“I sure wouldn’t want to go meet my Maker with them words bein’ my last,” Preacher remarked. “But trash is trash right to the end.”
Preacher put out the fire and packed up what supplies he felt he could use. He took powder, shot, caps, and lead and secured his new supplies on a second packhorse. He’d be damned if he was going to waste his time and energy on burying such trash as these. He left them where they lay and pulled out, heading for the land that smokes and thunders.
As he rode away, he did not look back at the dead. Overhead, the buzzards were already circling.
Miles to the north, Villiers stared morosely into the fire. The grease from the meat on the spit cracked and popped as it hit the flames. To the east and north, Granite Peak, almost thirteen thousand feet high, was clearly visible, the summit poking out from the clouds.
“You reckon Preacher’s a-comin’?” Logan asked him in a low voice.
“Yeah,” Villiers replied in a whisper. “You can damn well bet he’s comin’. And he’ll keep on comin’ ’til we’re all dead or gone to China or some goddamn place. I wish I’d never got mixed up in this mess.”
“Let’s you, me, Trudeau, and Pierre slip out and get gone.” Logan’s voice was very low. “We’ll head to Canada, change our names, and start over.”
“Man, can’t you understand what I been tellin’ you people over and over?” Villiers replied. “We done a harm to Preacher. He don’t forgive and he don’t forget. Not ever. He’ll hunt us all to the grave. And then probably come back and haunt us. We got to stay together and stop him. Splittin’ up is the worst thing we could do.”
“Are you skirred, Villiers?”
Villiers slowly nodded his head. “Yeah. I’m scared, Logan. Preacher tracked a man from down near the Sangre de Cristos to clear up into Canada years back. He found him camped along the Battle. Left him dead on the riverbank. Wouldn’t even bury him. You know what that man done? Stole his pelts. That’s all. Just stole his pelts. You understand what we’ve done? We’ve kilt his friends and his horse, kidnapped women and girls and boys and tortured ’em and raped ’em and worser. And you ask me if I’m scared? Man, I’m so scared, I’m bound up so’s I can’t even take a decent crap. Now go away and leave me alone.”
Sitting away from Villiers, Bedell’s own thoughts were very much like those of the Frenchman. For the very first time in his long life of crime and mayhem, Victor Bedell was frightened. He had not been frightened of Preacher before. Yes, the man had thoroughly whipped him in a fight in St. Louis, but it had not been a fair fight. Preacher had fought like a savage, kicking, gouging, and biting, and otherwise engaging in pugilistic conduct unbecoming of a gentleman.
But now Bedell knew that Preacher was never going to give up. He was going to track them all down and kill them. Over a goddamned horse! Bedell had never heard of anything so ridiculous. A horse was just a damn dumb animal. Like a stupid dog. You beat it until it minded you, or if it didn’t, then you killed it.
“But no one tracks down and kills another human being over a goddamned horse!” Bedell blurted out loud.
Villiers turned his head to stare at the man. “That’s what you think,” he said sourly. “I have. You kill a man’s horse out here, you damn near condemn him to death. Logan’s killed a man over a horse.” Logan looked up and grinned when Villiers added, “Of course, Logan was stealing it from the man at the time.”
“Ridiculous!” Bedell said, but all the men could detect the slight note of fear in his voice.
Preacher tracked the band of outlaws north over the Divide and up the east side of the lake and into the Absaroka Range. Whoever was doin’ the guidin’, Preacher deduced was keepin’ way to the east of the scalding waters. Preacher had high hopes of sitting Bedell down on one of them big holes just about a minute before she blew. That blowhole would give his arrogant butt a cleanin’ the bastard would never forget.
But Preacher concluded the chances of his bein’ able to do that were slim to none.
Preacher figured he’d just have to settle for shootin’ the no-count.
Maybe he could find him some wanderin’ Blackfeet and hand Bedell over to them. The Blackfeet could get real inventive when it came to ways of dealin’ with the likes of Bedell. They could make it last a long time.
Preacher went to sleep thinking of how Bedell would look after the Blackfeet got done with him. He knew one thing for a fact: that way of gettin’ rid of Bedell would damn sure please the ladies who survived the wagons’ trip west.
Preacher spent the next two weeks scouring the land for some sign of Bedell and his bunch. He roamed from Avalanche Peak clear up to Slough Crick looking for a sign of them. But Bedell and his pack of hyenas seemed to have just dropped off the face of the world. That would have been just fine with Preacher, but he knew that men like Bedell and them who rode with him seemed only to survive when the good and the decent died young.
Preacher was determined to change that, at least for this go-around.
When Preacher awakened the next morning, he stretched in his blankets and took him a lung full of high mountain air. With the cold air, he sucked in the strong smell of wood smoke and the faint odor of frying bacon.
He smiled and came out of his blankets like a puma on the hunt. He dressed quickly, knowing that it was no bunch of Indians fryin’ bacon. “Got you!” he said.
4
Making certain that Thunder was safe in a brush corral—which he could easily break out of, should Preacher not return—with plenty of graze and water available, Preacher took his rifles, his bow and quiver of arrows, his pistols and ample shot and powder, and struck out on foot, literally following his nose.
Bedell and his gang had either been so close to him, it was like that old saying about not seeing the trees for the woods, or the outlaws had shifted their camp and moved in close while Preacher was asleep. Either way it went, Preacher was about to end this show. The fact that he was going up against fifteen-to-one odds never slowed his step. He figured the more people in the camp the more confusion he could cause. Hell, some of them just might end up shootin’ each other ’fore he got through.
The smell got stronger and Preacher slowed his step, weaving through the thickening timber as he worked his way down near to the flat valley floor.
He stopped, not believing his eyes. Bedell had picked the worst campsite Preacher had ever seen. The man was either a total fool or so arrogant that he believed he and his gang were all alone in the wilderness.
They were camped smack in the middle of a clearing, with timber all around them. They had them a fire going that you could roast an ox over, and they were all huddled around it, cookin’ breakfast and boilin’ water for coffee. And there was Bedell, just as big as brass, with Jack Cushing and Rat Face right beside him. That damn Villiers was standin’ beside Trudeau and two others that Preacher didn’t know right off.
Preacher carefully worked his way closer to the clearing. If he made the spot he’d chosen, he would be less than seventy-five yards from the group when he opened fire. My, but the smell of bacon and coffee was making his mouth water. After he did the deed, he just might sample some of that breakfast. Preacher lifted both rifles, holding them like pistols, and blew Eli and Able straight to hell, the heavy balls doubling them over and sending them lurching to the ground. Preacher jerked out both pistols and charged up to the edge of the timber, screaming like an angry panther.
Two men jumped up from the ground and ran into the timber on the far side of the clearing just as Preacher opened up with his pistols. Trudeau and Logan went down next, both of them belly-shot. A woman that Preacher recalled was named Ruby something or another grabbed up a pistol and fired it at Preacher. The ball came so close Preacher could hear the whiz and feel the heat. Preacher grabbed up a rifle and fired just as Ruby turned to charge up her pistol. Preacher’s ball struck her at nearly pointblank range and took part of her head off.