Read Kiowa Vengeance Online

Authors: Ford Fargo

Tags: #action western, #western adventure, #western american history, #classic western, #kiowa indians, #western adventure 1880, #wolf creek, #traditional western

Kiowa Vengeance (2 page)

BOOK: Kiowa Vengeance
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“You don’t have to worry about me,” she
said.

She heard the crack of the guard’s rifle as
he opened fire on the warriors. Their shouts and screams increased,
but Cora doubted that any of them had been hit. She turned to the
window and looked out over the muzzle of the Colt. She saw only
four men, though she’d thought there were more.

“Two on this side now,” Benteen said, as if
reading her mind.

Hix looked out his own window, saying
nothing. Weatherby whimpered in the floor, out of sight of the
windows.

The driver exhorted the horses with shouts
and curses. The stage guard fired again, and then the Indians fired
as well. One of them had a rifle, and his first shot hit the guard.
Cora saw him fall from the coach on Benteen’s side.

An arrow thunked into the side just below
Cora’s window, and she drew back. She leaned against the seat, took
a deep breath, and told herself that she’d been in worse trouble
when the lawmen came for her brother who’d stupidly helped to rob a
bank. She’d gotten out of that; she’d get out of this. She let out
her breath and turned back to the window.

The stage lurched left and right, the horse
running almost out of control. It was all Cora could do to hold
herself in the seat, and she wondered how the driver could manage
to stay aboard. Well, that wasn’t her worry. Those savages were.
She tried to line one up with the gunsight. It was impossible. She
pulled the trigger, anyway.

The pistol kicked up and back. The noise of
the explosion almost deafened her, and the black powder smoke
filled her nose and eyes. She heard other dim explosions as Hix and
Benteen began firing.

Cora was never exactly sure just what
happened next. She heard a crash and a terrible splintering noise.
The coach seemed to leap into the air. It tilted far to the right,
and Cora knew that it was going to tip over. She tried to grab hold
of something, but there was nothing within reach. She, Hix,
Benteen, and Weatherby were all thrown together in a heap, and the
coach thudded to earth on its side.

While Cora struggled to free herself from
the tangle of bodies, the coach was dragged along the ground. Dust
and dirt flew inside. The men cursed and flailed their arms.

Finally the coach stopped moving. Cora was
still intertwined with the others. She shoved arms and legs aside
and rolled over. She got her feet planted and stood up. She had
lost her small hat, and the bun of her hair had come loose, though
it was not yet straggling. The leather seat was in front of her.
The left side of the coach had now become the top.

Benteen and Hix got unknotted and stood as
well, though they had to hunch over because the side of the coach
was now the roof. Weatherby lay in a sort of ball and didn’t move.
Cora didn’t know if he was dead or merely unconscious, but it
didn’t really matter at the moment. What mattered was that she find
her pistol. Somehow, Benteen and Hix had held onto theirs.

Cora looked down and saw the pistol on top
of her bag, which lay at Benteen’s feet. The gunsmith noticed her
glance and managed to pick up the Colt. Cora took it from him.
Space in the coach was tight in its new position, and Cora was
uncomfortably aware of the closeness of the two men.

“Don’t step on Mister Weatherby,” she
said.

Neither Hix nor Benteen responded. Benteen
cocked his head as if listening, and Cora began to pay attention to
the sounds outside the coach. She heard the jingling of harness and
the stomping of the stage’s team.

“They’re taking the horses,” Hix said.
“That’s probably what they were after in the first place. Doesn’t
mean they won’t come for us, though.”

“We’ll need those horses,” Benteen said.

Hix smiled with his mouth but not his eyes.
“Only if we’re alive.”

“I don’t plan to die here,” Benteen
said.

“Nor do I,” Cora said.

“Nobody plans to die, ma’am,” Hix said. “It
just happens. You might want to save one of those bullets. The
Kiowa don’t treat women kindly. They’ll keep you alive a lot longer
than you want to be if they get hold of you.”

“I won’t allow them to get hold of me.”

“They don’t care what you’ll allow,” Hix
said. “They don’t have rules.”

He sounded to Cora as if he might know what
it was like to live without rules. A strange man, for a barber.

Benteen straightened and took a quick look
outside, then ducked back in. “Too late. They’ve cut the horses
loose and one man’s leading them off. That leaves five men for us
to defend ourselves against.”

Cora heard a ripping sound as knives sliced
through leather at the back of the coach.

“They’re getting into the boot,” Hix said.
“They know we’re trapped in here, so they won’t be in a hurry.
They’ll look for anything that might be useful to them in the
parcels and mail before they have their fun with us.”

“If there was a strongbox, they have that,
too,” Benteen said.

Cora could hardly believe they were talking
so calmly. She was about to remark on it when Weatherby groaned and
stirred.

“What happened?” he asked, looking around at
the cockeyed coach and trying to find a way to sit up.

“Can’t say,” Benteen told him. “We’re in a
fine fix, is all I know.”

“The savages?”

“Outside. They’ll be after us before long,
just like raccoons rooting a turtle out of the shell.”

Weatherby slumped back down with a whimper
and had nothing more to say.

“They are not going to root me out,” Cora
said.

“I hope not,” Benteen said, “but they’ll
try.”

Cora heard excited talk outside. She
couldn’t understand the words, but she knew the Kiowa must have
found something of great interest in the luggage. Perhaps they’d
opened her trunk and found her dresses and her undergarments. Or
something equally titillating.

It was hot and close inside the coach. Cora
wished she could open her bodice, but that of course could never
happen, not even if she was about to be killed. She thought about
her brother. She had warned him so often about his reckless
nature—she had never dreamed it would result in her being on the
run, and on a stagecoach during an Indian attack as a consequence.
He was in prison now, as she assuredly would have been had she not
fled in time. Prison was a fate she had once considered terrible
beyond words. Now, it seemed almost attractive.

No. She would not let herself think like
that. She was still alive, still free, and so she would remain.

“They’ll not have me,” she said.

“You’re right,” Benteen said, though he
didn’t sound entirely convinced. “We’ll fight them off.”

He located his bag and opened it, pulling
out some cotton wadding. He handed some to both Hix and Cora.

“Stuff that in your ears, quick! Gunfire in
here will be deafening.”

They did as he suggested, and he dropped the
remaining wadding on Weatherby, who was not so hopeless as to be
stupid. He put the wadding in his ears.

It grew quiet outside. Cora kept a close
watch on the windows above her head. After a few moments, she saw
something move. She recognized it. It was the top of her other hat,
the one that had been in her trunk. The hat moved up an inch.

Cora raised her pistol in both hands, and
when the hat moved again, she pulled the trigger. The explosion was
such that even with the wadding she had a fierce ringing in her
ears. The smoke was too thick for her to see the result of her
shot, and she did not hear a scream, but she was confident that the
bullet she fired had taken off the top of the Indian’s head.

Cora had never killed anyone before, though
she was wanted for the murder of a member of the posse that had
come for her brother. She had been careful not to hit anyone that
day.

She’d thought she’d feel different after
taking someone’s life—sad, perhaps, or guilty—but she felt neither
of those things. Elation was more like it. One of them was dead.
That left four.

As the smoke cleared, she could see
something resembling a smile on Hix’s face. Benteen’s lips were
moving, but she couldn’t make out the words. He seemed pleased,
however.

The Indians would not be pleased, she knew.
They would try even harder to get them out of the coach, but as
long as they came at them through the windows, she or the others
could pick them off.

“Did I kill him?” she asked. Her voice
sounded odd to her, and she could barely hear herself.

Benteen plucked the wadding from her right
ear. He spoke slowly and formed his words carefully, which helped
Cora to understand.

“You might have grazed him,” the gunsmith
said. “Gave him a good surprise, for sure. I was surprised, too. I
never had a schoolteacher like you.”

Cora took back the wadding and replaced it
in her ear. She was not terribly disappointed that the Indian
wasn’t dead, as long as he’d been frightened, but she was afraid
that she’d revealed too much about herself. Determination was one
thing. Pulling the trigger to kill a man was something else. She
had hoped to play the role of a modest schoolteacher to keep people
from being too interested in her. She’d thought it would be easy,
but she hadn’t counted on finding herself in a wrecked stagecoach
fighting off Kiowas with three men she’d just met. Two men, really,
she thought. Weatherby hardly counted.

“I was frightened,” she said, trying to get
back into her role, “and I must have pulled the trigger by
accident. I’m glad the poor fellow wasn’t hurt too badly.”

Seeing her lips moving, Hix and Benteen took
the wadding out of their ears. Cora repeated what she’d said and
hoped they believed her. Hix looked skeptical but made no
comment.

“Is there any way we can escape this coach?”
Cora asked, once again removing the wadding.

“Not with those Indians out there,” Benteen
said.

“I don’t hear them. Could they be gone?”

“No, they couldn’t be gone,” Hix said. “Your
ears are still ringing. They’re out there. They’re just cooking up
some kind of devilment to get to us.” This time Cora was sure a
grin creased his face. “You showed them that it wouldn’t be
easy.”

“We can’t stay here forever,” Cora said.

“No,” Benteen said. “We can’t. They know
that as well as we do, but they might not be able to wait for long.
If they’ve been out raiding, the army knows about it by now. The
soldiers will be looking for them. If we can hold out long enough,
they might leave.”

“Wouldn’t be like them to give up,” Hix
said.

“No,” Benteen admitted. “It wouldn’t.”

They stood in the cramped space, practically
breathing in each other’s faces, and Cora wondered if their
situation could really be as hopeless as it seemed.

She heard a sound like a smothered
thunderclap and at the same instant a bullet tore through the roof
of the coach and came so close to her face that she thought she
felt the heat of its passing. Splinters flew, narrowly missing her
face. One of them stuck in Benteen’s cheek, but he didn’t cry
out.

“Damn,” Benteen said. “Begging your pardon
ma’am.”

He pulled Cora down on Weatherby. Hix fell
atop them. He didn’t beg anyone’s pardon.

“One of them has a rifle,” he said.

Another bullet tore through the coach. Cora
heard muffled yells from beneath her and Benteen. Weatherby. He was
the safest of them all, but had no courage.

“We need to get the one with the rifle,” Hix
said.

Benteen pushed him aside and said, “My
pleasure.”

He stood up and thrust himself through the
center window on what was now the top of their compartment. He
pulled his boots up just in time to avoid a third bullet that
cracked into the coach.

Cora heard three muffled shots from above
and then a couple of thunks against the coach as arrows struck it.
Benteen dropped back down inside.

“Get him?” Hix asked.

“Nope,” Benteen said.

“Damn. Sorry about the language, ma’am.”

“Got his rifle though,” Benteen said. “It
won’t be any good to them now.”

Cora found herself wishing that Benteen had
been a little better shot and gotten both the Indian and the
rifle.

“Was there another rifle?” she asked.

“Didn’t see one,” Benteen said. He paused.
“Didn’t really have time to look around.”

Cora had heard that the Kiowa were as deadly
with their bows as most men with a rifle, but at least an arrow
couldn’t penetrate the coach, not with enough power behind to do
anyone any harm. Something else occurred to her.

“Why is this happening?” she asked. “I
thought the Kiowa were at peace with us.”

“It’s a shaky kind of peace,” Hix said. “Any
offense can set them off—and usually does, whether it’s real or
not. Most likely it’s real, though. Things have gotten out of hand
between townspeople and the Indians more than once. There’s buffalo
hunters around here, too. They don’t get along too well with the
Indians, and the Indians hate them.”

“I can understand why,” Cora said, thinking
of all the dead animals that the Indians would no longer be able to
use for food and clothing.

“Yeah,” Benteen said, “but when the killing
starts, understanding doesn’t matter much. Whatever happened, it
wasn’t our fault. We weren’t anywhere around. Doesn’t matter to the
Kiowa, though. We just happened to be handy. That’s enough for them
when something gets them stirred up.”

More arrows thudded into the side of the
coach. Cora wondered why the Indians bothered, but only for a few
seconds. Then she smelled the smoke.

“Well, that does it,” Benteen said. “We
can’t stay in here.”

“First one out’s a dead man,” Hix said.
“They’ll be waiting.” He gave the drummer a light kick. “Let’s give
‘em Weatherby. He’s useless.”

“No, no, my God, no,” Weatherby said.

“That wouldn’t be right,” Cora said, though
she agreed that Weatherby was useless.

BOOK: Kiowa Vengeance
3.91Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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