For reasons known only to him, Bates foolishly jumped up and made a run for the wounded Prince and Duke. He came close to making it.
“We’ll sure give it a try,” Preacher muttered, pulling his rifle to his shoulder.
The fancy hunting rifle banged and Bates had a leg knocked out from under him. He did a flip and hit the ground, hollering to the high heavens.
“Now that was a lucky shot,” Bones muttered.
“You got lucky on that one, boy,” Preacher muttered. “Let’s get gone from here.”
After five minutes or so had passed, Bones crawled to his knees. He sensed, more than knew, that Preacher had done his work and was gone. “All right, people. Let’s gather up the wounded and get them to the gospel-shouters.”
Bones looked over at Zapata, lying on his belly. “He can’t ride, so some of you rig up a travios.”
“This sorta knocks our plans in the head, don’t it, Bones?” Van Eaton spoke softly.
“Yeah.”
“And I was lookin’ forward to dallyin’ some with them women over yonder. I like ’em with some meat on their bones. That there Hanna hottens up my blood something fierce.”
“Go find a cold crick and jump in it,” Bones suggested.
“Hell, I took a bath last month!”
When the dejected and bloodied bunch of man-hunters reached the site of the make-shift hospital in the middle of the wilderness, they were quick to note that not only were the missionary men armed, and armed well, so were the wounded. Even the women had shotguns strategically placed. Took Bones about one second to understand that if they made a try for the women, a lot of men were going to die, for several of the wounded were more than fit to travel. That meant they were staying behind deliberately to act as guards.
Bones cut his eyes to Van Eaton. His right hand man had picked up on it, too. He nodded his head slightly
“I must have medical treatment!” Prince Zapata yelled. “I demand it.”
“Put him over there,” Otto said, pointing and trying to hide his smile. “I’ll see to his wound.”
“I demand you stop that smiling at me!” Zapata shouted. “I am seriously wounded.”
“You don’t demand anything from me,” Otto bluntly told him. And I never heard of anyone who died from being shot in der butt.”
Bones, Van Eaton, and those who helped bring the wounded to the make-shift hospital took their leave and being careful to stay in the center of the long valley, made their way back to camp. It was a weary and dejected bunch of man-hunters. Even the shoulders of the nobility slumped a bit as they rode. Nothing had turned out the way they planned. But the thought of calling off the hunt was nowhere in their minds.
For the others, over coffee and hot food, the talk was, surprisingly, not of quitting, but of what to do next.
“Corner him and burn him out,” Pyle suggested.
“Corner him?” Flores looked at the man. “How? Most of the time we don’t even see him.”
“I wish we had some cannons,” Falcon wished aloud. “We could blow him out of the mountains.”
No one chose to respond to that. But a few of the men did smile at the ridiculousness of the remark.
“I got an idea,” Sam Provost said. “Let’s do to him like he done to us. Let’s insult him and make him mad. Then he’ll lose his temper and do something stupid.”
“He’d see through that charade,” Jon Louviere said. “Whoever told you Preacher was a stupid man was very badly misinformed. He is very intelligent and cunning. Which makes this game all the more exciting.”
Van Eaton looked at the man. “Game? This is a game to you?”
“But of course.”
“Man,” Van Eaton said, shaking his head, “I can’t figure none of you all. We got people dead all over these mountains. That Preacher has put lead in near’bouts all of us at one time or the other. He’s destroyed our camps, burned our supplies, stampeded our horses, ambushed us, caused rockslides, thrown snakes at us, made fools of us, and he ain’t even got nicked one time. And you think it’s a game?”
Bones poured more coffee and sat back down. “It’s done got personal to me now. The money aside, it’s a matter of honor. If we don’t corner Preacher and bring his head back in that there jug, we’re all done as bounty-hunters. We’ll never be able to get another job. News of this will get out. You can just bet that them that quit and headed back east has done told the story to anyone who’ll listen. Folks is laughin’ at us all over the place. I can’t have that. I won’t tolerate it. I ain’t leavin’ these mountains ’til Preacher is dead and we got his head. I’ll die first.”
Bones had finally expressed what had been in the minds of the rest of the men; the constant thought that silently nagged and dug at their pride. One man was making fools of them all. That just wouldn’t do. To a man, they couldn’t allow it. The hunt had to go on. The men didn’t have a choice, or so they thought.
“We got to leave the valley and take to the mountains,” Tatman spoke up, raw hatred for Preacher burning in his eyes. “We got to stop thinkin’ like this was back east and start thinkin’ like a mountain man.”
“By jove!” Sir Elmore piped up. “I think you’ve got it!”
“Maybe so,” Bones said. “Maybe so. It’s worth a try. We’ll leave ten men behind to guard the horses and the camp, and we’ll strike out on foot. We’ll each take supplies for three days and fan out in the mountains.” He looked at Tatman. “Good thinkin’, Tatman. Real good thinkin’.”
* * *
“What are them igits doin’ now?” Preacher muttered, peering at the men through his pirate glass. “Looks like a bunch of ants scurryin’ about down there.” He studied the activity for a moment longer, then put away his glass and shook his head. “They’re comin’ after me on foot. They done lost what little sense they had left. They’re comin’ right at me, in my country, on foot. Lord have mercy!”
With a smile that would have caused a savage alarm, Preacher picked up his rifle and moved out. Now he’d show them how this game was really played. “Ants to a honey trap,” Preacher muttered.
Tom Evans was the first to discover how far out of his class he was. Something smashed against the back of his head, dropping him into darkness. When he came slowly swimming out of unconsciousness, he thought for sure he was dead. He might as well have been. Preacher, and he was certain it was Preacher who’d hit him with something, had taken his shot bag and his powder. He’d busted Tom’s rifle and pistols and snapped the blade off his fine knife. He had peeled him right down to the buff, and had even taken his boots. “Halp! Tom hollered.” Somebody come halp me.”
About a half a mile away, Homer Moore was waking up. He had a fearsome headache and a big lump on the side of his head that hurt like the devil when he gingerly fingered it. And he didn’t have a stitch on. He looked wildly around him. His weapons were gone, as were his clothes. He was as defenseless as the day he’d been born. “Oh, Lord!” Homer said.
Cliff Wright heard a noise behind him and turned. He caught a rifle butt under his chin that knocked him cold. When he came around, he was hanging upside down from a tree limb by his bare ankles. Like the others, he had been left bare-butt nekked and could see where his weapons had been rendered useless by somebody. Preacher, he was sure. Cliff started hollering for help. He didn’t know how he was gonna live this down. Come to think of it, he didn’t know how he was going to get down. “Halp! Halp!” he yelled.
Tatman came charging through the brush and Preacher busted the man’s right knee with the butt of Homer’s rifle. He smashed the knee to pieces and Tatman was out of the game for a long time. The big man passed out from the pain. When he awakened, his weapons were gone. He began crawling for safety, moaning and cussing and dragging his knee-broken leg.
Derby Peel turned around about three times and got himself lost as a goose in the dense forest and underbrush. He panicked and began running and yelling. He fell into a ravine, landed on his rifle, busted the st
ock of his rifle and broke several of his own ribs in the process. He passed out from the pain in his side and chest.
The men were so widely separated, and the country so rough and heavily timbered and thick with brush, the cries of the totally embarrassed men could not be heard. It was only by accident that Derby Peel was found, lifted out of the ravine, and toted off to the missionary’s hospital.
“The ignorant fool fell into the ravine and landed on his rifle,” Lige remarked. “How damn clumsy can you get?” He turned around just as Preacher hurled a fist-sized rock that caught the big man in the center of his forehead and knocked him sprawling to the ground.
Jeremy King, one of Lige’s bunch, whirled around, lifting his rifle. Preacher blew a hole in his chest and Jeremy landed on his back, dead eyes open and staring at nothing.
The woods erupted in wild gunfire, but Preacher had dropped to the ground an instant after he fired and the balls hit nothing except air, leaves, branches, and thudded harmlessly into the timber.
Tom Evans and Homer Moore, who had been wandering about trying to find their clothes, chose that time to blunder into the clearing ... bare butt shining.
“My God!” Fred Lasalle blurted. “Them boys ain’t got no clothes on.”
“I always did wonder ’bout them two,” Bob Jones said.
“What’s all the shootin’ about?” Tom asked.
“Git down, you fools!” Stan Law hollered. “It’s Preacher up yonder.”
“Don’t get over here next to me,” Bob warned.
Their worries were needless, for Preacher was a good quarter of a mile away, running through the timber. He spotted movement ahead and stopped, bellying down on the ground. He smiled when he recognized Van Eaton as one of the men.
Van Eaton moved just as Preacher squeezed off a shot. The ball slammed into a tree and Van Eaton got a face full of splinters that bloodied him and scared him. He dropped to the ground, sure that he’d been mortally wounded.
Preacher quickly reloaded and wriggled into a better spot. Sam Provost raised his head up and took the last look of his life. Preacher shot him between the eyes.
That was enough for Van Eaton. Leaving Sam’s body behind, he and the other man with him, Horace Haywood, ran from the area. They’d gone about two thousand yards when they came up on Cliff Wright, dangling butt bare and all from a tree limb. One side of his face was bloody and scratched something awful. The men stood and stared in disbelief for a moment.
“Y’all want to stop that bug-eyed gawkin’ and cut me down and find me something to wear!” Cliff hollered.
While Horace was cutting him down, Van Eaton asked, “What happened to your face? Did Preacher do that?”
“No!” Cliff snapped the word. “A big bear did. He come by about an hour ago and reared up two-three times a-sniffin’ at me. Like to have scared me half outta my wits, let me tell you. Then he rared up on his back legs, reached up and slapped the pee outta me and just wandered off. I hate these mountains, Van Eaton. I mean, I really, really hate these mountains. I hate these mountains nearly ’bout as much as I hate that mountain man. And I do hate Preacher.”
“All your guns is ruint,” Horace told him. “And I can’t find your clothes nowhere.” He took off his jacket and handed it to Cliff. “Wrap that around you.”
Van Eaton held up a hand. “Wait. Let’s go back and peel the clothes offen Sam. He shore ain’t got no more need for them. And his boots’ll fit you too, Cliff.”
“Suits me. I’ll get his guns, too.”
But Preacher had smashed Sam’s guns, leaving them useless, and taken his powder and shot.
“Crap!” Van Eaton said, as Cliff removed the dead man’s clothing. “Now I see what he’s doing. If this keeps up we’ll be throwin’ rocks at him.”
Lige and his dwindling bunch came cussing through the timber, dragging a moaning Derby Peel on a hastily made travois. Lige’s head was bloody and there was a huge knot in the center of his forehead.
“What happened to you?” Van Eaton asked.
“Preacher,” Lige said, a surly note to his voice. “He flung a rock at me.”
Van Eaton sighed and muttered, “Now he’s throwin’ rocks at us. Good Lord Amighty.” He pointed to Peel. “All right, all right. What about him?”
“He either fell into a ravine or Preacher throwed him into it. He’s stove up pretty bad. Busted some ribs, I reckon,” Homer said, red-faced. He was wearing Jeremy’s jacket which wasn’t quite long enough to cover his essentials, and Tom was wearing the dead man’s pants.
“Where’s your guns?”
“Busted up. Gone. I don’t know. Preacher took all our powder and shot, too.”
“Halp!” The shout came faintly to them. “Somebody come halp me. Over here.”
“That’s Tatman.”
Van Eaton rubbed a hand over his unshaven face. “I hope to hell he’s wearin’ his britches. I done seen enough men’s bare butts this day to last me a lifetime!”
7
The missionaries were amazed and somewhat amused that one man could inflict so much damage on so many. And to a person, they all realized something else about this legendary mountain man called Preacher. He could have easily killed all these men who now were straining their meager medical facilities and knowledge. But despite his tough talk and dire threats, he had elected to injure most and not kill.
If the missionaries were secretly amused, the man-hunters certainly were not. The nobility were livid with rage, and Bones and Van Eaton and Lige were so mad they could scarcely speak.
No plan they had conceived thus far had worked, and Preacher had made fools of them—again—toying with them as if they were little children.
“This is mighty fine venison you cooked up, ma’am,” Tom Evans said to Patience. “One of your men shot this today, did he?”
“You might say that,” she replied.
“Huh?” Tom said.
“Preacher brought it in about an hour before you gentlemen arrived,” Prudence told him.
Tom’s face turned beet-red and he almost choked on his food. He suddenly lost his appetite.
Duke Burton Sullivan was tempted to hurl his plate into the fire, but thought better of it. That would be very bad manners on his part. Prince Juan Zapata muttered some curses in his native tongue and laid his plate to one side. Derby Peel shook his bruised head and wished he had never left home. Tatman, his knee set and immobilized, was the first to admit—to himself—that the whole bunch of them were outclassed. None of the newly wounded men had any idea that Preacher was less than a hundred yards away, watching the scene through very amused eyes. After a time, Preacher picked up his rifle and slipped away. Bones and his men would not be expecting an attack on their main camp this soon after their fiasco in the mountains. Preacher thought he’d just go stir things up a bit.
Back at their own camp, Bones and Van Eaton sat to one side and looked over what was left of their group. It sure was a pitiful sight. Beat-up, bloodied, bruised, and embarrassed, the men were silent and sullen this late afternoon. But incredibly, almost to a man, there was no thought of giving up.
Joe Moss, one of Lige’s group, got up from the ground to pour a cup of coffee. On his way to the fire, he paused to speak to Alan James, a man from his home state. Joe turned and Preacher’s rifle boomed from the dusk and the shadows, the ball shattering Joe’s left knee and knocking him screaming and thrashing about on the ground. Alan leaped for his rifle and brought it to bear. But there was no target. Only the darkness presented itself.
“Oh, Sweet Baby Jesus!” Moss hollered, jerking in pain. “I’m ruint for life.”
Before the echo of the shot had faded, every man in camp had bellied down on the ground. Every man except Alan. He stood crouched, rifle at the ready. Preacher’s rifle boomed again, and Alan was spun around like a top, the big ball breaking his hip bone. He fell across Joe’s shattered knee and Joe screamed and dropped into unconsciousness. All over the camp, men were cussing and casting about
dire threats. But nobody got up to carry any of them out.
Preacher slipped across the valley and headed for his own camp. Somebody would be transporting the newly wounded over to the missionaries, and true to his word, Preacher would not ambush anyone doing that. He knew the man-hunters would not honor that if he was the one wounded, but that was their rock to mentally tote around. Preacher’s conscience was clear and he planned on sleeping well that night.
* * *
The next morning, Sir Elmore, Baron Zaunbelcher, Willy Steinwinder, Bones, Van Eaton, and Lige rode over to the camp to see about their friends. They almost went into apoplexy when they saw Preacher, lounging comfortably and drinking coffee.
“Howdy, boys!” the mountain man called cheerfully. “Did y’all get a good night’s sleep?”
“Just remember, this is a neutral zone,” Frank Collins reminded the men.
“We’ll honor it,” Bones said. He looked at Preacher. “You got more than your share of nerve, Mountain Man.”
“I reckon.” He pointed to the several bouquets of wild flowers that now brightened the camp. “But I wanted to show the ladies how much I ’preciated them bein’ here. So I picked them a bunch of flowers. Purty, ain’t they?”
Willy Steinwinder’s face became ugly and mottled with rage. When he got his anger under control, he said, “You ... picked those flowers?”
“Well, they shore didn’t leap out of the ground and into my hand. I think y’all ain’t bein’ very gentlemanly ’bout this here situation.”
“What do you mean, sir?” Baron Zaunbelcher demanded.
“Y’all didn’t bring nothin’ for the ladies, did you?”
Steinwinder turned his back to Preacher and looked up at the blue of the sky. He muttered darkly under his breath.
Preacher wouldn’t let up. With a straight face, he said, “Here I am, havin’ to hunt game so’s the very men who was doin’ their dead level best tryin’ to kill me will have somethin’ to eat. Now, that don’t seem real fair to me. Seems like y’all would see fit to contribute somethin’.”
Forty Guns West Page 18
