“Well, if you was to ask them, they’d say that livin’ in houses and wearin’ uncomfortable duds and goin’ out to do work for somebody else every day in the hope you’ll get paid for it is a crazy way to live.” Preacher smiled. “I ain’t sure I’d argue too much with ’em about that, neither.”
They studied the tracks for a while. Preacher estimated at least thirty families were in the band. Most of the people left had to be women and children and old ones. He and Hawk had killed enough warriors that Tall Bull might not have more than two dozen men left to follow him into battle.
That left the war chief with a dilemma. Should he protect his people . . . or should he go after the men who had caused so much trouble and caused the proud Blackfeet to flee?
Either way, there had to be grumbling in the tribe. That thought pleased Preacher. He didn’t want Tall Bull to ever rest easy again. He wanted the war chief stirred up and worried . . . until the time finally came for Tall Bull to die.
* * *
When Hawk was steady enough on his feet to travel, Preacher said, “I want all four of you fellas to pull back west a ways and then head north along the edge of the valley. Stay out of sight. Hawk, you know what I’m talkin’ about. I’m countin’ on you to guide the other three, even with that head wallopin’ you got.”
“And what are you going to do?”
“Dog and me will follow the creek,” Preacher said as he gestured toward the stream. “That’s what the Blackfeet are doin’, and I intend to stay on their trail.”
“You would push me aside now, after everything that has happened?”
Preacher could tell Hawk wanted to argue, so he said sharply, “That ain’t it at all, and you know it. Right now, all I’m doin’ is a mite of scoutin’. I want to know where the Blackfeet are headed and what they’re gonna do once they get there. When I’ve found that out, I’ll hunt you fellas up, and we’ll make our plans for what we’re gonna do next.”
He didn’t care much for explaining himself, but he knew how strong-willed Hawk was. Preacher was nothing if not a practical man, so taking a moment to lay out his thoughts would save time later on.
Hawk still wore a reluctant frown, but he nodded. “It is not a bad idea.”
“It will give your injury time to heal,” White Buffalo said.
That turned Hawk’s scowl darker. “My head is fine. The world no longer spins around me.”
“We need to keep it like that,” Preacher said. “Anyway, like I said, you’re gonna be in charge, and I’m countin’ on you to watch out for these two fellas.” He nodded toward Buckley and Todd, who hadn’t been able to follow the conversation in the Absaroka tongue.
Both young men smiled hopefully at Preacher’s gesture.
“We’re ready to do whatever you say, Preacher,” Buckley said.
“I was just tellin’ Hawk and White Buffalo the four of you are gonna head north along the edge of the valley while I follow the creek and the trail Tall Bull’s bunch left. I’ll scout out where they are then find you fellas and we’ll figure out what we’re doin’ next.”
“You’re going by yourself?” Todd asked.
“Not exactly. Dog’ll be with me.”
The big cur was worth at least two good fighting men, Preacher knew. He’d put some of the poultice he’d made for Hawk on the arrow wound on Dog’s hip. That leg seemed to be a little stiff and sore, but it wouldn’t slow Dog down much.
If there was a fight, Preacher figured it wouldn’t slow him down at all.
“It may be a few days ’fore you see me again,” the mountain man went on. “Don’t worry, just keep headin’ north. I’ll find you when the time comes.” He looked at Hawk. “For what it’s worth, I’ve gotten used to havin’ you fightin’ with me, boy. It’s gonna seem a mite odd, you not bein’ there, but you got a more important job to do right now.”
“Who will save your life when your ancient senses betray you?”
“Well, who’s gonna save your life when you do somethin’ foolish ’cause you don’t know no better?” Preacher didn’t wait for a response. He just clapped a hand on Hawk’s shoulder for a second, then jerked his head. “Come on, Dog.”
They started off, following the creek. With the twists and turns and the thick stands of trees and brush that grew in the valley, it wasn’t long before Preacher’s companions were out of sight behind him. He didn’t look back. He was leaving them in Hawk’s hands and knew if anyone could keep them safe, it was the young warrior.
It was natural for a man to be proud of his son. Preacher had discovered he had that pride in his heart, after all. He and Hawk might not ever be as close as some fathers and sons, but that bond was between them and always would be, he thought.
The Blackfeet had abandoned their village the day before, but the entire band couldn’t move very fast. Preacher figured they were less than ten miles ahead of him. He could make up that much ground fairly quickly. He didn’t expect to catch up with them by the end of the day, but it was entirely possible he might the next day.
As he and Dog walked along the creek bank, his eyes were always on the move, searching for signs of anything out of the ordinary. He knew Dog’s senses were alert, too. It wasn’t likely they would walk into an ambush, but anything was possible. All of Preacher’s guns were loaded and primed.
The Blackfeet hadn’t gone to any pains to conceal their trail. Even Buckley and Todd could have followed it without much trouble.
They weren’t trying to hide, Preacher thought. They didn’t care if anybody followed them. They just wanted to get away from the scene of their disastrous encounters with the legendary Ghost Killer, where so many of their husbands and brothers and sons had died.
Once they had settled into a new, semipermanent camp—no Indian camp was truly permanent—Tall Bull would deal with the white devil and his allies. Preacher could imagine the war chief’s blustery boasting about what he was going to do. Tall Bull would have to talk big to keep his people’s loyalty. His actions sure hadn’t accomplished much lately.
In fact, since the attack on the Absarokas, just about everything had gone badly for Tall Bull. He really had to be questioning whether his medicine had deserted him.
By late afternoon, Preacher could tell from the tracks of the Blackfeet that he had closed the gap between them by quite a bit. They were still a good distance ahead of him, but he didn’t intend to close in on them. When they chose a place to settle down for a while, he could go find Hawk and the others and lead them back for the next phase of the war.
General Preacher, Todd had called him, the mountain man mused as night fell and he settled down with Dog under a tree. He gnawed some pemmican from his possibles bag. The quest for vengeance he and Hawk and White Buffalo had set out on had taken on the characteristics of a war, sure enough. Maybe he was a general after all. A general in command of a very small army . . .
Preacher dozed off.
CHAPTER 36
Dog’s quiet growl roused Preacher from sleep. Instantly, he was wide awake and ready to fight.
Dog didn’t sound like the threat was imminent, however. Preacher slitted his eyes and listened intently for whatever sound had disturbed the big cur. He sniffed the air, although his sense of smell couldn’t hope to match Dog’s, then reached over and rested his hand on the back of the animal’s neck. Dog’s hair was standing up, a sure sign something had bothered him.
After a moment, Preacher heard something. Soft sounds he recognized as men moving quietly through the night, trying not to make any noise.
Even seasoned Blackfoot warriors couldn’t move in complete silence. That required a man to glide through the shadows like a . . . ghost.
Preacher sat with his back against a tree trunk about twenty yards from the creek. Along that stretch, a man could hunker down on the shallower bank, reach out, and cup a handful of the cold, crystal-clear water.
The three men who emerged from the darkness did just that. They knelt at the edge of the creek to
drink.
Preacher watched them in the starlight. As keen as his eyes were, he couldn’t make out too many details. He could tell they were Indians, though, and had no doubt they were Blackfoot warriors sent by Tall Bull to scout the band’s back trail.
A moment later, he heard the soft murmur of their voices as they talked to each other, and although he couldn’t make out all the words, he caught enough to be sure they were speaking the Blackfoot tongue.
Well, he thought, since Fate dropped this little present in his lap—
Interrupting his thought, a memory flashed through his brain, the recollection of a night when he, Audie, Nighthawk, and some other trappers had been sitting around a campfire and Audie had been telling them about a war between two bunches of men in the old days.
Audie talked about the Trojans and Greeks: “The Greeks made a giant wooden horse and left it in front of the gates of Troy, then their army lit a shuck out of there.
“Only they didn’t, really. They just got out of sight so the Trojans would think they were gone and haul in that fool horse, believing it to be some sort of tribute from a vanquished foe.
“Greeks were hiding in it, of course. Once they were inside they gate they came out of the horse that night, opened the gates, and let in the rest of their army. The real massacre quickly commenced. That’s why folks sometimes say, ‘Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.’”
Audie pointed out that was actually foolish advice. “As the Trojans learned, the smart thing was to take a good long look in that gift horse’s mouth and make sure there wasn’t more in it than what a fella might expect.”
All that went through Preacher’s mind in a heartbeat. What Audie had said on that long-ago night made sense. Because of that, Preacher waited to see if more warriors showed up before he made a move.
Several minutes passed as the Blackfeet quenched their thirst and talked in complaining tones. They straightened, stretched, and generally acted like men who were tired and doing a job they didn’t particularly want to do.
One of them turned and ambled toward the trees where Preacher and Dog waited in the shadows. He fumbled with his buckskin leggings, clearly intent on answering the call of nature.
That pretty well made up Preacher’s mind. “Now, Dog!”
The big cur sprang out of the darkness like a spring uncoiling.
The luckless warrior barely had time to open his mouth and try to scream before massive jaws full of sharp teeth closed on his face. Dog’s weight bore him backwards.
Preacher charged right behind Dog, plucking his tomahawk from his belt. Shots from guns would carry too far. He brought his arm back, then whipped it forward. The tomahawk made a whispering sound as it revolved through the air, then landed with a meaty thunk! as the head sunk into a warrior’s shoulder.
That man yelled in pain and staggered to the side, out of the fight for the moment. Preacher bore down on the other warrior, who was trying to get an arrow out of his quiver and fit it to his bow. Preacher left his feet in a diving tackle, crashed into the warrior, and drove him off his feet into the creek.
Water rose high around them in a huge splash. Preacher landed on top and groped for the Blackfoot’s throat as the man thrashed around underneath him. He caught hold of it and bore down, trying to hold him under the surface so the water would rush into the man’s lungs and finish him off.
Preacher glanced over his shoulder to make sure the man he had wounded hadn’t recovered enough to charge into the creek after him. That warrior was still stumbling around on the bank, trying to wrench the tomahawk’s head out of his flesh.
One of the desperately flailing arms belonging to the Blackfoot in the creek clipped Preacher on the jaw. It wasn’t much of a blow, but it was enough to make his grip slip for an instant. The warrior tore loose and broke the surface, gasping for air. He didn’t get much before Preacher’s left hand shot out and grabbed him by the throat again.
Preacher took a second look at the bank. The warrior there had gotten the tomahawk loose but was bleeding heavily, the blood black and oily in the starlight.
“Hell with this,” Preacher muttered. He drew his knife and plunged it into the chest of the man he was holding, ramming the blade into his heart. He pulled it free and let go of the man’s throat, allowing his already dead body to collapse into the stream.
Preacher turned toward the bank with the bloody knife in his hand.
The wounded Blackfoot tried to run, but Dog took him down from behind. Slashing teeth opened the warrior’s throat and finished him off.
With water dripping off him, Preacher stepped up onto the bank and told the big cur, “I reckon if Hawk was here, he’d be keepin’ count and takin’ great pleasure in pointin’ out I killed one of the varmints while you got two.”
Dog just made a little chuffing sound as he shook drops of blood from his muzzle.
“Yeah, it don’t make no never mind to me, neither,” Preacher said. “Let me drag these fellas into the brush so they won’t be found so easy if anybody comes lookin’ for ’em. Then maybe we can finish our night’s sleep.”
* * *
They were up before the sun in the morning, as usual. For some reason, Preacher had a hankering for a cup of coffee, but of course there was none to be had. He had some in his supply packs on The Mule With No Name, but that critter, along with the other members of Preacher’s motley little army, was miles away.
He settled for gnawing on pemmican again, washed it down with creek water, and then took up the trail with Dog padding along beside him.
Neither of them even cast a glance at the thicket where Preacher had left the bodies of the three Blackfoot warriors. That violent incident was over and done with, and he wasn’t the sort to brood over such things any more than Dog was.
Wouldn’t have been natural for either one of them.
Mid-afternoon found them kneeling atop one of the small hills that cropped up here and there on the valley floor. Preacher wanted to take advantage of its height to study the landscape ahead of them. His eyes spotted movement about a mile away.
Dog growled.
“You see ’em, too, eh? That’s them, all right, the whole bunch of ’em. We don’t need to get no closer than this. Tall Bull’s likely to send more men back to make sure nobody’s followin’ ’em. Although, since those three last night didn’t come back, he’s liable to have a devil of a time gettin’ anybody to step up and volunteer.”
Dog ignored the mountain man’s musings and kept his gaze fastened on the tiny figures in the distance as they struggled along, dragging their travois and all their worldly possessions behind them.
Preacher waited until the Blackfeet were out of sight again before he and Dog resumed their trek. Knowing they were close to their quarry, they used all the stealth at their command to stay out of sight as they followed the Blackfoot pilgrims.
That night they crept closer to study the camp Tall Bull’s people made. The Blackfeet had built cooking fires, but they didn’t set up their tepees. It was just a stopping place for one night. They hadn’t found their new “home” yet.
Preacher counted the warriors he could see and came up with the number twenty-seven, including Tall Bull himself. Preacher might have laid eyes on the bastard during some of the many confrontations he and Hawk had had with the Blackfeet, but it was the first time he was certain he was looking at the war chief. Tall Bull was like White Buffalo had described him, tall and burly and brutal, wearing a necklace of buffalo horns and carrying a wicked-looking war club.
From where Preacher was stretched out in some brush a hundred yards away, he could have put a rifle ball in Tall Bull’s head. He was sure of it. He was equally certain he and Dog could get away without any of the Blackfoot warriors ever coming close to them.
For a long moment, he gave the idea serious consideration. Finally, he decided against it. One reason was personal, the other strategic.
If he killed Tall Bull, the Blackfeet would come up with a new c
hief and continue their pilgrimage to wherever they were going. That wouldn’t be enough to satisfy Hawk. The youngster would continue fighting them all by himself if he had to, and Preacher wasn’t sure Hawk was up to that challenge yet. That was the strategic reason.
The personal one was that he carried Birdie’s image in his mind and the warmth he felt for her in his heart. He didn’t want to kill Tall Bull from a distance. If things had worked out that way in battle, fine. But given a choice . . .
Preacher wanted to be looking right in that son of a bitch’s eyes, nice and close, when Tall Bull died.
CHAPTER 37
The Blackfeet pulled out at dawn the next morning and continued trudging northward. The mountain called Beartooth and the valley of the Absaroka on the other side of it were far behind them.
They couldn’t leave their actions behind them, though. The consequences of Tall Bull’s ruthlessness and cruelty followed them, in the forms of a man and a dog.
Preacher kept his distance for the next two days, until the Blackfeet stopped at a mountain lake formed where the creek flowed down into a bowl between some hills. Except for occasional open areas, tall green pines and firs surrounded the lake, which was an incredibly deep blue. It was a beautiful spot, Preacher thought as he and Dog watched from one of the hills while the Blackfeet began setting up their new village in one of those meadows along the shore.
It was better than they deserved, he decided, but he was willing to let them live there in peace . . . once Tall Bull and most of the remaining warriors were dead.
The lake would be teeming with fish and plenty of game was in the area, too. Preacher saw deer and antelope every day. The Blackfoot women and children wouldn’t have much trouble surviving, even without warriors to go out and hunt.
The boys would grow up to be warriors, but maybe they would remember what had happened during the long, bloody season and realize it wasn’t wise to slaughter other tribes just because they weren’t Blackfoot. Maybe the memory of Preacher’s vengeance would remain with them.
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