Hard Ride to Hell (9780786031191) (18 page)

The memory of that night was etched clearly in Preacher's brain. As long and violent a life as he had led, it would seem like all the desperate gunfights ought to start blending together, but they didn't, not really. At least they didn't for him.

So if he remembered that big fella, there was a chance the man might remember him, too. Scowling, Preacher looked down into his empty mug as he set it on the bar. The broad brim of his hat would obscure his features at least partially if the man glanced into the mirror at his reflection.

Several of the men at the bar turned to greet the newcomer. A couple of others stood up from one of the tables and moved over to join them. The big man looked around and asked, “Where's Page and the rest of the bunch?”

One of the men he addressed pointed upward with a thumb and said, “Gone to visit the gals already, Randall.”

“I'm surprised they had enough money left for that,” the man called Randall said.

“Page has always got the price of a poke on him. Claims he never lets himself get so broke he can't afford a woman.”

“All right. The others can collect their pay later, I suppose. Come on.”

Carefully, Preacher watched what was going on in the mirror. Randall went over to one of the poker tables, took a leather pouch from his pocket, and opened it, spilling coins onto the green baize. He spread them out with his other hand, and the men began picking up the gold pieces.

One of them bit into a coin he picked up. That brought a laugh from Randall.

“Really, Garth?” he asked. “You really think the Colonel would try to pay you with phony money?”

“No offense, Randall,” Garth said. “I trust you and the Colonel about as much as I trust anybody . . . which ain't a whole hell of a lot, I admit.”

“You satisfied these double eagles are real?”

“Yeah, I'm satisfied,” Garth replied as he pocketed his payoff.

Blood money, Preacher thought angrily, his jaw clenching. Every one of the coins those men were picking up was stained with Assiniboine blood and earned by slaughtering innocent men, women, and children. On top of that, they had carried off a young woman and her child. Every one of the bastards deserved to be horsewhipped and then hanged. Preacher would have handled the whipping, gladly.

What he had just overheard tied everything up with a nice, neat bow. Colonel Ritchie was behind the raid on the Assiniboine village, and the only reason for it that made any sense was that he wanted their land for his railroad. Like Cyrus Longacre, the unscrupulous railroad magnate with whom Preacher, Smoke, and Matt had clashed a while back,
³
the Colonel believed he was a law unto himself.

He would learn different, Preacher vowed, maybe even before Smoke and Matt got here.

He had no doubt that the two younger men would follow him. They would respond to the message he had sent them, and starting at Two Bears's village they would follow the same trail that had led him here. There was no telling how long it would take them to arrive, though, and Preacher was in no mood to wait. He wanted to get Wildflower and Little Hawk out of the Colonel's greedy hands as soon as possible.

His ears perked up as he heard one of the men ask Randall, “What'd you do with the kid?”

“What do you think I did with him? I left him with the Colonel's housekeeper. She'll take good care of him.”

That confirmed Preacher's guess that the little boy could be found at the Colonel's mansion. But why no mention of Wildflower? That question made a worried frown appear on the old mountain man's face.

The bartender came along and asked, “You want a refill on that beer, old-timer?”

“Uh, no, I reckon not.”

“Somehow I'm not surprised. You get your free drink, but you don't want to spend anything after that.”

“I got things to do,” Preacher snapped. “Don't get uppity, son, and I might come back later.”

“Yeah, you do that.”

The bartender drifted off again. Randall and the other hired guns were still standing around the poker table, talking. Preacher didn't want to risk being in the same room with them any longer, so he turned and ambled toward the entrance, being careful to keep his face angled away from Randall so the man wouldn't have a chance to recognize him.

He didn't sigh in relief until he'd pushed through the bat wings and was on the boardwalk outside. As an added precaution he kept his head down as he went to the hitch rack and untied Horse's reins. He led the stallion away. Dog followed them.

Preacher's brain ran rapidly through his options. He didn't have a large enough force to launch an outright attack on the Colonel's house. Clearly, Ritchie had plenty of hired guns available to defend him. Not only that, but if Standing Rock and the other warriors galloped into Hammerhead and attacked the mansion, there was a good chance most of the citizens would grab their guns and put up a fight without ever knowing the truth of the situation, seeing the Assiniboine only as marauding redskins.

No, this problem called for stealth, Preacher decided. Standing Rock and the others would wait where they were until they heard from him. If he could get into the mansion, grab Little Hawk and Wildflower—assuming she was there—and get out again without being discovered, they could rejoin the rescue party and make a run for it. With enough of a lead, they could stay ahead of any pursuit, just the way Randall had stayed ahead of the rescuers during the long chase to Hammerhead.

So it was up to him, he thought as he raked his fingers through his beard, and the only ally he would have was darkness. A glance at the sky told him there were a couple of hours of daylight left.

Once night fell, he would take a look around that mansion and see about getting inside. Until then, he needed to lie low so there wouldn't be any chance of Randall spotting him and recognizing him from the Assiniboine village.

Leading Horse, with Dog padding along beside him, Preacher headed for the nearest livery stable.

 

 

The man who ran the stable wasn't as old as Preacher, but he was getting pretty long in the tooth. After exclaiming over what a fine-looking animal Horse was, he led the stallion into a stall, where Preacher unsaddled him.

The stablekeeper, whose name was McFarland, made sure Horse had plenty of grain and water, and then said to Preacher, “How'd you feel about a game of checkers?”

That was just like these old codgers, thought Preacher, not including himself in that category, always wanting to sit around and play checkers and run their mouths.

In this case, though, that might come in handy for him. He smiled and said, “I'd plumb admire to, friend.”

They went into the stable's office. Dog had to stay outside, McFarland said. He had a big yellow tomcat, and he didn't think the critters would get along.

Preacher took one look at the scarred old feline and agreed. He asked, “What do you call him?”

“I've always just called him Cat.”

Preacher thought that was a pretty poor excuse for a name, but he kept that opinion to himself.

McFarland already had a checkerboard set up on the desk, where he had obviously been playing a game against himself. He cleared it off and set up the pieces again, and he and Preacher settled down to a new game.

Preacher concentrated on his moves for a few minutes, long enough to tell that McFarland wasn't a very good player, and then said, apparently casually, “I've heard a lot about that Colonel fella who runs things around here.”

“Colonel Ritchie? Yeah, he founded the town. Wouldn't be a blamed thing here if it wasn't for him.”

“Lives in that big house up at the end of town?”

“Yep.”

“Probably got a bunch of guards around. Rich men usually do.”

“I wouldn't know about that. Wouldn't surprise me, though. All I know for sure is he's got a housekeeper. Handsome woman, too. Miz Dayton, she's called. Nice as can be, always smiles at me when I pass her on the street.”

That was the woman Randall had given the baby to, Preacher thought. He supposed she was devoted to her employer.

“What about a fella called Randall?”

McFarland frowned slightly and asked, “Where'd you hear about him?”

“Oh, I don't know,” Preacher said casually. “Here and there, I reckon. Somebody said he's the Colonel's right-hand man.”

“Yeah, you could say that, I guess. They been together since the war. Randall rode in the Colonel's cavalry regiment and was his chief scout. Reckon he'd do just about anything the Colonel ordered him to.”

Including killing a bunch of innocent people and stealing a woman and her baby.

“Of course, that's just rumor,” McFarland went on. “Randall don't talk about himself or the Colonel or those days back in the war. Fact is, most of the time he don't say much of anything. It makes me a mite nervous just to be around him. Big, cold-eyed galoot like that, you never know what he's gonna do. Sort of like bein' around a mountain lion, I guess.”

Preacher knew what McFarland meant. Randall gave off an air of menace that seemed to come natural to him.

A man could be mighty dangerous, though, without appearing to be. He figured he was a good example of that himself.

He moved a checker and said, “Things'll be different here when the railroad comes in, I reckon.”

“They sure will. There'll be a lot more people, a lot more business, and a lot more money ridin' those rails into the basin. Right now there's barely enough to get by, but those of us who got here first will stand to make a fortune when the railroad arrives.”

“And the Colonel will make the biggest fortune of all.”

“Well, sure. That's only fittin', ain't it?”

It would be, Preacher thought, if the man had gone about things the right way, without resorting to murder and kidnapping. He had seen men of Ritchie's stripe before, though, former military commanders who had never gotten over the power they had wielded during the war. They regarded anybody who got in the way of their plans as an enemy to be destroyed, just the same as they had destroyed their enemies during that great conflict.

McFarland chuckled and said, “You ain't payin' enough attention to your moves, friend.” He jumped one of Preacher's checkers and picked it up.

“Yeah, I reckon not,” Preacher said. He reached out and jumped all five of McFarland's remaining checkers, ending the game.

Too bad it probably wouldn't be that easy getting what he wanted from Colonel Hudson Ritchie.

The dining table was big enough for twenty people, but the Colonel sat at it alone, a plate full of roast beef and potatoes in front of him. A glass of fine wine was at his elbow as he ate. Mrs. Dayton stood by, ready to refill the glass if need be or provide anything else he wanted.

After eating in silence for several minutes, the Colonel asked, “Where's the child?”

“Sleeping, sir.”

He wasn't sure why he asked. The child's welfare was of no real concern to him. As long as Two Bears
believed
that he had both hostages in his power and did what the Colonel wanted, the ultimate fate of Wildflower and Little Hawk didn't matter at all.

Idle curiosity had prompted the question, he supposed. There had never been a baby in this house before. In all likelihood there never would be again. He was much too old for fatherhood, and the prospect never really interested him, anyway. Family responsibilities would just get in the way of all the great things he was meant to accomplish.

However, that thought made something stir in his brain. Earlier he had been pondering the possibility of someday residing in the White House. All the presidents except one had been married, the Colonel realized with a slight frown, and that one—James Buchanan—had been an incompetent boob. The public expected the nation's leader to have a wife, a First Lady who would serve as the hostess for all the important state functions held in the White House.

His gaze turned speculatively to Mrs. Dayton. She was an intelligent, attractive woman. Her late husband had been an officer who served under his command. A bit of a dullard, but a competent officer. Following the man's death, she might have been destitute had it not been for the Colonel taking her into his service, so she had always been exceedingly grateful to him. His eyes narrowed as he considered the possibilities.

She noticed him studying her. She always noticed things. That was one of her talents. With a smile, she asked, “Do you need something, Colonel?”

He gave a brusque shake of his head.

“No, no, everything's fine,” he said. “I was just contemplating something. Forgive me if I was staring. You know how absorbed I become with my thoughts, Mrs. Dayton. Often I don't even see what I'm looking at.”

“Yes, sir,” she said. Her smile faltered slightly. “I know.”

“Perhaps some more wine . . .”

“Of course, sir.”

She came over to pour it. As she did, the Colonel realized how ludicrous his thoughts of a moment earlier had been. Attractive or not, the woman was a servant, certainly not suitable to be the wife of the President of the United States. She was good enough for cooking and cleaning, as well as caring for an Indian baby. She was even an acceptable, compliant bed partner for those times when the Colonel needed to slake his unavoidable human lusts. But anything else . . . ?

No. Definitely not.

“Thank you, Mrs. Dayton,” he muttered as she withdrew from his side after filling his glass.

The sound of a faint cry floated through the open doors into the opulent dining room.

“He's awake,” she said. “I had better go see to him.”

The Colonel waved a hand negligently.

“Go ahead,” he told her. “I'm fine here.”

With hooded eyes, he watched her leave the room. Once he got to Washington, he thought, there would be other widows in the city, more suitable widows. Women who had been married to politicians or diplomats, women who knew how things worked in the halls of power and would be content to stay in their place, happy in the luxury and celebrity of being First Lady. He would find a woman who would make no real demands on him and turn a blind eye whenever he paid a nighttime visit to the quarters of his housekeeper. It would all work out....

With enough money and power, everything always worked out, the Colonel thought as he cut off another bite of rare roast beef and popped it into his mouth.

 

 

Preacher ate supper in a hash house on Main Street and then drifted back into the Emerald Palace Saloon for another beer to let the hour get a little later before he scouted the Colonel's mansion. He checked by looking over the bat wings first to make sure Randall wasn't in the saloon. Not seeing any sign of the big gunman, he went on inside.

Archibald Ingersoll stood at the bar this time instead of outside trying to drum up business. He lifted a hand in greeting and said, “Hello, old-timer. Did you get your free drink?”

“I sure did,” Preacher said. He laid a coin on the bar. “Now I figured on buyin' one.”

Ingersoll chuckled.

“That's the idea, my friend.” He waved the bartender over. “What are you having?”

“Beer's fine.”

“Draw a mug for our amigo here,” Ingersoll instructed the bartender, who wasn't the same one Preacher had talked to earlier in the day.

As Preacher sipped the beer, Ingersoll went on, “What do you think of our town so far?”

“It's all right, I reckon.”

“Think you might want to settle down here?”

Preacher smiled and said, “You wouldn't want me as a citizen. I ain't the settlin'-down type.”

“Too fiddle-footed, eh? I understand. I used to be the same way, always looking for a new place, searching for something better. But I've found it here, I do believe.”

“Even though this Colonel fella owns everything in sight?”

The saloonkeeper shrugged and said, “He seems to be a fair man. The rent he charges me for this building is reasonable enough. And he's promised to bring the railroad in, which will make us all rich men.”

“It'll make the Colonel rich, all right. I ain't so sure about anybody else.” Preacher downed some more of the beer. “You ever been up there to that fancy house of his?”

“As a matter of fact, I have. A while back he ordered some wine from my suppliers, and I delivered it to him. Well, to his housekeeper, Mrs. Dayton. Wonderful woman. Nice as she can be.”

“So everybody keeps tellin' me.”

“It's the truth. If you ever meet her, I'm sure you'll like her, too.”

“Why in the world would I ever meet up with the Colonel's housekeeper?”

“I don't know,” Ingersoll said. “I was just saying that she's a fine woman.”

“Does he have any other servants?”

“The Colonel? Not really. There are a couple of women who come in and help Mrs. Dayton with the cleaning, I believe, but that's all. Oh, and he has a bookkeeper, but that fellow spends most of his time in the Colonel's office here in town, not up at the house. The Colonel keeps his buggy and his horses at McFarland's livery, so there's no need for him to have a hostler of his own.”

None of this chatter was getting Preacher the information he really needed. He said, “I never seen a rich man yet who didn't keep a bunch of bodyguards around.”

“I wouldn't know about that. It wouldn't surprise me too much, though, if there were a couple of men patrolling the grounds around the mansion at night.” Ingersoll lowered his voice. “You didn't hear it from me, mind you, but some of the men who work for the Colonel are professional gunmen. Tough hombres, too. You wouldn't want to cross them.”

“I don't intend to,” Preacher said, and he wasn't lying. Under the circumstances he preferred to avoid the Colonel's gun-wolves. He wasn't scared of the varmints, but he was more interested in getting Little Hawk away from there safely and finding out what had happened to Wildflower. A shoot-out during the rescue would just endanger the tyke.

He took his time with the beer, chatting idly with Ingersoll while he nursed it. He wanted things quiet and settled down before he made his move. When he was finished, he pushed the empty mug across the bar, prompting Ingersoll to ask, “Want another?”

Preacher shook his head and said, “One's my limit, I reckon. I ain't as young as I used to be.”

“None of us are, my friend, none of us are.”

“I'll see you around,” the mountain man said, although he knew that if everything went the way he wanted it to, that wouldn't be the case. He wouldn't see Ingersoll or anybody else in Hammerhead.

At least not for a while. Not until he came back with Smoke and Matt, cleaned out this rats' nest, and settled things with the Colonel.

He left the saloon and turned west, toward the big house on the edge of the settlement. It loomed there on top of the rise, with the yellow glow of lamplight in a couple of windows. Not everyone up there had gone to bed yet, Preacher mused, but he was tired of waiting. He wasn't as patient as he had been when he was a young man.

His steps carried him toward the mansion, and as he walked he slipped into the shadows, disappearing with the practiced ease of a man whose life had often depended on stealth.

Randall stood in the doorway of a room on the second floor of the Emerald Palace. Behind him, the whore he had just been with was getting dressed. Randall had already given her a couple of silver dollars and had been just about to leave when he spotted the old man in buckskins standing at the bar talking to Archibald Ingersoll.

Even though he couldn't see the old-timer's face from here, something about him was familiar, Randall thought. That puzzling sensation was enough to make him pause in the doorway instead of stepping out onto the balcony that ran around the rear of the barroom. He moved the door so that it was still open but cast a shadow over him.

“Something wrong, honey?” the soiled dove asked.

“No,” Randall said. “Be quiet.”

“Because if there's anything else you want to do, I reckon a few more minutes wouldn't hurt anything—”

“Shut up,” Randall snapped.

He heard her sniff. Even a whore could get her feelings hurt. He didn't care. All the instincts he had developed over the past two decades were telling him it was important to find out more about the man at the bar.

The old-timer finished his beer. Ingersoll said something to him, and the man turned his head slightly as he replied.

Randall stiffened and drew in a deep breath through his nose. He could see enough of the man's face now to know that it was familiar. It took him only a couple of seconds to remember where he had seen those leathery, bearded features before.

In Two Bears's village, on the night of the raid
. The old man was the one who had ridden in during the fighting and pursued him. Randall had gotten a fairly good look at the man's face in the firelight, and he was certain this was the same one.

The old man turned and walked out of the saloon.

Randall didn't believe for a second that it was a coincidence the old-timer was here. He had followed them all the way from the Assiniboine village to Hammerhead, and that had to mean he planned to rescue the prisoners. Well, there was only one hostage now, Randall reminded himself, but the old man wouldn't know that.

Had some of the Indians come with him? That seemed likely, Randall decided. The savages would be waiting somewhere outside of town, staying out of sight, while the old man tried to locate Wildflower and Little Hawk.

The Colonel needed to know about this, even though Randall didn't regard either the old-timer or a ragtag bunch of redskins as much of a threat. They could become an annoyance, though, and the Colonel disliked annoyances.

“You gonna stand there all night, honey?” the woman asked. “I got work to do, you know.”

Randall restrained the impulse to turn around and slap the whiny bitch. Instead, he said, “I've got work, too.”

Killing work.