Luke took it. The gun had a satisfying heft and balance in his hand. “A six-gun! One of them repeating revolvers,” Luke marveled.
“Know how to use it?” Johnny asked.
“After four years with Hood’s Brigade?” Luke said in disbelief.
“In that case I’d better show you how it works, then. I wouldn’t want you shooting me or yourself by accident,” Johnny said, straight-faced.
Luke’s scowl broke into a twisted grin. “Shucks, you’re joshing me,” he said.
“I am? That’s news to me.”
“You’re still doing it, dang you.”
Johnny Cross flashed him a quick grin, strong white teeth gleaming, laugh lines curling up around the corners of his hazel eyes. A boyish grin, likable somehow, with nothing mean in it.
Sure, Johnny was funning Luke. Hood’s Brigade of Texans was one of the hardest-fighting outfits of the Confederacy, whose army had been distinguished by a host of fierce and valiant fighters.
Johnny turned the horse’s head, pointing it west, urging it forward into a fast walk.
Luke stuck the pistol into the top of his waistband on his left side, butt-out.
“It’s good to have something to fill the hand with. Been feeling half-nekkid without one,” he said.
“With what’s left of that uniform, you
“How many more of them ventilators you got tucked in them saddlebags?”
“Never enough.”
“You must have been traveling in some fast company, Johnny. I heard Quantrill’s men rode into battle with a half-dozen guns or more. That true?”
“And more. Reloading takes time. A fellow wants a gun to hand when he wants it.”
Luke was enthusiastic. “Man, what we couldn’t have done with a brace of these for every man in the old outfit!”
“If only,” Johnny said flatly. His eyes were hard, cold.
A couple of hundred yards farther west, a stand of timber grew on the left side of the road. A grove of cottonwood trees.
East, the brown dust cloud grew. “Fair amount of riders from the dust they’re kicking up. Coming pretty fast, too,” said Luke, looking back.
“Wouldn’t it be something if it was that bunch who cleaned you out?”
“It sure would. Any chance it’s somebody on your trail, Johnny?”
“I ain’t been back long enough.”
Luke laughed. “Don’t feel bad about it, hoss,” he said. “It’s early yet.”
Johnny Cross turned the horse left, off the dirt road into the cottonwood grove. The shade felt good, thin though it was. The Texas sun was plenty fierce even at the start of spring. Sunlight shining through spaces in the canopy of trees dappled the ground with a mosaic of light and shade. A wild hare started, springing across the glade for the cover of tall grass.
Johnny took the horse in deep behind a concealing screen of brush. “We’ll just let these rannies have the right of way so we can get a looksee at ’em.”
Luke was serious, in dead earnest. “Johnny—if it is that pack that tore into me—Monty is mine.”
“Whoa, boy. Don’t go getting ahead of yourself, Luke. Even if it is your bunch—especially if it is—don’t throw down on ’em without my say-so. They’ll get what’s coming to ’em, I promise you that. But we’ll pick the time and place. Two men shooting off the back of one horse ain’t the most advantageous layout for a showdown.
“I know you got a hard head but beware a hot one. It should have cooled some after four years of war,” Johnny said.
“Well—it ain’t,” said Luke.
Johnny grinned. “Me, neither,” he said.
The blur at the base of the dust cloud sweeping west along the road resolved itself into a column of riders. About a dozen men or so.
They came in tandem: four pairs in front, then the wagon, then two horsemen bringing up the rear. Hardbitten men doing some hard traveling, as indicated by the trail dust covering them and the sweat-streaked flanks of their horses. They wore civilian clothes, broad-brimmed hats, flannel shirts, denim pants. Each rider was armed with a holstered sidearm and a carbine in a saddle-scabbard.
A team of six horses yoked in tandem drew the wagon. Two men rode up front at the head of the wagon, the driver and a shotgun messenger. A freight wagon with an oblong-shaped hopper, it was ten feet long, four feet wide, and three feet high. A canvas tarpaulin tied down over the top of the hopper concealed its contents. Crates, judging by the shape of them under the tarp.
The column came along at a brisk pace, kicking up plenty of dust. There was the pounding of hoofbeats, the hard breathing of the horses, the creak of saddle leather. Wagon wheels rumbled, clattering.
The driver wore his hat teamster style, with the brim turned up in front. The men of the escort were hardeyed, grim-faced, wary. They glanced at the cottonwood grove but spotted no sign of the duo on horseback.
On they rode, dragging a plume of brown dirt in their wake. It obscured the scene long after its creators had departed it. Some of the dust drifted into the glade, fine powder falling on Johnny, Luke, and the horse. Some dust got in the chestnut’s nostrils and he sneezed.
