Preacher's Pursuit (The First Mountain Man) Page 7

  “You know, Clyde,” Preacher drawled. “I may have misjudged you a mite.”

  “You don’t know the half of it, my friend,” Mallory said, and then hiccupped.

  Laura just rolled her eyes, muttered something about men being just one step above the beasts of the fields, and laughed softly in spite of herself.

  Chapter 9

  As tempting as it was to prolong his stay at the trading post, Preacher headed for the high country the next morning. He had traps to check, and no matter how much he enjoyed the company of Laura Mallory, he was still a solitary man at heart. No woman was going to change that.

  He felt a definite pang, though, as he looked back and saw her standing beside one of her brother’s wagons. He had found her there a short time earlier and said his good-byes to her.

  “Do be careful, Preacher,” she had told him with heartfelt sincerity. “I would like to spend more time with you the next time you return to the trading post.”

  “I’d like that, too,” he’d said. “I’d like it a whole heap.”

  For him, that was being pretty demonstrative, and the slight smile on Laura’s face told him that she understood that. For a second, he’d gotten the feeling that she was going to come up on her tiptoes and brush a kiss across his grizzled cheek, but she didn’t. She just shook hands with him instead, and then he mounted up and rode away, leading his new packhorse.

  Now, as he glanced back, a couple of hundred yards away Laura lifted her hand and waved. Preacher returned the wave, then resolutely turned his gaze toward the mountains again.

  The drumming of hoofbeats caused him to rein Horse to a stop and look around again. Clyde Mallory galloped after him, demonstrating considerable skill at riding. He slowed his horse as he came up to Preacher.

  “Somethin’ I can do for you, Clyde?” Preacher asked. He considered the Englishman a friend now, after they had battled side by side in the brawl the night before. They had shaken hands and said goodbye earlier this morning, too, before Preacher went to find Laura.

  “Actually, there is,” Mallory replied. “I’ve come to offer you a job.”

  Preacher’s shaggy eyebrows rose in surprise. “I’ve got a job,” he said. “I trap beaver and sell the pelts to the Harts.”

  Mallory waved a hand. “Oh, I’m aware of that, of course. But the talk around the trading post is that you’ve also guided a number of wagon trains out here.”

  “A few is more like it,” Preacher said with a shrug.

  “I’d like for you to take charge of my wagons. I need a good man to take them back to St. Louis and be in charge of making the return trip with a fresh load of freight.”

  Preacher frowned. “I figured you’d be doin’ that yourself.”

  “That was the plan,” Mallory agreed, “but I’m having second thoughts about leaving Laura here. Even if she stays close to the settlement, there could be danger.”

  “Sure there could,” Preacher said. “Folks can run into trouble wherever they are. But you could always take her back to St. Louis with you.”

  “Which would also be hazardous. Indians might be more likely to attack the wagons than they would the settlement.”

  Seemed to Preacher like Mallory should have thought of all this before he ever brought Laura out here in the first place. But it wouldn’t serve any purpose to point that out now, so Preacher kept the thought to himself.

  Instead, he said, “You’re right. You want me to take over the wagons so you can stay here with your sister and make sure she’s safe?”

  “Exactly! Will you consider it?”

  Preacher didn’t have to think about it for very long. He never had liked being saddled with the responsibility for other folks, even though he seemed to keep getting roped into situations like that. That was why he lived the isolated life that he did. And the settlement was plenty big for him to visit now and then; he had no desire to venture back to smelly, crowded St. Louis just yet.

  “Sorry, Clyde,” he said, shaking his head. “I don’t reckon I’d be interested. But I’m obliged to you for makin’ the offer. Reckon you wouldn’t have if you didn’t trust me.”

  A look of disappointment appeared on Mallory’s ruddy face. “I certainly do trust you, Preacher. Are you sure I can’t persuade you—”

  He stopped as Preacher shook his head again. With a rueful smile on his face, the Englishman went on. “Ah, well, I tried.”

  “You might find somebody else at the tradin’ post who’d be interested in the job,” Preacher suggested.

  It was Mallory’s turn to shake his head. “There’s no one else I’d offer it to. Laura and I will simply have to figure out the best way to proceed and go on from there.”

  “Sorry,” Preacher said again.

  “Think nothing of it, my friend. A man must follow his own drummer, you know. Sometimes, we have little or no choice in the roles we play in this production we call life.”

  “I reckon,” Preacher said.

  He lifted a hand in farewell as Mallory turned and headed back toward the settlement. After a moment, Preacher heeled Horse into motion again. Dog bounded ahead as Preacher rode toward the mountains.

  Colin Fairfax paced back and forth across the camp, impatience and anger growing inside him. Five of the scouts he had sent out several days earlier to search for Preacher had failed to return, and he was growing worried that something had happened to them.

  He didn’t care that much about the men themselves, of course, but when the time came for him to confront Preacher at last, he wanted the odds to be on his side as much as possible. Not only that, but he didn’t want Preacher to have any idea that someone was after him until the proper time came. If those fools had attempted to kill Preacher and failed, that would certainly serve as a warning to the mountain man.

  Because of that, Fairfax had sent out men to search for the missing scouts, and he expected them to report back at any time now.

  His frustration grew until one of the sentries came into camp to tell him, “A couple o’ riders comin’ in, Mr. Fairfax. Looks like Harbin and Cranmore.”

  “It’s damned well about time,” Fairfax snapped. He walked to the edge of camp with the guard and watched the two men on horseback working their way down the side of a long hill toward them.

  As they came closer, Fairfax realized the sentry was right. The two men were Harbin and Cranmore, the ones he had sent out to search for the missing men. As they rode up and reined in, Fairfax snapped, “Well?”

  They didn’t have to ask what Fairfax wanted to know. Harbin took off the coonskin cap he wore and wiped sweat off his forehead. “No sign o’ Jubal or Wilcox,” he said.

  “What about Garroway, Hilliard, and Kent?”

  “We found their bodies,” Harbin said.

  Fairfax stared at him for a moment, then exploded, “Son of a bitch! He killed them! They went after him despite my orders, and he killed them.”

  “You’re talkin’ about Preacher?”

  “Of course I’m talking about Preacher! Who else would I be talking about?” Fairfax took off his beaver hat and ran his other hand over his bald scalp as he struggled to bring his anger under control. Ever since Schuyler’s death and his own long ordeal in escaping the wilderness, Fairfax’s emotions had been so raw, he might fly into hysterics if he didn’t keep them tamped down. He took a deep breath and asked, “What about Preacher? Did you see any sign of him?”

  “Nary a one, in fact.” Harbin scratched his jaw and frowned in puzzlement. “Fact o’ the matter is, if you asked me I’d say it looked like those fellas killed each other.”

  “Killed each other? That’s insane.”

  Cranmore spoke up for the first time. “Not if you knew Hilliard,” he said. “He flew off the handle mighty easy, especially if he’d been drinkin’. Garroway was almost as bad. And there was a busted jug there where they were camped. They got in some sort o’ ruckus, somebody pulled a pistol and one o’ the others grabbed a knife…” Cranmore shrugged. “’
Fore you know it, they was all either dead or dyin’.”

  Fairfax put his hat back on. “And it didn’t look like Preacher killed them?”

  “Nope,” Harbin said with a shake of his head. “I don’t think Preacher was anywhere around.”

  “But you didn’t find Wilcox or Jubal?”

  “Not hide nor hair of ’em.”

  “So Preacher could have killed them.”

  Fairfax saw the glance that Harbin and Cranmore exchanged. He knew they thought he was insane for automatically blaming Preacher for anything that happened, especially anything bad. Fairfax had overheard enough comments he wasn’t supposed to hear to know that the feeling was prevalent among the men Beaumont had sent with him.

  He didn’t care. They didn’t know Preacher. They didn’t know how dangerous the mountain man really was.

  “I suppose he could have,” Harbin said after a moment. “No way of knowin’ either way.”

  Fairfax nodded curtly, turned on his heel, and stalked back to the center of camp without saying anything else. He looked around at the men, who were cleaning their weapons or tending to their horses or playing cards. He raised his voice and said, “Listen to me, everyone!”

  When he had their attention, he went on. “Tomorrow we’re going to resume the search for Preacher. But we’re not going to split our forces again. We’ll all search together until we find him and dispose of him.”

  That announcement brought frowns from several of the men. One of them said, “But there’s two dozen of us, Boss. It’s hard for that many men to move around without makin’ a hell of a lot of racket.”

  “That may well be true,” Fairfax said, “but I’m not going to allow Preacher to whittle us down to nothing. If we’re spread out, he’ll pick us off by twos and threes until we’re all dead. At least if we’re together when we find him, we’ll have a chance.”

  Harbin and Cranmore had followed him in from the edge of camp, leading their horses. Cranmore said, “But, Boss, you’re talkin’ about one man.”

  “No.” Fairfax shook his head. “I’m talking about Preacher.”

  Let them think he was mad. They would see for themselves that he wasn’t…

  When they finally met Preacher.

  Preacher rode through South Pass and on into the thickly wooded mountain fastnesses with their cold, swift-flowing streams where the beavers were so plentiful. He spent a couple of days riding a familiar route and checking his traps. When he had collected half a dozen of the critters, he stopped at one of his regular camping spots, skinned the beavers, scraped the insides of the hides, and staked out the pelts to dry. He would stay here for a day or so, letting Horse rest and waiting for the pelts to dry enough so he could roll them up and stow them on the packhorse.

  He had stayed busy enough that he didn’t think too much about Laura Mallory, but the image of her beautiful face stayed in the back of his mind anyway. Any time he had a few free moments, memories of the time he had spent with her at the trading post came back strongly, reminding him of how much he had enjoyed her company and how strongly he had been drawn to her.

  Not since Jennie had he given any thought to marrying someday. He might have married Jennie if he’d ever had the chance. The fact that she was a whore and had known hundreds of men besides him didn’t really matter. Preacher was the only one who had ever known her heart.

  But that was a long time ago, and after she’d died, he had figured there would never be anybody else he wanted to get hitched to.

  Now, though, maybe that had changed, he mused as he sat next to a creek with his back propped against the rough bark of a pine tree and smoked a pipe. He knew it was mighty early to even be thinking about marryin’ Laura Mallory. Shoot, he had only known her a few days. And she was English as well, a lady through and through, even if she didn’t carry the actual title like some Englishwomen did.

  Horse was grazing peacefully on the creek bank a few yards away. Dog dozed with his chin resting on his paws in the shade of the same tree. Preacher looked over at the big cur and said, “Dog, I reckon I’ve gone plumb loco. No way in hell could I ask a lady like Laura to marry a dirty, smelly, ol’ varmint like me…is there?”

  Dog didn’t open his eyes, but he flicked one ear and sighed, as if to wonder why in the world Preacher was asking such a question of him.

  The next second, however, Dog’s head came up and his eyes snapped open. Preacher knew that Dog had smelled something he didn’t like even before a menacing growl rumbled deep in the big cur’s throat. Horse lifted his head as well and pricked his ears, standing stock-still now.

  Preacher knew those warning signs…knew them all too well, in fact. He leaned over to pick up the long-barreled flintlock rifle lying on the ground nearby.

  As he moved, something hummed past his ear like a giant insect and smacked into the tree trunk. Pine bark splinters stung Preacher’s cheek as they exploded outward from the impact of a rifle ball. He snatched up his own rifle and rolled across the ground, trying to get behind one of the other trees before whoever had just tried to kill him reloaded and drew another bead on him.

  That might have worked…if the peace and quiet of the day hadn’t been suddenly shattered by the roaring reports of a dozen or more rifles.

  Chapter 10

  Preacher hugged the ground as the lead balls buzzed through the air over his head like a swarm of angry bees. “Dog!” he roared. “Horse! Get out of here!”

  The two animals took off running. Horse wasn’t wearing a saddle or bridle, so he looked like a wild mustang as he dashed through the trees. Dog halted after a short distance, looked around, and whined.

  “Go!” Preacher shouted at the big cur. He winced as one of the shots came close enough to kick some dirt into his eyes.

  This was gettin’ downright annoyin’, he thought as he blinked his vision clear again.

  A ball burned across the back of his right leg. He knew he couldn’t stay where he was. He was damned lucky they hadn’t ventilated him already. He was going to have to risk getting up. Either that, or lay there and wait for the sons of bitches to start aiming better.

  With a powerful lunge, he was up and running. He darted between a couple of trees. The ground dropped away from him into a gully. He tried to maintain his balance as he slid down the side of it, but he was moving too fast to do it. He fell, tumbling down the slope and scattering the pine needles that carpeted it.

  Of course, falling in the gully was probably the best thing that could have happened, he realized as he came to a stop at the bottom of it. It gave him some cover. The men who were trying to kill him couldn’t hit him down there.

  But he couldn’t fight back either, and that was like a big rock stuck in his craw.

  He lay there for a moment, catching his breath and thinking about what had just happened. The back of his leg hurt where the rifle ball had scraped across it, tearing his buckskins, but he didn’t let himself think about that. His instincts told him that the wound was painful but not serious.

  The tree under which he’d been resting and thinking was only a few yards from a stream, and on the other side of that stream were thick woods. The men who’d tried to kill him had snuck up over there through those trees. He should have heard them, he thought bitterly. No matter how good they were, he should have heard them.

  And he would have if he hadn’t been so preoccupied with thoughts of Laura Mallory, he told himself. Pondering marriage to the Englishwoman had damned near gotten him killed.

  It wasn’t Laura’s fault he’d been mooning over her. He’d known better than to let his guard down. It had only been a few days since two attempts had been made on his life. He should have been ready for the next ambush.

  If he hadn’t leaned over when he did, he’d be dead now. There had been just one shot at first, as if the man who had fired had told his companions to hold off.

  He’s mine, Preacher could imagine the man saying. I’m going to kill the bastard.

  Only he hadn�
��t. He had missed, and that had served as the signal for the other men with him to open fire. Preacher had escaped death by a whisker.

  And that whisker might get shaved off any minute now, because he could hear shouts coming closer.

  “He went this way, I tell you!”

  “No, I saw him over here!”

  “Be careful!” There was something vaguely familiar about that voice, but Preacher couldn’t place it. “You don’t know what he’s capable of!”

  The man sounded like he had run into Preacher before. Preacher had made plenty of enemies during his adventurous life, but most of them were dead.

  He could worry about the man’s identity later, he decided. Right now, the important thing was to keep from winding up dead himself.

  His enemies had crossed the creek, and were now spreading out through the trees on this side of the stream. Preacher had heard their feet splash through the water, and now he could track their movements by the racket they made. Whoever they were, they weren’t experienced frontiersmen. They couldn’t move around quietly, and they weren’t very good rifle shots either, or else he’d be a sieve by now.

  One of them was getting close. Preacher heard the man moving along the edge of the gully above him. He crawled upward, using some brush for cover, until he was within arm’s length of the edge. He placed his rifle beside him and reached down to his waist to draw the heavy-bladed hunting knife.

  When the hunter was right above him, Preacher moved with blinding speed. He lunged up, grabbed the man’s shirt, and jerked him off his feet. The man fell and started sliding down the slope into the gully. He opened his mouth to let out a yell, but before any sound could emerge, Preacher landed on top of him and his left hand clamped over the man’s mouth. His right drove the knife into the man’s body. By the time they came to a stop at the bottom of the gully, the hunter was dead with Preacher’s cold steel buried in his heart.