Vengeance Trail (26 page)

Pete had reached the spot next to the river where Billy lay. Sister had dropped down over him in protective fashion.

“Sister!” he shouted and pulled her away. “Katie, move her back to the wagon!” A quick check showed Billy’s head and face
covered with blood, but the prairie peddler was still breathing. The lawman
made a fast assessment of where the shot must have come from: across the river and up on the far slope.

Whoever was doing the shooting was good at it.

Eli Stagg saw the man race toward the body of the man, saw that he had missed the woman. He watched as the two women scurried
back to the wagon. Cursing his aim, he resettled the barrel of the Creedmore across the saddle.

He lowered his eye to the rear sights and brought his intended victim in line with the front bead.

Pete Winter’s mind was turning quickly. Whoever it was across the river was one hell of a shot, and probably right this instant
was lining
him
up for the next bullet. He dug his heels into the ground and sprinted away just as the ground where he had been kneeling
exploded in a muddy spray.

Eli Stagg cursed the missed shot and quickly jacked another shell into the breech.

He saw the fellow running and before he could draw a bead on him, the target jumped in behind the wagon.

He took pressure off the trigger and settled back thinking of the missed opportunity. Except for one bad shot, he could be
headed right now down to the camp, down to the women.

He turned his attention to the hobbled pair of mules whose pricked ears flicked the air.

Sister sat against a wagon wheel, her hands pulling at her hair, a high wail escaping her lips.

“Stay low, Katie. Make sure Sister stays put. Whoever that is across the river is carrying a long gun, and he can hit what
ever he chooses to aim at,” he warned her.

“Billy?”

“Billy’s still breathing, but….” He did not finish what he knew did not need to be said.

“Somehow, I have got to get to those mules and get them hitched up to the wagon. Then, we have to figure out a way to get
down there and get Billy and without getting ourselves killed.” He paused and caught his breath.

“I think if we can keep moving, Katie, we can keep from getting shot. Whoever is doing the shooting over there can’t be all
that good to hit a moving target at such a distance.”

“Billy keeps his rifle in the wagon,” Katie remembered.

“Katie, even if I had two good arms, that piece won’t reach that fellow across the river.” He saw her expectant look turn
to one of disappointment.

Pete was steadying himself for a run to the mules when another shot from the big gun roared and rolled across the sky. One
of the mules screamed, took a faltering step and dropped to the ground.

“Damn it! He’s killing the mules!” said Pete. A second shot finished the job.

Johnny Montana had easily made it across the river. Whoever was doing the shooting was not shooting at him, he reasoned.

He worked the horse up through the stand of cottonwoods toward the camp.

Henry Dollar had galloped up onto the rise of land overlooking the river. Across the river, at water’s edge, he saw the body
of a man lying face down and just beyond, a wagon. Beyond that, there was a dead mule. He had arrived just as the bounty hunter
shot the second mule.

The lawman’s attention was drawn to the knoll
where the gun was being fired. Less than a hundred yards. He saw a blue haze of smoke rising.

He gave spurs to the dun.

Eli Stagg eyed his work on the encampment across the river. He was a patient man by nature, he could wait an hour or a day
or week if need be. Sooner or later, he would have his shot at the last man and then go and take the women. With the mules
shot, they weren’t going anywhere.

“He holds the upper hand, Katie,” cautioned the ranger. “We can’t just stay here and do nothing. He knows where we are, but
we don’t know much about where he is. If we don’t get down there to Billy, he probably won’t live.”

Katie fought to maintain her nerve, to stand by Pete.

“What can we do?” she asked.

“We need to maintain cover,” he said. “Our only chance of getting to Billy and keeping our heads protected is if we can push
this wagon down to the river ahead of us—use it for cover.”

“Yes!”

“We’ll have to hope the wagon rolls down in a straight line, which means you and Sister will have to push while I guide the
tongue. Do you think you can do that, Katie?”

“We’ll have to do it, Pete.”

“Good. Let’s give her a try.”

They leaned themselves into the wagon, and with much effort, it began a slow movement down the slight slope toward the river.

“Push, push!” he urged.

The bounty hunter noticed the motion of the wagon. He was more curious than concerned. He considered firing a shot into the
wagon itself as a
warning, but prudence over the preciousness of cartridges caused him to refrain.

Several times the trio had to pause to renew their strength, each time, they adjusted the wagon’s tongue and front wheels
in order to guide it in the direction they wanted it to go.

Finally with one final effort, they forced their weight against the wagon and rolled it to the water’s edge. Their good fortune
had been to place it between the water and the body of Billy.

Pete reached Billy and just as he did so, Billy moaned and rolled over. Pete and Katie pulled him closer to the wagon. Sister
began her wailing again. Quickly examining the head wound, Pete looked up with a smile of surprise.

“I think he has only been greased across his scalp and knocked cold! He’s bleeding, but it looks worse than what it is.”

Billy’s eyes fluttered.

“Yieeee!” screamed Sister as she scrambled to him.

“It’s alright, Sister. Billy’s just got a new part in his hair, he’ll be around in a minute.

When she saw Billy’s eyes flutter all the way open, she offered him a moon-faced smile.

Eli Stagg was still concentrating on the camp below and the strange goings on when the thud of hooves snapped his attention.

Henry Dollar already had his pistol in his hand when he topped the small knoll and discovered what he had been looking for.
He saw the big man lying sprawled behind the rear sights of the Creed-more.

The bounty hunter swung around, bringing the big gun to bear on the oncoming stranger. The rider
looked busted up by the way he rode, but he rode coming on like the devil afire, the dun’s hooves tossing up clots of dirt.

Henry Dollar saw the man swing the barrel of the Creedmore around. The rifle exploded. The slug found not the rider, but the
horse and buckled its forelegs. The lawman felt himself flying free of the saddle, felt the hard impact of the ground when
he landed. It felt like one mighty savage blow.

The impact knocked the air from his chest, the battered ribs drove into his lungs. The pistol he had been holding flew free
from his grip and was lost amid the grasses.

Instinct willed him to move. In spite of the pain and breathlessness, he struggled to his knees.

He could hear the deadly scrape of shell being jacked into the chamber of the Creedmore.

The bounty hunter was not more than ten feet from him. Standing. Lifting the big gun, the barrel glinting the morning sun.
The lawman felt as though he could barely move, as though everything were in slow motion.

He heard the deep breathing of the man with the Creedmore as he approached.

From somewhere within his duster, his hand found the small pocket gun the prostitute, Janey, had bought him back in Mormon
Springs.

Then, Eli Stagg made a fatal mistake. He took time to aim carefully at a man not ten feet away from him.

Henry Dollar shot the man squarely in the face. His body stiffened slightly, a few staggering steps, and his body seemed to
shudder before falling forward and striking the ground.

Pete Winter heard the gunfire from across the river.

Sister McKnight had washed Billy’s head clean of the blood and wrapped it in a bandage of white muslin. Then she gave him
a bottle of Sorrowful Plains Elixir to sip, which he did not seem to mind at all.

As soon as he gained back his senses and had swallowed half a bottle of elixir, he declared, “I’ve been pole-axed!”

“No, Billy,” said Pete, “You have been shot in the head is all.”

“It feels like church bells going off inside my brain!” And then, as was his manner, he offered up a slow grin that parted
the upper portion of his bushy beard. “Haw, shot in the head, you say! And I lived to tell about it? Now ain’t that something
special!”

They all laughed and hugged one another and for a single instant forgot the danger.

“Well, this looks damn near like a party!” came the voice. Katie was the first to turn.

“Johnny!”

“That’s right, darling. Ol’ Johnny’s come back for you. It sure as sugar looks like I wasn’t missed one dern bit.”

Pete Winter stood.

The outlaw leveled his gaze toward the lawman.

“I’ve come back, ranger. I’ve come back for her. No damn way in hell was I gonna let you have her. What in the hell would
she do with someone like you, anyway.”

He thumbed the hammer back on the pistol.

“I won’t go with you, Johnny. You’ll have to kill me first!”

“I can do better’n that, little Miss. I’ll shoot your boy friend and them other two, then I’ll do what ever in the hell I
choose to do with you!”

He took aim at the ranger.

Katie stepped in front of Pete.

“Don’t, Johnny! Don’t do it!”

“Why the hell not?”

“Because…because I’m asking you not to. Let them alone and I’ll leave with you.”

“Don’t be foolish, Katie,” warned Pete.

“Shut your mouth, boy!” ordered the outlaw. “Come on ahead then, gal, climb up on the back of this animal and we’ll ride out
and leave them be.”

She felt Pete’s hand on her arm.

“Let me go,” she said softly.

“Katie?”

Her eyes implored him.

“He’ll kill everyone if I don’t,” she said. There was no doubting it. He watched as she mounted on behind the outlaw.

The mare did a little sidestep at the extra weight.

“You sure do lead a charmed life, lawman. It’s the second time this woman has saved your bacon. We ever run up against each
other again, I’ll make sure she’s not around to protect you.”

Johnny Montana dug his heels into the mare and
slapped it with the reins, plunging it down the slope and toward the river.

He did it without thinking.

Not until mid-stream when the water rushed up past his boots, did Johnny Montana realize his mistake, a realization brought
on by an old fear— drowning.

He fought the horse’s head around in order to return to shore.

Billy Bear Killer had retrieved his shotgun, and in a confused and angry state, took aim at the fleeing outlaw. Pete Winter
slapped the barrels upward just as he fired both barrels.

“You’ll hit Katie!”

Some of the buckshot lifted the hat off Johnny Montana’s head and left him confused. He saw the old man holding the shotgun
on the shoreline, cursed and fought the horse to turn back into the river.

“That dang river’s full of quicksand!” warned Billy.

Henry Dollar’s attention was drawn by the booming report of Billy’s shotgun. He saw a man and woman on horse back struggling
in the river. He saw too, the people on the far side: two men and a woman. One of the men he recognized: Pete Winter!

He did his best to organize his thoughts. Everything inside him felt busted up from being tossed from the horse.

The water had risen to their waists and then had begun to recede. Johnny Montana felt that luck was with him even though the
water felt cold, like ice, like needles piercing his skin.

“Hang on, darling! This is one time when ol’ Johnny beats the river!”

The mare had ridden up onto a sandbar, but then quickly sunk in to its chest, setting panic within the animal’s brain.

The horse began to struggle furiously, its screams rending the air, the quicksand securing its hold all the more so with the
flailing efforts.

Katie let out a soft cry of fear, and Johnny cursed, and then they were both pitched off the horse and into the river.

In an instant, Pete and Billy grabbed a rope from the wagon and plunged into the river.

“I cannot swim with one arm, Billy!”

“I larned when I was a babe,” said Billy. “Give me the rope.”

Henry Dollar saw that the mare was trapped and drowning in the river. He lifted the Creedmore and laid it across the bounty
hunter’s saddle.

He had no choice. He took aim, squeezed the trigger and ended the struggle of the horse.

Katie swam agains the force pulling her downstream. She saw Billy swimming toward her, a rope looped over his shoulders.

“Hang on, sis,” shouted Billy.

Johnny Montana flailed his arms, felt the river pulling him under, swallowed mouthfuls of the muddy water.

Billy could see that Katie was making headway toward the near shore and so he came and swam alongside her until they reached
the shallows and could stand. Pete was already making his way down the shoreline towards them.

A terrible scream came from the river. They saw the head of the outlaw bobbing up and down, disappearing, reappearing, and
then, finally, he surfaced no more.

In silent dreadful witness, Katie remembered Johnny’s premonition. It had been the only thing that he had ever been right
about.

Pete and Billy half-carried her back to the wagon. Sister McKnight wrapped Katie and Billy in blankets and built a fire for
them to sit by. Pete stood guard with Billy’s shotgun just in case the shooter across the other side decided to come on.

It was late afternoon when they heard the crack of a pistol shot. Pete glanced around the wagon. What he saw startled him.

There, sitting astride a big dun, was Henry Dollar. Pete stepped back from behind the wagon and came to stand at the water’s
edge. Cupping his hand to his mouth, he shouted: