A Texas Hill Country Christmas

by William W. Johnstone

  “I know that was Tully Moran, a wanted outlaw,” the stranger said in a deep, powerful voice, “but I don’t know who you two young gentlemen are. I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t move too quickly until I’m sure what the situation is here.”

  “Mister,” Chance said through teeth gritted against the pain of his wound, “I’m not gonna be going anywhere very fast with a bullet hole in my leg.”

  “We were prisoners of that fella and the gang he is with,” Ace explained. “There are a couple more inside the cave.”

  “More prisoners or more outlaws?” the stranger asked.

  “Both,” Ace said. “They had a friend of ours and a young woman, and there are two owlhoots we knocked out while we were trying to get away.”

  “We’d better check on that, then, before those outlaws regain consciousness.” The dark stranger finally lowered his rifle. “I can trust you, I take it?”

  “Mister, we’re so grateful to you right now you don’t have a thing to worry about,” Ace assured him. “Who are you, and how’d you happen to show up just now?”

  “I’ve been doing a little outlaw-hunting of my own,” the man said as he started past Ace and Chance. “And as for who I am—the name’s Luke Jensen.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  As Seth looked through the rain-shrouded hills at the looming bulk of Enchanted Rock, he thought how primitive this land appeared in these conditions, like a prehistoric wilderness filled with savage dangers.

  And that was right, he told himself. Because somewhere out there, waiting to kill him, was Oliver Hudson.

  The trail was awash with water. Every little gully was full and running swiftly, and sheets of water lay over the fields and the road. Mud sucked at the hooves of Felix Dugan’s horse. The rain continued to fall, pounding against Seth like millions of tiny fists.

  Whatever happened to him today, he deserved it, he told himself. But Charlie and Delta didn’t. Charlie’s life and Delta’s happiness were at risk because of him, and knowing that gnawed at his guts like a hungry buzzard.

  Four men on horseback suddenly appeared in the sodden gloom up ahead, urging their mounts out of a stand of bare-limbed trees next to the road. Seth would have spotted them before now if it hadn’t been raining so hard, but he couldn’t miss them as they blocked his path. His hands wanted to reach for the guns under his slicker, but he reined in the impulse. He couldn’t just start shooting without knowing what he faced.

  He didn’t stop until he was close enough to see their faces under their hat brims. The rugged, unshaven features were familiar. None of them belonged to Oliver Hudson, however.

  One of the men urged his horse forward a step and called out over the rain, “Hold it right there, Sam! Keep your hands where we can see ’em.”

  “Don’t worry, Cameron,” Seth told the outlaw. “I don’t plan to start the ball. And the name’s Seth Barrett now.”

  That brought a short laugh from the man, who went on, “You’re Sam Brant and you always will be. Callin’ yourself something else don’t change a blasted thing.”

  Unfortunately, Cameron was probably right about that, thought Seth. His dreams of a new life were over, shattered by the inevitability of the past.

  “Where’s the boy?” Seth asked harshly.

  “The boss has him. The kid’s all right. He ain’t been hurt. All you got to do to save him is turn over the loot you stole from us.”

  A bleak smile touched Seth’s face as he said, “I guess I forgot there was supposed to be honor among thieves.”

  “I reckon you did,” Cameron said. “Now shuck your irons and let’s go. We’ll take you to the boss.”

  Slowly, Seth shook his head.

  “I’m not giving up my guns.”

  The four outlaws stiffened. Seth could tell that they were getting ready to draw on him.

  “I wouldn’t,” he snapped.

  “Four of us and one of you,” Cameron said. “I know you’re good with a gun, Sam, but you can’t take all four of us and you know it.”

  “And if you kill me, Hudson will never get his hands on that money. I know that, too.”

  The argument went home. Cameron scowled in frustration.

  “Hudson said we was to take your guns. He don’t take it kindly when folks don’t do what he tells ’em.”

  “He’ll like it even less if all this turns out to be for nothing, won’t he?” Seth said. “That’s what will happen if you force me to fight.”

  Cameron turned his head and exchanged glances with the other men. Then he looked at Seth again and said, “All right. Keep your irons.” He drew a Winchester from the saddle sheath on his horse and worked the lever. “But if you try anything I’ll kill you anyway, and devil take the hindmost.”

  Seth shrugged and walked his horse forward. The outlaws parted and let him through, then fell in around him.

  “Lead the way,” he told Cameron. “I want to get this over with as much as you boys do.”

  Under different circumstances, Ace would have been shocked that the man who had just saved him and Chance had the same last name, but right now there was no time for that.

  Instead he helped Chance to his feet as Luke Jensen strode toward the cave mouth.

  “Can you walk?” Ace asked his brother.

  “Yeah, it’ll hurt like blazes, but I can get around. We’d better try to catch up. If Will’s gotten his hands on a gun, he’s liable to get nervous in there.”

  That was a good point, thought Ace. He didn’t want Porter to take Luke for one of the outlaws and try to shoot him.

  Besides, as grim and hard-bitten as Luke Jensen looked, if Porter took a shot at him, it would probably be the young writer who got ventilated.

  Ace looped an arm around Chance’s waist. They went after Luke, Chance hobbling considerably as they did so. Ace called, “Wait a minute, Mr. Jensen.”

  Luke paused and looked back over his shoulder.

  “I thought you said there are two more outlaws in there.”

  “There are,” Ace said. “But it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to spook our friend Will.”

  Luke leaned his head toward the cave and said, “Better let him know to hold his fire, then.”

  Ace nodded and called, “Will! Hey, Will, don’t shoot! We’re all friends coming in.”

  Luke grunted, and as the three of them started forward again he said, “I don’t recall telling you boys we were friends. All I know about you is that I don’t recognize your faces from any reward dodgers I’ve seen.”

  “That’s because we’re not wanted anywhere,” Ace said.

  “That we know of,” Chance added. He grimaced with each step he took.

  “What are your names?”

  “I’m Ace, and this is my brother Chance.” Ace paused, then added, “Our last name is Jensen.”

  Luke stopped and looked over at the brothers as he raised one eyebrow skeptically.

  “Really?”

  “Yes, sir,” Ace said. “It’s not that uncommon a name.”

  “We even met the famous Smoke Jensen a while back,” Chance put in.

  Luke stared at them for a moment longer, then abruptly he laughed.

  “All right, whatever you say, boys,” he told them. “Let’s go see about those other two owlhoots.”

  As they walked into the cave, Ace saw that Deke and Shaw had regained consciousness, but Porter and Evelyn stood about fifteen feet from them, shakily pointing guns at them.

  “Chance, you’re wounded!” Porter exclaimed.

  “I’ll be all right,” Chance told him.

  Luke looked at the two outlaws and said, “Deke Connolly and Nate Shaw. You two aren’t worth much, but it all adds up, I suppose.”

  Shaw curled his lip and said, “You talk like a stinkin’ bounty hunter, mister.”

  “Keep a civil tongue in your head or I’ll kick your teeth down your throat,” Luke said. “Ace . . .” He rolled his eyes, no doubt an indication of what he thought about the na
mes the Jensen boys went by. “Help your brother sit down so the young lady can tend to his wound. Then you and Mister . . . ?”

  “Porter, sir. William Sydney Porter.”

  “You and Porter can tie up these two while I cover them. And if they try anything, you’d better get out of the way in a hurry, because there will be gunfire. While you’re doing that, you can tell me what’s going on here.”

  The next few minutes were busy ones. Evelyn used a knife she found to cut away the trouser leg around Chance’s wound while Ace and Porter tied up the two outlaws. Luke Jensen stood there, still dripping water from his poncho and hat and kept an eye on everybody.

  When Evelyn had cleaned away as much of the mud as she could from the deep bullet graze in Chance’s thigh, Luke reached under his poncho with his left hand and brought out a small silver flask. He tossed it to Evelyn and said, “Pour some of that on the wound, then bind it up. And that’s the best bourbon money can buy, young man, so I hope you appreciate the sacrifice.”

  “Oh, I reckon I—Ouch!” Chance said as the fiery liquor bit into his flesh.

  The heat from the fire was starting to dry all of them a little by the time Deke and Shaw were trussed up securely and Chance’s leg was bandaged with strips of cloth discreetly sliced from Evelyn’s rather bedraggled petticoat. That was the cleanest dressing they were going to find around here.

  “Now I suppose I should get my horse and round up some of the mounts you stampeded out of here,” Luke said. “Then we can all get started for Fredericksburg. That’s the nearest town, isn’t it?”

  “That’s right,” Ace said.

  Evelyn gnawed her bottom lip for a second, then said, “We can’t leave.”

  Luke looked at her and said, “Oh? Why not?”

  “Because I heard them talking . . .” She looked at Ace, Chance, and Porter. “Before the three of you were captured, I mean. When I was a prisoner here by myself. I heard Oliver giving orders and . . . and boasting about what they were going to do.”

  “You mean Oliver Hudson?” Luke asked.

  Evelyn nodded and said, “That’s right. He’s the leader of this gang of outlaws.”

  “He is now,” Luke said. “He didn’t used to be.”

  “I know. That’s part of what I heard.” Evelyn took a deep breath. “He told the others they were going to kidnap a small boy, and that once they did that, someone named Sam would do anything they told him. I think Oliver means to kill this man Sam, whoever he is.”

  “I wouldn’t doubt it a bit,” Luke said. “And you’re right, miss. Under the circumstances, we can’t leave. Not with a boy’s life at stake.”

  Ace frowned and said, “Mr. Jensen, you seem to have a pretty good idea who all these people are and what’s going on here.”

  “That’s right. I’ve been on Sam Brant’s trail for quite a while.” Luke lifted the Winchester in his hands. “And I don’t reckon I’m leaving the Hill Country without him.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  A short time later, Ace crouched behind a large rock on top of the bluff next to Luke Jensen. They couldn’t see much as they peered out over the rain-swept landscape, but Ace thought they would be able to spot any riders approaching the cave.

  Chance, Porter, and Evelyn were with the horses, back in the trees behind Ace and Luke. The two prisoners were with them, too, gagged now as well as tied securely, so they couldn’t call out a warning to their fellow owlhoots. Ace and Luke had carried the two dead men up here as well, so when Hudson and the rest of the gang got back to the cave, they would find the hideout apparently deserted.

  As long as Hudson was holding the little boy hostage, they wouldn’t be able to make a move against the gang. Luke had explained that they would try to come up with some way to get the boy away from his captors, but they couldn’t figure out how to do that until the outlaws got back.

  As they waited tensely, Luke surprised Ace by saying, “So you and your brother have met the famous gunfighter Smoke Jensen, eh?”

  “That’s right. Sure surprised me when we did, too. I’d read about him in dime novels, but I never expected to run into him in real life. As it turns out, he’s a fine hombre, too. He gave us a hand in a little scrape we got into up in Wyoming. It was a real pleasure meeting him.”

  Luke chuckled and said, “I’ll have to tell him that next time I see him.”

  “You know him, too?” Ace asked as he looked over at the older man.

  “You could say that. He’s my little brother.”

  Ace’s eyes widened.

  “Really? And now we’ve run into you. What are the odds of that?”

  Luke said, “For all the wide-open spaces, the frontier’s not as big as you might think it is, especially for fellas who, let’s say, have a habit of running into trouble. You and your brother do your share of that?”

  “More than our share, I’d say,” Ace replied. “We’re not looking for it, but it seems to find us wherever we go.”

  Luke nodded solemnly and said, “Believe me, I know the feeling.” He lifted his head. “Listen. I think I hear horses out there somewhere.”

  “Yeah,” Ace said a moment later. “I do, too. They sound like they’re coming closer.”

  Luke’s eyes narrowed in thought as he said, “The gang kept guards up here all the time?”

  “As far as I know. They only grabbed us earlier today.”

  “Then they’ll probably expect some sort of all-clear signal,” Luke said, nodding.

  “Aren’t they liable to catch on that something’s wrong if you don’t give them the right signal? Or see that you’re not who you’re supposed to be?”

  “I’m counting on the weather to take care of both of those things. In this downpour, they won’t be able to see all that well.”

  Ace supposed that made sense. He leaned forward a little, hands tightening on the Winchester he held, as they waited for the riders to come into sight.

  That didn’t take long. The men and horses blended together into large, almost formless masses as they approached the cave. They slowed and Luke breathed, “They’re waiting for the signal.”

  He stood up, held his rifle above his head, and swung it back and forth. The riders down below wouldn’t be able to make out any more details about him than he could about them, but they ought to be able to see that movement, thought Ace.

  The men on horseback started forward again and disappeared into the cave, so they must have been satisfied with the signal.

  “Now what?” Ace asked. “They’ll see that the place is empty and know something happened.”

  “And since he got the all-clear, the first thing Hudson will do is send somebody up here to find out what’s going on. He’ll be confused, but at this point he shouldn’t think he’s in any danger.”

  Ace hoped the older man was right. From the few things Luke had mentioned about his past while they were waiting up here, Ace knew he’d been a manhunter for a long time. By now Luke ought to know how an outlaw would think and react.

  “Let’s head for the trail,” Luke suggested.

  They hadn’t gotten there when two men appeared, trudging up from below. Luke and Ace kept their heads down as the outlaws approached. One of the men called through the rain, “Hey, who’s that? Deke? Tully? The boss wants to know what in blazes is goin’ on. The prisoners are gone!”

  Luke muttered something in return, but the men couldn’t make it out over the downpour. They came closer, and the second man said, “What was that?”

  Luke made his move then, leaping forward and sweeping his rifle up to smash the butt against the jaw of an outlaw. Ace tried the same thing, but the man who was his target reacted with quick instincts and twisted out of the way. He yelled and tried to bring up the rifle he was carrying.

  Before he could do that, Luke rammed his rifle barrel into the man’s midsection. It was a continuation of the same move that had laid out the first man, and as the second one doubled over in pain, Luke’s knee came up and cracked
against his jaw. He went down, too, out cold just like his companion.

  “Sorry,” Ace said.

  “That’s all right, kid. You’re still learning. Just remember, there aren’t many second chances in this business.”

  Ace didn’t intend to go into the bounty hunting business, but he didn’t figure there was any reason to point that out to Luke right now.

  They dragged the two senseless men into the trees where Chance, Porter, and Evelyn were waiting. In a matter of minutes the two outlaws were tied and gagged like Deke and Shaw.

  “Don’t recognize these two right offhand,” Luke said, “but when I have the time to go through my wanted posters I’ll probably find them. This could add up nicely.”

  “What about the boy?” Evelyn asked.

  Luke shook his head and said, “I couldn’t tell if they had him or not. I believe there were about a dozen riders. How many are in the bunch?”

  They had to look to Evelyn for that answer, since she was the only one who had seen the whole gang. She said, “I think there were a few more than that, but I’m not sure exactly how many. But I believe Oliver planned to send some of his men to carry a message to this Sam Brant.”

  “So Hudson’s waiting for them to show up with Brant.” Luke rubbed his chin and frowned. “He’s got to be torn right now. He wants Brant, but he’s bound to be upset about your disappearance, too, Miss Channing. Maybe he’ll split his forces again and send some of his men to look for you. Come on, Ace. Let’s get back to where we can keep an eye on the trail in case any of the others start up here.”

  They hurried back to the rocks where they had been hidden earlier. As Ace crouched there, he looked across the open area in front of the cave at the little creek running along the far side. Actually, it wasn’t a little creek anymore, he thought. It was a raging torrent running bank-full. He could hear its rumbling even over the storm. And as long as the rain continued to fall, it wasn’t going to go down anytime soon.

  Ace was watching the swollen creek, so he wasn’t aware that something else was happening until Luke said, “Riders coming.”

  Ace swung his attention to the figures on horseback approaching the cave. He counted five of them.