Hunters

by James Reasoner

  “I know the feeling,” Costigan said.

  The two Pawnee who had ridden out with Spotted Dog parted so they could flank Costigan as he rode forward. The buffalo hunter nodded to Bill and hitched his horse into motion.

  “What are we…doing here?” Macauley panted as he and Fraker came to a stop in the alley beside the bank. “Shouldn’t we be…around back?”

  “Not yet. We’d never get away. There’s something else we need to do first.” Fraker grabbed the ladder and started up. “Go get our horses and tie them in the alley out back. Then wait for me here.”

  He climbed as fast as he could. When he reached the top, he was glad to see that the man posted up there was still alone. No one had joined him to help in the possible fight against the Pawnee.

  The townie was a brown-haired man wearing spectacles. He glanced back over his shoulder as Fraker hurried toward him.

  “Did you come to give me a hand? You’ll need a rifle.”

  “No, you’ve already got one,” Fraker said as he came up to the man. He brought his fist up and smashed it into the man’s jaw, taking him completely by surprise. The man went down hard onto the roof, out cold.

  His rifle clattered at Fraker’s feet.

  Fraker reached down and picked it up.

  “And you don’t know it, but I’m a hell of a shot with one of these,” he said, even though the man was no longer conscious to hear him.

  He dropped to a knee, worked the rifle’s lever to make sure there was a bullet in the chamber, and then stretched out on his belly. The Winchester’s barrel rested across the short wall around the roof’s edge. The gun needed to be as steady as it could for this. A miss might achieve the same result, but a hit would mean there was no turning back.

  Fraker rested his cheek against the smooth wood of the stock and peered over the barrel. He shifted the rifle until its sights rested squarely on the back of the Pawnee war chief who had just turned away to ride back to his men. The shot was a long one, but Fraker had a clear field of fire.

  He squeezed the trigger.

  Bill didn’t hear the shot, but he saw the way the bullet’s impact drove Spotted Dog forward over the neck of his pony. Blood spouted from the hole in the war chief’s back.

  The crack of the shot sounded then, just catching up to the slug that had smashed through Spotted Dog’s body.

  Costigan twisted in the saddle, obviously thinking Bill had gone crazy and gunned down the chief. He yelled, “No!”

  Bill didn’t know what had happened, but he saw what was about to. Face twisting with rage, one of the subchiefs lifted his lance and sent his horse plunging toward Costigan’s mount, clearly intending to impale the buffalo hunter.

  Instinct took over. Bill whipped his Colt from its holster and fired. He wasn’t blindingly fast on the draw, but he was quick and accurate. His bullet caught the Pawnee warrior in the shoulder, shattering it.

  Costigan still had his Henry rifle. He brought it to his shoulder and blew the other subchief off his pony as the man raised his bow with an arrow nocked.

  Bill yanked his horse around and slashed at it with the reins. The animal lunged into a run toward the settlement.

  Costigan fled, too. Bill glanced back and saw him following. They were closer to the rest of the war party than they were to town, but they stood a slender chance of reaching Redemption alive if the defenders gave them some covering fire.

  Shots rolled out from the town. Bill hunkered low in the saddle as bullets whistled past from one direction and arrows rained through the air from the other direction.

  The old saying about being between a rock and a hard place flickered through his mind. This was more like being between lead and a sharp place, but that was just as deadly.

  Horror filled him at the way he and Costigan had gunned down the two men with Spotted Dog. They’d had no choice, though. If they had turned their backs on those Pawnee, it would have been the same as committing suicide.

  And no matter how tragic and unfair this situation was, Bill wasn’t ready to die yet. He wasn’t like Costigan.

  Now that the battle couldn’t be avoided, it appeared Costigan wasn’t going to throw his life away for no reason, either, Bill realized. The buffalo hunter’s horse drew even with his. Costigan was riding low in the saddle, too, to make himself a smaller target.

  Over the pounding hoofbeats, Costigan yelled, “Why did you—”

  Bill didn’t let him finish. “I didn’t! The shot came from town!”

  “But who—”

  The wind whipped away the rest of Costigan’s words, but Bill didn’t need to hear them to know what the man had said. He didn’t have an answer.

  But he hoped he lived long enough to find that answer. Whoever had fired that shot likely had doomed innocent people to death…and Bill intended to see that the varmint paid for that.

  Fraker left the Winchester on the roof and scrambled back down the ladder to the alley. When he got there, Macauley stared at him in disbelief.

  “What did you do?” Macauley asked over the roar of gunfire that had erupted in the wake of Fraker’s shot.

  “Killed that Pawnee chief,” Fraker said. “There’s our distraction.” He pulled his Colt from its holster. “Come on. We don’t have much time. They’ll be herdin’ women and kids in there pretty soon.”

  He led the way to the bank’s back door. It was locked, but with all the shooting going on in town already, nobody was going to notice one more gun going off. He aimed the revolver at the lock and pulled the trigger.

  It took two shots to shatter the lock, but then the door flew open when Fraker kicked it. He charged into the building with Macauley right behind him, also with gun in hand.

  They found themselves in a short hallway with an open door at the other end that led into the bank’s main room. Fraker’s gaze landed immediately on the huge, squat safe that sat next to the bank president’s desk.

  With the threat of a Pawnee attack looming over the town, nobody was conducting any bank business this afternoon. The banker, who was also Redemption’s mayor, Fraker had learned, wasn’t here, and there weren’t any customers, either.

  In fact, only one man was in the bank: a slender, bespectacled teller. He had been standing in the open front door, watching what was going on outside, but he swung around as Fraker and Macauley charged into the room, and from the way his eyes widened, he grasped right away what was going on.

  That was too damned bad…for him.

  Fraker shot him in the belly.

  As the teller groaned, doubled over, and collapsed, Fraker said to Macauley, “Get to work on that safe!” Fraker ran over to the door, grabbed the wounded man’s collar, and dragged him away from the entrance so nobody passing the bank would see him.

  “You think anybody heard that shot?” Macauley asked as he knelt in front of the massive safe.

  “Hell, it sounds like the Battle of Gettysburg out there!” Fraker said. “Nobody knows what’s going on in here. Just get that safe open!”

  He pushed the bank’s front door up but didn’t close it all the way. He wanted to be able to keep an eye on the street. Holding the Colt close by his head, he leaned over to peer through the opening he had left.

  The wounded man at his feet was still groaning. The sound got on Fraker’s nerves after a moment. He reversed the gun in his hand, bent over the teller, and slammed the butt of the gun against the man’s head as hard as he could three times, feeling bone splinter with each blow. The man got quiet and stopped writhing around.

  It was merciful, thought Fraker. A man who was gut-shot generally took a long time to die, and it was a hard way to go. It was a lot quicker and easier having your head stove in.

  “How’s it comin’ along?” Fraker asked as he straightened from the dead man.

  “Getting there,” Macauley said. “Don’t distract me.”

  Macauley might have worse distractions in a minute, Fraker realized. He could hear the Indians howling and yipping now, ev
en over the gun thunder.

  The battle was about to spill into the very streets of Redemption.

  Chapter 28

  Bill never would have dreamed that it would take a year to ride a few hundred yards at a full gallop, but that’s what it felt like as he and Costigan raced toward the settlement.

  The air was dark with arrows around them. One of them struck the cantle of his saddle and glanced off. The shaft slapped his thigh and bounced away.

  Lucky for him and Costigan, the Pawnee had been so shocked to see Spotted Dog gunned down that they hadn’t reacted immediately. Bill and Costigan had already put more distance between them when the Indians charged. That swift reaction might have been enough to save them. The edge of town was close now.

  Costigan’s horse screamed and broke stride, leaping wildly as an arrow drove deep into a rear haunch. Costigan kicked his feet free of the stirrups just as the animal collapsed. He sailed over the horse’s head and slammed into the ground, rolling over a couple of times before he came to a stop.

  Bill reined in and yelled, “Costigan!”

  The buffalo hunter came up running. An arrow skewered his right thigh. He cried out in pain and tumbled off his feet again.

  But somehow he found the resolve to get up and limp toward Bill’s horse. Bill extended a hand. Costigan reached up and gripped Bill’s wrist. With a grunt of effort, Bill heaved the man up onto the back of his horse behind the saddle.

  “You should’ve left me!” Costigan said as Bill kicked the horse into a run again.

  “And abandon another gimpy-legged fella? I don’t think so!”

  Bill hoped the delay hadn’t cost both their lives. The barricades at the end of Main Street were only fifty yards away now.

  But the Pawnee were even closer.

  Another volley of shots ripped out from the settlement’s defenders. The hail of lead tore into the front ranks of the charging war party and slowed the Pawnee for an instant as several of their ponies went down. That gave Bill and Costigan the chance they needed to cover the last of the ground.

  Nearly stumbling from exhaustion, the heavily burdened horse ran past the barricades.

  Bill reined in and dropped out of the saddle. He turned quickly to grab Costigan as the buffalo hunter fell more than dismounted. Josiah Hartnett appeared at Bill’s side to catch hold of the wounded man, too.

  “Let’s get him behind one of the barricades,” Bill said.

  “Somebody give me a rifle and prop me up where I can shoot,” Costigan insisted.

  Hartnett asked, “Are you all right, Bill?”

  “Yeah, but don’t ask me how! Pure luck, I reckon. Come on.”

  They helped Costigan over behind the piled-up barrels. They had been stacked so that there were gaps between them where the defenders could stick a rifle barrel and fire. Costigan said, “Lean me against that hitch rack and give me a rifle. I can shoot from there.”

  Extra Winchesters were lying on the boardwalk. Bill picked up one of them and put it in Costigan’s hands.

  “You sure you’re all right? You’re losin’ some blood from that arrow!”

  “Go on, Marshal,” Costigan said. “Don’t worry about me.”

  Under the circumstances, Bill had no choice but to do what Costigan said.

  The Pawnee were almost on top of the defenders at the edge of town. Bill yanked his Colt from its holster and ran to join the fight.

  The plains just outside the settlement were littered with the bodies of the Pawnee and their ponies. At least half the war party had been cut down by the withering fire from the defenders.

  But that left scores more, and now they were racing past the barricades, screaming their war cries, firing arrows, and thrusting iron-headed lances at the citizens of Redemption. Bill twisted, triggering the Colt again and again as he tracked its barrel from left to right, and blew a couple of the warriors off their mounts. As his hammer clicked on an empty chamber, he had to throw himself aside to avoid one of the lances.

  He rolled up against the boardwalk and struggled to his feet. His bad leg ached like a rotten tooth, but that was the least of his worries now. He plucked fresh cartridges from the loops on his belt and thumbed them into the revolver’s cylinder, snapping it shut just in time to squeeze the trigger and send a slug blasting into the chest of a Pawnee who was about to fire an arrow at him.

  It was chaos in the street, a hellish melee of blood, gunfire, and death. Bill glanced toward the hardware store, knowing that Eden and her father had probably taken shelter there. His heart leaped in alarm as he saw one of the warriors bound onto the building’s porch.

  The Pawnee had barely taken a step toward the door when the store’s front window erupted outward in a shower of glass. The bullet that drove into the warrior’s chest threw him backward off the high porch.

  Inside the broken window, Eden worked the lever of the smoking Winchester to throw another round into the chamber, then leaned forward to search for another target.

  Bill felt a surge of relief, along with admiration for the courage his wife displayed, but it was tempered with fear for Eden. By getting into the middle of the fight, she was putting herself in danger.

  Then struggling men surged between him and the hardware store, and he couldn’t see her anymore. There was no time to worry, because another Pawnee lunged at him with a lance. The tip ripped Bill’s shirt as he twisted aside. His Colt roared and bucked, and the warrior collapsed with a slug through his middle.

  At least this was one battle in which it was easy to tell friend from foe. Bill found himself backed up against the barrels, shoulder to shoulder with Costigan, as more of the Pawnee swarmed around him and forced him to give ground. The two men emptied their weapons. Bill was able to reload again, but Costigan didn’t have any more shells for the rifle. He turned it around and heaved himself to his feet, even with his wounded leg, using the rifle like a club and flailing back and forth with it as warriors closed in around him. Bodies with crushed skulls began to pile up around him. Blood dripped from scratches on his face, giving him a fearsome aspect.

  Bill fired his last shot and saw the slug tear through the throat of a Pawnee who was screeching practically in his face. The man collapsed at Bill’s feet, blood fountaining from his ruined neck. The lance he had tried to ram through Bill’s body rattled to the ground beside him.

  Bill shook his head as he realized that the shooting was beginning to be sporadic. The horrible tumult in the street was dying down. Only a few of the Pawnee were still mounted, and as Bill watched, riflemen on the roofs blasted them off their ponies. Here and there men on the ground still struggled, but Bill’s heart leaped as he realized the fight was just about over.

  Redemption had paid a price…but it was still here. The defenders had won. The war party was on the verge of being wiped out. That was a terrible, tragic thing, Bill thought as he reached down and picked up the lance that had fallen at his feet, considering that all the Pawnee had wanted at first was to recapture, if only for a short period of time, the way of life they had always known.

  But that had led to the slaughter of their young men, and the thirst for vengeance that had brought them here, where Fate had presented them all with the choice of life or death. The people of Redemption had fought for life.

  The Pawnee, in their own way, had embraced death.

  But now, Bill thought as an overwhelming weariness washed over him, it was finished.

  He looked along the street and saw smoke billowing up from the back of the bank.

  “Fire!”

  The shout ripped itself involuntarily from his throat. He broke into an awkward run toward the bank, weaving between bodies of Pawnee and the town’s defenders. He saw Colonel William Bledsoe lying on his back, chest pincushioned with arrows. Bledsoe hadn’t survived, but some of the other buffalo hunters had. They joined Bill in hurrying toward the bank, along with the townspeople who were still on their feet and relatively unhurt.

  Frontier towns feared fire
above almost anything. Flames could wipe out a settlement in almost the blink of an eye.

  As Bill reached the bank, two men on horseback burst from the alley beside it. He caught a glimpse of them, recognized Fraker and Macauley, and saw the heavy canvas bank bags they had tied to their saddles. In that instant, Bill knew what had happened.

  He also knew his gun was empty and Fraker was bearing down on him. The outlaw had a Colt in his free hand. Flame spouted from the muzzle as he fired. Bill felt the wind rip of the bullet past his ear as he thrust up with the only weapon he had.

  The Pawnee lance.

  The iron-tipped shaft caught Fraker in the belly and tore through his body at an angle. Fraker screamed as the impact drove him backward out of the saddle. He crashed to the ground. The lance had gone all the way through him. The blood-smeared tip stuck out a couple of feet from his back. He had dropped his gun, so he used both hands to paw feebly at the shaft lodged in his belly.

  His fingers fell away from it limply as a shudder went through him. After that, he didn’t move again.

  Bill was vaguely aware that he had heard a couple of shots ring out from a rifle as he was thrusting the lance at Fraker. He turned away from the dead man and saw Macauley sprawled motionless on the ground a few yards away. Mordecai Flint prodded him with the smoking barrel of a Winchester.

  “You got him, Mordecai?” Bill asked.

  Flint snorted. “I know a damn bank robber when I see one, even if I ain’t ever been a lawman before!”

  “You are now,” Bill told him. “You’re a lawman for sure.”

  Now they had to worry about the blaze, but as Bill turned back toward the bank, Josiah Hartnett came up to him and said, “We’ve got the fire under control, Marshal. The brick walls stopped it from getting out. I don’t know how it got started. The Indians never reached the bank.”

  Bill nodded toward the two bodies in the street. “That’s how it started. Those two figured they could rob the bank while everybody was busy fightin’ off the Pawnee. Reckon they started the fire as an extra distraction. They almost got away with it, too.”