A Texas Hill Country Christmas

by William W. Johnstone

  Ace told Porter, “You’d better start thinking about what you’re going to say to Miss Channing the next time you see her, Will.”

  “I’ve barely thought of anything else this morning,” Porter replied. “I’m going to declare my deep and abiding love for her, of course. I plan to wax eloquent about her beauty and pledge that my affection for her will be eternal. I’ll promise to make something of myself and provide for her so splendidly that never again shall she know a single day of discomfort or doubt.”

  “You figure on doing that by clerking in a bank or a drugstore?” Chance asked. “Isn’t that what you said you’ve been doing? Or maybe if you make a hand at writing, you’ll get rich doing that?”

  “Doesn’t seem likely,” Ace said with a dubious shake of his head.

  “Whatever I do, all my efforts will be dedicated to making Evelyn happy,” Porter insisted. “What more could any woman ask for?”

  Chance laughed and said, “In my experience, women aren’t much on the idea of giving a fella credit for trying. They’re more interested in what he can actually do.”

  “I’ll convince her. You’ll see.”

  “I hope you do,” Ace said. “Otherwise we’ll have made this trip for nothing more than some good German food.”

  “Not a bad reason in itself,” Chance put in.

  They rode on, trying to avoid the worst mud. The wind picked up a little, but it still wasn’t raining. When the time came to rest the horses and the three of them had dismounted, Ace took the dragoon revolver out of Porter’s carpetbag and handed it to the young man.

  “Let’s see what you can do with this,” he suggested.

  Porter took the gun eagerly. He wrapped both hands around the smooth walnut grips and asked, “What do you want me to shoot at?”

  Chance pointed at a dead tree about fifteen feet from the edge of the road.

  “That tree trunk’s almost as wide as a man,” he said. “See if you can hit it.”

  “That should be a simple task.” Porter stretched both arms out in front of him as far as they would go and pointed the revolver at the tree. The barrel wobbled up and down and side to side, despite his efforts to hold it still.

  “Pull your arms back in a little,” Ace told him. “And that’s a single-action revolver, Will. You’ve got to cock it before you can shoot it.”

  “Oh. Yes. Of course.” Porter had to use both thumbs to pull the hammer back and lock it into place. He aimed again, and the gun was a little steadier this time. He still didn’t squeeze the trigger. Instead he said, “I must admit, it’s a bit unsettling to think about shooting at, well, a fellow human being. I mean, you said the tree is about the same size, Chance, and that made me reflect on what a deeply profound experience it must be to take aim at someone for the express purpose of doing them harm, nay, ending their very existence—”

  “Just shoot the tree already,” Ace said.

  “Very well.” Porter took a deep breath and squeezed the trigger.

  The dragoon boomed like thunder and kicked up so hard that it flew out of Porter’s hands as the recoil knocked him backward. Chance exclaimed, “Whoa!” and jumped forward to catch the revolver before it fell into the mud.

  Nobody caught Porter. He wound up sitting in a puddle looking stunned and miserable. Ace managed not to laugh, but he couldn’t keep from smiling and shaking his head.

  Porter opened his mouth and then closed it again a couple of times. Chance grinned and said, “I reckon Will’s been struck speechless for once in his life.”

  Ace stepped forward to offer Porter a hand, but as he did, something whipped past his ear and thudded into the road. Ace knew instantly what had just happened.

  Somebody was shooting at them.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The crack of the shot came almost at the same time as Ace sensed the slug passing by his ear, with just enough delay to tell him that the bushwhacker was a little distance away. That meant a rifle. He had a split-second while the would-be killer levered the weapon, so he lunged forward, grabbed Porter’s collar, and hauled the man to his feet.

  “Run!” Ace snapped.

  Chance was moving, too, grabbing the horses’ reins and pulling them toward the far side of the road. The trees and brush there were thick enough to provide some cover.

  Ace gave Porter a shove in the same direction. Porter stumbled but stayed on his feet and hurried toward the trees behind Chance and the horses.

  Another bullet whined past Ace’s head. This time the sound of the shot gave him an idea where the bushwhacker was, and he yanked out his Colt and triggered three fast rounds in that general direction. He didn’t expect to hit anything, especially at long range, but he wanted to give the rifleman something to think about.

  Chance and Porter vanished into the cedars. Ace’s long legs carried him into the trees as well. A third shot ripped out from the hidden gunman. The bullet clipped a tree trunk and showered Ace with splinters as he darted past it.

  Then he was in relative safety with a lot of those trunks between him and the rifleman. He stopped and pressed his back against a tree. Several yards away, Chance had stopped with the horses. Porter’s mare was spooked, and Chance had to struggle to keep the animal under control. Porter, his clothes smeared with mud from his fall, stood nearby, wide-eyed with fear.

  “Anybody hit?” Ace called to the other two.

  “We’re fine,” Chance said, then he cursed and thrust the mare’s reins into Porter’s hands. “Hang on to her, blast it!”

  The brothers’ mounts were more accustomed to gunfire, so they weren’t causing any trouble. Chance could drop their reins and be confident that they wouldn’t go very far. He did that and started dragging out the Winchesters from their saddle boots.

  The bushwhacker couldn’t see them anymore, but that didn’t stop him from spraying lead through the stretch of woods where they had taken cover. Bullets tore through tree trunks and rattled through branches. Just by sheer luck, a few of them came a little too close for comfort.

  Chance tossed Ace’s Winchester to him. Ace plucked the repeater out of the air and said, “We need to discourage that varmint.”

  “That’s just what I was thinking,” Chance agreed. “Will, stay here.”

  “I . . . I can assure you that’s precisely what I intend to do!” Porter responded with a gulp.

  Ace and Chance split up and began working their way back toward the edge of the trees. When Ace reached a spot where he could see the road again, he watched the slope on the other side and waited for some telltale sign of the rifleman.

  After a few moments his keen eyes spotted movement in the brush at the mouth of a gully about two hundred yards away. Ace concentrated on that location and saw a muzzle flash.

  “I see him!” he called to Chance. He couldn’t see his brother anymore but knew he wasn’t far away.

  “I do, too!” Chance said. “Want to make it hot for him?”

  “Bet a hat I do,” Ace replied. He brought the Winchester to his shoulder, braced its barrel against the trunk of the tree where he had taken cover, and opened fire.

  The shots were like a long roll of thunder as the Jensen boys poured lead at their attacker. Ace fired seven times as fast as he could work the rifle’s lever, and Chance loosed a similar number of rounds. Squinting through the haze of powder smoke, Ace saw the brush in the gully’s mouth whipping around under the onslaught.

  They held their fire. The gun-thunder echoed in the hills for several seconds before fading. As it did, Ace heard the faint sound of a horse crashing through brush in the distance.

  Chance laughed and called, “He’s lit out! Reckon we blistered him a little?”

  “I hope so,” Ace said.

  From deeper in the woods, Porter called, “Is . . . is it safe to come out now?”

  “Stay right where you are, Will,” Ace told him. “We want to make sure he’s gone and not just trying to pull some sort of trick.”

  They waited and listen
ed for a good five minutes before Ace was willing to accept that the bushwhacker had fled. He and Chance went to get their horses and told Porter to come with them.

  As they emerged onto the road, Ace looked around warily. Everything seemed peaceful again.

  Chance had shoved Porter’s big revolver behind his belt. He pulled it out and put it in the carpetbag again.

  “I think that’s enough practicing for now,” he said dryly. “I’d rather put some distance between us and this place. Will, this was the first time you’d ever been shot at, wasn’t it?”

  “How . . . how did you know that?”

  Chance chuckled and pointed, said, “By the seat of your britches.”

  Porter flushed and said, “You know I sat down in the mud when I fired that gun. That’s all this is.”

  “Sure it is.”

  “As a matter of fact, this was indeed my first experience at being under fire, but I think I acquitted myself rather well. I didn’t lose my head, did I?”

  “No, you didn’t,” Ace agreed. “You moved quick and did everything we told you. Keep that up and you might live through this.”

  “You make it sound almost as if you expect us to come under attack again.”

  “There’s a good chance of it,” Ace said. “Who do you think was shooting at us?”

  “Why . . . some highwayman out to kill us and rob our corpses, no doubt.”

  “What about Hudson?” Chance asked.

  Porter’s eyes got big again as he said, “Do you really think the man would stoop to murder?”

  “Maybe he’s worried about you and Evelyn,” Ace said. “Could be he was keeping an eye on you and saw us leave Austin this morning, headed toward Fredericksburg. He could have gotten ahead of us and set up this ambush.”

  “He might not have been trying to kill you,” Chance added. “Maybe he just wanted to scare you off, make you give up and turn back.”

  Ace said, “I don’t know. Those bullets were coming mighty close for warning shots.”

  “Yeah, but at that range, it’s hard to cut things too fine.”

  Ace shrugged and said, “It’s possible.”

  Porter looked back and forth between them and exclaimed, “Good Lord, you’re both so casual about someone nearly killing you!”

  “It’s not like this is the first time it’s happened,” Chance said.

  “And he missed, so there’s no point in getting worked up about it,” Ace said. “No matter who that bushwhacker was or why he was shooting at us, the most important thing is that none of us were hit.”

  “Yes, I can see that,” Porter said, nodding. “I’m not sure I’ll ever be as blasé about a brush with death as you two are, though.”

  The three of them mounted up and rode on. Ace and Chance flanked Porter now, and their eyes never stopped moving as they watched the slopes around them. Ace didn’t think it was likely the bushwhacker would make another try right away, but there was no guarantee of that. He hoped that one of the bullets he and Chance had thrown at the man might have tagged him, so he wouldn’t be interested in any more ambushes, but there was no way of knowing that, either.

  Late in the afternoon, they came to a settlement along the banks of a river that twisted through the hills. A sign at the edge of town announced that the place was called Johnson City. One of the first buildings Ace saw was a stage line office.

  The stagecoach from Austin hadn’t overtaken them during the day, but it probably wasn’t very far behind them now. Ace pointed out the stage station to the other two and said, “The coach will probably stop there for the night.”

  Eagerly, Porter said, “So I’ll have an opportunity to speak to Evelyn and persuade her to abandon her plan to marry Hudson. I might convince her to turn back before she even reaches Fredericksburg!”

  “Yeah, if you think that’ll do any good,” Chance said.

  “Hope springs eternal!” Porter cried.

  A low rumble sounded. To the surprise of Ace and Chance, the storm had lurked in the west all day without moving in to drench the already soaked landscape any more. The thunder meant that respite might not last much longer, though, and so did a sudden gust of cold wind.

  “Let’s find a stable for these horses and a place to get in out of the rain if it starts to pour,” Ace suggested.

  There was a stable on the other side of the street from the stagecoach station. The garrulous old man who ran it introduced himself as Carlton. He gushed over what fine horses Ace’s chestnut and Chance’s cream-colored gelding were and told them that the Pedernales Hotel, named after the nearby river, was the best hotel in town.

  “Of course, it’s also the only hotel,” he added with a chuckle. “But they’ll take good care of you there. One of my brothers runs the place. Got a fine barbecue pit, too, so you’ll want to eat in the dining room.”

  “You happen to know what time the stage from Austin gets in?” Ace asked.

  “I know when it’s scheduled to come in, since my other brother manages the station. Ought to be close to on time, since the good weather’s held today. I sure didn’t expect it to. I been givin’ some thought to how maybe I ought to start buildin’ me a big boat.”

  “So what time does the stagecoach get here?” Chance asked.

  “Oh, I didn’t say, did I?” Carlton took a turnip watch out of his pocket, flipped it open, stared at it, and said, “Right about now. Fact is, I hear it comin’.”

  So did Ace and Chance. They turned toward the stable doors as the stagecoach came bumping and splashing along the street.

  Porter hurried out, unable to contain his eagerness. The brothers trailed him. Across the street, the Concord coach had rocked to a halt in front of the stage line office. A couple of hostlers came out of the barn to tend to the team. A man in a white shirt, vest, string tie, and sleeve garters emerged from the office. He was probably the stableman’s brother, the station manager, thought Ace.

  The driver and guard climbed down from the box. The driver grasped the door latch, twisted it, and swung the door open.

  “Johnson City, folks,” he announced. “We’ll be over-nightin’ here. The roads ain’t in good enough shape these days to risk travelin’ in the dark.”

  Porter came to a stop a few yards away and waited with a look of breathless anticipation on his face for the passengers to emerge. Ace and Chance came up behind him.

  Two men in cheap suits got off the stage, both of them obviously traveling salesmen. Porter began to look worried.

  But then Evelyn Channing appeared in the coach’s door like a blond vision, and with a glad cry, Porter started toward her. She saw him coming and paused, a look of complete surprise on her face.

  Suddenly a hard voice ordered, “Not another step, Porter!” and the command was punctuated by the unmistakable metallic sound of a revolver’s hammer being eared back.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Oliver Hudson stalked around the back of the stagecoach, gun in hand. Ace fought down the impulse to draw his own Colt. If he reached for it, that would just give Hudson an excuse to shoot him. Legally, it wouldn’t be self-defense, but close enough that most Texas juries would give Hudson the benefit of the doubt.

  And Ace would still be dead, either way.

  He glanced over at his brother, saw that the same thoughts were going through Chance’s mind. Ace shook his head just enough for Chance to see it.

  “Oliver!” Evelyn exclaimed. “I didn’t expect to see you here. You said you were going on to Fredericksburg to take care of some business before our wedding.”

  “That was my intention,” Hudson said as he kept Porter, Ace, and Chance covered. The sight of the gun in his hand had made the hostlers and the station manager back away. They didn’t want to be caught in the line of fire if any shooting broke out. The two drummers who had gotten off the stagecoach before Evelyn were scurrying toward the Pedernales Hotel, eager to be well clear of any trouble.

  Hudson went on, “I got worried about you making the trip
by yourself, though, so I decided to join you here. It’s a good thing I did. You don’t need this fool annoying you.”

  He sneered at Porter as he spoke.

  Porter’s face flushed with anger. Ace said quietly, “Keep your wits about you, Will.”

  Porter’s head jerked in a nod. Even though Hudson’s gun was pointed at him, he ventured a step closer to the stagecoach, where Evelyn still stood on the iron step just below the open door.

  “I’m not here to annoy you, Evelyn,” he said. “I just want you to listen to reason.”

  Before the young woman could respond, Hudson said, “And I want you to turn around and get out of here, Porter. You’re a pest. A fly just buzzing around and bothering folks. Isn’t that right, Evelyn?”

  There was some sympathy in her eyes as she looked at Porter, Ace thought, but her lips tightened firmly. She said, “William, we’ve talked about this. You’re a fine man and a good friend and I’m sure you’re going to be successful at whatever you do. But I’m simply not interested in being courted by you. I’ve agreed to marry Oliver, and that’s the way things are going to be.”

  “You can’t mean that,” Porter said as a tone of misery crept into his voice. “Can’t you see he’s a gunman? A reprobate? He’s probably an outlaw!”

  “You little worm!” Hudson snarled. “I don’t have to take that sort of talk.”

  He took a quick step forward and swung the pistol at Porter’s head.

  “Oliver, no!” Evelyn cried.

  Hudson didn’t stop, though, and Ace didn’t think Porter was going to be nimble enough to get out of the way. If Hudson pistol-whipped him, he might wind up with a busted head.

  Ace lunged forward and tackled Hudson before the blow could fall.

  Momentum carried them toward the stagecoach. Ace rammed Hudson’s back against the vehicle as hard as he could, in the hope of jarring the gun loose from Hudson’s hand.