The Loner: Inferno #12

by J. A. Johnstone

  More people from the wagon train had come up behind The Kid. They crowded forward, eager to see what was happening, and the press of human flesh forced him to move closer. Harwood wasn’t next to him anymore—he couldn’t see the scout—but suddenly he realized Jessica Ritter was. Her hip was against his, and neither of them had room to pull away.

  Jessica looked over at him, tall enough that she didn’t have to tilt her head back much to do so. “Mr. Dunlap’s too old for this!” She had to raise her voice to be heard over the tumult.

  The Kid knew what she meant. Brennan was middle-aged, an obvious veteran of many years in the cavalry, but Dunlap was even older. He had told The Kid that he was settling down when the wagon train reached Raincrow Valley. He had put in enough dangerous decades on the frontier to deserve that retirement.

  Even so, The Kid didn’t know what Jessica expected him to do. He couldn’t stop the fight. It had gone too far for that. The only thing that would end it was one man getting the best of the other.

  At that moment, Brennan landed a hard, looping punch that made it past Dunlap’s attempt to block it. The sergeant’s fist crashed into Dunlap’s jaw with such force the older man was lifted off his feet and spilled onto his back. Brennan charged into the circle after him, and that left the gap between wagons wide open.

  The troopers began to pour through it, spoiling for a fight the immigrants were glad to give them. In the blink of an eye, punches were being thrown furiously and indiscriminately.

  Now this was a full-fledged brawl.

  Most of the immigrant women fled from the violence, which caused the crowd to thin out in a hurry. The Kid could move again. It wasn’t his fight and he didn’t want any part of it, so he started to back up.

  Jessica Ritter stalked forward, grabbed the shoulder of a trooper who was pounding his fist into the face of a civilian, and hauled him around with a shouted, “Hey!”

  She punched the startled soldier in the nose, flattening it and making blood spurt from his nostrils.

  The startled trooper howled in pain and clapped one hand to his injured nose. He swung the other in a backhand that cracked across Jessica’s face and jerked her head to the side.

  It was an instinctive reaction on the soldier’s part, an unthinking response to the pain he felt. Under normal circumstances it was unlikely he would have hit a woman.

  The Kid reacted instinctively, too. Since Scott Harwood wasn’t around to protect the woman he was engaged to, The Kid lunged forward, shoved the stumbling Jessica behind him, and uncorked a punch that buried his fist to the wrist in the trooper’s belly. The man doubled over and collapsed at The Kid’s feet.

  He turned toward Jessica, not expecting any thanks but not anticipating what he got, either. She punched him hard in the chest.

  “I didn’t ask you to do that!” she yelled. “I can take care of myself!”

  The imprint of the trooper’s hand stood out on her cheek where she’d been hit, and she looked a little dazed.

  Suddenly, her eyes rolled up in their sockets, and her knees started to come unhinged. The Kid caught her before she could fall, getting his hands under her arms. Her head rolled loosely on her neck as she sagged against him.

  Fists still flew and chaos still raged around him. He started to back up, half carrying and half dragging the unconscious Jessica. He wanted to get her clear of the ruckus before either of them got seriously hurt.

  Stumbling into the open, The Kid paused and scooped her up in his arms. She was solidly built and weighed enough that he grunted with the effort of carrying her. He made it to where he had eaten his supper before all hell broke loose, and carefully he put her on the lowered tailgate.

  “What the hell are you doing with her?”

  The angry shout came from Scott Harwood, who rushed up to the wagon with his hand on the butt of his revolver. The Kid watched him closely. He didn’t want to kill the scout or even wound him, but if Harwood tried to draw that gun, The Kid would have to do something. He wasn’t going to stand there and let Harwood shoot him.

  “Calm down,” The Kid snapped. “I’m just trying to help her. She got hit in that brawl. You can see that for yourself.”

  Harwood regarded him coldly. “Did you hit her?”

  “What? Of course not!” The Kid shook his head disgustedly. “It was one of the cavalrymen ... but only after she busted his nose.”

  The fierce tension visibly gripping Harwood eased a little. He asked, “How bad is she hurt?”

  “Not too bad, I expect. I think she just passed out. But when she started to fall down I figured I’d better get her out of there. She could have gotten hurt a lot worse if that loco bunch trampled all over her!”

  Harwood nodded, clearly knowing The Kid was right about that. “Sorry, Morgan,” he muttered. “I saw you messing with her, and I didn’t know what had happened.”

  “You can tend to her now.” As The Kid started to turn away from the wagon, the high, shrill notes of a bugle blowing attention sounded in the night.

  The troopers stopped fighting and formed up into rough ranks, the ones who were still conscious and on their feet, anyway. Several of them were sprawled on the ground, either out cold or moaning from the blows that had knocked them down.

  Lt. Nicholson, bareheaded and looking furious, strode into the circle of wagons as the strains of the bugle died away. His gaze fell on Sgt. Brennan, and he demanded, “Sergeant, what’s going on here?”

  Brennan stood stiffly at attention. “A, uh, misunderstanding with these pilgrims, sir.”

  “Misunderstanding, hell!” Harwood walked up with a groggy-looking Jessica leaning on him. “Your men attacked us, Lieutenant. One of them even assaulted my fiancée!”

  “Is that true, Sergeant?” Nicholson snapped at Brennan.

  “With all due respect, sir, it sure ain’t,” the noncom said. “That fella Dunlap, the wagonmaster, threw the first punch. I was just defendin’ myself, and the rest of the lads were only tryin’ to help me.”

  “What were you doing over here, anyway?”

  “Well, sir, you didn’t make the wagons off-limits, so the boys and me figured maybe some of these ladies would like to dance.”

  “So you tried to force your way in here to fraternize with these civilian women.” Nicholson drew in such a deep breath it caused his nostrils to flare. “Get back to camp, Sergeant. Have the men pick up the ones who can’t walk and take them with you. And double the guard for tonight! I don’t want the pickets just standing around. The men on guard duty will walk the perimeter of this entire area, double time!”

  Brennan hesitated. “Sir, the men will likely be in the saddle for a long time tomorrow—”

  “Then they should have thought of that before they decided it was so important to go sashaying around with these women. You have your orders, Sergeant. Dismissed!”

  Horace Dunlap had been helped back to his feet. He still looked a little stunned, but was able to come up to Nicholson. “You need to keep those troopers of yours under control, Lieutenant.”

  Nicholson looked at him coldly. “My apologies for this incident,” the lieutenant said, although he didn’t sound too sincere. “But you have to understand that my men are under a great deal of pressure. The Apaches could be anywhere. We could be fighting for our lives without even a moment’s notice.”

  “The same thing’s true for us,” Dunlap said. “Don’t get me wrong, Lieutenant. I’m glad you fellas are here tonight. Just keep ’em away from our wagons.”

  Nicholson gave him a brusque nod and stepped over a wagon tongue to leave the circle and go back to the cavalry camp. The immigrants began to scatter to their wagons. Some hadn’t finished eating supper yet.

  The Kid picked up his bowl and coffee cup, which he had brushed off the tailgate when he placed Jessica on it. When he turned to take them back to the women who had provided the meal, he found Jessica standing in his path.

  “I’m sorry I hit you,” she said. Her apology sounded abo
ut as genuine as the one Nicholson had offered to Dunlap.

  “That’s all right,” The Kid told her with a faint smile. “Chalk it up to the heat of battle. Anyway, I’m not hurt.”

  “You’ll have a bruise there in the morning.”

  “Maybe. Let me guess, Mrs. Ritter ... You were raised with a bunch of brothers.”

  “Seven of them,” she said. “And I was the youngest in the family. I learned early on that I’d have to fight for anything I got.”

  “You learned well,” The Kid said.

  “Yes. Unfortunately, there are times when fighting doesn’t do any good, when all the rage in the world won’t—” She stopped herself and after a moment went on. “Anyway, I’m sorry.”

  “Apology accepted.”

  “Good night.” She started to turn away.

  The Kid touched her lightly on the arm. When she looked back at him, he said, “Maybe next time we’ll be fighting on the same side.”

  “We’ll be in Raincrow Valley in three days. There won’t be a next time.”

  Chapter 6

  The rest of the night passed quietly. The Apaches didn’t attack, and there was no more trouble between the soldiers and the members of the wagon train. The Kid had spread his bedroll underneath one of the wagons, and slept soundly.

  When he got up in the morning and looked toward the cavalry camp, he saw the troopers were already getting ready to move out.

  One of the women who had provided supper for him the night before came over to him bearing a steaming cup of coffee. The Kid took it with a grateful grin. “Thanks, ma’am.”

  “I’ll bring you some flapjacks and bacon in a minute if that’s all right, Mr. Morgan,” she said.

  “That’s more than all right,” he assured her. “It sounds wonderful.”

  He looked around and didn’t see Jessica Ritter, but even though it occurred to him, he didn’t think he ought to ask after her. Things between them had been rather tense ever since they’d met. Jessica didn’t seem to want any attention from him, yet sometimes went out of her way to talk to him.

  While The Kid sat on a wagon tongue and drank his coffee, Horace Dunlap came over to him and nodded good morning. The wagonmaster’s face was bruised and swollen from the fight with Sgt. Brennan, and he moved like he was sore all over.

  With a sheepish grin, he confirmed it. “Reckon I’m gettin’ a mite too old for bare-knuckles brawlin’. I just hope that durned sergeant has half as many aches and pains as I do this mornin’.”

  “I think there’s a good chance of that,” The Kid said. “It looked to me like you got in some pretty good licks.”

  Dunlap chuckled and nodded. “Yeah, I did, didn’t I?” He waved a hand toward the cavalry camp. “I guess you saw them soldier boys gettin’ ready to ride.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m gonna go over there and ask that lieutenant one more time if he’ll go with us to Raincrow Valley. I don’t expect it’ll do any good, but I got to try. You want to come with me, Kid?”

  “I don’t see what good having me along will do.” The Kid frowned.

  “You’re a famous hombre. Lieutenant Nicholson might come closer to listenin’ to you.”

  “I think you’re way wrong there, but I’ll go with you. For moral support, if nothing else.”

  The Kid told the woman at the campfire that he would be back in a few minutes for his flapjacks and bacon, then, carrying the coffee cup, he walked over to the cavalry camp with Dunlap.

  A couple of troopers got in their way, carbines slanted across their chests. “Hold it right there, sir,” one said to Dunlap. “Please state your business.”

  “I want to talk to your lieutenant,” Dunlap said.

  “I’ll see if he’s available,” the soldier said.

  Dunlap scowled and pointed at Nicholson, who stood about ten feet away watching some of the men saddle their horses. “He’s standin’ right there.” The wagonmaster sounded like a man trying not to reveal his irritation.

  “I’ll see if he’s available,” the trooper repeated. He turned on a heel and walked over to Nicholson, where he saluted, then spoke to the officer in a low voice.

  The Kid had never been in the army, so he was no expert on military discipline. It seemed to him Nicholson was being a little too strict, especially considering they were out in the middle of nowhere.

  But maybe that was what it took to maintain order among his men, The Kid mused. The troopers hadn’t seemed too well-disciplined the night before when they’d been brawling with the immigrants.

  Nicholson nodded to the soldier who’d been talking to him. The trooper came back over to The Kid and Dunlap. “You can speak to the lieutenant now.”

  “Much obliged,” Dunlap said in a dry tone, making it clear how ridiculous he thought the whole thing was. He hooked his thumbs in his belt and walked over to Nicholson.

  “What can I do for you, Mr. Dunlap?” the lieutenant asked.

  “Well, you can go with us to Raincrow Valley and make sure the Apaches don’t scalp all those good folks in the wagon train.”

  Nicholson shook his head. “I’ve already told you I can’t do that.”

  “Just how big is that war party you’re chasin’, anyway?”

  “It’s been reported to have as many as a hundred warriors in it.”

  “Good Lord!” Dunlap exclaimed. “How many men have you got in your patrol?”

  “Thirty,” Nicholson answered without hesitation.

  “Then if you do find them Indians, you’ll be outnumbered more than three to one.”

  “That’s true,” the lieutenant admitted. “But I’m counting on the fact that a well-trained and well-equipped member of the United States Cavalry is the fighting equivalent of several dirty, illiterate savages.”

  It was all The Kid could do not to ask Nicholson just how big a damned fool he really was. Instead he asked, “What sort of rifles do your men carry, Lieutenant?”

  “What?” Nicholson appeared to be taken by surprise by the question. “They’re Springfields, of course.”

  “Single shot weapons?”

  “Of course.”

  “Most of the Apaches have Winchester repeaters that they’ve either stolen in raids or traded for with white and Mexican gunrunners.” The Kid had been told as much by Frank Morgan. “Those rifles can fire off fifteen rounds in the same time it would take your men to get off three or four shots, reloading between each round. But you think one of your men is really a match for three or four of them?”

  “The hostiles are undisciplined—”

  “Why don’t you ask my head scout, Scott Harwood about that? Scott served with General Crook over in Arizona while Crook was tryin’ to chase down Cochise and Geronimo. He can tell you just how undisciplined those Apaches are.”

  Nicholson’s face flushed with anger. “It doesn’t matter what you say,” he snapped. “I know my men, and I have my orders, which are to locate and engage the hostiles. I won’t be distracted from that mission by a bunch of farmers.”

  Dunlap looked mad enough to start swinging again. The Kid put a warning hand on his shoulder.

  “Lieutenant, I think you’re making a mistake,” The Kid said. “I believe if your superiors were here, they would see how important it is to get this wagon train safely to Raincrow Valley.”

  Nicholson glared at him. “From what I understand, you’re nothing but a wandering gunman, Morgan. It’s presumptuous of you to claim you know more about what my superiors would want than I do. I’ll say it one last time. I have my orders. And we’re moving out with all due speed.”

  Nicholson turned and called to his noncom. “Sergeant Brennan, tell the men to mount up!”

  “Yes, sir!” Brennan replied. He had been standing not too far away, glaring at Dunlap and The Kid. Now he began stalking around the camp, getting the troopers on their horses and ready to ride.

  Nicholson nodded to the two civilians. “You’re dismissed.”

  The lieutenant’s
contemptuous tone made Dunlap’s hands clench into fists.

  “Come on,” The Kid told the older man. “We’re wasting our time here.”

  “Yeah, I reckon it was a waste of time tryin’ to talk sense into somebody with his head so far up his rear end that he can’t hear nothin’.”

  The Kid chuckled at the angry look that flashed across Nicholson’s face as the lieutenant glanced back. Nicholson’s spine was stiff and the back of his neck turned a deep red as he walked away.

  When The Kid and Dunlap returned to the wagon train, Scott Harwood and Milo Farnum were waiting for them.

  “Talking to the lieutenant didn’t do any good, did it?” Harwood asked.

  “Nope,” Dunlap replied. “I didn’t figure it would, but I had to try.” He took off his hat and scratched his head. “Oh, well, we made it this far without any real trouble. Maybe we can make it a mite farther.”

  “We’ll both be on the scout all day,” Farnum said. “If there’s any Injuns waitin’ for us, Horace, Scott and me will find ’em.”

  Dunlap nodded, but The Kid saw the doubt in the wagonmaster’s eyes. The Apaches were so good at hiding, sometimes when they attacked it seemed like they came up from the very ground itself, like worms rising from the earth after a hard rain.

  Some of the immigrants were hitching up their teams and getting ready to roll the wagons. All The Kid had to do was saddle his dun, so he took the time to enjoy the breakfast the woman had put aside for him.

  “What’s your name, ma’am?” he asked.

  “I’m Mrs. Price. Violet Price.” She was about forty, a pleasant-looking woman with short brown hair.

  The Kid still hadn’t seen Jessica that morning. But as he approached her wagon a few minutes later, she emerged from the canvas-covered bed and dropped to the ground.

  “Good morning,” he said. “Do you need a hand getting your team hitched?”