Wilderness: Mountain Devil/Blackfoot Massacre (A Wilderness Western Book 5)

by Robbins, David

  Nate found himself liking the trapper a lot. Once they escaped—if they did—he intended to invite Allen and Allen’s wife to the Shoshone village. The Crows and the Shoshones got along tolerably well so there shouldn’t be a problem in that regard.

  He crept to within eight feet of the tree line. Propped on his elbows, he surveyed the valley. What if the Blackfeet didn’t wait until sunset? What if they sprang their trap sooner? Getting the reverend to safety would be a hopeless task; simply staying alive would be a chore. But if he was to mount Pegasus right then and there and cut out at a full gallop, he’d more than likely make it through the Blackfeet. There was only one problem. He would have to leave the others behind, and he would never, ever desert friends in a time of dire need.

  For the next two hours Nate patrolled the north end of the stand, going from east to west and back again, stealthily slipping from tree to tree, always alert, always ready to fire should a Blackfoot appear. He felt disappointed when none did.

  The sun arced on its downward course through the blue vault of the sky.

  Nate was trying to determine if a dark patch off in the grass was a weed or a warrior when someone came through the brush to his rear and whispered urgently.

  “King! Shakespeare wants all of us at the clearing.”

  Glancing over a shoulder, Nate saw the younger Burke. George was a bundle of nervous energy, and kept transferring his weight from one foot to the other while wagging the flintlock he held as if swatting at flies. “Why? What’s wrong?” Nate asked.

  “We’re pulling out now instead of waiting for sunset.”

  Surprised, Nate cautiously retreated until he stood by Burke’s side. “Why the change in plans?”

  “Talk to Shakespeare. He told me the Blackfeet are up to something but he didn’t say what.”

  Alarmed, Nate hastened to the clearing. All the horses were facing due south and Henry Allen was astride the roan, holding the leads to the pack animals. McNair was adjusting the bridle on his white mare. Reverend Burke, amazingly, was sitting up, a bible in his left hand. “How are you faring?” Nate inquired.

  “As well as can be expected. Don’t fret over me, brother. The Lord will preserve me.”

  Nate stepped to the mare. “Why the rush to get out of here? I thought we were waiting until near dark.”

  “I took Henry’s telescope and climbed a tree,” Shakespeare answered. “Spotted six warriors sneaking to the west to reinforce those already there. The way I see it, they’re getting set to mount an attack. If they come at us through the trees on the other side of the creek, they’ll force us out into the grass where the rest can kill us or take us prisoner.”

  “Damn,” Nate muttered, although he admired the wily strategy. When would he learn to never underestimate the Blackfeet? When would he learn to always expect them to do the unexpected? How often must he remind himself they were the scourge of the northern plains and Rockies with good reason?

  “If most of the warriors are west of us, their lines in the grass will be thin,” Shakespeare was saying. “We should be able to fight our way out.” He finished with the bridle. “We need to leave now, before they can spring their surprise. I’ll go first to draw their fire. Allen will handle the pack animals. George will stick close to the travois so he can keep an eye on his brother. You bring up the rear.”

  “I should be the one who draws their fire,” Nate objected. “I can—” He stopped speaking as a series of savage whoops arose west of the creek.

  “They’re attacking!” Allen cried. “And they’ll be on us before we can get out of the stand!”

  “I’ll hold them off!” Nate said, whirling. He ran toward the creek, cocking the Hawken as he did, and probed the trees for movement. If he could delay the Blackfeet, if he could halt the charge for even a few minutes, it would give the others the time they needed to escape. The ribbon of water came into view, and so did a dozen or more Blackfeet who had already crossed it and were entering the pines on the east side. Stopping, he jammed the stock to his shoulder, sighted, and stroked the trigger.

  The Hawken spat lead and smoke. A tall Blackfoot who seemed to be leading the attack crumpled. Immediately, the rest sought cover, some diving to the ground, others dashing behind trees. But a few never made it.

  To the left of Nate guns cracked, three in swift succession, and he turned to see Shakespeare, Allen, and George, smoke curling from the barrels of their weapons.

  “What the—!” he blurted out, and saw a warrior coming straight at him bearing an upraised war club. In the blink of an eye the right flintlock was in his hand, and he fired when the onrushing Blackfoot was no more than seven feet away. The ball took the warrior in the throat, stopping him in his tracks as if he had slammed into a stone wall. Then the Blackfoot staggered and fell to his knees, his hands clamped to the wound in a futile attempt to staunch the crimson geyser spraying forth.

  Nate would have liked to finish the warrior off, but if he used the second flintlock he would have to rely on his knife or tomahawk should another Blackfoot try to slay him. So he backed up, sticking the expended pistol under his belt and drawing the loaded one.

  To the left more guns boomed. Shakespeare and Allen fired pistols simultaneously while retreating into the brush.

  Suddenly someone screamed.

  Pivoting, Nate beheld George Burke on his side on the ground, an arrow through his chest. Nate took a step, intending to drag Burke to safety, when two more shafts sped out of the greenery and sliced into Burke’s chest within a hand’s width of the first.

  George swiveled his head and spied Nate. His eyes were wide in shock and disbelief. Then, blubbering red spittle, he collapsed and expired with a sigh.

  Pausing behind a fir, Nate scanned the stand. The Blackfeet were all in hiding. Temporarily, at least, the charge had been broken. Both Shakespeare and Allen were behind trunks, reloading. Crouching low, he burst from concealment, racing toward McNair. A rifle thundered and something tugged at his beaver hat. An arrow missed his head by a hair. And then he was there, the trunk sheltering him.

  “Trying to get yourself killed, Horatio?” Shakespeare whispered while wedging a ball and patch into his rifle.

  “What the hell are you doing? You were supposed to cut out with the others.”

  “Does your wife know you use such foul language?”

  “Damn it, this is no time to be making jokes.”

  “Why, how now, Adam! no greater heart in thee? Live a little; comfort a little; cheer thyself a little.”

  “Shakespeare!”

  The mountain man grinned and peeked around the pine. “All right. All right. Don’t throw a fit.” He glanced at Nate. “Did you really and truly think I would run off and leave you to be butchered? I knew what you were trying to do, but one man couldn’t stem their charge. So we joined in. Now, if they don’t press us, we can sneak back to the horses and light out.” He gazed into the trees. “Where’s George?”

  “He’s dead.”

  “Drat. I liked the lad.” Shakespeare leaned the rifle against the trunk and began reloading his pistol. “You’d better reload your pieces, Horatio, unless you’re fixing on fighting the Blackfeet tooth and claw.”

  Exasperated, Nate opened his powder horn. “I don’t need you to remind me what to do. And I’ll thank you to stop calling me Horatio. It’s not my name.”

  “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”

  “Sometimes I think you’re a lunatic,” Nate muttered. He repeatedly glanced at the surrounding pines, anticipating a second assault.

  “We’ll let them try again,” Shakespeare whispered loud enough for Allen to hear. “When they hunt their holes, we get back to the horses and show these Blackfeet how fast white men can ride when they have to.”

  “We can’t go fast hauling that travois,” Nate reminded him. “The Blackfeet will be on us like wolves on snowbound deer.”

  “We are not the first who with best
meaning have incurred the worst.”

  “Here they come!” Allen warned.

  Flitting like painted specters from spot to spot, yipping and yelling like demented furies, the warriors were closing in, some sweeping to the right, some to the left, executing a pincer movement to outflank their foes.

  “Fire, men, fire!” Shakespeare bellowed, doing just that. About thirty feet out a Blackfoot toppled, a hole where his nose had been.

  Nate heard Allen join the fray as he picked up the loaded flintlock, trained it at an onrushing figure, and shot. A feather in the warrior’s hair leaped from the man’s head, but the Blackfoot himself, untouched, dove for safety.

  “Now!” Shakespeare shouted, backing into the undergrowth.

  All of Nate’s guns were empty and taking the precious time necessary to reload them would be certain suicide; the Blackfeet would be on him before he could do it, So he sprinted for the clearing, dodging and weaving like a man possessed, deadly shafts tipped with their terrible barbed points raining down on all sides. Shakespeare was ahead of him. Allen, because of his wound, was in the rear but moving as if his heels were on fire.

  Nate saw Shakespeare break from the vegetation into the clearing, and a second later did likewise, only to halt in astonishment and gasp in stupefied shock at finding their horses gone. Every last animal. Even the packhorses and the travois. “How?” he blurted.

  “There!” McNair declared, pointing to the south.

  Nate, bewildered, sprang forward. Outlined against the firs, standing at the boundary of the stand and the tall grass, were all the animals including Pegasus. How had they gotten there? Was the reverend responsible? To the west the Blackfeet whooped in murderous rage as they closed in.

  The travois was empty.

  In startled bewilderment Nate noticed the vacant blanket and feared the Blackfeet had seized the minister, until his gaze lifted and he spied Reverend John Burke walking into the grass. “Reverend!” he yelled, but Burke paid no heed. The minister, walked with firm tread, his shoulders squared, his bible held aloft in his right hand.

  Nate stopped beside Pegasus and surveyed the valley. The Blackfeet in the grass had yet to show themselves. Their attention was undoubtedly on the reverend, who suddenly started quoting Scripture at the top of his lungs.

  “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, he leadeth me beside the still waters.”

  “Come back!” Nate cried. He took a step to go after Burke, but a firm restraining hand on his arm checked his advance.

  “No!” Shakespeare said. “Mount and ride. We’ll get him on the fly.”

  Nate spun and vaulted onto his stallion. Out in the open the minister boldly walked deeper into the grass, reciting all the while.

  “He restoreth my soul. He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”

  Jabbing his heels into Pegasus, Nate galloped toward John Burke. A Blackfoot popped up off to the right, an arrow nocked to a taut bowstring, and aimed at the too tempting target.

  “Try me!” Nate shouted, but the warrior loosed the shaft a heartbeat later, and in helpless horror Nate witnessed the flight of the glittering arrow as it flew true, striking the reverend high on the chest.

  John Burke staggered and almost fell. Miraculously, he regained his balance, held the bible higher, and walked onward. “Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies,” he thundered as if from a pulpit. “Thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.”

  Nate was halfway to the minister. He saw the Blackfoot nock another shaft, and nearly laughed with glee when Henry Allen’s Kentucky cracked and the warrior dropped like a stone. His elation was short-lived, however.

  Another Blackfoot rose, his right arm sweeping back to throw a lance.

  This time it was Shakespeare who fired. The warrior was lifted from his feet and crashed from sight in the grass.

  “Reverend Burke!” Nate called, hunching over, bracing to grab the minister under an arm and heave him over the saddle. Vaguely he was aware of Blackfeet in the trees behind them and a few Blackfeet on both sides.

  “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life,” the minister roared, “and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever!” Stopping, he turned, his eyes alighting on Nate, each twinkling with a gleaming spark of inner victory. He beamed proudly. “Did you see, brother?” he yelled. “Did you see?”

  See what? Nate wondered, reaching out with his left hand. He was nearly there—ten feet or less to go and he could grasp the reverend’s arm—when another arrow transfixed John Burke from back to front, the tip exploding out Burke’s chest. The reverend took a halting step, gawked at the barbed point coated red with his blood, and then collapsed, falling straight down in a disjointed heap.

  “No!” Nate bellowed, slowing, thinking there still might be hope, that John Burke might still be alive, until a glimpse of the minister’s blank eyes and parted lips convinced him otherwise. Glancing up, he spotted the warrior responsible whipping another arrow from a quiver. Rage seized him, and without realizing what he was doing he goaded Pegasus into a full gallop and angled toward the bowman.

  The Blackfoot nocked the arrow and elevated the bow, his actions precise and rapid, a seasoned warrior who knew enough not to waste motion when in combat. He made no effort to move out of the way until the absolute last moment.

  Nate’s gaze was locked on his adversary. When the arrow leaped toward him he was rigid in the saddle, aflame with a burning desire to revenge John Burke. He scarcely felt the shaft as it shot under his left arm, clipping fringe as it passed. But he did feel the impact when Pegasus plowed into the Blackfoot like a living battering ram and sent the warrior flying. The bow sailed into the grass. Nate wheeled his stallion, holding the Hawken and the reins in one hand, and drew his tomahawk. Somewhere, someone was shouting. He didn’t care who or why. All he cared about was satisfying his craving for vengeance.

  The stallion pounded toward the warrior once more. Dazed but game, the Blackfoot was standing, pulling a sheath knife as he straightened. He never had the opportunity to use it.

  Nate swooped down on the warrior, his tomahawk shining in the sunlight as he swung it on high, then buried the edge in the top of the Blackfoot’s skull. He let go of the handle and swept on past, making for the south end of the valley, hearing rifles blast and the frenzied cries of the war party.

  Somehow, Shakespeare and Allen had gotten ahead of him and were beckoning him on.

  He raced after them, listening to the buzz of arrows and balls, hoping Pegasus would be spared. A glance showed him ten or so Blackfeet pouring from the pines. He wasn’t worried. Not even the fleetest of men could hope to overtake a robust stallion in the prime of its life.

  Shortly the arrows and balls ceased cleaving the air and Nate slowed Pegasus to a trot. A hundred yards distant awaited his friends. Twisting, he saw a crowing Blackfoot next to John Burke, waving the minister’s scalp in small circles. Had the Hawken been loaded he would have shot the warrior dead. He watched others dance in glee around the body and strike it with their clubs and tomahawks. Still others had hold of the packhorses and the animals belonging to the Burke brothers, but they were making no attempt to give chase. Evidently the Blackfeet were satisfied with their spoils, or else they simply didn’t care to lose any more men.

  “I thought for a bit there you were a goner, King.”

  Facing front, Nate thoughtfully regarded the trapper and fell in between Allen and McNair as they started homeward. “It would have served me right if I was.” He sighed and sadly shook his head. “I came so close. So damn close.”

  “Don’t talk nonsense, Horatio,” Shakespeare said. “We did all we could for the good reverend, and then some. He made the choice. There was nothing we could do.”

  “Wha
t choice?” Allen asked. “Do you mean he wanted to get himself killed? He deliberately walked on out there knowing what would happen?”

  “Stranger things have happened.”

  Nate breathed the sweet mountain air and watched a butterfly flutter over the grass. “I’ll find a way to send word to the Burke family in Rhode Island. It’s the least I can do.” He looked toward the Blackfeet again, to be certain none were in pursuit. The war party was moving into the stand, taking Burke’s body with them.

  Henry Allen was also gazing back at the trees. “I still don’t understand. Why did Reverend Burke do it?”

  “Old William S. had the answer to that one,” McNair responded soberly. “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances. And one man in his time plays many parts.” He gave the mare a pat. “I just pray, when my times comes, I play my part as well as John Burke did.”

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