Till Death (A Herne the Hunter western. Book 15)

by John J. McLaglen

  ‘It’s okay, Charlie.’

  Herne straightened up, releasing the hammer of his Colt and moving the pistol back towards the greased holster.

  As he did so, the preacher turned to face, him, turned and stopped, stopped and stared. Even from the opposite side of the street, Herne could read the intensity in the man’s eyes, small and dark and like beads of jet in his face. The mouth was small and the lips almost not there, little color showed on his cheeks. He kept his eyes on Herne and reached into his right-hand pocket. Herne stayed the Colt on its way to the holster. The preacher drew a small black leather-bound book from his pocket and held it out towards Herne as if it were a talisman.

  Herne snorted and dropped his Colt into place, swinging on his heel and reaching for the reins of his horse from one of the others.

  ‘Let’s get them things,’ he said curtly.

  Herne put the preacher and his bible from his mind and concentrated on the task at hand. They bought the things they needed, delaying only while Charlie Bowdre deliberated over buying a new pipe, and prepared to head back out of town.

  ‘Ain’t we goin’ to get us a beer afore we go?’ asked one of the men.

  Herne and Bowdre exchanged doubtful glances.

  ‘Don’t rightly know,’ said Charlie hesitantly, ‘only it seems—’

  ‘Seems what? Hell, I’m only talkin’ ’bout gettin’ a beer. One miserable little glass of beer.’

  ‘Well—’

  ‘Maybe we better not push our luck,’ put in Herne.

  ‘Aw, Jed ...’

  Herne shrugged. ‘Have it your own way. You want a drink, the two of you, you take it. Me an’ Charlie here, I think we’ll ride on out. We take it slow, you can catch us up inside an hour.’

  Now it was the turn of the other two to exchange doubtful looks.

  ‘Hell, I thought all of us—’

  Herne shook his head. ‘You thought wrong.’

  The man sighed. ‘Okay. Have it your way. We’ll get us a beer some other time.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Bowdre pushed open the door and went out on to the boardwalk. It was hotter and noisier and the air was almost still. Sweat immediately began to run down his neck and from between his arms.

  ‘Jesus,’ exclaimed the man behind him. ‘We’re goin’ to burn up.’

  ‘Damned right/ echoed his friend. ‘Glass of beer would’ve come just about right.’

  Herne wasn’t saying anything. He hadn’t even noticed the extra heat. He was looking beyond Charlie Bowdre and the others to where the preacher was standing beside a flat-bedded wagon some few yards into the street. He was standing there and staring up at Herne as if he’d been waiting for him to emerge from the store. A look of more than recognition passed between them. And then Herne’s eyes moved on to the seat of the wagon and they saw Louise.

  He didn’t know then that was her name.

  He didn’t know anything about her except that she was pretty enough to make him forget the preacher’s stare. Herne saw nothing for those moments save the slim beauty of her face, the natural color of her cheeks set against the milkiness of her skin, the generous width of her mouth, the least tremor of her lower lip.

  Her hair was dark, almost black, and curled loosely about her face. She wore a simple gingham dress, blue and white, gathered at the waist. She realized that Herne was looking at her and for several seconds she looked back at him and there was a directness, a candor, about her that struck Herne as different.

  But the woman sitting alongside her frowned and bent towards her and said something that Herne could not hear and the girl fussed with her hands and turned her head away.

  Herne knew that she was young but not how young.

  ‘Jed.’

  He turned at the sound of Charlie’s voice.

  ‘You changed your mind ’bout a beer, or what?’

  Herne shook his head. ‘No, Charlie, I ain’t changed my mind.’

  Charlie Bowdre shook his head, uncertain, and mounted up. Herne tied the sack of supplies he’d bought to the pommel of his saddle and did the same. The preacher helped first his wife and then his daughter down from the wagon and started off towards the store. Herne had pulled his horse round and was moving out into the wide street. Bowdre’s shadow fell across him, like a cloud across his eye. The other pair were already heading down the street, heads turned now to see what was holding Herne and Bowdre back.

  None of them saw the shotgun poke over the lower sill of the upstairs window opposite, show itself then quickly angle down.

  No one knew of its existence other than the man whose hands held it, slightly nervously, in place and squinted along the length of the barrels.

  Other than his colleague who was standing well back down the alley fifteen yards along the street. A third man who was positioned back towards the livery stable, his pistol already gripped in his hand. A fourth watching from the window of the barber shop, head and shoulders showing over the curtain that was draped across, weapon hidden.

  The blast of the shotgun tore the morning apart.

  One of the men who’d ridden in with Herne was hurled forward on to the neck of his horse, legs kicking up behind him and arms flung out. The back of his shirt was little more than thin shreds of blue that were already disappearing into a morass of flayed flesh and streaming blood. The animal bucked and twisted beneath him and threw him, face down, to the dusty street.

  The second man had been facing, unknowingly, the direction from which the shotgun blast was to come. A rash of shot whipped through his face, making him instantly beyond recognition. In places he was cleaned to the bone. Pieces of tissue as large as silver dollars were hurled through the air. Grey matter from his brain skidded over the uneven boards of the sidewalk and stopped against the preacher’s right shoe.

  The girl screamed and threw herself inside the protection of her mother’s arms. ‘Jesus damn it!’

  Charlie Bowdre flung himself from his saddle, hitting the dirt hard and rolling painfully over to his right, his fingers fumbling for his gun. A pistol shot skipped earth up into his face and momentarily blinded him.

  Herne swung his mount about, guiding it with knees and boots, hand clawing for his Colt and arcing it clear and up. He saw the ends of the shotgun’s barrels being pulled hastily out of sight and sent a quick shot tearing through the inch of wood at the bottom of the window frame.

  A woman’s voice was screaming, high-pitched and loud, and it was impossible to tell if it were the mother or the daughter.

  Another rifle shot came from the corner of alley and street and this one splintered away an end-strut from the back of the preacher’s wagon. Boots slapped the street dirt hard and fast and the man from the opposite end of town headed towards the still sprawling figure of Charlie Bowdre.

  Herne saw him coming, called a warning to Charlie, and went back to his own affairs. He shot through the open window as the shotgun began to push back out and was disappointed not to hear a man shout in pain. But the weapon was withdrawn.

  Charlie wriggled through forty-five degrees and rested his right arm on the elbow and fired twice. The first slug whined away harmlessly, the second shattered the running man’s left shinbone and drove him through a half-circle. The leg kicked up behind him and the man collapsed, lopsidedly. Charlie set the fingers of his left hand about his right wrist to steady his aim and sent a bullet into the man’s side. The body jerked a couple of feet as if a mule had kicked into it and then seemed to be still.

  On the sidewalk the preacher had pulled his womenfolk into the store for safety and now stood in the doorway, his bible thrust outwards towards the street.

  Herne ran to the side of the flat-bed wagon and ducked down against one of the wheels. Seconds later a pistol bullet drove into one of the spokes and ricocheted away, sending splinters against Herne’s back and his left shoulder. He fired once at the alley corner, once at the upstairs window and jumped up on to the wagon, rolling fast across it and knocking parcels and p
ackages asunder. He came down on the other side, landing on his knees, right arm resting on the edge of the wagon and his head ducked down behind it, taking aim.

  The shot gun appeared at the window and Herne hesitated, waited, saw a few inches of the man’s head, neck, shoulders: Herne fired.

  The double barrels angled steeply up into the air and the head was blasted back and away. This time there was a scream of agony but Herne was moving too fast to hear it.

  Charlie’s shout had spun him about and flat on to the dirt of the street. Charlie fired over Herne’s head, once only, enough to send the man with the rifle sliding back from sight.

  ‘Jed?’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘He the only one?’

  Herne got to one knee and glanced up at the window. No one else had taken the bushwhacker’s place.

  ‘Guess so.’

  ‘Let’s get the bastard.’

  Herne slid fresh cartridges down into the chambers of the Colt and looked over his shoulder. His gaze was held by the spectacle of the preacher in the store doorway, his wife and daughter looking, despite themselves, through the glass.

  ‘Okay, Charlie.’

  Herne stood up and moved to the wall. Up and down the street anxious and interested faces peered from what cover they could find. The bodies of the three dead men lay like bloodied islands adrift in the wide stretch of packed dirt and mud.

  In the hushed air of anticipation that followed his slow progress towards the head of the alley, Herne heard the clear sounds of a horse and rider moving away fast.

  He stopped and turned his head. ‘Hear that?’

  ‘Yeah. Best be sure though.’

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  Herne was level with the barber’s shop when some instinct made him swing his head. He saw the shape of the man - only a spectator like so many others - yet there was something about the stance that warned him. That moment the glass at the front of the barber shop exploded outwards and Herne crouched against the planking of the wall and fired. Once the fragments of glass still flying through the air like a flock of startled, translucent birds – twice – the glass settling, the man pitching forward through the shop front and staggering over the boardwalk.

  Both Herne and Charlie waited, weapons at the ready.

  The man pitched on to the hitching rail between two horses which shifted uneasily away and allowed him to fold his body round the rail. For several seconds he swung there, hung there, then somersaulted over and landed with his arms almost straight back past his head, one leg stretched wide to the side and the other buckled beneath him.

  ‘Check the alley, Charlie,’ said Herne and walked to where the man lay.

  He recognized him as being one of the Dolan followers who’d been involved in the shoot-out at McSween’s. He didn’t think he knew any of the others.

  ‘Clear, Jed. He’s skipped out.’

  Herne holstered his Colt while Charlie went to retrieve their horses. The black-hatted preacher had come to the edge of the boardwalk and stood with his bible pressed against his black heart, right hand outstretched towards the dead and words of prayer loud from his lips.

  The girl, face whiter now inside its frame of black hair, stood in the shop doorway and stared down at the splattering of red and grey that spread over the boards.

  Chapter Five

  Herne didn’t think a lot more about the girl the rest of that summer. There were too many other things demanding his attention. The attempted ambush in Lincoln sparked off a series of irregular outbursts between the two factions which resulted in a good many wounded and not a few dead. Those who’d reckoned the Lincoln County War to be over seemed to have been misinformed.

  But gradually, as the fierceness of the New Mexico summer began to temper down, things eased off. Incidents were no more than isolated sparks. The big ranchers and the beef contractors were coming to terms: there was too much money to be made, too much profit being lost, too many government contracts that had to be filled.

  Herne and Charlie Bowdre rode out one morning early in the fall and headed down towards the Hondo river. They part had in mind doing a little hunting, but more than anything staying cooped up with the Kid was getting to them so’s they needed to feel a lot of space around them. Space and air. They let their mounts have their heads, galloping freely across the scrub between sage and saltbush, the rhythm of the animals’ bodies driving up through their own, the wind racing.

  Finally the two men slowed and steered the horses along the rise of a slope of land topped with half a dozen black oaks, their evergreen leaves spreading wide from smooth pale bark.

  ‘Hell, Jed, that was somethin’.’

  Herne leaned over the neck of his mount and tried to control his breathing. ‘Sure … was. Better’n …’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Bowdre swung down from the saddle. ‘Take a spell?’

  ‘Sure.’

  Herne dismounted and both men loosened the girths under their saddles. Bowdre took down his water canteen and had a quick swallow before passing it over. Herne removed his hat and let it fall to the floor before accepting a drink. Sweat stuck both men’s clothes fast to their bodies.

  ‘You hangin’ on long?’ asked Bowdre, sitting down at the foot of one of the oaks and leaning his back against it.

  Herne looked at him. He’d wondered how much Charlie wanted to talk about leaving. It was common gossip that he had a Mexican wife called Manuela. When a bunch of them, including Billy, Bowdre and Herne, had lit out for the border after an earlier incident in the war, Charlie Bowdre had left them heading south and ridden to visit Manuela.

  Herne didn’t understand what kept him from being with her all the time. He’d even thought about asking, but had shied clear. Charlie was a pretty even-tempered man, but ragging him about his Mexican wife was a sure way to get him fighting mad.

  Not that Jed Herne thought too much about having a wife anyway, just that if you had one it made more sense to live together rather than apart.

  Herne waited for Bowdre to continue.

  ‘I was thinkin’ … don’t seem a whole lot of point in hangin’ around. We ain’t goin’ to be welcome on the payroll once they’re certain it’s cowhands they need an’ not such as you ‘n’ me.’

  Herne squatted on the ground, taking off his bandanna and wiping the sweat away from his neck ‘You’re thinkin’ right. Seems to me. We better go afore we’re pushed.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Charlie gave a short laugh and dug down into the soil with the heel of his boot. ‘Sometimes I reckon I should’ve lit out a long time back. Like that feller who faced off Billy the time Billy was drunk.’

  ‘Hart, you mean?’

  That’s him. Wes Hart. Just up and rode out an’ kept goin’. Billy didn’t like that. Sent me an’ Dan Halloran after him. Followed him right up into Indian Territory. He was workin’ as a deputy, had been when we caught up with him.’

  Herne nodded. He remembered Wes Hart: a tall, mean bastard with faded blue eyes, a mother-of-pearl grip on his Colt Peacemaker and a sawn-off 10-gauge shotgun.

  ‘Halloran never come back from that, did he?’ Herne said.

  Bowdre shook his head. ‘I was all for talkin’ Hart into ridin’ back with us an’ if he stood fast leavin’ it at that. Dan, he took it more serious. Made a play for his gun.’ Bowdre paused and looked at Herne. ‘Hart killed him.’

  “Yeah,’ said Herne softly. He was certain he would have done the same.

  ‘He helped me throw Dan over his horse and I rode off and buried him out by this creek. Came back.’

  ‘Maybe you should’ve stayed.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  Both men were silent for a while, the only sound that of the horses pulling down at the leaves of the oak.

  ‘Reckon I’ll give it another couple of days,’ said Herne finally. ‘Then drift west, see if I can pick up work.’

  ‘Arizona?’

  ‘Good as any.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Bowdre hacked out more eart
h.

  ‘How ’bout you?’

  Charlie Bowdre glanced across and shrugged his shoulders and said, ‘You know how it is with me. Me an’ Manuela.’

  He turned his head away and scratched at his left shoulder. It was the first time Herne had ever heard him mention his wife’s name of his own choice.

  ‘Charlie …’ he began.

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Oh, hell, nothin’.’ Herne straightened and stretched the muscles in his legs. ‘What say we move on?’

  ‘Okay.’

  They cut down across their earlier trail, making for the river. Before long they could see it blue against the reddish-yellow mud of its flat banks, a slow and shallow path of water travelling down from the Sacramento Mountains to the west towards the River Pecos.

  Some little way along the buildings of the town of Hondo showed dark in the yellow light.

  There was a gathering down by the river.

  Voices lifted to them.

  We’ll all gather at the river

  The beautiful, the beautiful river

  We’ll all gather at the river

  That flows by the throne of God

  There were around twenty folk down at the water’s edge, mostly women and children, a scattering of men, and with them a few dogs and horses and a couple of mules. Herne recognized the flat-bed wagon before he picked out the preacher.

  Without even wanting to, his eyes searched the small crowd for the girl, but she didn’t appear to be there. Neither did her mother. The preacher raised both hands for silence as the hymn came to an end. He took off his black coat and handed it to a woman standing close and then turned and waded out into the Hondo. He went on into the water until it lapped around his thighs. Then he held the bible aloft and began to address the congregation.