Читать книгу Judgment Day - William W. Johnstone - Страница 9

When the sun rose the next morning, Jason was outside on the wall along with Saul Cohen. Saul was in a much better mood this morning, all things considered.

The Apache were already not only awake, but attacking the fortress Fury’s citizens had made of the town. They hadn’t succeeded in setting anything ablaze yet, unless you counted Gil Collins. On his way from the outhouse back to his post of yesterday, he’d caught a flaming arrow in the side.

Fortunately, somebody got him put out right away and called for the doc. Morelli started his day off by pulling the arrowhead out of Gil and treating his burns.

But the arrow hadn’t sunk in deeply, and Gil was back at his post, picking off the few Apache that dared to chance climbing the gate today.

“Jason?” Saul said as he climbed up beside him. “Jason, I want to apologize for yester—” he began sheepishly.

But Jason cut him off, saying, “You were having one hell of a rotten day, Saul. Forget it. I’m awful sorry that Rachael lost the baby.”

“Thank you, Jason. But—”

“Never mind, I said,” Jason replied. He turned and fired again, but failed to hit anything. Cursing softly under his breath, he crouched down and began to reload the rifle.

“Where do you want me?” Saul asked.

“Here would be good,” Jason said, without looking up from his rifle’s breech. “How’s she feeling? Rachael, I mean.”

“She will survive.”

“Good. Glad to hear it.”

They were outstandingly fortunate, because the wagons from which his townspeople had purchased doilies and fish forks and china dolls and the occasional guitar also contained a number of other things, including a load of ammunition.

And they were making good use of it now.

Jason brought his rifle up again just as Saul swung his rifle between the tops of the sharpened stockade logs, and an Apache fell from his pony. Dust puffed up around the body, momentarily obscuring it.

“You’d think they’d learn,” Jason said flatly, and took aim.

“Learn what?” Saul asked.

Jason fired, and this time the brave he’d aimed at fell.

“That bullets hurt,” he replied as he took aim again.

The Apache vaulted from his pony just as Jason pulled the trigger, and he missed. How many of them were there anyway? It seemed that no matter how many they killed, they just kept coming.

As if reading his thoughts, Saul said, “How many are there?”

“Don’t know,” Jason replied, scowling. “I think it’s a swarm, like locusts.”

“It’s a plague of locusts,” Saul corrected him. “A swarm of flies, a plague of locusts.”

“Oh.”

Saul fired, and another brave fell.

“Nice shot.”

“He wasn’t the one I was aiming at.”

Down at Jason’s house, the Reverend Milcher, along with his wife, Lavinia, and their brood of children, were huddled in the kitchen. The two smallest were beneath the table, hands over their ears as if they could block out the sound of gunshots from outside.

“Samuel, can’t you do something?” Lavinia asked, for not the first time.

He gave her a decidedly parental look, glowering from beneath bushy eyebrows. “I am doing something. I am protecting my family.” His fist clenched more tightly around the stock of his rifle, which had been across his lap, unfired, since they rose.

“But they—”

“Hush, wife,” he barked, and Lavinia—along with several of the children—gave a frightened little jump. “They’ll need me more later. At present, I can do them little good, except in my prayers.”

“Yes, dear,” she said. She hoped she’d said it calmly. She hoped it for the children’s sake. They were all a-jitter, and they’d been that way since yesterday. The only one of them who was unaffected was little Oliver—only because he was just eight months old.

“We could all use some food,” her husband said.

But even Oliver knew something evil was in the air, that someone was out there doing Satan’s work. He’d been fussing constantly over the last twenty-four hours, which she supposed had frayed her nerves. As if they weren’t frayed enough already. Perhaps Samuel was right.

“Some lunch, Lavinia?” he repeated.

She said, “Sheriff Fury doesn’t have much on hand. I think I can make soup, though.”

“Fine. Soup.”

From beneath the table, one of the girls said in a tiny voice, “Mama? I want to go home now, please.”

Still looking straight ahead, Samuel said, “We have no home to go to.”

Four of the children began to cry again.

Three were close enough for Lavinia to gather them into her arms. “Don’t worry,” she whispered, her lips gently pressed first to one small brow, then the other. “Hush, my darlings, don’t fret. The Good Lord will provide.”

By three that afternoon, Jason had finished his third tour of the perimeter. The Apache still hadn’t come at them from the north, and the occasional weak assaults from the west side—the side of the stockade that ran parallel to the creek—remained just that: occasional and weak.

Jason wasn’t concerned about attacks from the west. The banks of the stream were steep and still slick with the retreating water’s mud. Additionally, there was no gate on that side, and therefore no specific weak point for the Apaches to attack.

But he was worried about the north. Although their losses were small compared to those they were inflicting upon the heathen horde, there seemed to be an inexhaustible supply of them, as if God had given the Apache a man-sized rubber stamp with which to create new warriors as they needed them.

Jason was just a little miffed at God for the time being.

But he’d had an idea, one he’d conjured in a moment of brilliance, and as he made his way back around to the south, he talked with the men on the wall. They were all tired, so tired, as was he, but still up for the fight. He was proud of them. He’d gathered plenty of volunteers as he made the circuit, and already a crowd—men and horses alike—was beginning to form up at the northern gate.

His townsmen might be exhausted, but they were out for blood. And they were too weakened by gun smoke and the steadily beating sun, and the sounds and smells of battle and blood, to give much of a damn for life or death anymore.

He knew just what they were feeling. He was feeling it, too.

So he gathered together those men who were willing, there at the north gate. They had their orders, and each man was mounted on his or a buddy’s fastest horse. All were heavily armed and steely-nerved.

At the head of the mob, Jason looked at the kid standing at the gate’s latch. He’d already freed the crossbeam. He nodded and said, “Now, Bill.”

Young Bill McCallister slipped the latch and jumped atop the gate’s foothold to swing it back. Suddenly, the way was clear.

Thirty armed riders burst through the gate and into the clear, fifteen of them barreling immediately to the east. Jason and the others waited until the first bunch turned south at the far eastern corner of the stockade, then kicked their own horses in the opposite direction. They turned at the corner of the stockade and rode south, along the narrow path between the outer wall and the creek bank, as if Old Scratch himself was on their tails.

They emerged into the open at the same time as the first fifteen riders and galloped toward the middle, relentlessly scattering or cutting down any Indians in their path.

The men on the wall held their fire for the moment, and Jason rode his mare, Cleo, with her reins clenched in his teeth. Both of his hands were busy with the rifle, which barked repeatedly. The riders’ weapons belched sparks and smoke and bullets that spelled the end of many an Apache warrior.

The remaining Apache, taken by surprise, were easily routed.

Easily, that is, if one didn’t count the losses to the town. But Jason had no time to grieve over, much less notice, the losses. The only thought on his mind—and the minds of his men—was to kill as many Apache as possible, and that they proceeded to do, mindless of the toll it took on their own ranks.

And they chased the horde away to the southeast, chased them so fast and furiously that the dust cloud raised by the Apaches’own ponies obscured the view of the meager force chasing them. They chased the Indians for ten miles before Jason said enough.

They stopped there, ten miles to the southeast of the town, sat there on their blowing horses, and watched the cloud of dust behind the retreating Apache grow smaller and more distant.

Somewhere behind Jason, a man muttered, “That outta hold the bastards for a while.”

So softly that the words were barely audible, Jason replied, “Yeah. It better.” And then he reined his mare around.

Their group had dwindled in number. Where there had once been thirty, there were now barely twenty riders, and they were all haggard and panting, and soaked through with sweat. Some were bloody. Several of them had taken arrows, but they had made it to the end. They had run the game to ground, and they were happy beneath the grime and gore that streaked them.

“C’mon. Let’s get back and pick up our dead,” Jason said flatly.

Someone knocked on the trapdoor, and both Matt and Jenny jumped. Then they heard Curly’s voice, and Jenny relaxed.

She watched as Matt climbed up the ladder and released the bolt on the trapdoor, then threw it wide.

Curly helped him out, then sank his head down again. “It’s all right, missus,” he said as Jenny got to her feet and began to gather their supplies. “Sheriff Fury stopped by. Said they chased the Injuns away to the south. Don’t look like they’ll be back.”

Smiling, she handed up two sacks of supplies, then the water bags, one at a time. “Is he still here? The sheriff, I mean.” Curly held his hand down to her, and she took it, smiling. Her brother had saved them all, once again.

But Curly, after hoisting her up and letting her gain her feet on the living room floor, shook his head. “He said he had to get back to town. Had to catch up to his men, he said.” Curly took off his hat for a second and bowed his head before slapping the hat back into place. “Said to give you his very best regards, ma’am.”

“How kind.” Her smile remained in place, but only for Curly’s sake. And, she supposed, Matt’s.

“How much damage to the town?” Matt asked. He had already poured himself a stiff drink, she noted.

Curly turned away from her and toward her husband. “Some,” he said. “Said they burnt out the Milchers. Did damage to the livery and some of the south buildings, but they got it in hand.”

Matt nodded. As if he cared. She wanted to slap his supercilious face.

“Was anyone hurt?” she asked, although she knew the answer when it came to Apaches.

Curly nodded sadly. “Said his deputy took an arrow, but he’s on the mend. Cooper, Swayze, Thorpe, and a bunch of others all dead. Got a lot more wounded, though. The wall held up fine.”

She supposed he meant the stockade.

“Your sister’s fine, too, Boss,” Curly continued without further prodding. “Said she helped Mrs. Morelli cook up a good stew last night for the whole town.”

“Just like when we were trailing out,” Jenny whispered. But it didn’t matter. They weren’t paying any attention anyway.

Suddenly, more than anything, she wanted to see her brother. She wanted to touch his beautiful face and see for herself that he was alive. She wanted to hug Megan tight and help her and Olympia cook a stew for everybody.

She wanted to be someplace, anyplace but here. Anyplace but with Matthew.

She asked, “Curly, do you think my brother wanted us to come into town?” And immediately regretted how she’d phrased the question.

Curly said, “No, ma’am, I don’t think so. Said they’d be fine, now that the Injuns have took to the hills.”

Matt said, “Just the same, tomorrow’s Monday. I’ll be going in to the bank.” He seemed to notice her for the first time. “You can come along with me if you like, Jenny.”

Golly, thanks, Jenny thought, but she just nodded at him. As if she needed his permission! Without any further conversation, she picked up the food bag and lugged it into the kitchen.