Sure enough, late that afternoon Preacher and Wilkerson reined to a stop on top of a rise overlooking a vast bowl between two hills and saw that it was packed with what looked at first like a brown sea flowing slowly back and forth. It was actually a buffalo herd, and a smallish one at that. Only about ten thousand of the shaggy creatures were grazing down there, Preacher estimated. When he was younger he had seen herds numbering in the millions, but so many of the beasts had been slaughtered in the past fifteen years that those days were probably gone for good.
“That’s what I was lookin’ for,” Wilkerson said with a sigh of relief. “That ought to make ’em happy. They can set up their guns and kill buffs for an hour.”
“And leave the carcasses to rot,” Preacher pointed out.
Wilkerson shrugged. “We’ll skin out a few of them to make rugs or robes or whatever the folks want. I’m sorry about the others, but there’s nothin’ I can do about it.”
Preacher tried not to frown in disapproval. Hank already knew it was wrong. He didn’t need Preacher to tell him that. If Hank could live with it, then so be it.
“Keep an eye on the herd,” Wilkerson went on. “I’ll ride back and tell the others.”
“The herd ain’t goin’ any place.”
“I know. But I’d appreciate it anyway, Preacher. You look like you could chew nails right about now.”
Preacher jerked his head in a nod.
While he sat on the ridge, Wilkerson told the others about the buffalo and got them started setting up camp. Several members of the group had to ride out and see the buffalo for themselves, including Helena Markova and her husband. The count was in his forties, a stocky gent with a mustache that came to a sharp point on each end. He wore a red coat and a fur hat that looked ridiculous to Preacher, but not as ridiculous as the monocle he sported.
Markova pulled out a spyglass and used it to study the buffalo. When he lowered the glass, he said, “Ugly-looking creatures, aren’t they?”
“They probably think the same thing about us, Alexi,” the countess said.
Markova snorted. “You give them too much credit for thinking, my dear.”
“The count’s right, ma’am,” Wilkerson said. “There ain’t many things on God’s green earth dumber’n a buffalo. That’s why they’ll just stand there and keep grazin’ while they’re bein’ shot down right and left. Until one of ’em gets hit, or until the smell of blood gets too strong, they don’t realize there’s anything wrong.”
“Why don’t we just go ahead and shoot them this afternoon?” Ben Skillern asked.
“We’ll have more time in the morning,” Wilkerson explained. “It’ll be easier that way. We can shoot for a while, then skin out some of the varmints and start back to the train with the hides.”
No one put up an argument. After several hours in the saddle, the hunters were tired and looking forward to a good night’s sleep before they started killing again.
The camp was half a mile downwind from the herd, which meant the air was pretty potent. No one complained about the smell except Helena. Preacher was used to it, and didn’t even notice it anymore. The smell of antelope steaks frying helped some.
The servants had set up tents where their bosses would sleep. They brought out folding tables and chairs, so the politicians, tycoons, and aristocrats could sit down to eat, the way they were used to.
Preacher hunkered on his heels under a scrubby tree with his plate of food. Wilkerson came over to join him as the orange rays of the sun began to fade in the western sky.
“Well, what do you think?” Wilkerson asked.
Deliberately, Preacher finished chewing the mouthful of antelope steak before he swallowed. “I think somebody’s followin’ us.”
Wilkerson’s eyes widened. “What in blazes are you talkin’ about, Preacher?”
“I’ve had an uneasy feelin’ all day,” Preacher explained, “but I figured it was because I was out here with a bunch of loco greenhorns who seem bound and determined to get into trouble. A little while ago, though, I spotted a couple riders a ways back. Looked like they was doggin’ our trail.”
“Indians?” Wilkerson asked in a low, worried voice.
Preacher shook his head. “I don’t think so. Can’t be sure, but I think they was white men.”
“Two white men ain’t all that worrisome. There’s two dozen of us.”
“Just ’cause I saw two riders don’t mean that’s all there is.”
Wilkerson scratched at his beard. “Yeah, I reckon that’s true. Why would they be followin’ us?”
Preacher waved a hand at the camp. “You ever stopped to add up how much that bunch is worth, Hank?”
“No, I don’t suppose I did.”
“Neither did I, because I’ve never been that good at cipherin’, but you know it’s got to be a whole heap of money.”
“You think somebody wants to kidnap them?” Wilkerson asked tensely.
“It’s a thought,” Preacher said.
Wilkerson muttered a curse. “We’ve gotta get ’em back to the train, and there ain’t gonna be any more of these little campouts, no matter what that damn McCormick says.”
“You can’t go herdin’ that bunch across country in the dark,” Preacher pointed out. “Somebody’d be bound to get lost. Better to sit tight here tonight and head back tomorrow. Shoot, you could even let ’em kill a few buffs in the mornin’, if you want to. You just need to put a good guard on the camp tonight to make sure nobody sneaks up on you.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” Wilkerson looked at Preacher with a frown. “Wait a minute. You’re talkin’ like you ain’t gonna be here.”
“I ain’t.”
“Blast it, Preacher, I never thought you’d run out on me the first time trouble crops up!”
“I’m not runnin’ out on you,” Preacher said. “I thought I’d drift back yonder and see if I can find the varmints who been trailin’ us. If I can, maybe I can figure out who they are and what they want. Then we’ll have a better idea how to deal with ’em.”
Wilkerson grimaced and shook his head. “Sorry, Preacher. I should’ve knowed better.”
“That’s right, you should have.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard all those stories about how you used to slip into those Blackfoot camps and cut the throats of half a dozen of their best warriors without any of the rest of ’em havin’ any idea what was goin’ on. Is that what you’re gonna do with this bunch?”
“That was a long time ago,” Preacher protested. “I was a lot younger then. Anyway, we don’t know who those fellas are. Could be they’re just innocent pilgrims who happen to be goin’ the same direction we are.”
“Do you really believe that?”
A grim smile tugged a little at Preacher’s lips. “My gut don’t.”
“I trust your gut. So if you find out they do mean us harm . . . ?”
Preacher’s hand strayed to the bone handle of the Bowie knife sheathed at his waist. “We’ll see what we can do about that.”
Chapter 24
Long ago, the Indians—specifically his greatest enemies the Blackfeet—had dubbed him Ghost Killer. At times Preacher had done things especially to convince them he was supernatural, a spirit warrior who could enter their camps as a phantom, then become real long enough to kill their greatest warriors as they slept.
Those days were behind him. The country had changed. It had been a long time since he’d been at war with the Indians, and he was considerably older.
But he could still manage some stealth when he needed it. He slipped silently through the shadows, using every bit of concealment he could find as he searched for the men who had been trailing the hunting party.
As time passed and he didn’t locate them, Preacher began to wonder where they were. He wasn’t the sort of man to doubt himself. He didn’t question whether or not he had actually seen someone following the hunting party. He knew what he had seen. Those riders had been back there.
But where were they? He had gone at least a mile from the camp without finding any sign of them. He lifted his head and sniffed the air. No smell of woodsmoke or tobacco. Had the riders veered off in some other direction?
Or had they circled to get ahead of the hunting party?
Preacher turned his head and peered off toward the north. His eyes narrowed as he spotted just the faintest orange tinge in the night sky, low on the horizon. “Son of a—” he burst out.
He had left Horse ground-hitched a couple hundred yards away as he stalked his quarry on foot. Letting out a loud, high-pitched whistle to call the stallion, he started forward at a run to meet the horse and save as much time as he could. He had to get back to the camp right away.
He knew he might be too late already.
With a swift rataplan of hoofbeats, Horse appeared, looming out of the night in front of him. Preacher called out to the animal. Horse had barely slowed to a halt when Preacher swarmed up into the saddle, grabbed the reins, and wheeled the stallion around. Digging his heels into Horse’s flanks, he sent the animal lunging ahead in a gallop.
Preacher grimaced when he saw the orange glow in the sky was a little brighter. He sniffed the air again, and the wind out of the north brought with it a slight scent of smoke.
Hank Wilkerson was no fool. He would smell that smoke, too, and know right away what the result of it would be. Preacher recalled the terrain around the camp. It was mostly flat, but there was a rocky hill several hundred yards away. If Wilkerson could get his charges up that hill, there was at least a chance they would survive the inevitable on-slaught.
Preacher cursed as he raced northward on Horse. His instincts had told him something was wrong as soon as he saw those riders on their back trail, but he couldn’t have predicted that whoever was following them would try to wipe out the entire hunting party. It was cold-blooded mass murder, and he couldn’t see any reason for it. Senator Olson and those Congressmen probably had some political opposition, and Packard, Skillern, Dunlop, and the other businessmen were bound to have made some enemies. But would any of those enemies resort to wholesale slaughter?
All Preacher knew for certain was that somebody had started a prairie fire on the other side of that buffalo herd. As the wind carried the smoke and the flames southward, that mass of shaggy creatures would grow nervous and start to move, slowly at first, then faster and faster. Their animal instincts would force them to flee, until they were running full tilt, living engines of destruction aimed straight at the camp where those greenhorns slumbered, unaware of the danger.
Over the pounding of Horse’s hoofbeats, Preacher suddenly heard a low rumble, like thunder or the sound of distant drums. He grimaced as he leaned forward in the saddle and urged the stallion on.
The buffalo were moving. The stampede had begun.
As Preacher drew closer the smell of smoke was stronger. He veered Horse to the east. If he continued heading due north, he would run smack-dab into the stampeding buffalo. It wouldn’t do anybody any good for him to get trampled. He spotted a low ridge that would probably keep him safe. Like a flooding river, the buffalo would smash over anything in their way, but they would also take the path of least resistance.
The rumble of tens of thousands of hooves pounding the ground steadily grew louder and louder until it seemed to shake the whole world. Preacher felt the terrain sloping and knew he was climbing to the top of the ridge he hoped would save his life. When it leveled out, he reined Horse to a stop and gazed off to the north. He was high enough that he could plainly see the flames of the prairie fire leaping into the air higher than a man’s head.
The inferno was several hundred yards wide. The wind wasn’t strong enough to send it racing southward like so many other prairie fires Preacher had seen, but the flames were making steady progress. The blaze cast a hellish orange glow over the landscape that was bright enough to reveal the sea of shaggy backs fleeing from it.
Preacher looked toward the hill he recalled, hoping to see the members of the expedition seeking shelter there. It was too far away, though, and he couldn’t make out any details. The stampede was flowing around the hill, as he had thought it would, so if Wilkerson and the others had reached the top, they ought to be safe.
For the time being, Preacher was safe, but he was stuck where he was. He couldn’t descend from the ridge without getting caught in the stampede. He had to wait until the buffalo were past.
They might run all the way to the railroad, he realized. The folks who had been left behind at the train would be safe enough, but they’d likely witness a spectacular scene, the likes of which they would never see again.
“Hell of a thing, Horse,” Preacher said to the stallion.
The fire began to burn itself out. The hooves of the stampeding buffalo had churned up the ground so badly there wasn’t much grass left to burn. The men who had started the blaze had accomplished their goal. They had caused the herd to stampede through the hunting party’s camp.
The rumbling died down once the buffalo were past the ridge where Preacher waited. It seemed to take ages for all the hairy brutes to go by, but it was really less than a quarter hour, Preacher knew. As stampedes went, it was actually a small one.
But plenty deadly enough to anybody caught in its path.
Time for him to find out just how deadly it had been, he told himself as he lifted the reins and clucked his tongue at Horse. The stallion started down the ridge.
As he rode, Preacher drew his Winchester from the saddle boot, in case he encountered any stragglers from the herd. A fear-maddened buffalo bull might charge him and Horse out of sheer panic, and he would have to put it down.
The unholy smell of smoke lingered in the air as Preacher came to the spot where he thought the camp had been located. After a moment he found what was left of some tents, and then some debris that was probably a shattered table.
He saw what looked like shapeless bundles of clothing, and his mouth tightened into a grim line under his mustache. Those rags were all that was left of human beings. Several people had died there. Preacher knew there wasn’t enough left to try to figure out who the bodies belonged to. He headed for the rocky knoll in hopes of finding some survivors there.
He had reached the bottom of the hill when a shot blasted out above him and a slug screamed off into the night. Somebody was up there, anyway, he told himself.
“Hold your fire!” he shouted. “Don’t shoot, blast it! It’s me, Preacher!”
“Preacher?” It was a woman’s voice that came down to him. Had to be Countess Helena Markova. She was the only female in the bunch. “Preacher, is it really you?”
“It’s me, and I’m comin’ up.” He added again, just to make sure she understood, “Don’t shoot me.”
Horse took the slope without much problem, weaving around the boulders that littered the side of the hill. When Preacher came to the top, several people gathered around him. The moon and stars cast enough light for him to recognize the Count and Countess Markova, the journalist Jasper McCormick, Milton Packard, Jiggers Dunlop, and Benjamin Skillern. Senator Olson’s two aides, Curtis and Jennings, were there, along with the two Congressmen and the servants who had come along. But Preacher didn’t see Senator Olson himself, or Hank Wilkerson. None of the plainsmen Wilkerson had hired to accompany the expedition were there, either. Preacher muttered a curse. It looked like Hank and the hired men had lost their lives getting those pilgrims to safety. The senator was probably a casualty, too.
Helena had one of those fancy hunting rifles cradled in her hands. “What happened? Where were you, Preacher?”
The old mountain man swung down from his saddle. He didn’t answer Helena’s question but asked one of his own. “Where’s Hank Wilkerson?”
“Dead,” Helena said. She seemed to have assumed the role of spokesman for the group. In fact, she was the only one who didn’t look completely shaken up and scared out of her mind, Preacher noted. That included the count.
“Hank wa
s caught in the stampede?”
Helena shook her head. “No, he was dead before it started. He and the men he hired.”
Preacher frowned. “What? How in tarnation did that happen?”
“I don’t know,” Helena replied with a shake of her head. “But when I saw the fire and went to look for Mr. Wilkerson, I found him on the outskirts of the camp, the last place I had seen him earlier in the evening. He had been stabbed. When I went to look for the other guards, they were the same way. Someone murdered them before the stampede started.”
“Wait just a doggone minute!” Preacher exclaimed. “That don’t make any sense. Hank and the rest of those boys knew what they were doin’. It’d take somebody mighty dangerous to sneak up on ’em and kill ’em without wakin’ up the whole camp.”
Helena regarded Preacher coolly. “Someone like you, perhaps, Preacher? You didn’t answer my question about where you were when the stampede started.”
Anger welled up inside Preacher. “Hold on,” he snapped. “You don’t really think I had anything to do with killin’ those ol’ boys, do you?”
“Mr. Wilkerson told me you were famous across the frontier for slipping into the camps of the savages and killing them,” Helena returned.
“Yeah, but Hank and me were pards from ’way back!” With an effort, Preacher got control of himself. Helena and the others were waiting for an explanation, so he said, “Earlier this evenin’, I told Hank I’d spotted some riders trailin’ us. I dropped back to see if I could find out who they were and what they wanted.”
“Well?” Helena demanded. “Did you find them?”
Preacher shook his head. “I reckon they must’ve circled around us, got north of that buffalo herd, and started that fire to stampede the buffs. That’s the only thing that makes any sense.”
“Why would these mysterious men do that?”
“I don’t know,” Preacher admitted. “Only thing I can figure is that they wanted to kill one of us and didn’t mind wipin’ out ever’body else to do it.”
The Family Jensen Page 18