Preacher didn’t know if Courtland was the warrior’s first target, or if more men lay dead in their tents. He could check on that later. At the moment, he had a more pressing problem, and so did Courtland. The Blackfoot had a knife gripped in his raised fist, and Courtland’s desperate grip on the warrior’s wrist was all that kept the blade from falling.
Locked as closely together as the men were, Preacher couldn’t risk a shot. But when Courtland rolled over his attacker was on top momentarily, and Preacher struck. He stepped in and drove the butt of his rifle against the back of the Blackfoot’s head in a swift, deadly stroke. He felt bone shatter under the force of the blow.
The warrior died without a sound.
Courtland jerked his head aside to avoid the falling blade as the knife slipped from the Blackfoot’s fingers. The dead man collapsed on top of him.
With a curse, Courtland shoved the warrior’s corpse aside and scrambled away from it. By then, the other men had gathered around, and a couple hurried forward to help Courtland to his feet.
“Spread out, blast it,” Preacher barked. “Bunched up, you’re a better target.”
“Do what he says,” Freeman ordered. “Wiley, are you all right?”
Courtland nodded. “I think so. Thanks to Preacher . . . again.”
The men scattered, resuming defensive positions around the wagons. The surviving guards had rushed in to see what all the commotion was about. Preacher did a quick head count and came up with eleven, not counting himself.
The guard whose throat had been cut was the only fatality.
Preacher called Dog over and knelt beside him, putting an arm around the big cur’s shaggy neck. “Hunt, Dog.”
When Preacher let go, Dog bounded off into the night, vanishing rapidly in the darkness. Preacher knew he would range all around the camp, searching for enemies.
If Dog came across any more Blackfoot warriors out there, Preacher would be able to tell by the snarling and snapping and yelling.
Instead, silence lay over the prairie for a good twenty minutes before Dog came trotting back. He snuffled Preacher’s hand, and the mountain man ruffled the fur on the animal’s head. “Good boy.”
He turned to Courtland and Freeman. “There ain’t any more Injuns out there. Not anywhere close to the camp, anyway.”
“You’re sure?” Courtland asked.
“If they were there, Dog would’ve found ’em. That varmint who snuck in was by himself.”
“What did he think he was going to accomplish, one man like that?”
“You’d be surprised.” Preacher smiled. “If he’d been slick enough to crawl in here, cut three or four throats, and get back out without anybody knowin’ until morning he’d been here, that would’ve played hell with everybody’s spirit.”
Preacher didn’t mention he had done the same thing to his enemies himself, many times.
He went on, “It’s bad enough he managed to kill the guard out yonder on the east side of camp.”
“Jenkins?” Courtland exclaimed. “Jenkins is dead?”
“Yeah. Throat was cut ear to ear. Maybe he dozed off when he should’ve been watchin’, or maybe the fella was just that good. It don’t really matter, does it?”
“No, it doesn’t,” Courtland agreed with a weary sigh. “Poor Jenkins is just as dead either way. Otis, have a couple men bring in his body. Go with them to guard them.”
Freeman nodded. “Sure.” He moved off to pick some men for the grim chore.
“What happened in the tent?” Preacher asked Courtland.
“Luckily, I’m a fairly light sleeper. I woke up and sensed something was wrong. Smelled something, maybe.”
“Could be. That bear grease they use is pretty rank.”
“When I opened my eyes, I could see just well enough to make out a shape above me. I reacted without even thinking about it and threw myself aside. He was already trying to stab me. The knife went in the ground, I guess. I felt his arm come down right beside my ear. So I grabbed his wrist and hung on for dear life.”
“That was the right thing to do,” Preacher told him. “You could’ve hollered for help, though.”
“I know. I should have. But I was concentrating so hard on keeping him from killing me . . .” Courtland shrugged. “I just didn’t think of it at the time.”
A few minutes later, Freeman and the two men he had taken with him came back with the dead sentry’s body. They wrapped it in a blanket and placed it next to one of the wagon wheels.
“We’ll bury him in the morning,” Courtland said, “before we get moving again.”
“Speakin’ of that,” Preacher said. “If I’m not back by mornin’, you fellas head north and I’ll catch up to you as soon as I can. You can just leave Horse here. He won’t wander off before I get back.”
“Catch up?” Courtland repeated with a puzzled frown. “What do you mean? Aren’t you coming with us?”
“Yeah, but there’s somethin’ else I got to do first.”
“What’s that?”
“Figured I’d give ol’ Red Knife and his boys a taste of their own medicine.”
CHAPTER 7
“I don’t much like this, Preacher,” Courtland said a few minutes later as the mountain man was getting ready to leave. “Won’t you just make this fellow Red Knife even more angry if you’re able to kill some of his men?”
“I don’t figure it’s possible Red Knife could get much more out of sorts with us than he already is,” Preacher replied. “Besides, it ain’t really Red Knife I’m tryin’ to spook. It’s the warriors who are with him. He’s their war chief and they’ll mostly do what he tells ’em to, but if enough of ’em decide it ain’t worth it to keep comin’ after us, they can make him change his mind. That’s been known to happen, anyway.”
“But what if you get killed instead?”
“That’s a risk I’m runnin’, all right.”
“And the rest of us as well. I was counting on your help to get us to Fort Gifford.”
“If we can shake those Blackfeet off our trail, it’ll be a lot easier,” Preacher pointed out.
Courtland shook his head. “I suppose I can’t argue with that. Anyway, you’re not the sort of man to be talked out of something once your mind is made up, are you?”
Preacher chuckled. “If that’s your way of sayin’ I’m stubborn as a mule, I reckon you’re right about that!”
He called Dog over and gave the big cur a good whiff of a piece of buckskin shirt he’d taken from the dead warrior. Once Dog had the scent, Preacher ordered simply, “Trail!”, and Dog bounded off into the night. He would be able to backtrack the Blackfoot without much difficulty, Preacher knew.
Preacher said so long to Courtland and Freeman and trotted out of the camp, taking the same direction Dog had. He carried the long-barreled flintlock rifle and had all four pistols tucked behind his belt. His powder horn bumped lightly against his hip as his long legs carried him over the prairie. He planned to do his killing with the big knife on his calf, but if it came down to a gunfight, he was going to be prepared.
From time to time, Dog circled back to make sure Preacher was still following him. With tireless ease, the mountain man’s leathery muscles bore him onward, across plains, up and down rises, and through buffalo wallows. The trail led in a generally eastward direction.
The miles fell away under Preacher’s high-topped moccasins. The stars wheeled through the ebony sky overhead, and the sliver of moon dipped toward the horizon. Preacher didn’t slow down until the faint tang of smoke drifted to his nose. He stopped, went to a knee, and let out a low whistle easily mistaken for the call of a night bird.
After a moment, Dog answered the summons, padding out of the shadows. Preacher whispered, “Good job. You brung me right to ’em.”
The fire was a small one fueled by buffalo droppings and gave off little smoke, but Preacher could smell it anyway. He was within a few hundred yards of the Blackfoot camp. On hands and knees, he crawled towar
d it, following the smell of the smoke. Dog crept along beside him.
Eventually both bellied down on the ground. Preacher took off his broad-brimmed hat and left it lying there with his rifle. He would come back to reclaim them when his mission was finished, if he was able to.
If he wasn’t, it wouldn’t really matter what happened to the hat and the gun.
He moved in utter silence as he crawled toward the camp. The Blackfeet had stopped for the night in the lee of a grass-covered knoll. Somewhere nearby trickled a little creek; Preacher could hear it. He also heard the Indian ponies shifting around and pawing at the ground. There was no wind.
Red Knife would have posted guards, just like Wiley Courtland had. The difference was the Blackfoot sentries would be more alert, as well as more dangerous if they discovered him before he was ready to make his move.
Preacher stopped and lay absolutely still, with his head lifted just enough for him to see the camp and the tiny red glow of the fire’s embers. Slowly, he turned his head from side to side, searching for the guards. He spotted a dark shape off to his left that might be a man.
“Stay,” he breathed to Dog, then started crawling toward the shape. The big cur wouldn’t budge from that spot unless Preacher told him to, or unless a fight broke out. Then he would be right in the middle of it as fast as his legs would carry him.
Slowly, so the new grass barely stirred around him, Preacher crawled toward the guard. He couldn’t afford to get in any hurry. It was still hours until dawn, and he would put all the darkness to use.
Eventually he was close enough to see the patch of darkness he’d been closing in on was definitely man-shaped. He smelled the bear grease on the guard’s hair.
Preacher circled so he could take the sentry from behind. When he rose from the grass, he was like the head of a coiled snake, coming up to strike.
His left arm went around the guard’s neck and clamped down like an iron bar, shutting off any sound as he jerked the man backward. At the same time, he drove the knife in his right hand forward. The long, razor-sharp blade sliced through the buckskin shirt and into the Blackfoot’s body with hardly any resistance.
The man’s muscles spasmed, but they were no match for Preacher’s strength. A deep shudder went through the warrior as the knife’s tip penetrated his heart. His back arched for a second, and then he went limp in Preacher’s grip.
Preacher lowered the body to the ground and withdrew his knife. He wiped the blade on the dead man’s shirt to clean it off. The thrust had stilled the guard’s heart so quickly there wasn’t much blood.
No sounds disturbed the night. Preacher knew he could crawl back to where he had left Dog, along with his hat and rifle. The dead guard evened the score for Jenkins’ death back at Courtland’s camp, and that lone, mysterious death might be enough to demoralize the rest of the Blackfeet.
But Preacher figured he could do more damage. He stretched out on his belly again and crawled toward the men sleeping on the ground near the remains of the fire.
They were scattered out some, which made his job easier. During the next hour, three more men died, the ones farthest on the outskirts of the camp. Their desire for a bit of privacy, if that was what had motivated them to separate themselves from their fellows, cost them dearly.
In each case, Preacher clamped his hand over the mouth of his quarry and slashed the man’s throat with a swift, silent move. Blood fountained from the wounds, bringing death in a matter of seconds.
It was grim work, the sort of thing that ate at the souls of some men, but Preacher would never lose a minute of sleep over it. Blackfoot warriors lived to kill, and would have done the same thing to him without hesitation if they’d had the chance.
He didn’t want to push his luck, so after the fourth kill, counting the guard, he backed away. Darkness and silence still hung over the camp. Hardly daring to breathe, Preacher worked his way back to where he’d left Dog. His instincts guided him unerringly to the spot.
Dog didn’t make any noise, but he licked Preacher’s face in welcome. Preacher grinned in the darkness, happy to be reunited with his old friend and relieved his foray into the Blackfoot camp had been successful.
In the morning, the Indians would have a new, terrifying story to tell about the man they called Ghost Killer, he thought.
A line of gray appeared in the sky along the eastern horizon by the time Preacher came trotting up to Wiley Courtland’s camp with Dog at his heels. When he got close enough, he knelt down and called, “Hello, the camp! Hold your fire. It’s me, Preacher.”
One of the guards leveled a rifle in his general direction, and for a second Preacher thought the man was so spooked he was going to pull the trigger anyway. But the guard held off. “Preacher? Preacher’s back!”
His call roused the whole camp. As he stood up, several men came hurrying out to meet him. Courtland gripped his arm and slapped his shoulder excitedly. “I didn’t know if we’d ever see you again!”
“Didn’t have much faith in me, did you?” Preacher drawled with a grin on his bearded face.
“All the faith in the world! But you have to admit, the odds of you coming back alive from a mission like that were pretty small.” Courtland paused. “You did find the Blackfoot camp, didn’t you?”
“I did,” Preacher said, “and there are four of them who won’t be comin’ after you, or anybody else, ever again.”
Freeman let out an impressed whistle. “You killed four Blackfeet and still were able to fight your way out?”
“Wasn’t any fightin’ to it,” Preacher explained. “Nobody knew I was there. They’re probably just wakin’ up and findin’ the bodies right about now.”
“That’s remarkable,” Courtland turned to give orders. “Build the fire up and get the coffee on. I want to get an early start and put as many miles behind us as we can today.”
“That’s a good idea,” Preacher told him. “I’m hopin’ that losin’ four more men will convince Red Knife to leave us alone, but I sure wouldn’t count on it.”
“What do you think the chances are that he will?” Courtland asked.
“I don’t know,” Preacher answered honestly. “But whatever they are, there’s an even better chance he’ll come after us with blood in his eye!”
CHAPTER 8
It had been a long, harrowing night, and Preacher hadn’t slept much. He was used to being tired, though, and was ready to move out with the rest of the men. A hot breakfast and some coffee had done wonders to restore his vitality. After a somber ceremony in which Jenkins, the dead guard, was laid to rest in the prairie sod, the wagons rolled out again, heading north.
Preacher rode at the head of the group with Courtland. The horse herd brought up the rear, raising its customary cloud of dust. That dust was going to make them mighty easy to track if Red Knife decided to come after them, Preacher thought, but nothing could be done about it, short of figuring out a way for the critters to sprout wings and fly.
That idea put a faint smile on his face. He wasn’t given to fanciful notions, but every now and then one occurred to him.
Courtland was a talkative gent. “Tell me about some of your adventures. Otis said he’s heard people talking about you in St. Louis. They claim you’ve killed thousands of Indians, wrestled with bears and mountain lions, and explored more of the frontier than any white man west of the Mississippi.”
“Yeah, well, people like to talk,” Preacher said. “And whenever the facts ain’t interestin’ enough, they’ll just make up a story or three.”
“But you have fought a lot of Indians, right?”
“I suppose. But I’ve been good friends with even more of ’em. It don’t pay to make an enemy when you can make a friend instead.”
“You don’t run away from trouble, though. I can tell that about you.”
“I’ll allow that the good Lord didn’t put in any backup when He was stirrin’ the pot to make me,” Preacher said. “It’s just a matter of common sense. You can�
��t run away from trouble without turnin’ your back on it, and the second you do, that’s when it’ll jump right on top of you.”
“That’s actually quite profound,” Courtland said with a smile.
“Like I said, common sense.”
After a few more minutes, Courtland asked, “Have you ever been married?”
“Depends on whether you reckon there’s got to be a church and a minister involved for that. I’ve known a heap of women I was mighty fond of, and I reckon they felt the same way about me.”
“You’re talking about squaws?”
“I’m talkin’ about women.” Preacher spoke with a slight edge in his voice. “Out here on the frontier, folks is folks, and it don’t take you long to get to where you don’t care what color their skin is. I just spent the winter with a Dutchman, a dwarf, a Crow Indian, and a fella as black as the ace of spades. I got the same name for all of ’em. Friend.”
Courtland nodded. “That’s a very admirable attitude. I meant no offense.”
“None taken. As for the gals I’ve knowed . . . some were Indian, some weren’t.” He thought back to his first love, the beautiful, tragically doomed girl called Jenny. “And before you ask, I don’t know if I’ve got any kids. Could be, but I just don’t know.”
“Doesn’t that uncertainty ever bother you?” Courtland asked with a slight frown.
“Not really. Everybody has to make his own way in the world.” Preacher scratched at his beard. “Might have me a real son one of these days. That wouldn’t be bad, I suppose. Not until I’m ready to settle down, though, and Lord knows when that’ll be.”
Courtland smiled. “Not any time soon, I expect. And I can say that having known you less than a day!”
The group didn’t encounter any trouble that day or the next. They didn’t see any Indians, either, only wildlife. The antelope and moose they came upon impressed the men, but they watched from a rise in absolute awe as a herd of several thousand buffalo rumbled past.
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