CHAPTER 33
Preacher crouched next to the rear wall of the trading post. He had found a gap between the logs that hadn’t been chinked, and he had his ear pressed to it, listening to everything that was going on inside.
So he heard Roderick callously sentence the prisoners to death, along with Senator Allingham. With that massacre about to take place, everyone’s attention would be focused on the tense situation in front of the building.
He motioned Simon Russell closer and whispered the details to him, then said, “You go in the window and try to protect the count and Miss Ritter. I’ll go around front and deal with their plan to kill the senator and his ladies.”
Russell nodded and whispered, “Good luck, Preacher.”
“We’ll all need it, I reckon,” the mountain man agreed.
He cat-footed along the wall to the corner, then turned it and stole forward. He stopped when he could see the line of cottonwoods about fifty yards away where Allingham had taken cover. The rest of the rescue party would be well hidden in there, too, Preacher thought, ready to open fire if they needed to.
He heard the front door open, then a British-accented voice called, “Hold your fire, Senator. I’m bringing your ladies out, just like you wanted.” Quietly, the man added, “All right, you two, get moving. But don’t forget we’ve got guns to your heads.”
Preacher heard a muffled, unintelligible response. The kidnappers had gagged Margaret and Sarah so they couldn’t warn Allingham about the double-cross, Preacher recalled. He had heard Roderick give the order earlier.
Preacher risked a look around the corner as the little group started out from the building. Margaret and Sarah were in the lead, their legs free now but their hands still tied together in front of them. Wads of cloth had been stuffed into their mouths and fastened in place with rawhide strips.
Right behind the two women came a pair of Englishmen, each with a cocked pistol pressed to the back of a prisoner’s head. Four more British agents with rifles held ready emerged and formed a half-circle around the captives. Preacher didn’t see Roderick and knew the plotter was still inside the trading post.
Sarah stumbled as she moved forward uncertainly. Margaret reached over with her bound hands and steadied her daughter. She stood straight and seemed calm. She had found a new reserve of strength somewhere, Preacher thought. She had to know she was going to her death—at least that was the plan—but she didn’t show it. The mountain man actually admired her at that moment.
“Here they are, Allingham,” the man holding the gun on Margaret called. “Come on out now. This is over.”
From the trees, Allingham said, “Stop where you are and let them come ahead on their own. When they’re safe, I’ll surrender.”
The Englishman jerked his head at his companions, indicating they should stop. He said, “That’s not the way it’s going to work. You come out where we can see you. We’ll stay here, and you can meet the women as they come toward the trees.”
For a moment, Allingham didn’t respond, then he said, “All right. As long as nothing happens to my wife and daughter.”
“That’s up to you, mate.” The man prodded his pistol against the back of Margaret’s head and added, “Get goin’, mum.”
Slowly, Margaret and Sarah walked toward the trees. Margaret still had to brace up the obviously terrified and half-hysterical Sarah.
Under his breath, the leader of the British agents said to his companions, “As soon as they’re all standing together, wipe them out.”
Senator Allingham appeared next to one of the trees. His rifle was a little shaky as he came forward, but he didn’t hesitate to stride straight into deadly danger. The gap between him and the two women steadily decreased.
“Easy, boys,” the Englishman breathed. “Just half a moment longer . . .”
Margaret and Sarah couldn’t control themselves anymore. Only a few yards separated them from Allingham. Suddenly they ran toward him.
They were trying to shield him from the kidnappers’ guns, Preacher realized. He stepped around the corner, lifted his rifle, and yelled, “Get the ladies on the ground, Senator!”
Allingham reacted instantly, dropping his rifle, spreading his arms, and lunging forward to tackle his wife and daughter. His arms went around them as he crashed into them and bore them both to the ground, where Preacher hoped they would be out of the line of fire.
The kidnappers’ response to Preacher’s shout was swift as well. They pivoted toward him, and pistols and rifles roared. A veritable storm of lead whipped around the mountain man, who stood there coolly and pressed the trigger of his rifle.
The tall man who had been doing the talking for the Englishmen jerked back as the ball from Preacher’s flintlock smashed into the center of his forehead and bored deep into his brain. He fell, dead before he hit the ground.
More shots blasted from the rest of the rescue party hidden in the trees. One of the British agents howled in pain and collapsed as a rifle ball broke his right thigh bone and knocked the leg out from under him, but the others managed to scramble back inside to what they considered safety.
But Simon Russell was already in there, and he was about to have help. Preacher didn’t bother reloading his rifle. He dropped the empty weapon, whirled toward the nearest window, and called, “Now, Dog!”
The big cur had been waiting for the order. He leaped through the open window and disappeared inside.
While the kidnappers were forcing Margaret and Sarah Allingham outside, Count Stahlmaske scooted over closer to Gretchen, who looked calm but frightened.
“I can only tell you again how sorry I am that you became involved in this ridiculous situation, my dear,” he said.
“I really thought Preacher would be here by now,” Gretchen said. “If the senator is out there by himself, he’s not going to be any match for these men.”
“If only I were free—”
“Turn a little,” Gretchen suggested. “They’re not watching us very closely. Maybe I can untie your wrists.”
Stahlmaske was about to tell her he had already tried that, but then he decided it couldn’t hurt anything. Gretchen’s fingers were slender and more supple than his, plus she had longer nails with which to work. He twisted his body so she could reach his hands bound behind his back, and she went to work.
He heard her mutter under her breath as she strained to free him. To his great surprise, it seemed to him that after only a few minutes the ropes around his wrists were a bit looser. She continued her efforts as shouting came from outside. Allingham was trying to talk the kidnappers into turning his wife and daughter loose.
Gretchen’s breath suddenly hissed between her teeth in alarm. Stahlmaske turned his head and saw Roderick coming toward them.
“Don’t the two of you look cozy, all huddled together that way?” he jeered. “Have you been thinking, Gretchen dear? Have you relented in your decision? I might be willing to allow you to live if you made it worth my while.”
Gretchen pressed herself against Stahlmaske as if searching for sanctuary, but in reality she had increased her efforts to untie him. She said, “I would never have anything to do with you, Roderick, you know that. And if I did, it would only be so I could get close enough to cut your throat some night while you slept.”
Roderick sighed and said, “Yes, I suppose that’s exactly what you would do. Such a pity. I always thought that you and I—” He leaned forward suddenly and frowned. “What are you doing there? Are you trying to—”
Before he could finish the question, someone shouted outside and a great volley of gunfire crashed. At the same time, Stahlmaske felt the ropes around his wrists fall away. His hands and arms were free, but they were numb and useless from being pulled back into such an awkward position for so long.
He did the only thing he could. He jerked his legs up and then lashed out with them, driving his bound feet into Roderick’s stomach with so much force it sent the younger man flying backward.
Stahlmaske waved his arms and flexed his fingers, trying to force feeling back into the limbs. He reached up, grabbed hold of the top of the counter against which they had been leaning, and pulled himself up. From the corner of his eye he saw a roughly clad man climbing in through a window and recognized Simon Russell from the riverboat.
Awkwardly because his ankles were still bound and he didn’t have full use of his arms yet, Stahlmaske hopped around the counter and lunged toward several hatchets that lay on a shelf. He grabbed one, bent over, and chopped at the ropes around his ankles, heedless of any injury he might do to himself in his haste. The thick leather of his high boots turned aside the blade when his strokes missed.
Half a dozen British agents were still inside the trading post. When the shooting started outside, they had rushed toward the door, but one of the men spotted Russell and shouted a warning. As some of them whirled to meet this new threat, Russell fired his rifle, the report echoing deafeningly from the low ceiling. One of the Englishmen went down with a smashed shoulder.
Russell flung his empty rifle at the others and pulled the pistol from behind his belt. He raced forward to put himself in front of Gretchen as he raised the pistol and cocked it. A rifle ball ripped across his side as the British agents opened fire. The impact twisted him halfway around, but he stayed on his feet and squeezed the pistol’s trigger. It boomed and sent a ball into the chest of another Englishman.
Stahlmaske’s feet were free now, the severed ropes having dropped away from them. He snatched another hatchet from the shelf and rolled across the counter. A rifle ball chewed splinters from the planks as he did so. As he landed on his feet in front of the counter next to Russell, his arms whipped forward and the two hatchets flew through the air. Each of them struck one of the British agents. One went down with blood spouting from his throat where the hatchet had lodged, but the other man received only a minor injury.
That changed a second later when a gray, furry form slammed into him and knocked him off his feet. The man didn’t even have time to scream before Dog’s powerful jaws locked on his throat and ripped it out.
More of the kidnappers dashed back through the open door, fleeing from whatever was happening outside. Stahlmaske heard a lot of shooting and knew that a full-fledged rescue party must have arrived.
Preacher was probably out there somewhere, too, he thought.
The rifle fire from the rescue party hidden in the trees had driven the kidnappers back inside the trading post, but those left outside still had other problems. As Preacher ran toward the Allingham family, he glanced at the Pawnee camp and saw the warriors scrambling this way to get in on the fight.
He reached the Allinghams and bent down to take hold of the senator’s arm.
“Head for the trading post, now!” he barked.
“But . . . but the rest of the kidnappers are in there,” Allingham said as he pushed himself up on hands and knees, still hovering over his wife and daughter.
“Yeah, but the Pawnee are out here. Now move!”
Allingham scrambled to his feet and helped Margaret and Sarah up. As they broke into a run toward the trading post, Preacher pulled his other pistol from behind his belt and used it to wave the others out of the woods.
“Come on!” he shouted. “Into the trading post!”
Heinrich Ritter, Egon, Ludwig, Warburton, and the other crewman from the Sentinel burst out of the trees and dashed toward the building. Arrows began to fly through the air around them as Roderick’s Pawnee allies opened fire.
Preacher had one loaded pistol, a tomahawk, and a knife to hold off a dozen bloodthirsty warriors.
Shouldn’t be that hard, he thought with a grim smile on his face.
Probably all it would cost him was his life.