The Jackals

by William W. Johnstone

  He nodded. “Thirty-two is my guess. Teat-fire. Likely a Moore.”

  “I don’t know what it is, Matt, except that it’s got a brass frame and is loaded.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’d appreciate it if you’d stop moving your hand toward that knife.”

  “I’d appreciate it if you’d stop aiming that relic at my middle.”

  “I appreciate you, Matt, but that’s not happening.”

  “So Alvin J. Griffin Number Four was right all this time,” McCulloch said, and let out a long sigh.

  “No,” she said, “he was wrong. But I’ll be damned if I ride back to that station to get myself alive and well to El Paso, where I’ll get hung up quicker than it usually took you to string up some Mexicans when you Rangers found them rustling cattle—and don’t tell me that never happens. I’ve been around this part of the world for a damned long time.”

  “So you’re taking one horse . . . ?”

  “Two. In case I need to put some extra distance between me and the Indians.”

  McCulloch grinned. “So . . . which way will you be heading?”

  She looked up, tried to find the moon and stars but quickly stopped. “Oh—” Her lips trembled, and she almost swayed in the saddle.

  “Cloudy this night, and close to a new moon. Lot harder to find your bearings when it’s this way. Besides, you don’t want to leave us yet, do you, Gwen?”

  “Why?” she asked, her shoulders sagging and her head dropping in defeat.

  “That fifty thousand dollars of Mr. Henderson’s,” he reminded her. “It’s back at Fort Hopeless. Unless the Apaches have overrun our fortress.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  “Can you actually move with all that metal on?” Jed Breen asked.

  The visor of the helmet was closed, and when Sir Theodore Cannon answered, neither Breen nor Sean Keegan could understand a blasted word he said.

  Breen had to reach over and push up the metal. “You want to spit that out again?”

  “Tally-ho, my good man,” the actor said. “Yes. I can move. Even with my horribly maimed foot. The metal acts as a good cast, if I do say so myself. It’s heavy, but, well, most people think that knights in those glorious but dark, lean, frightful times were immobile, but that is far from the case. As I told you earlier, I have seen actors do handstands and cartwheels while wearing suits even heavier than what I have on.”

  “The question is,” Sean Keegan said, “can you work the reins to the horses?”

  “But of course, my good man, but of course.”

  Breen tapped a knife against the armor and shook his head.

  “This particular getup,” Sir Theodore said, and somewhere beneath the shadows and the metal, he must have smiled. “Did you enjoy my use of your Western parlance, gentlemen? Getup. What a fascinating word. Sir Walter Scott would have loved it. But I digress. The suit I don was made for jousting, thus it is thicker on this side.” He tapped his left side.

  “You can still work the reins,” Keegan repeated. “And the brake.”

  “Yes, yes, yes. Come, gentlemen. If King Arthur’s knights could not mount their horses without the help of their manservants, they would have all died.” His right leg rose, and the heavy boot dropped with a clang. His left leg lifted and also banged on the floor. “Now, I do not think I shall be able to run very fast, crippled and weighted down, but . . .”

  Keegan slapped the tin on the man’s chest with the butt of his revolver. “I guess it will stop an arrow.”

  “Probably not a bullet, though.” Jed Breen frowned.

  “Then let’s hope ol’ Holy Shirt don’t lose his charm.”

  “I’m excited,” Sir Theodore said. “Nervous, but what actor does not feel sick before he first steps onto the stage? No matter how many times he has performed this play, he remains a total wreck, nerves tormenting him so, but then he finds himself treading the boards and all is well. Yes, all is well.”

  “Do you want to climb out of that airtight?” Keegan asked.

  “Goodness, no! There’s no telling how long it would take me to climb back into this bucket.” He clanged away.

  Breen chuckled. “That noise alone might scare off the Apaches.”

  Keegan was in no humor. “I don’t like it.”

  “I don’t, either,” Breen said. “I don’t think this will work at all.”

  “Then why are we doing it?”

  “Because if we have to die, when they find us with a knight in medieval armor, they’ll be writing about us for the next fifty years.”

  Keegan shook his head and spit on the floor.

  “What time is it?” the newspaperman asked.

  “No idea,” Keegan answered absently.

  Breen moved to the shutter and looked into the night. “We’ve got a while before sunrise, but McCulloch and that gambler, they damned well better hurry.”

  * * *

  Getting past a number of Apaches in the dark while maneuvering through the rocks and cactus afoot had seemed almost impossible. Coming down the hill with four horses?

  Maybe, McCulloch thought, Stanhope had been thinking levelheaded back where they had found the horses. Mount up. Ride hard and fast and as far away from Culpepper’s Station. Leave all that money, a bounty hunter, a grizzled former Army sergeant, and a crazy actor to Holy Shirt and his boys.

  They had made it maybe a quarter mile before they stopped. Stanhope kept her hand on the muzzle of one of the horses. Matt McCulloch left the two horses he was leading back with her and crept forward. His right hand held the knife. Anxious, he held his breath, sweating, hoping, and praying that the crackling of wood, probably the skeleton of a long-dead cactus, had been caused by a javelina, and not one of the Apache warriors. But he knew better.

  “Apaches,” an old scout had told him up in the Guadalupe Mountains a year or two back, “ain’t human, son. It’s the noses, you see. They’s better than a coonhound for followin’ a trail. They can smell anything. A white man. A white woman. Grease from a gun. Sweat from a trapped man. And the hair from a horse.”

  McCulloch knew they were downwind of whoever or whatever was coming this way.

  The way the horses acted pleased him. So did the way the woman did not panic. He knew the horses would not stay quiet for long, but he did not expect the noise that broke the stillness.

  Water sprayed on the rocks thirty feet behind him. If an Apache could smell the hair of a horse, then surely this one could smell the urine as one of the mounts relieved its bladder.

  A rock skidded across the ground, and McCulloch felt the Apache step closer. He planned to bury the knife into the warrior’s throat, hoping to sever the vocal cords before the brave could let out a scream, when another unexpected thing happened.

  Gwen Stanhope shouted, “Look out!”

  McCulloch was already moving toward the sneaking Indian when he stopped, and somehow sensed the presence of something dropping out of the sky.

  He pushed himself away, landed on his back, somersaulted over, and sprang to his feet. The second Apache had leaped from the rocks above, and if not for Stanhope’s warning and McCulloch’s lucky move, the former Texas Ranger would be, if not dead, at least on the ground and about to be cut to ribbons.

  The Indian who had jumped off the ledge came up, spitting venom and Apache curses, and swinging his tomahawk in defensive maneuvers, even though McCulloch was too far away to be any threat. The other Apache charged and yelled. Behind McCulloch, the horses stamped their hooves and whinnied.

  McCulloch brought the blade of his knife up, deflecting the Apache’s thrust. He threw a left punch that grazed off the Indian’s bare shoulder, and as the Apache tumbled past him, McCulloch slashed with his knife. He must have missed, but that extra sense—what many Rangers said had kept him alive all these years—had him ducking.

  The tomahawk sliced only empty air, and McCulloch dived to his right as the tomahawk came at him again. Then he heard the pistol shot. He turned his head to shiel
d his eyes from the muzzle flash, and saw the first Indian coming at him. McCulloch buried his knife just beneath the brave’s ribs. His free hand caught the warrior’s wrist, and the Apache’s knife slipped from his grip as McCulloch twisted the blade.

  “Aiiiiiyeeeeeeee,” the dying brave wailed as McCulloch pushed him back.

  One horse thundered past.

  McCulloch whirled around and saw the shadow of the Apache with the tomahawk. He was on the ground, not moving, and McCulloch knew he owed Gwen Stanhope again. She had saved his life twice in as many minutes.

  “Matt?” she called out in the darkness.

  McCulloch ran. He found her holding reins to three of the horses, including McCulloch’s buckskin. He took the reins from her, and the reins to the pinto. “Get on that one. I’ll pull the pinto behind me.”

  “Where are we going?” she asked.

  An arrow whistled over his head. Apaches yipped. A musket roared, and the bullet whined off a rock far beyond them. The pinto pulled hard, burning McCulloch’s left hand with the leather reins.

  “Where are we going?” She repeated the question, and her voice broke from total fear.

  To Hell, McCulloch thought, but he said, “Ride for the station. Don’t stop till we’re there.”

  He waited till she managed to climb into the saddle despite the horse’s dancing. Then a bullet hit the horse. It grunted and fell.

  “Kick free!” McCulloch yelled.

  Stanhope hit the ground, but away from the horse. McCulloch turned quickly, started to find his weapon and shoot, but knew better. Another bullet blew off the horn of his saddle.

  “Get on the pinto!” he yelled.

  He didn’t have to. Stanhope was already leaping into the saddle as McCulloch tossed her the reins.

  Another bullet whined off a rock. McCulloch almost lost the hold on the reins to his buckskin when the gelding reared. But he also heard an Apache yelling at his men. McCulloch understood just a few words, but nothing this one was saying. Even so, the former Ranger figured he must have been warning the Apaches not to shoot the horses. Or, maybe, he figured, not to shoot at all. Not rifles. Not revolvers. That would ruin Holy Shirt’s medicine.

  Whatever was being said, it gave McCulloch the chance he and Stanhope needed. He found the saddle and kicked the buckskin hard in the ribs. “Stay close!” he yelled.

  “Don’t worry about me!” she cried out.

  He felt the wind as the buckskin exploded into a lope. He swung low in the saddle. And he prayed he was riding in the right direction.

  * * *

  Sergeant Keegan had fallen asleep, but it wasn’t his watch. He was supposed to be asleep. Sir Theodore Cannon was snoring something awful, but he was supposed to be catching a few winks, too. Jed Breen wanted desperately to sleep, but he wasn’t about to leave Alvin J. Griffin IV to keep an eye out for Apaches—or the return of Gwen Stanhope and Matt McCulloch.

  But his eyes were closed, and his breathing was steady.

  He heard the footsteps, and he tried to tell himself that this was not happening. That Alvin J. Griffin was not that big of a fool.

  The bolt started to slide, and Breen shook his head, opened his eyes, and brought up the double-action. 38 that was in his right hand. He rolled over, quiet as a mouse.

  Gunfire popped in the distance, causing Breen to frown. Apaches? McCulloch and the girl? He almost felt the urge to pray. For the Ranger. And the blonde. Silence returned. Breen wondered if the gunfire had unnerved the newspaperman. For several minutes, he heard nothing, so Breen started to fake his snores. The sergeant started snoring again, too.

  A minute passed. Then five. No more gunshots sounded in the distance, and that could have meant good news or terrible news. After two more minutes, Breen was shaking his head. Alvin Griffin was trying to move the bolt off the door.

  Sergeant Keegan’s snores continued, but they sounded different. Breen turned his head to look at the blanket where the Army veteran was sleeping only to find Keegan on his belly, eyes open, Remington in his right hand, looking at the door—all the while snoring.

  After a quick glance at Breen, Keegan nodded, and both men began crawling across the floor and around Fort Hopeless, Keegan to the left, Breen to the right. When they were ten feet from the door, they rose as Griffin tried to push up the cottonwood bar as silently as possible. The newspaperman realized something was afoot, and the bar slammed back into place as he spun around.

  Two revolvers were aimed at his face.

  “Going somewhere?” Keegan asked.

  “To Hell,” Breen answered. “That’d be my guess.”

  The newspaperman backed against the door and dropped the grip and the canteens. “I . . . I . . . I . . . was . . . j-j-just . . . trying . . . getting . . . fresh air.”

  Breen laughed.

  Keegan waved the revolver. “Go ahead. We won’t stop you. But . . . you don’t need the water.”

  “And I don’t think those greenbacks need any fresh air.” Breen waved the Lightning at the ugly bag the newspaperman had dropped.

  “What do you think, Breen?” Keegan asked.

  The bounty hunter shook his head. “Taking money . . . that I understand. But water? That’s low-down.”

  “I wasn’t . . .” Griffin started, but stopped and gagged when Keegan shoved the barrel of the Remington into his gut.

  “Shut up,” Keegan said. “Did you think you could get away from all those Apaches?”

  “I guess that much money drives people to gamble a lot,” Breen said.

  “You best say exactly what you were doing,” Keegan said. “It’ll go easier on you.”

  “Meaning you’ll kill me quick!” the journalist said.

  Keegan shrugged.

  “I was getting fresh air.”

  “Maybe he was opening the door so the Apaches could finish us off,” Breen said.

  Keegan straightened, realizing that was probably exactly what the newspaper editor had planned. “While those bucks are butchering us, torturing us, hell, he probably could have gotten away.”

  “No.” Griffin’s hands reached for the ceiling. “No, I swear. I wouldn’t have done that.”

  “That much water would have gotten him to safety,” Keegan said.

  “And that much money could have bought him a new life,” Breen added.

  “No!” The man screamed. “No. I swear. I wouldn’t . . . I wasn’t . . .”

  “Kill him,” Keegan said.

  “With pleasure,” Breen said.

  Then they heard the horses.

  * * *

  “Damn it all to hell,” McCulloch said.

  No Indians followed. He did not know why, and he did not care. Maybe Holy Shirt had ordered the braves not to risk the horses or not to risk the medicine man and war leader’s medicine. It couldn’t be that Apache superstition about fighting at night, because that was what had just caused McCulloch to swear.

  The grayness had not seemed important. He hadn’t even noticed it. He had not realized that he was seeing more than he should have been seeing at night. That’s probably because all the pressure he had been under trying to get Stanhope and himself to the horses, and then trying to get the horses to the stagecoach station.

  It was almost dawn. It had taken them that long.

  On the other hand, he was alive. Stanhope was alive. They had two horses. One was dead. One was dying. But they had two, and that’s all they needed to pull that wagon.

  He shot a glance behind him, saw Stanhope leaning low, mouth set, eyes determined. They crested the hill, then raced down to the bottom, moved through the boulders and creosote, and saw the charred skeleton of the barn.

  “Open the damned door!” McCulloch cried. “Open the damned door!”

  Two Apaches sprang out of the bushes on the other side of the stagecoach road. They quickly brought their bows to the ready, while their left hands found arrows in their quivers. One shot first. The arrow just missed striking the buckskin in the throat. The ot
her Indian was about to fire when he was blown about five yards back into the mesquite.

  McCulloch looked back at the cabin to see Jed Breen kneeling beside Sir Theodore Cannon’s wagon and removing the empty .50-caliber shell from the breech of his Sharps. Sergeant Keegan appeared at the doorway and sent two rounds from his Remington revolver that chased the other brave away.

  War whoops sounded behind McCulloch, and he pulled hard on the reins to the buckskin and leaped out of the saddle. Breen came to him, shifting the Sharps to his left hand.

  McCulloch shoved the reins into the bounty hunter’s right hand. “Get him inside!” he yelled, and rushed to Gwen Stanhope, who was leaning out of the saddle to the left as the pinto twisted and turned and kicked out with its hind legs. That sent the blonde to the dirt.

  McCulloch leaped up and managed to grab one of the reins. He fell onto his knees, was pulled back about ten feet, but somehow managed to snag the other rein. The horse stopped just long enough for McCulloch to scramble to his feet. He turned, saw Indians charging from the corral, and looked back as Sergeant Keegan managed to shove Stanhope through the open door.

  “Come on!” McCulloch yelled, and headed for the stagecoach station. The horse followed obediently, or maybe fearful of the charging Indians behind him. McCulloch ducked and hoped the pinto would have the good sense to duck to get its sorry hide inside the station.

  When he realized he was inside, and when he realized that Keegan and Breen were slamming and bolting the door before the Apaches made it in, he was jerked to the floor as the horse reared slightly.

  McCulloch spun around, escaping the hooves as the pinto came down on all fours.

  McCulloch blinked, trying to remember how to breathe. He couldn’t blame the pinto for going a little wild inside the station. Seeing a man in a shining suit of armor would startle man or beast.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  The desert, Alfredo Pagliotti thought as he crossed himself and removed his sugarloaf sombrero, did many strange and wonderful things. It was hot, yes, very hot, and that would have one believe that meat would rot and spoil, and sometimes, sí, it did just that. And yet there were other times . . .