Preacher's Pursuit (The First Mountain Man) Page 2

  It made Preacher’s skin crawl to think about it. Having so many people around in St. Louis was bad enough, but he could handle it because he made the trip down the Missouri River only once or twice a year. But he visited the trading post more often than that, and whenever he did he felt cramped, like he didn’t have any elbow room, and it seemed like there were too many folks breathing the mountain air. They might use it up, he worried, although that seemed unlikely when he looked at the vast blue arch of the sky above the mountains.

  He could see the trading post and the settlement far below him as he rode through South Pass. The big, sure-footed horse he had named Horse—Preacher was nothing if not a practical man—picked its way down the trail with ease. The shaggy, wolflike cur Preacher had dubbed Dog bounded ahead.

  Preacher was leading three horses: his own packhorse, which carried his supplies and the load of pelts he had taken since his last visit to the trading post, and the two that belonged to the pair of dead bushwhackers. He had found the animals tied to a tree not far from the spot where the men had ambushed him, but there had been nothing in their belongings to tell him who they were or why they had tried to kill him.

  The would-be killers were lashed facedown over their saddles. Preacher had thought seriously about leaving their carcasses for the wolves. He had even considered burying them. But in the end, he had decided to bring them with him since he was less than a day’s ride from the trading post and the dry, cool, high country air helped keep dead varmints from rottin’ too fast.

  He wanted to see if anybody at the settlement recognized them.

  It took him almost an hour to make his way down from the pass to the broad, grassy park where the trading post was located. Folks had seen him coming. Dogs barked and kids ran out to meet him. Most of the youngsters were ’breeds, the children of trappers and their Indian mates, but some belonged to families that had come out here from St. Louis and other places in the East, looking for a place to call their own.

  A stocky, round-faced boy of eleven or twelve grinned at him and called, “Hey, Preacher! What you got there?”

  “Couple o’ skunks in human form, Jake,” Preacher answered the boy as he reined to a stop. “Ever seen either one of ’em before?”

  Some folks would’ve tried to keep the boy away and not expose him to the sight of the dead bodies, but Preacher figured anybody who was going to live in these mountains had to be tough enough to handle such things. Death was a fact of life, and it didn’t do any good to coddle young’uns and try to hide that fact from them.

  Jake wasn’t bothered by it. He’d been through hard times already despite his young age. He grasped the hair on one of the dangling heads and lifted it so he could see the man’s face. After a moment, Jake let go and the head flopped down again.

  “Nope,” Jake said. “He’s a plumb stranger to me, Preacher. Lemme look at the other one.”

  Jake studied the face of the second corpse with the same result. Other kids crowded around him while he was holding the man’s head up, and Preacher asked the same question of them, only to have all of them shake their heads in the negative. It was beginning to appear that the two bushwhackers hadn’t visited the settlement before coming after Preacher.

  He hadn’t asked any of the grown-ups yet, though, so he hitched Horse into motion again and rode toward the big log building that was the center of the community.

  Corliss and Jerome Hart’s trading post was solidly built, with thick walls that had been notched out here and there to create plenty of rifle slots. In addition, a stockade fence made of vertical logs with sharpened tops had been erected around the place, with watchtowers at the corners and a parapet that ran inside it where defenders could stand and fire. The cousins had run into enough Indian trouble on the way out here that they had built the post with fighting off attacks in mind.

  So far, the Indians in the area had left them alone. But a man who was prepared for trouble, whether it came or not, usually lived a lot longer on the frontier.

  The double gates in the stockade fence stood open right now. Preacher glanced up and saw that all of the watchtowers were manned. If the sentries saw any sign of hostiles approaching, they would sound the alarm and the gates would be closed and barred before the Indians could get there. Everyone in the settlement knew to listen, and if they heard the bell mounted on top of the trading post tolling, they knew it meant to get inside the wall as quickly as they could. All the settlers would gather there in case of trouble.

  Today, though, peace reigned in the valley, and folks strolled in and out through the gates, visiting the trading post for supplies or just some conversation, then heading back to the log cabins that dotted the grassy park. With a procession of youngsters trailing him, Preacher rode through the gates as well, and brought Horse to a stop before the trading post just as Corliss Hart stepped out onto the shaded porch.

  Corliss smiled and lifted a hand in greeting. He was a muscular man in his thirties with a friendly face and a shock of dark hair.

  “Howdy, Preacher,” he called. “Didn’t expect to see you back here quite this soon.”

  “I was lucky and already got a good load o’ plews,” Preacher drawled. He shifted Horse to the side so that Corliss could see the other two saddle mounts and their grisly burden. “Got a load o’ something else, too.”

  Corliss’s smile disappeared and his eyes widened. “Good Lord!” he said. “Who’s that?”

  “You tell me,” Preacher said. “They tried to kill me this mornin’.”

  “Well, that was a foolish mistake,” Corliss muttered as he came down the steps from the porch and moved forward to get a closer look at the bodies. Grimacing a little in distaste, he did what Jake had done: lifted the heads by the hair and studied the faces of the dead men.

  He was shaking his head when he turned away from the horses. “I’m sorry, Preacher, but I never saw them before. They look like pretty unsavory sorts, though.”

  “They ain’t any sort anymore ’cept dead.”

  Corliss looked at the youngsters crowding around and said, “You children run along. You don’t need to see this.” He added to his adopted son in particular, “Jake, go inside and give Deborah a hand.”

  “Aw, Corliss,” the boy complained. “I seen dead folks before, you know.”

  “You’ve seen too much in your life. Run along.”

  Grumbling and dragging his feet, Jake went inside. The other kids went back to whatever they had been doing. Dead bodies started to lose their novelty pretty quickly. They didn’t do anything.

  As Preacher swung down from the saddle, Corliss asked, “Is that blood on your shirt? You’re hurt, Preacher!”

  The rangy mountain man shook his head. “Naw, not to speak of. Just got a little hide scraped off where a rifle ball come too close for comfort. I already slapped a poultice on it. It’ll be fine.”

  “Deborah could take a look at it if you’d like.”

  The idea of Corliss’s pretty, dark-haired wife poking around at his bare torso made Preacher a mite uncomfortable, so he shook his head. “No, thanks. It’s all right.”

  “Suit yourself. Anyway, you probably know as much about treating bullet wounds as anybody else in this part of the country.”

  “I’ve patched up a fair number of ’em,” Preacher admitted. “On me and on other folks, too.”

  A short, slender, sandy-haired man wearing a thick canvas apron over his clothes bustled out onto the porch. “Preacher!” he said. “What’s this about dead men?”

  “They tell no tales,” Preacher said. He inclined his head toward the corpses. “Wish they would, though. I’d kinda like to know why they wanted to kill me.”

  Corliss’s cousin Jerome came down the steps. Unlike the easygoing Corliss, who sometimes seemed to be on the verge of dozing off even when he was wide awake, Jerome Hart was nervous most of the time, whether there was really anything to be nervous about or not.

  During the journey out here, there had been a riva
lry between Corliss and Jerome for Deborah’s affections, a rivalry in which Corliss had emerged victorious. For a while, it had looked as if the resulting bitterness would divide the cousins permanently. But they had made their peace and as far as Preacher knew, there had been no more problems between them.

  “I’ve never seen them before,” Corliss said, referring to the two dead bushwhackers. “Take a look, Jerome, and see if you recognize them.”

  Jerome frowned and hesitated. “I, uh, I’m sure that if you don’t know them, Corliss, then I wouldn’t—”

  “Oh, for goodness’ sake,” Corliss snapped. “They’re dead, they can’t hurt you.” He lifted the corpses’ heads one after the other.

  Jerome paled and swallowed hard as he looked at them. “I’m sorry, Preacher,” he said. “I don’t know them. I don’t think they’ve ever been here.”

  “That’s what I figured when Jake didn’t recognize ’em. That younker keeps his eyes open.”

  “Jake?” Jerome repeated. “You let Jake look at these…these cadavers?”

  Preacher nodded. “And the other kids from the settlement, too.”

  Jerome looked horrified, but he didn’t say anything. Preacher knew that the ways of the frontier were different than anything Jerome was accustomed to. Jerome was trying to get used to them, but it might take him a while.

  News of what Preacher had brought in was already spreading through the settlement. People began to show up to have a look at the bodies. Anything different, even something like this, was a welcome break from the hardships of everyday life. Deborah Hart, her gently rounded belly starting to display that she was expecting, came outside and took her turn checking to see if she recognized the bushwhackers. It came as no surprise to Preacher that she didn’t. Neither did Pete Carey, the stocky jack-of-all-trades who helped the Hart cousins run the trading post.

  “Well, Preacher,” Corliss said after a while, “you seem to have drawn a blank. What are you going to do now?”

  Preacher spat. “Only one thing to do. Reckon I’ll need to borrow a shovel.”

  “You’re going to bury them?”

  “I killed ’em. I’ll plant ’em.”

  Jerome said, “Surely we can give you a hand with that at the very least. And Reverend Porter can say a prayer for their souls…although I’m not sure they deserve it if they tried to murder you, my friend.”

  “That’s for somebody else to sort out, not me,” Preacher said. “Once they’re in the ground, I figure on sellin’ that load o’ pelts to you fellas and the two extra horses, and then I might buy me a jug o’ whiskey.”

  Corliss frowned. “But they tried to kill you, and you don’t know why! Doesn’t that bother you?”

  “I’m a mite puzzled,” Preacher admitted, “but I’ll let you in on a little secret…This ain’t the first time somebody’s tried to kill me. And I got a real strong feelin’ it won’t be the last…”

  Chapter 3

  By nightfall, the two men were buried, Reverend Thomas Porter had said the proper words over the graves, and Preacher had gotten a good meal cooked on a stove in the trading post rather than over a campfire. Now he sat in a barrel chair in a corner, his long, buckskin-clad legs stretched out in front of him as he took an occasional nip from the earthenware jug he held. Several other trappers of his acquaintance sat with him, swapping windies. Preacher was mostly silent, though, a frown on his face as he pondered what had happened.

  Despite the nonchalant answer he had given Corliss Hart, the attempt on his life did bother him. Life on the frontier was fraught with enough dangers already. Even though the two strangers had been unsuccessful in their efforts to kill him, the very fact that they had tried told Preacher that somebody else could show up out of the blue and do likewise.

  “What do you think, Preacher?” a red-bearded trapper named Bouchard asked.

  The direct question shook Preacher out of his brooding. “What do I think about what?”

  “Jock thinks there’ll be real towns out here someday.”

  “Aye,” another trapper said. “Jus’ like Glasgow or Edinburgh, wi’ factories and shops and row after row o’ houses.”

  Preacher shuddered at the thought. “Lord, I hope not. If things ever start to get like that, just take me out and shoot me ’cause I don’t wanna see it.”

  “Maybe that’s why those fellows ambushed you,” Bouchard suggested with a grin. “They were just trying to spare you from having to witness the ravages of civilization, mon ami.”

  Preacher downed a snort of hooch. “Yeah, I reckon,” he said caustically.

  The Scottish trapper, Jock, leaned forward and said, “Ye dinna kin why those scuts came after ye, Preacher?”

  Preacher shook his head. “I don’t have any idea. Maybe I had trouble with a friend o’ theirs in the past, and they were tryin’ to settle the score.”

  He didn’t have to explain what he meant. The other men knew that whenever somebody had trouble with Preacher, that somebody usually ended up dead, or at least hurt mighty bad.

  Corliss Hart came over and said, “Why don’t you stay here at the trading post tonight, Preacher?”

  A frown creased Preacher’s forehead. “Sleep with a roof over my head? I ain’t in the habit o’ doin’ that very often. Hell, it ain’t even been a year since I was last in St. Louis.”

  Jock said, “Next thing ye kin, he’ll be wantin’ ye t’ take a bath, Preacher!” The Scotsman slapped his thigh and laughed uproariously at the very idea. The other trappers joined in the laughter.

  “No, I’m serious,” Corliss said. “Surely, it would be safer staying here than camping somewhere in the area. Maybe those two men were the only ones who are after you, but you can’t be sure of that.”

  “Fella can’t be sure of much of anything in this life,” Preacher said. “He gets up in the mornin’ not knowin’ if he’ll see the sun go down that evenin’. But worryin’ about that too much will drive him plumb out of his head if he ain’t careful.”

  “Well, the offer stands, if you’re so inclined. Deborah and Jerome and I would be glad to have you as our guest.”

  Preacher took another drink from the jug and wiped the back of his other hand across his mouth. “I’m obliged, Corliss. I truly am. But I reckon I’d have a hard time goin’ to sleep without the stars up yonder lookin’ down at me.” He pulled in his legs and stood up, moving with the easy grace of a big cat. “Fact is, I’m a mite tired, so I think I’ll go on and find a place to lay my head.”

  He said his good nights and walked out of the trading post, dangling the jug from his left hand. The thumb of his right hand was hooked behind his belt, not far from the butt of one of his pistols. The weapon was in easy reach if he needed it, and it was loaded and charged again. He had taken the powder horns and shot pouches off the two men he had killed that morning. They wouldn’t be needing ’em again.

  Torches burned at the watchtowers and at intervals along the walls, casting their glow over the area outside the stockade. The gates were still open, but a couple of armed guards stood just outside them keeping watch. Preacher paused on the porch to look out at the night. Dog lay on the porch a few feet away. He raised his head and pricked his ears forward as Preacher stood there.

  The valley was peaceful. Lights burned in the windows of some of the cabins in the settlement, and silvery moon glow washed over the grass. At moments such as this, it was hard to believe so many dangers lurked in the darkness.

  But hostile Indians could be watching the settlement at this very moment. So could lawless white men, for that matter. Bandits weren’t common on the frontier, but they weren’t unheard of either. Storms could be brewing…natural or man-made. A fella never knew.

  Preacher gave a little shake of his head. It wasn’t like him to mope around like this. He had left his belongings on the porch, wrapped up in his bedroll. He picked them up now, growled, “Come on, Dog,” and stepped down from the porch. The big cur rose and padded after him.

  He h
ad already put Horse away in the paddock adjacent to the stockade after dickering with Jerome over the load of pelts and the two horses. They had come to an agreement without much trouble. Preacher knew he could have gotten more for the furs in St. Louis…but that would have meant going to St. Louis. The Harts paid him enough to take care of his simple needs.

  He planned to walk out into the trees that came right up to the edge of the settlement in places and find a good spot to spend the night. As he left the stockade, he nodded to the guards and said, “Might as well close ’em up for the night, boys. I don’t think anybody else is leavin’.”

  “All right, Preacher,” one of the men said. They knew his reputation. If he offered an opinion about anything, nine times out of ten it could be taken as the gospel. The guard went on. “I’m sort of surprised that you’re not staying inside the walls tonight.”

  “Why’s that?”

  The man shuffled his feet a little uncomfortably. “Well, I mean, since those fellas tried to kill you and all…not that I think you’d worry about that even for a second, Preacher…!”

  The mountain man chuckled. “Forget it, son. I ain’t offended. But I ain’t worried neither.”

  To tell the truth, if there was somebody else out there in the night looking to kill him, he almost hoped they’d go ahead and do their damnedest. That beat waiting around. He’d take his chances against almost anybody, especially with Dog around to warn him and pitch in if need be.

  And if somebody did come after him, maybe this time he’d be able to grab them and make them tell him what in blazes was going on. He had learned a few tricks from the Blackfoot about the best ways to make a fella talk…

  Despite the fact that Preacher was halfway hoping his enemies would come after him again, the night passed quietly and peacefully. He slept lightly, as always, resting but ready to come fully awake at an instant’s notice. His soogans protected him against the nighttime chill, which was year-round at these elevations.