left arm, which was doubled underneath him.
When he shifted slightly, the pain in both places grew worse. His head swam, and he thought he was going to pass out again.
But then he heard a peculiar thudding sound, and managed to lift his head and open his eyes. The sound was hoofbeats as several horses trotted away. The light wasn’t good, but Preacher saw fair hair…
“Laura,” he croaked, too low for anyone to hear him.
His eyesight sharpened a little, enough for him to see Laura Mallory riding on the back of a horse, behind a man who looked like her brother Clyde. Preacher couldn’t figure out what Clyde was doing here at the settlement when he was supposed to be on his way back to St. Louis with the wagons.
But that didn’t matter. What was important was that Laura and her brother were surrounded by Indians. The Blackfeet had captured them and were taking them away, probably intending to torture them to death!
Preacher groaned and tried to push himself to his feet. If he could find his rifle and reload it, he might be able to stop the savages from escaping with the Mallorys.
As he put weight on his left arm, though, fresh agony shot through it, as if imps from Hell were hacking away at it with knives. It collapsed underneath him, causing him to sprawl on his belly again. A black fog rolled through Preacher’s brain for several seconds.
By the time he could lift his head again, Laura, Mallory, and their Indian captors were gone.
When the Good Lord was putting Preacher together, He’d left out the capacity for despair. But at that moment Preacher came mighty near to experiencing it.
He fought off the feeling. Something was wrong with his left arm, no doubt about that, but his right one still worked. If he was careful about it, he could get to his feet, find Horse, go after those damned Blackfeet…
Somebody grabbed his long, tangled black hair and hauled up hard on it, sending fresh waves of agony through his head. He heard a startled cry from above him as he swung his right arm up and back and drove the elbow into something yielding.
The Blackfoot warrior who’d been fixing to scalp him must have thought he was already dead, Preacher realized.
That was a bad mistake for the varmint to have made.
Instinct, anger, and determination combined to give Preacher the strength he needed to ignore the pain and twist onto his back. At the same time he lashed out with a foot and caught the startled Indian in the belly with it. The Blackfoot went over backward.
Preacher kept rolling and got his right arm under him. He levered himself up with it until he could get his feet on the ground. Surging upright, he kicked the Indian again, this time in the jaw. Bone shattered, and the Blackfoot went down and stayed down.
Swaying as a wave of dizziness hit him again, Preacher managed to stay on his feet until it passed a few seconds later. His left arm hung limp and useless at his side. He lifted his right hand to his head, and found a patch of sticky wetness just above his right ear.
He had been creased by rifle balls in the past, and knew that was what had happened to him a few minutes earlier when he was knocked out of the saddle. He prodded the wound with his fingers and it hurt like hell, but he didn’t figure his skull was busted.
The cabin that he supposed had been Laura Mallory’s was burning now, and by the garish light of the blaze, he saw that his left arm was broken about halfway between the elbow and the wrist. It hung crooked, and he could see the lump where the broken bone was pressing up against the skin.
At least the bone hadn’t torn all the way out of the flesh. If he could find somebody to set it and splint it, it might heal up all right.
That would have to wait, though, because right now there was still a battle going on. He looked toward the stockade and saw that the gates were shut.
Muzzle flashes flickered along the walls as the defenders on the parapet fired down at the Blackfoot attackers. The Blackfeet had found all the cover they could and were pouring lead at the stockade.
Preacher wondered fleetingly where the attackers had gotten so many rifles, and good ones at that. Indians had adapted quickly to the firearms brought to the frontier by the white men. In fact, it had been an avid interest by a Blackfoot brave in a rifle belonging to one of Lewis and Clark’s men that had led to the Indian’s fatal shooting, that incident being the wellspring of the hostility that the Blackfeet had felt toward the whites ever since.
But usually, the only guns they had were ones they had stolen or taken off the corpses of their victims, and many of those were older trade muskets that weren’t particularly accurate or reliable. Fact is, some of those muskets were prone to blowing up in
the hands of anybody who tried to use them.
Preacher could tell by the crisp sound of the firing that the rifles being used by the Blackfeet in this raid were of much higher quality. That was going to make defeating them even harder.
Harder…but not impossible. Preacher looked around until he found the pistol he had dropped when he tumbled off Horse. His other pistol was still tucked behind his belt. He started limping toward the stockade.
Funny, he thought with a bleak grin, he hadn’t even realized that he’d hurt his leg, too, until now.
Reloading a flintlock pistol one-handed was a right difficult chore, but Preacher managed. He stayed in the shadows of the cabins as he approached the Blackfeet from behind, but they weren’t looking in this direction anyway. They thought all their enemies were in front of them.
Again, that was going to be a bad mistake, at least for some of them.
Preacher grimaced as he passed the body of a woman who had been shot in the back. A few yards further on lay the body of a girl about ten years old. Probably the woman’s daughter, Preacher thought. She had sent the little girl running on ahead of her, but then she’d been killed and the girl was next.
Fury seethed like fire inside Preacher. He tamped it down. Killing took a steady hand and cold nerves.
He pressed his back against a cabin wall. Twenty feet away, a couple of Blackfeet warriors crouched behind a wagon and fired toward the stockade.
Preacher could see the rifles being used by the Indians and knew his guess had been right. The weapons looked new.
He took a deep breath and then stepped out and walked quickly toward the Indians. He was within five feet of them before something warned them of his approach. One of them started to turn, his mouth opening to shout a warning.
Preacher shot him in the side of the head. The ball crashed through the Indian’s brain and exploded out the other side of his skull.
Even as the dead warrior was slumping against the wagon with half his head gone, Preacher lunged at the other one and swung the now-empty pistol. The barrel crashed against the man’s head with a satisfying crunch of bone. The Indian folded up.
Preacher's Pursuit (The First Mountain Man) Page 14