Wilderness Double Edition #10

by David Robbins

  Even more importantly, Nate had seen fit to teach his son about unarmed combat—how to use his fists and feet as white men did, how to grapple and wrestle as Indians did.

  If there was any one point Nate had stressed the most, it was always to do the unexpected. A close second had been that when Zach found his life hanging in the balance, he had to do whatever it took to win.

  So as Zachary King hurled himself at Old Bill Zeigler, he did the last thing the mountain man would ever have anticipated. Instead of striving to bludgeon a man bigger and stronger than him, Zachary took deliberate aim and threw the club with all his might.

  At that very instant, the rifle blasted.

  Twelve

  Nate King was fording the shallow river when shots rang out to the west, punctuated by screams of mortal terror. Jabbing his heels into the flanks of the stallion, he galloped up onto the bank and on into the cottonwoods. Once again his pistols were wedged under his belt. The loaded Hawken was in his left hand.

  Jeremiah Sawyer had deserved a proper burial. Nate had delayed his pursuit of the cutthroats long enough to dig a grave deep enough to insure scavengers wouldn’t unearth the body later. As a crowning touch he had added a crude cross fashioned from a broken branch, using whangs from his buckskin shirt to bind the pieces at the right angle.

  Then Nate had climbed, on the stallion and headed across the river to see if he could pick up the trail of Lassiter’s gang before it was too dark.

  Now, racing through the woodland, ducking branches and weaving among trunks, Nate recalled the recently made wagon tracks and feared for the safety of the poor pilgrims bound for the Oregon Country. Lassiter would give them the same treatment as Jeremiah.

  Nate couldn’t allow that to happen. He had covered over a quarter of a mile and was scouring the west side of the valley for the killers when he came upon a small knoll. Going up and over rather than around, he was shocked to see five horses tethered below and a giant of a man in the act of untying them.

  There was no doubt as to whether it was a member of Lassiter’s bunch. Immediately on seeing Nate, the giant tried to bring a rifle into play.

  Streaking down the knoll, Nate was beside the man in a flash. He should have shot then and there. But he had the notion to take the giant alive in order to get certain questions answered. So he drove the stock of his Hawken against the giant’s skull. It was like striking an anvil.

  The man bellowed in pain and staggered, but didn’t go down. Nate wheeled the stallion and closed in to deliver another blow. The giant had dropped his own rifle and appeared defenseless. Nate should have known better.

  Whipping around, the giant swung his mallet of a fist, clipping the stallion on the point of its chin. A punch from a normal man would hardly have fazed it. This man stopped the horse in its tracks. Wobbly legs swaying, the stallion almost went down.

  Nate raised the Hawken to swing again. The giant, moving with astonishing speed for a man of his bulk, leaped and grabbed hold of the front of Nate’s shirt. The next moment Nate sailed over the head of his horse and crashed down on his stomach in the high grass.

  Woozy from the impact, Nate tried to stand and turn. He was only halfway erect when fingers gouged into his shoulders and he was flung a dozen feet against the knoll. In the bargain he lost the Hawken. Dazed and winded, Nate twisted and saw the giant lumber toward him.

  “Any last words, you son of a bitch, before I snap your spine like a dry twig?”

  Nate kept his breath for saving his life. The giant lunged at him and he scrambled aside, then pushed upright. His right hand fell on a pistol and he drew, his arm a blur. Yet as fast as he was, the giant was faster.

  Arms like coiled bands of steel closed around Nate. He was hoisted off the ground and found himself nose to nose with the puffing giant, who grinned and squeezed.

  “I’m fixing to crush you, mister!”

  Nate didn’t doubt it. Shakespeare McNair had once told him about large snakes in Asia or Africa that crushed prey in mighty coils, and it seemed to him that he was about to suffer a similar fate. He surged against the man’s arms, but as powerful as he was, he couldn’t budge them.

  The giant laughed and a lancing spasm racked Nate’s chest. Then another. He was unable to take a deep breath and swore his ribs were about to collapse, splintered into fragments.

  Nate couldn’t use his arms or hands. His feet dangled uselessly and he couldn’t get a grip on his weapons. The giant smirked, sensing victory. And that was when Nate drove his forehead into his foe’s nose. Cartilage crunched, blood sprayed, and a moment later, Nate was free.

  The giant tottered backward, a hand covering his shattered nostrils. He acted more shocked than hurt.

  To give the human bear a moment’s respite was to invite disaster. Nate took two steps and dived. His arms looped around the giant’s ankles. He heaved, felt the man’s legs start to give, and heaved again. The smash of the heavy body hitting the earth was like that of a felled tree.

  Nate rolled to the left, out of the giant’s grasping reach. He was upright first and waded in with fists flying. A right hook caught the giant on the jaw, but did nothing more than make him blink.

  Rumbling deep in his chest, the huge man sprang, swatting Nate’s left jab aside. Again those massive arms coiled around Nate and lifted him into the air.

  “You die!”

  Spit and blood splattered Nate’s face. He tried to slam his head against the giant’s mouth but the man was prepared and jerked away.

  “Not this time, bastard!”

  Undaunted, Nate tried another tack; he rammed his knee into his adversary’s groin, not once but three times in swift succession.

  Sputtering, the giant released his hold and shambled off to the left, his enormous hands spread protectively over his privates.

  Nate drew his tomahawk. He no longer cared about taking the man alive. Darting forward, he slashed at the giant’s neck but the killer sprang out of harm’s way and flourished a long knife, which he waved in tiny circles.

  “It takes more than you’ve got to rub me out.”

  The Shoshones believed that warriors should never talk in the heat of battle, a belief shared by Apaches and others. Talking distracted men at crucial moments. It was considered the hallmark of poor fighters. Yet this man, gabby as he was, had proven to be as masterful a fighter as Nate had ever encountered.

  Circling, Nate sought an opening. He had to be wary of the giant’s greater reach and strength. Twice he feinted, but was unable to pierce the other’s guard. The tomahawk and knife rang together like small bells, clanging with each strike.

  Blood seeped from the giant’s smashed nose into his mouth and he kept spitting it out to one side. Nate watched closely, his legs coiled like springs, and when the giant spat again, he dove, aiming a vicious swipe that would have ripped a thigh wide open. But the giant slid to the left with the agility of a mountain sheep.

  The strain of all Nate had been through began to take its toll. His head ached abominably from the clout Jeremiah had given him, and his aching lungs strained to catch a breath. He had to end the fight quickly or the giant would end it for him.

  As if sensing Nate’s weakness, the huge man stalked in for the kill, swinging the knife like a sword, slashing high and low, seeking to penetrate Nate’s guard. Nate retreated under the onslaught, parrying furiously, his fatigue rendering the heavy tomahawk more unwieldy than it would ordinarily be.

  Having to focus on the giant to the exclusion of all else, Nate had no idea what was behind him as he retreated step by hasty step. He suspected he was being forced back toward the forest. Confirmation came when tree limbs appeared overhead. Moments later he backed into a bole.

  Evidently the giant had been waiting for that to happen. Snarling like an animal, he lanced his knife forward, seeking to pin Nate against the trunk. Nate wrenched aside, but not quickly enough. He nearly cried out as the keen blade sliced through his shirt and skin, drawing blood.

  Skip
ping to the right, Nate crouched to meet the next attack. The wound was shallow but it stung like thousand bee stings at once.

  The giant slowly turned. Wearing a mocking smile, he advanced, his arms constantly in motion as he flipped the knife from one hand to the other. His strategy was transparent. He would keep Nate guessing until the very last instant, then finish Nate off with a swift stroke.

  That wasn’t going to happen. Nate knew the giant expected him to keep on defending himself with the tomahawk, knew that the very last act the giant would expect was for him to snap back his arm and hurl the tomahawk in an overhand toss, yet that was exactly what he did. And he also knew, even as the smooth haft sped from his fingers, that the giant would easily dodge the tomahawk or deflect it. The latter proved to be the case.

  Then, at the exact moment that the giant’s knife arm was bent halfway around his body from the swing, Nate sprang, drawing his own blade as he did.

  The giant’s eyes widened to the size of walnuts and he desperately tried to cover himself with his other arm.

  Nate reached him first. Or rather, the knife did. It sank neatly between two of the giant’s ribs, ripping through flesh and muscle with astounding ease, all the way to the hilt. Nate twisted, holding on tight as the giant tried to back out of reach. The man grunted, streaked his knife arm overhead, then stiffened, gasped, and melted as if made of soft wax.

  Leaping back in case the giant tried to nail him while falling, Nate held his dripping blade at waist level. He was eager to finish his enemy off, but there was no need.

  With a puzzled expression on his face, the giant eased onto his buttocks and sat there with a hand over the wound. He blinked and looked at Nate. “Damn. Never figured a runt like you would be the one—” Breaking off, he stiffened, then sagged onto his back.

  Nate stepped nearer, prepared for any tricks.

  “I want,” the giant said weakly. “I want—”

  “What?” Nate finally spoke, but he was destined to never know since the man expired with a drawn, strangled breath and went limp.

  Nate took a deep breath to steady his racing pulse. He had been in more violent clashes than he cared to think about since settling in the Rockies, but few adversaries had pressed him as hard as the giant. “Whoever you were,” he said softly, “you were as tough as they come.”

  The nicker of a horse reminded Nate there were more cutthroats abroad in the night. Shaking his head to clear his thoughts, he hastened to the animals. The stallion was grazing. The other five horses looked at him, but made no move to flee.

  First Nate rounded up the two rifles. It turned out the giant had also owned a Hawken, the same caliber as Nate s. He put it in his bedroll. Next, taking the lead rope in hand, he mounted the stallion and rode to the south even though the shots and screams had arisen to the west.

  There was a reason. Nate figured that he had all of the horses belonging to Lassiter’s band of bloodthirsty killers, and he wasn’t about to let them get their hands on the animals. He rode several hundred feet, slipped from the saddle, and secured all six horses.

  After making sure his guns were loaded, Nate ran west. It wasn’t long before fingers of flame appeared in the night. They took on the size and shape of three campfires spaced about thirty feet from one another in the shape of a circle. The pilgrims, Nate guessed, since only greenhorns would bother to build three fires where one would suffice.

  Slowing, Nate worked his way as silently as a Shoshone warrior to a large fallen log. Kneeling, he studied the layout of the camp and the figures moving about.

  A tall man with his thumbs hooked in his belt was strutting about as if he owned the valley. It had to be Lassiter, Nate guessed. Nearby two hard-hewn characters in buckskins were covering a cluster of frightened pilgrims. A fourth killer was visible in one of the wagons, sorting through belongings in search of plunder.

  Of the pilgrims, two were bawling women. A third female, younger and fairer of form, was glaring at Lassiter. A young man stood beside her, his hands in the air. Another man stood meekly next to a wagon wheel, three children grasping his legs in fear.

  Nate shifted, then choked off an oath. Two bodies lay in spreading red pools—that of a man in homespun clothes and that of a small boy, a child no older than Zach.

  “Even children,” Nate whispered to himself, horrified. The sight chilled him to the bone. No matter how long he lived in the wilderness, no matter how much slaughter he beheld, he found it impossible to regard wanton butchery with anything other than total loathing. Some of his fellow trappers, had no such qualms. To them, death was so common an occurrence that it hardly deserved a second thought. They could stare at heaps of bodies killed in a raid and not be moved in the least.

  Not Nate. He burned with sheer rage on seeing the child. Only the worst sort of men could do such a thing, men with no morals, no scruples, no conscience. Men as hard as the mountains themselves. Men whose hearts had changed to stone.

  The thought gave Nate pause. Was it proper to even call them men when they were more akin to the savage beasts that shared the land they roved? Anyone capable of shooting an innocent child in cold blood was the scum of the earth, despicable beyond redemption, as soulless as a grizzly or a fierce painter.

  Nate raised the Hawken and extended it across the log, making it a point not to let the barrel scrape the rough bark. He tucked the stock to his shoulder and took precise aim at Lassiter.

  According to Jeremiah Sawyer, Earl Lassiter was the brains of the bunch. Kill him and the rest would be thrown into fleeting panic, giving Nate the time he needed to pick them off one by one.

  Without warning, Lassiter turned and stepped to the wagon being ransacked. The short man inside said something. Nodding, Lassiter climbed in.

  Nate held his fire. He wanted a clear shot, and he only caught glimpses of the cutthroat leader as he moved about under the canvas.

  One of the men guarding the pilgrims, a killer wearing a blue cap, reached out to stroke the young woman’s hair. She recoiled and slapped his hand. In retaliation, the man smacked her with such force she stumbled back against a wagon, which spurred the young man beside her into lowering his arms and moving toward the killer.

  Nate saw the man in the blue cap train his rifle on the husband. A wicked gleam lit the killer’s visage. In another second he would fire, slaying the husband in front of the young wife’s eyes.

  Nate couldn’t allow that. Swiveling, he glued the front bead to the killer’s chest, lined up the rear sight with the bead, and stroked the trigger.

  The man in the blue cap, unknown to Nate King, was Dixon. The lead ball tore into his chest, passed completely through a lung, and burst out his back between the shoulder blades. The impact lifted him off his feet and flung him to the grass, where he convulsed briefly, trying to marshal his fading willpower. The last sensation he experienced was that of a black hand enfolding all he was in its inky grip.

  Ben Kingslow had been standing near Dixon when the shot shattered the night. Instantly he crouched and snapped return fire at a cloud of gunsmoke in the woods.

  Nate King, already on the move, heard the ball smack into the top of a log and ricochet off. He darted into a thicket and bore to the left.

  Inside the wagon, Earl Lassiter leaped up at the booming crack and jumped onto the front seat. The shot had come from in the trees, not in the camp. He saw Dixon down and dead and Ben Kingslow rapidly reloading. “How many? Where are they?” he shouted.

  Kingslow had no idea and pivoted to say as much.

  By then Nate had raced over fifteen feet. His right hand flashed to a pistol and it cleared leather in a practiced draw. One handed, he sighted at the killer who was reloading, then fired, rushing his shot.

  This time Nate’s aim was off. Kingslow was in the act of pulling his ramrod out when the shot caught him high on the temple. It was like being pounded by a hammer. The next he knew, he was lying on his back, stunned, his rifle no longer in his hands. He groped for it, rising onto his el
bows.

  Of the pilgrims, Katie Brandt was first to regain her senses after being startled by the gunfire. Belatedly she realized that whoever was out there was trying to help them. One of their captors was dead, another severely wounded. They would never have a better opportunity to turn the tide.

  “Glen! Bob!” Katie shouted. “We have to help!”

  Kingslow was almost to his knees when a hellcat in the guise of a young woman flew into him, her nails raking his cheek and neck. He tried to shove her away but Glen Brandt was on him a heartbeat later, slamming fists into his face and head. Kingslow grabbed for his knife, felt his wrist grabbed in turn as the knife came clear.

  Glen saw his wife seize the killers wrist and leaped to her aid, adding his hands to hers. Both of them bent and shoved upward simultaneously, shearing the blade deep into the cutthroat’s stomach at a ninety-degree angle.

  All this while, Nate had continued circling, hoping for a clear shot at Lassiter. Suddenly the leader and the short man spilled from the wagon and sprinted into the cottonwoods.

  Of Nate’s three guns, only one pistol was still loaded, which didn’t stop him from speeding in pursuit of the renegades. He bounded past a tree and saw the short killer ten feet off, fleeing.

  Snip sensed someone was behind him and whirled. He fired from the hip, and had he been a shade steadier, he would have put a ball through his pursuer’s gut.

  But as it was, Snip missed, and Nate immediately pointed his pistol and fired. At that range, the .55-caliber had the wallop of a cannon. Snip’s head dissolved in a geyser of brains and gore.

  That left only Earl Lassiter, who fled through the forest as if demons were on his trail. He’d glanced back in time to see Snip meet his Maker. The glimpse he had of the big man who was after them was sufficient to tell him who it was: Nate King, a close friend of Shakespeare McNair’s and Jim Bridger’s. He knew King was a free trapper whose reputation for honesty and courage was unmatched by any save the other two living legends.