Judgment Day. William W. Johnstone

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ top of a distant rise, Lone Wolf waited for his captains to return to him for a parley while he watched the battle.

      It was not going well. In fact, it was going very poorly. The whites picked off his men from the top of their wall like his forefathers had once picked off the mighty grazing buffalo from the cover of long grass.

      “I thought you said you had scouted,” grumbled Juanito, who had returned limping badly, a bullet imbedded in his thigh.

      “I did,” snapped Lone Wolf. “Just last week.”

      He had, too. All was just as he’d seen it, except for those big wagons they’d just observed hurrying to the relative safety of the inner wall. Lone Wolf knew they were freighters, daring to cart their wares across Apache land. And from past experience, he knew what they carried.

      He smiled to himself. Very soon, there would be new toys for the children and pretty cloth for the women, and the Apache would all have a rich supply of cattle and pigs and flour and salt to last through the summer and winter, and new ponies.

      “Your information was not very good,” said another brave, his voice mingled with the cries and shrieks of battle, and of men dying.

      Bobcat Who Snarls added, “It was not good, Lone Wolf. The walls are too high for such men as we. It would take men the size of gods to step over them.”

      “So said Raven Lids,” announced the brave who rode in with Bobcat Who Snarls. The dust still rose from his shoulders in clouds. “He said, ‘Then I will be that tall,’ and stood on his pony. He lies where they shot him off.” His tone indicated much cheating and untrustworthiness on the part of the whites.

      “Pick up the dead,” said Lone Wolf, “and bring them back. The wounded too. But do not stop the fight. We can win. You and you,” he said, pointing first to one man, then the next, “take your men to the side of the town where earth greets the sun. Attack strongly. You, Bobcat Who Snarls, you get back to the gate.”

      Bobcat Who Snarls didn’t look too happy, but went.

      “Juanito,” commanded Lone Wolf, “get yourself to the medicine man.” He pointed to a brave squatted in the brush, about a stone’s throw away. “Tell him I said to mend your leg before you go back to battle.”

      Juanito grunted, then left him, awkwardly hobbling toward the medicine man.

      Lone Wolf glanced to the west. The sun was falling close to the horizon. There would not be much time left for fighting today.

      Victory might have to be left for tomorrow. If this was the case, so be it.

      Ward Wanamaker, the town’s deputy and the man who had organized the bucket brigades once the wagons were all inside and the stockade closed up against the heathen, was busily hauling bucket after bucket up from the well.

      It was no easy feat, because the water level was rapidly falling. He knew that if they didn’t get these fires put out pretty quickly, they were going to have to let the fires have their way.

      He didn’t want that.

      His back aching, Ward hauled up another bucket, handed it to the next man in line, and sent down an empty. It was halfway to its target when he felt the arrow sink into his shoulder with a sharp sting, then a burning ache.

      He fell to his knees, and then face-forward into the dirt of the street.

      His bucket rope was grabbed by someone, he couldn’t see who, and he heard a voice shout, “Morelli! Dr. Morelli!”

      And then he felt hands dragging him out of the way while he repeated over and over, “Get me up, get me on my feet, get me up.”

      No one listened, not even his own body.

      He passed out.

      4

      Rap rap rap.

      Jenny looked up sharply, and Matt fairly leaped to his feet. Both remained silent, though, waiting to see if the knuckle-rapper had a blade and a spear or an arrow, or if he was friendly.

      After a moment, a voice came through the floorboards.

      “Mr. MacDonald? Ma’am?” Curly hissed from above. “You folks down there?”

      “Yes, Curly,” Matt said loud and clear. He looked relieved. Some of the color was even seeping back into his face. He climbed up the ladder, calling out, “Hang on, just got to throw this bolt….”

      One-handed, he slid free the four-by-four beam that secured the trapdoor, then gingerly opened it upward. Curly beamed down at them, relief coloring his freckled cheeks.

      “Sure glad to find you folks all right,” he said, and after making way to let Matt climb up, stuck his arm down toward Jenny.

      It figured that Matthew wouldn’t give her a second glance of concern, let alone a first one, Jenny thought. Had her mother ever felt this way about her father? She hoped not. And if she was wrong about her folks, she sure hoped that they’d had a nice hired man or two around. Like Curly.

      He helped her up the steps, then shyly let go and took a step backward. “Thank you, Curly,” she said, more for Matt’s benefit than Curly’s. Matt didn’t even turn around, and Curly grunted nervously. At least Curly acknowledged that she was there, she thought.

      Matt was at the front window. He said, “They went right past us,” and then, “They’re burning the town.”

      Jenny looked past his shoulder and saw the smoke rising up north. Not the whole town, she thought. It’s just the church again, like two years ago. Jenny had been in town the last time the Apache had come. Then, they’d set the church ablaze and shot her brother. But the town hadn’t had the stockade up back then. She told herself that everyone was fine and that the Apache were fighting a losing battle.

      And that her brother had everything under control.

      For once, she was glad that her husband didn’t go into town on Saturdays.

      Jason probably already had enough on his plate without Matthew elbowing his way in.

      Jason was at the top of the eastern portion of the stockade, emptying his rifle at a swarm of Apache—a knot of them really—who had attempted to break through the stockade wall. Now, three of them lay dead outside it. A fourth clung to his pony’s mane, his blood flowing down over the horse’s withers and front legs like red war paint.

      Jason raised the muzzle of his rifle and relaxed a hair as the fifth and six warriors rode away, their bloody comrade and his pony between them.

      He twisted his head at the sound and creak of approaching footsteps. Dr. Morelli climbed up the ladder and stepped up to the plank that supported Jason.

      “How’s it going?” he asked as he hunkered down.

      Jason shrugged. “I doubt anybody’ll try to come in this way again for at least ten, fifteen minutes.”

      Morelli grinned despite himself. “It seems to me to be getting a little quieter down at the south wall.”

      “Don’t СКАЧАТЬ