Bloody Trail (26 page)

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.

Weatherby whimpered, and Hix toed him again,
a little harder this time.

“
We won’t give them
anybody,” Benteen said. “We’ll wait awhile. The coach is heavy
wood. It won’t burn fast, and the smoke won’t get in here for a
while. It’ll get thicker outside, though.”

Cora didn’t see how that would help, but Hix
seemed to.

“
Right,” he said. “We
can’t wait too long, though. What’s the plan?”

“
When the smoke gets
thicker, you and I will pop out the windows and start shooting.
Hope to hit somebody.”

“
Like a jack-in-the-box,
grinning like the devil,” Hix said.

“
Let’s hope a pair of
devils can do the trick,” Benteen said.

Cora thought it over. Acting demure wasn’t
going to help any in this situation. She could go back to that
later.

“
Three devils,” she said.
“I’ll be shooting, too.”

“
Now, look, ma’am,”
Benteen said, “I don’t think—”

“
It doesn’t matter what
you think. Three guns are better than two, even if I don’t hit
anybody. You know it.”

Benteen looked at Hix. Hix shrugged.

“
All right, then,” Benteen
said. “Wait until I give the word. Hix will take the right window,
and Miss Sloane will take the left. Hix, you know what to
do.”

“
Sure,” Hix
said.

Cora knew there was something they weren’t
telling her, but their faces gave nothing away. She didn’t have
long to think about it because of in spite of what Benteen had
said, smoke had begun to gather in the coach

“
Ready?” Benteen
said.

Hix and Cora nodded.

“
On three,” Benteen said.
“One . . . two . . . three!”

The three of them popped up. Fire licked at
the bottom of the coach. Cora could see only dimly through the
smoke, but it appeared to her that the Indians were far out of
range of the pistols. She fired a shot, anyway.

Hix fired, too, but not Benteen. He’d
somehow opened the door.

“
Look out!” he yelled, and
he flipped the door open.

It banged down against the side of the
coach, but Hix had moved out of the way. Benteen climbed through
the doorway and dropped to the ground. Hix was right behind him.
Cora held her fire. She didn’t want to shoot one of them in the
back by accident.

The two men ran toward the Kiowa, but not in
a straight line. When they were close enough Hix stopped and fired.
Benteen kept moving.

One of the Indians dropped from his horse.
The others didn’t seem to know what to do. Hix started to run
again, and Benteen stopped to take a shot. Another Indian dropped.
Benteen was running before the Kiowa hit the ground.

The other two Indians turned their horses’
heads and kicked their heels into their sides. They galloped away,
followed by the mounts of the fallen men. Hix and Benteen stopped
to watch them go.

Cora was strong and agile enough to pull
herself through the doorway of the coach. It wasn’t easy, not with
her dress and undergarments hanging on things, but she crawled out
and jumped through the smoke. She landed awkwardly and fell, but
she was back on her feet before Benteen and Hix got to her.

“
Where’s Weatherby?”
Benteen asked.

“
Still inside, I suppose,”
Cora said.

They all looked at the coach and saw
Weatherby creeping out. He toppled to the ground, but no one went
to help him up.

“
What you did was very
brave,” Cora said to Benteen and Hix.

“
Or insane,” Benteen
said.

“
It worked,” Hix said.
“Indians don’t like to deal with crazy people.”

“
You killed two of them,”
Cora pointed out.

“
They like dealing with
crazy people who kill them even less,” Benteen said.

Weatherby removed his coat and used it to
beat the flames on the coach.

“
He turned out to be good
for something, after all,” Hix said. “We should help him. I have a
bag in there.”

He and Benteen joined Weatherby, and they
soon had the fires extinguished. When they were done, Benteen went
around to the unburned side and climbed into the coach. He tossed
out the bags, including Cora’s reticule.

“
What do we do now?” Cora
asked when the fire was out. “The next stage station must be miles
away.”

“
Six or eight,” Benteen
said. “And the last one’s about the same.”

“
There’s a ranch a few
miles from here,” Hix said. “Two or three. The Manning place. It’s
a lot closer than the stage station.”

“
I’m not sure I can make
it that far,” Weatherby said.

“
Up to you,” Benteen said.
“Stay here if you want to. Maybe the Kiowa won’t come
back.”

“
Or maybe they will,” Hix
said.

“
Couldn’t there be more of
them along our way?” Cora asked.

“
Sure could,” Benteen
said. “We can’t stay here, though. Those two might bring back some
others.”

Cora looked back at the coach. The clothing
from her trunk was strewn all around.

“
I’m going to put my
things back in my trunk,” she said.

“
You can’t carry that
trunk with you.”

“
I know that.” Cora was
demure again. “It’s not seemly to leave them lying out.”

“
No, ma’am, I guess not,”
Benteen said. He gave her a look.

Cora ignored him and went back to the coach.
She pulled the trunk a good distance from the smoldering hulk and
put things in it as best she could. It didn’t take long. The Kiowa
had broken the latch, but she closed the trunk anyway.

Benteen helped her stow it in the boot,
along with the bags. He’d taken some ammunition and the remaining
revolver from his, and Hix and Weatherby had also gotten a few
items from theirs.

“
Ready now?” Benteen
said.

“
Yes,” Cora said. “Which
way is that ranch you mentioned, Mister Hix?”

Hix pointed back down the road. “We go that
way for a while, then cut off to the left. You sure you’re up to a
long walk?”

“
Certainly,” Cora said,
and she set off at a brisk pace.

“
I sure never had a
schoolteacher like her,” Benteen repeated to Hix.

Cora heard him, but she paid him no mind. She
kept on walking, the bottoms of her skirts lightly stirring the
dust.

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Book 1: Bloody Trail

Book 2: Kiowa Vengeance

Book 3: Murder in Dogleg
City

Book 4: The Taylor County
War

Book 5: Showdown at Demon's
Drop

Book 6: Hell on the
Prairie

Coming: Book 7: The Quick and the
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Book 8: Night of the
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Book 9: A Wolf Creek
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