Sawbones

by William W. Johnstone

  “You tellin’ the truth about them Indians?” Reilly stopped a few feet away so the corporal kept a clear line of fire.

  “I am. The rancher needs help.”

  “So you gave it to him? Is that it? What a good Samaritan,” scoffed the corporal. “We haven’t seen so much as a feather off any Indian. He’s lyin’, Reilly. You fell for his line once. I’m orderin’ you to get them cuffs on him. Now, Reilly, now!”

  The private shrugged and stepped forward.

  He hesitated and looked up. His mouth opened, then his head snapped back. A bullet tore through his forehead and knocked him flat on his back.

  Knight stared at the body, stunned. He started to tell the corporal he had nothing to do with the killing when a second shot rang out. The other soldier jerked. His finger tightened on the trigger, but the shot went high. A final shot lifted the corporal from his feet and dropped him to the ground next to Private Reilly.

  Knight turned and faced a man gripping a six-shooter. The still-smoking pistol swung about and centered on him.

  CHAPTER 13

  Knight dropped to his knees and checked Private Reilly. The man had died instantly from the bullet through his head. The corporal was equally as dead. Knight looked up as the killer strode forward, his pistol leveled.

  “No need to see if they’re dead. I don’t miss.”

  The gun lifted so Knight looked down the barrel to the man clutching it. If Knight had seen the man walking along the street, he would have pegged him as a dandy, a ne’er-do-well out for a night on the town. As his fancy jade green brocade jacket flapped in the breeze, a second pistol was revealed in another shoulder holster. The man was a walking arsenal.

  “Don’t let the second six-gun fool you. I can whip that one out as fast as I can this one.” He made a few quick moves, replaced the pistol in his right hand under his left armpit, then drew the iron under his right arm with his left hand. He did a border shift, tossing the revolver to his right hand in a display of extraordinary dexterity.

  That left Knight with no doubt that he faced a gunslinger of great skill. “Why’d you kill them?”

  “I couldn’t have them taking you back. No, sir. I—”

  The whistle of an arrow cut off his words. From the deep woods came another arrow to join the first in the dandy’s right arm. Both arrows protruding from flesh, he dropped his pistol and half turned. Knight threw himself forward awkwardly, his arms wrapping around the man’s knees to bring him down, saving the stranger’s life. A dozen arrows whined through the air where his head and body had been an instant earlier.

  “Comanches,” Knight said. “I thought I trailed them into these woods. The two soldiers must have been here already.”

  The gunman’s face was pale with pain. “Indians? They’re after you, too?”

  “I’m after them. We ran them off from an attack on a nearby ranch.” Knight rolled over, pulled his rifle close, and ended up prone, studying the shadows dancing about. He squeezed off a shot and was rewarded with a grunt of pain.

  “You’ve got better eyes than me. Where are they?”

  “I can’t see them. They had to be in those bushes yonder to put two arrows in your arm like they did.” Knight shot again and again found human flesh. A brave half stood and toppled over a bush.

  “How many are there?” The dandy moaned as he grasped both arrows in a powerful grip and began pulling with a slow, deliberate strength. As they came free, the bloody arrowheads showed how deeply the arrows had sunk into his arm. He threw them aside.

  “No way of telling. There were four bands. We shot up one, the other three hightailed it. As many as forty braves might be out there.”

  “Not so many,” the man declared with more confidence than Knight could muster. “They’d have rushed us if they saw how badly they outnumbered us. And they must have been watching.”

  “There might be more soldiers around,” Knight said, a cold lump in the pit of his stomach.

  “The shots would draw them like flies to honey. Whatever we face is out there and no more.” The man rolled behind the corporal’s body and peered over the top.

  Knight fired twice more, the shots whining off into the forest. He heard one smash into a tree trunk. The other might have gone all the way back to the ranch house for all he knew.

  “You saved my life,” the man said. “Knocking me down got me out of the line of fire.”

  “We’re even, then. You saved me from the soldiers.”

  “They were quite intent on haulin’ you back to their camp. I heard that much. What’ve you done to merit such anger on their part? On the part of . . . who was it? Captain Norwood?”

  “It’s a misunderstanding.”

  The man chuckled. “Isn’t it always that? Time to see what we’re up against.” He gathered his feet under him, stood, and drew his pistol with his left hand. With a deliberate stride he went directly toward the clump of bushes where the Indians had hidden.

  “Wait!” Knight cursed under his breath, thinking the man had a few screws loose in his head to make an attack like that, standing upright and walking into the Indians as if he had nary a care in the world.

  Knight rolled a couple times and ended up resting his rifle on a rotten log. The first movement he saw in the brush where he had already hit two and the man had shot one Indian drew his fire. With methodical skill, he shot at anything that held even a faint human silhouette.

  The man advanced and triggered off six rounds. He did the switch, clumsy now, got out his second pistol, did a border shift tossing the gun from his weak right hand to his left and shot twice more until his gun came up empty.

  Knight thought that was the end of it. From some hideout the man produced another pistol and kept walking and firing. When the hammer fell on a spent chamber, he stopped. The gun disappeared as if he was a magician. A knife popped into his left hand an instant before he plunged into the brush.

  The sounds of a struggle got Knight moving. He sprinted to the spot, saw an advancing Comanche and dropped him. That exhausted the magazine in his rifle. With a speed he hadn’t known he possessed, he drew his Colt Navy and fanned off the rounds remaining. One hit the Indian grappling with the man. The Indian winced, grabbed for his thigh and gave all the opening necessary for the knife to rake across his throat. Wounded in leg and throat, the brave collapsed. He gurgled a few times as he drowned in his own blood, then died.

  “We make a mighty good team, Dr. Samuel Knight.” The dandy wiped off his blade in the grass.

  Knight didn’t see where it returned to a sheath. “How’d you know my name?”

  “I listened a spell while the two blue bellies were goading you into doing something stupid.”

  “Goading?”

  “The one with the stripes, the corporal, wanted you to go for your six-shooter in the worst way so he could cut you down. The private, now, he was actually looking like he would let you go. From what you said, he’d done that before, hadn’t he?”

  Knight didn’t answer. He checked the bodies for ammunition and found nothing. These braves hunted with bow and arrow, not rifles, meaning he was in jeopardy. Any new gunfight would force him to throw rocks.

  The man went on when Knight didn’t answer. “Yes, that’s the way I see it, and he would hang right alongside you. Two for the price of one. That’s the way Captain Norwood would see it.”

  “You know him? Norwood?”

  “Can’t say I do, but aren’t all the bluecoat officers the same? Give them a match, and they burn Atlanta.”

  Knight started back to where the two soldiers lay. They had rifles and ammo. He found his way blocked when the man rushed around and stood in front of him.

  “What’s got you in such a hurry? Can it be those two soldiers’ rifles? You’re out of ammo, aren’t you?”

  “So are you. You wouldn’t have used your knife like that if you’d had any ammunition.”

  “You’re a sharp gent, aren’t you? You think things through.” He held out hi
s hand to push Knight back, only he missed, stumbled, and fell to his knees. He turned his face up and tried to speak. A slight twist from the waist caused him to crumple to the forest floor.

  Knight bent and checked for a pulse. Thready. The man’s complexion had turned pale, whether from lack of blood or shock hardly mattered. Fingers clutching the thick green coat’s fabric on either shoulder, Knight heaved and began sliding the man along through the pine needles and detritus.

  He let him drop when he got to where Reilly had hobbled the soldiers’ horses. He didn’t find any ammo for his six-shooter, but they had plenty for his rifle. Stealing the US Army–issue rifle proved to be the best theft he had made. Torn between priorities, he looked back at the dandy, then reloaded his rifle and both the dead soldiers’ carbines before going to the wounded man. Peeling back the blood-soaked fabric revealed the full extent of the man’s wounds.

  Knight got his medical bag and started to work. Both arrows had gone clean through his arm and into his body. The wounds in his torso hadn’t been apparent at first. When the man yanked out the arrows, he let otherwise-plugged blood flow freely. Knight moved the man’s head to one side and pinched his nostrils, forcing him to gasp through his mouth. Not seeing any pink foam heartened him. Neither arrow had pierced a lung.

  He found where the man had sheathed his knife at the small of his back. A quick move drew it. Knight went to Reilly’s body and said softly, “They won’t give you any more extra sentry duty for being out of uniform. Not now. Know your shirt’s going for a good cause.” He cut long, inch-wide strips for his makeshift bandages.

  Returning to his patient, he poured the gunpowder from a Sharps cartridge into each wound and ignited it. The hiss caused him to look away, and the smell of burned flesh made his nose wrinkle. He ran his finger around each of the holes. Both had been sealed. Only a little more to go and he would have done all he could for his patient.

  He rolled the dandy onto his side to press a patch down on the two cauterized wounds. When he thrashed around, Knight considered clubbing him to make him quiet, but the man settled down when the bandage circled his chest. Knight tightened it the best he could and tied it off with a surgeon’s knot. If he had been in one of the Confederate field hospitals and this man had come in with his wounds, Knight would have sent him back to his unit when he regained consciousness. The loss of blood and shock were the only worrisome things. The injuries themselves were minor compared to a bullet wound.

  Knight used the corporal’s wool jacket to wipe as much blood from his hands as he considered the idea of leaving the dandy where he was but finally discarded it. Knight had no idea if the man would regain consciousness. If so, he could fend for himself. If he didn’t, he needed water and whatever food could be forced down his gullet.

  A new dilemma presented itself. If he didn’t leave the man, how did he get him back to the ranch house? The best he could do was throw him belly down over a saddle, but that was a treacherous way to travel. The wounds might begin to bleed again unless they were better tended.

  Another problem nagged Knight. He didn’t owe either soldier anything. They had wanted to take him back to Pine Knob to be hanged or put in front of a firing squad. Those were the best options facing him. He would never let himself be locked up again, as he had been in Elmira. Ever. Better to die than be penned up like an animal. All that had gotten him through that ordeal was the knowledge that Victoria waited for him at home. Now he had neither home nor loving wife.

  Other than his hands, he had nothing to dig with. The next best thing was hardly a smart course of action, but he took it anyway. He pulled both men into a pile in a nearby clearing, then piled dried limbs and grass around the bodies until the kindling reached shoulder high. Then he set fire to the pyre. A huge roar forced him to step away as the wood caught. The greasy black smoke rising from the flames told him that the men were consigned properly to what he had read once about a Viking warrior’s funeral. Or maybe it was more like an Indian funeral. More than once, he had seen the elevated platforms where intense fire had left a charred body behind. Either way kept them from having their bones picked by buzzards and carrion eaters.

  “Come on,” he said to the barely aware wounded man. “Can you ride?”

  The dandy collapsed in his arms. Taking that to mean no, Knight heaved him up over the McClellan saddle of Reilly’s horse and led the corporal’s along until he found his own. The wounded man had ridden something, but listening failed to reveal a whinny for Knight to find it. Still, a horse was a valuable commodity. Being accused of stealing yet another horse rankled him, so he started a methodical search in the woods, trying to figure how far the man had walked to sneak up on the soldiers. After riding much longer than he anticipated, he finally heard a horse protesting loudly.

  He turned toward the sound, then froze. His horse danced about. Knight tried to keep it silent and still. Ahead two braves examined a saddled horse. From the fancy silver conchas decorating the saddle, he knew whose horse it was. The dandy’s hat and belt were adorned with similar silverwork. As quietly as possible he drew a rifle but did not cock it, fearing the sound would be heard by the sharp-eared Comanches.

  Optimism soared when the two Indians began shoving each other. There wasn’t any need to understand their language. They fought over the horse. Maybe one had found it and the other thought he, as a superior, deserved it. What the war paint smeared on their faces meant told him nothing, but he had heard it indicated one’s standing within the tribe. The one with several white and yellow grease slashes on his cheek pounded on his chest and gestured grandly, making Knight figure he was of higher rank.

  The other brave dived, arms circling his opponent’s shoulders and pinning his arms to his sides. They rolled over and over on the ground until one kicked free and came up with a knife in his hand. The other circled warily. Knight found himself rooting for the one without a knife because the match seemed unfair. The situation changed in the blink of an eye. The one with the knife attacked, only to have his wrist bent around. He found his own knife buried in his gut.

  The winner savagely turned the blade, completing the coup de grâce. He yanked his opponent’s knife free and held the bloody blade high over his head. As he gave a whoop, he turned and saw Knight.

  The doctor reacted rather than thought. The carbine came to his shoulder, and he levered a round into the chamber and drew back on the trigger in a single motion. The heavy rifle bucked against him, almost taking him out of the saddle. He worked to get control of his horse then saw that his marksmanship continued to be superb. The bullet had caught the Comanche warrior in the middle of his chest. He hadn’t died instantly, but by the time Knight rode over, there was no need for his doctoring skills.

  He replaced the rifle in its sheath, snared the reins of the dandy’s horse, and secured them to his saddlebags. Not content, he started hunting for the Indians’ horses. He found them tied to a tree not twenty yards away. He fastened their hackamores behind the other two riderless horses, then made sure his patient was securely tied down over the saddle. With five horses—and a patient—more than he had come with, Knight wheeled around and headed back for the ranch.

  The going proved dicey, keeping the horses from trying to rear or jerk free, but if he rode slowly enough everything went smooth. As he topped the rise a quarter mile from the house, he drew rein and let out a low, heartfelt moan of despair. He hadn’t found the main band of Comanches because they had gathered to attack the ranch once more.

  Hannigan and the others were inside with the rancher. Rifle barrels stuck out from broken windows like spines on a porcupine. But Knight saw something those inside could not. An Indian prepared a kettle of pitch. He dipped his arrow in it, lit it, and let fly in a high arc. Wind caught the arrow and blew it away from the roof, but the brave already worked to prepare his next fire arrow. If he landed enough flaming arrows on the ranch roof, those inside would either be burned up or forced outside into the ring of Comanche braves. Eith
er way meant their deaths.

  CHAPTER 14

  The Comanches circling the house, whooping and hollering, caused more panic than the lone brave shooting fire arrows toward the roof. Knight knew this was not something the Indians had concocted on the spur of the moment. It was a practiced, well-thought-out, deadly attack.

  He pulled out two rifles, made sure he had loaded magazines in both, secured the horses, and settled down for serious shooting. Everyone told him he was a crack shot. It had never entered his mind, but he was beginning to think they might be right. His heart beat slowly, regularly, making it easier to aim. Whatever nerves he had were all soothed and quiet as he drew his finger back smoothly on the trigger. The rifle bucked. He missed the Comanche brave but hit the pitch pot and sent it skittering away.

  For a moment, the Indian looked about, confused at the sudden turn of events. As he spun to face where Knight stretched out on the hill, a second shot drilled him in the leg. The impact knocked the leg out from under him and made him fall face forward. In the back of his mind Knight knew he had hit the femur. As the brave struggled to sit up, another shot ended his life.

  Only then did Knight turn his attention to the Indians circling the house. Moving targets at this range proved more difficult to hit, so he shifted from aiming at the riders to taking out their horses. Killing the horses galled him, but human lives hung in the balance. Ben Lunsford and his sorely wounded brother were in the house. For all Knight knew the rest of Hannigan’s men were, too.

  He took down three horses before the Comanches realized they had two threats to deal with. Again, they acted as if they had faced similar situations. A quarter of the riders split off from the main attack and charged uphill toward Knight. His coolness surprised him. His accuracy devastated the attack. Again he aimed for the horses rather than the hunched-over riders, heads by their horses’ necks to present as small a target as possible. Four horses stumbled and fell.