pain as his fingers opened, the digits splaying out instead of contracting. The pistol fell unfired from his hand.
Preacher crashed into Buckhalter’s back a second later, driving the man forward and knocking him loose from Lorraine, who was shoved to the ground by the impact as well. That was a good thing, because arrows began to whip through the space the three of them had occupied a heartbeat earlier.
Preacher snatched up the pistol Buckhalter had dropped and slammed the butt into the back of the renegade wagon master’s head. Buckhalter went limp.
Reversing his grip on the gun, Preacher tilted the barrel upward as a member of the Pawnee war party vaulted through the narrow gap between a couple of wagons. The warrior’s feet had barely touched the ground when Preacher fired from a few yards away. The pistol ball, traveling in an upward path, caught the Indian under the chin and bored on up into his brain, flipping him backward so that he landed on the wagon tongue behind him. Blood gushed from the terrible wound as he lay there draped over the wooden shaft.
Preacher surged to his feet. He lifted Lorraine with him and hustled her toward the nearest wagon. “Stay under cover!” he told her.
Both his pistols were loaded. He pulled them from behind his belt as he swung back toward the fight. The Pawnee war party numbered about twenty men, he recalled, and even with the casualties the immigrants had suffered in the earlier battle, they still outnumbered the Indians. If they were cool-headed and kept their wits about them, they could win this fight.
Preacher was glad to see that the defenders had spread out, seeking cover behind the wagons. Shots roared all around the circle. Women and older children were reloading for the menfolks. It was asking a lot to expect these pilgrims from back east to fight for their lives and the lives of their families twice in one night, but it appeared that for the most part, they were meeting the challenge.
Preacher spotted an empty gap between wagons and knew the Pawnee were likely to realize there weren’t any defenders there. He headed for it and got there just as three of the painted savages rushed the opening. They saw him too late to swerve aside. The brace of pistols in his hands boomed like thunder, spewing flame and smoke from their muzzles. Two of the Indians went down, driven off their feet by the deadly impact of the lead balls.
But that left the third Pawnee, and he came hurdling over the wagon tongue to crash into Preacher and knock him backward. The hard fall jolted the empty guns out of Preacher’s hands. He looked up as the Indian screeched and brought a tomahawk sweeping down toward his head.
A rifle blasted somewhere close by. Blood and bone sprayed from the Pawnee’s head as a ball smacked into it. Preacher heaved the body aside and rolled over, coming up onto hands and knees. He saw Uncle Dan standing there with smoke curling from the barrel of the rifle the old-timer held. Preacher grabbed the tomahawk the Indian had dropped and threw it as hard as he could.
The ’hawk flew past a startled Uncle Dan, missing him by mere inches. The blade embedded itself in the forehead of the warrior who had been about to fire a rifle at the old-timer from behind. Uncle Dan must have heard the Indian collapse, because he looked around and gaped as he saw how close he had come to death.
Preacher gave him a nod and scrambled to his feet. Just as before, the shooting had begun to become sporadic. Indians were usually pretty quick to realize when they had bitten off more than they could chew, and they didn’t have the same sort of stubborn, foolish pride white men often had that would make them keep fighting a losing battle. They would call off an attack and figure that they could fight again some other day. That appeared to be what was happening now, as the shooting trailed off and then stopped.
Preacher looked toward the spot where he had last seen Buckhalter. The renegade wagon master wasn’t there now. Grimly, Preacher started in that direction, but he hadn’t gotten there when he heard Ned Donnelly shout, “Preacher, look out!”
Twisting around, Preacher saw Mike Moran charging toward him, already practically on top of him. The arrow still stuck out of Moran’s shoulder, but other than that he seemed to be unhurt. Moran yelled, “This is all your fault!” just before he rammed into Preacher.
For the second time tonight, Preacher landed on the ground with Moran’s crushing weight on top of him. This time he was on his back, so he could look up and see the hatred and rage boiling in the man’s eyes. Moran locked his hands around Preacher’s neck and began trying to choke the life out of the mountain man.
Preacher knew that Uncle Dan or Donnelly would likely shoot Moran before Moran could kill him, but he didn’t wait for somebody else to save his life. He reached up, got hold of the arrow sticking out of Moran’s shoulder, and snapped off the shaft. Moran yelled in pain as that caused the arrowhead to shift in his flesh, but the yell dissolved into a gurgle as Preacher rammed the jagged end of the broken shaft into his neck. Blood flooded over Preacher’s hand as he drove the makeshift weapon deep into Moran’s throat.
Moran’s hands came loose from Preacher’s throat. He reached up to paw at the shaft of the arrow, but he didn’t have the strength to pull it loose. By now, it wouldn’t have mattered if he had. A sheet of crimson flowed down over his chest. He swayed back and forth for a second as his eyes rolled back in their sockets, and then he fell to the side. A final spasm went through his body as he died.
Preacher pushed the corpse to the side. Donnelly and Uncle Dan were there, and they both reached down to help him to his feet.
“You all right, Preacher?” the old-timer asked.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” Preacher rasped as he rubbed at his throat. Moran hadn’t done any real damage, but Preacher knew he’d have some bruises and soreness in his neck for a day or two. “Where’s Buckhalter?”
“Gone,” Donnelly replied, disgust evident in his tone. “I guess he slipped away during the confusion of the fight with the Pawnee.”
Preacher wasn’t surprised. Buckhalter seemed to have an instinct for self-preservation.
It might not save him this time, though, with the survivors of that war party roaming around. The Pawnee would be mad about what had happened, and while they might be too smart to attack the wagon train again, they wouldn’t hesitate to take their frustrations out on a lone white man if they could get their hands on him.
“What about your wife?” Preacher asked Donnelly. “Was she hurt?”
Donnelly shook his head. “Lorraine is shaken up some, of course, but she’ll be all right.” He paused, then asked, “Do you think we’ll be attacked again tonight, Preacher?”
A grim chuckle came from Preacher. “Doubtful. I reckon you took a big enough toll on both bunches that they won’t be lookin’ for a fight for a while. There’s probably not more than a handful left alive. Buckhalter’s men will
