With his long legs, Nighthawk made it to the knob first. Several boulders were scattered at its base. Moving with great care and gentleness, especially for his size, the warrior ducked behind one of them and leaned down to place Artemis on the ground. The big slab of rock would protect the baby, although there might still be some danger from ricochets.

  Preacher wasn’t far behind him. He eased Apollo down next to Artemis.

  A rifle ball whined off the boulder and passed close by Preacher’s ear. He crouched lower and again fired the Colt toward the ridge. The range was too far for the handgun to be effective, although a lucky shot was always possible.

  Nighthawk ran around the rocks and held out his arms as Audie galloped up. Audie barely slowed his mount before he left the saddle in a dive, bringing his rifle and Preacher’s with him. He dropped the weapons as he sailed through the air for an instant before Nighthawk caught him. They had carried out this maneuver in many fights over the years when Audie needed to dismount in a hurry. Nighthawk used Audie’s momentum to help him turn and swing his diminutive friend to the ground.

  Preacher was out in the open, too, as the men hidden on the ridge continued firing. A rifle ball stirred the fringe on his buckskin shirt’s left sleeve. He scooped both rifles from the ground and tossed Audie’s toward Nighthawk. The warrior caught it. The weapon looked a little like a child’s toy in his massive paw. He passed it on to Audie as both of them ran behind the boulders again.

  Preacher hunted cover behind another of the big rocks. He stayed low while he checked his rifle. It was loaded but didn’t have a percussion cap on the lock. He carried a pouch containing shot and caps attached to his belt behind the holster for the right-hand Colt, as well as a small, brass-plated powder flask. A patch box on the rifle’s stock held cloth patches in which to wrap the lead balls before they were shoved down the muzzle with the rifle’s ramrod.

  With those supplies, Preacher could get off several more rounds, but the capacity certainly wasn’t endless. He would need to make every shot count.

  He eared back the hammer and thumbed a percussion cap onto the nipple. After taking his hat off and setting it aside, he edged his head up for a quick look at the ridge where the ambushers were holed up.

  Their rifles had fallen silent. Now that Preacher, Audie, and Nighthawk had taken cover, the would-be killers no longer had any easy targets. They weren’t very good marksmen in the first place, Preacher mused; otherwise, they wouldn’t have missed all the shots they had taken so far.

  On the other hand, he recalled that the two infants were important to these men and they didn’t want the little ones hurt. Preacher didn’t doubt for a second those were more of Mack Ozark’s men over there, so they might be taking extra care not to hit the babies.

  He said as much to Audie, calling over to the former professor, “That’s got to be more of Ozark’s bunch takin’ potshots at us.”

  “It’s certainly the most reasonable explanation,” Audie agreed. “If this fellow Ozark has as many followers as Dutch Charley said, he could have split them up into smaller search parties. The two men who escaped from the trading post could have run into some of the others and joined forces with them to orchestrate this ambush.”

  Preacher looked along the trail. Horse and the other animals had trotted a couple of hundred yards before stopping to graze. They were well out of the line of fire, although Horse would come galloping back without hesitation if Preacher whistled for him. Preacher wasn’t going to do that unless it was absolutely necessary; he wouldn’t place the stallion in harm’s way without cause.

  He wondered briefly where Dog was. He was a little surprised the big cur hadn’t warned them about the ambush. He hoped nothing had happened to the shaggy varmint.

  Worrying about that could wait until later. For now, he watched the ridge with keen interest. He was ready to snap the rifle to his shoulder and fire if he spotted a suitable target. Both sides, though, seemed to have settled into a waiting game.

  The tense silence stretched out for long minutes. Preacher wasn’t prone to nerves. He could wait, silent and unmoving, for hours when it was necessary to force an enemy into making the first move. That ability had saved his life numerous times in the past.

  Most men couldn’t do that. They would get antsy after a while and do something even when it wasn’t in their best interest. Preacher wasn’t surprised when a shout came from the ridge on the other side of the trail.

  “Hey, you boys over there in the rocks! You hear me?”

  It was a harsh, male voice. Preacher didn’t recall ever hearing it before. He glanced over at Audie, who shook his head. Preacher took that as agreement that he shouldn’t respond yet. Better to let their enemies stew a little more.

  “I know you can hear me, damn it!” the man yelled after a minute or so. “Listen, we don’t want to kill you!”

  Preacher grinned. After everything that had happened, nobody in their right mind would believe that claim.

  “All we want is those babies! You give ’em to us, and we’ll let you ride away. I give you my word on that, boys. Turn ’em over to us, safe and sound, and I swear nothin’ will happen to you.”

  Preacher waited a moment longer just to draw things out and then called back, “How do we know we can believe you?”

  “Because I give you my word!” the spokesman answered without hesitation.

  “That ain’t nowhere near good enough! How about this? You let my friends get the horses and ride on out of gunshot range, and then you can have these younkers. But until my friends are safe, I’ll be waitin’ right here to cut these babies’ throats if you try to double-cross us!”

  Even though Audie had to know Preacher was bluffing, a horrified expression appeared on his face.

  The gunman on the ridge sounded equally horrified. “You’d murder innocent children? What kind of a man are you?”

  “The kind who ain’t all that eager to trust somebody who’s been shootin’ at him!”

  The man on the ridge didn’t respond immediately. Preacher figured he was talking things over with the rest of the ambushers.

  After a few minutes, the man shouted, “All of you can ride away and leave the babies there in those rocks. We won’t shoot at you. What do you think about that?”

  “I think you’re still askin’ me to believe you! I ain’t loco enough to do that, mister!”

  Frustration was obvious in the man’s voice as he responded, “Why the hell do you even care about those young’uns? They ain’t yours! You just threatened to kill ’em, so you can’t have any strong feelin’s for ’em!”

  “Maybe they’re worth money!”

  In truth, Preacher and his companions had no idea why Mack Ozark’s men wanted so badly to reclaim the babies. It made sense that there had to be some good reason, though—and money was the reason men did many things.

  The suggestion drew a response. “Wait, you’re thinkin’ about sellin’ those infants? To who?”

  “Maybe to whoever meets our price.”

  “What’s your price?”

  “You tell us what they’re worth to you, and we’ll tell you if it’s enough!”

  Once again, silence settled down. Preacher wasn’t going to sell Apollo and Artemis, of course. He was both stalling for time and trying to tease out some possibly useful information from their enemies.

  But the faint sound of a rock shifting somewhere above and behind warned him that other people could try to stall for time, too. His instincts took over as he dived to his right, rolled over, and came up propped on his left elbow as he looked up the knob’s slope.

  A shot blasted above him as Preacher caught a glimpse of a man pulling himself over the rocks. The pistol ball splattered against the boulder he’d been using to shield himself from the killers on the other side of the trail. Preacher’s right hand jerked up with a Paterson Colt gripped in it. The heavy revolver boomed and gouted powdersmoke.

  The man who had climbed over the knob to attack them from behind had gotten to his feet. He fired a second shot just as Preacher squeezed off his first. The attacker’s shot went wild and landed in the trail between the knob and the ridge.

  The mountain man’s aim was more accurate, even though firing uphill like that was tricky. The bullet struck the man’s left foot and knocked that leg out from under him. He went down hard, letting out a startled yell as he toppled over, and then he came rolling down the steep slope straight at Preacher.

  The fall was pure happenstance, but it was bad luck for Preacher. He snapped another shot at the falling man but missed. Then, as Preacher tried to get to his feet, the out-of-control hombre smashed right into him.

  The impact drove Preacher against the rock at his back. Pain lanced through him, centered around his ribs. He knew he wasn’t badly hurt—yet—but the ambusher was doing his best to change that. He grabbed the wrist of Preacher’s gun hand with his left hand and forced it aside; with his right, he hammered punishing blows at the mountain man’s face and torso.

  Preacher brought his knee up and sank it into the attacker’s groin. The man howled in pain and bent forward. The grip on Preacher’s wrist slipped, allowing him to jerk free. He slammed the heavy revolver into the side of the man’s head and heard bone crunch as the blow smashed the skull. The man fell to the ground at Preacher’s feet and jerked and twitched uncontrollably as he died.

  He hadn’t been alone in the attack from behind. Two more men fired down at Audie and Nighthawk from the top of the rocky mound. The Crow warrior and the diminutive former professor flung themselves in opposite directions as bullets whistled and whined around them.

  Nighthawk rolled, came up on his knees, and drew his arm back. It flashed forward and the tomahawk he threw turned over and over in the air as it flew toward the gunmen. The throw was perfect. The tomahawk’s keen edge struck one of the men on the right cheek and cut deeply into his face, blinding him on that side and making him shriek as he stumbled and fell.

  Audie’s short-barreled rifle cracked and the other attacker lurched back as the ball struck him in the left shoulder. He managed to hang on to his gun, though, and continued firing. The heavy booms from the weapon told Preacher the man had a Paterson Colt, too.

  Preacher aimed through the cloud of powdersmoke around the man and fired. He couldn’t tell at first if the shot found its target, but then the man sagged forward and began rolling down the hill. The loose-limbed tumble was ample evidence that he was dead.

  The man who had been downed by Nighthawk’s tomahawk was still screaming, but the sound stopped abruptly with a gurgle proclaiming that death had claimed him, too.

  No more attackers came over the top of the rocky mound, but a fresh volley of shots crashed from the ridge on the other side of the trail. Preacher and his friends were forced to dive for cover again. As he twisted around, Preacher spotted four men charging toward the boulders, attacking from that side under cover of the resumed gunfire.

  Preacher had set his rifle aside, but he didn’t need it for close work like this. This was the sort of fight the Patersons were made for. He filled both hands, came up in a crouch behind the rock where he had taken cover, and yelled out his rage as he began firing. The Colts boomed and bucked in his hands, left, right, left, right, as he laid down a deadly storm of lead that scythed through the men charging toward him.

  They were devastated by the mountain man’s firepower. Two men staggered and fell immediately, cut down by Preacher’s lethal onslaught. Another bent double, clutched his bullet-torn belly, and began stumbling around in circles. The fourth man threw on the brakes, but any thought he might have had about retreating vanished as Nighthawk hurdled over a stone slab and caught the man’s shoulder in his left hand.

  At the same time, the knife in Nighthawk’s right hand buried itself in the man’s body in an upward-angling thrust. Once, twice, and again a third time, the blade ripped into the attacker, turning the man’s midsection into a bloody mess. Nighthawk tossed the dying man aside and began running across the trail toward the ridge.

  Preacher saw a man rise up over there to take aim at the charging warrior with a rifle. The mountain man snatched up his own rifle and fired first, a snap shot guided solely by instinct.

  But it was deadly accurate and the would-be killer disappeared as the ball from Preacher’s rifle struck him and knocked him backward. A heartbeat later, Nighthawk reached the base of the ridge and started climbing.

  Audie had reloaded his rifle and fired another shot at the crest to cover Nighthawk’s ascent. No one else stuck a head up, and Nighthawk reached the top in a matter of moments. He scrambled over and stood up as he looked around. Then he turned toward Preacher and Audie and spread his arms wide.

  “They’re gone,” Audie said. “Either we killed them all, or the ones who were left fled.”

  Preacher stepped over to the boulder where Apollo and Artemis had been placed for safety. He knelt beside the infants, who were making restless noises but not really crying.

  After a moment, he looked up at Audie and announced, “The young’uns are fine, just annoyed by all the racket. None o’ those ricochets came close to ’em.”

  “Thank heavens for that,” Audie said as he came over to join Preacher. “Nighthawk is coming back.”

  Nighthawk slid down the ridge and trotted back over to the mound where he and his companions had taken cover. With a mixture of sign language and grunts, he communicated that he had heard more than one horse swiftly departing the area.

  “Several of them got away,” Audie said, “which means that they’ll probably join forces with the rest of Ozark’s men.”

  “And we’ll have to deal with ’em again,” Preacher said with a grim look on his rugged face.

  “Yes, I’d say that’s highly likely. But we’ve fended off one attack and the children are fine, so we have to be thankful for that.”

  Nighthawk pointed. Preacher looked up the trail and saw Dog trotting toward them. The big cur came up to him and nuzzled his leg.

  “You missed the whole fight, you shaggy varmint,” he said. “Didn’t you hear all that shootin’ goin’ on?”

  Dog just looked up at him. Preacher laughed and shook his head.

  “I’m glad you’re all right, old son,” he said as he scratched Dog’s ears. “I was a mite worried that somethin’ had happened to you. Next time we’re headin’ into an ambush, I expect you to let us know about it.”

  Dog turned and ran off again.

  Audie laughed and said, “Sometimes he seems to have such an unusual connection with you that I almost forget he isn’t human, Preacher. Don’t be too hard on him.”

  “That ain’t likely,” Preacher said. “He’s saved my hide too many times for that.” He smiled as Dog stopped, looked back at the humans, and wagged his shaggy tail. “And I reckon there’s a good chance he probably will again.”

  CHAPTER 8

  The next two days passed uneventfully as the mountain man and his companions continued heading northwest. They were more than halfway to their destination, Preacher estimated.

  As they sat beside their small campfire that night, he said, “I’m a mite surprised we ain’t run into more of Ozark’s men. Maybe ol’ Mack his own self.”

  “Based on our previous encounters with them, they know we’re heading in the same direction they came from,” Audie pointed out. “That conclusion is based, of course, on the assumption that Ozark is making his headquarters somewhere in the vicinity of Emerald Creek. If that’s the case, he could have decided that the most efficient course of action is simply to wait for us to come to them.”

  “That makes a heap o’ sense, all right,” Preacher said. “And they’re liable to have a warm welcome waitin’ for us when we get there, too.”

  “Indeed.”

  Knowing that they might not run into any more ambushes didn’t make Preacher any less alert. He was still watchful as they traveled on through the beautiful, thickly wooded hills the next day.

  Audie had Apollo and Artemis eating potatoes, carrots, and beans he had brought from Dutch Charley’s garden. He cooked the vegetables thoroughly until they were soft and easily mashed to a consistency the youngsters could handle. He worried that they weren’t getting enough healthy food, but there was only so much he could do in that respect.

  The three men took turns standing guard at night, plus Dog and Horse were close by and would let Preacher know immediately if they sensed anything threatening. He was asleep that night while Nighthawk had the sentry duty, but Dog nosing his arm woke him. Instantly, he was fully awake and alert. As he lifted his head to look around, Horse suddenly let out a startled whinny. The stallion was disturbed, too.

  Something was wrong, no doubt about that. Preacher pushed himself up on an elbow. The fire had burned down to embers and gave off only a faint glow, but that was enough for him to spot Nighthawk on the other side of the clearing where they had made camp.

  The Crow warrior was on his feet, facing toward the trees, his tomahawk gripped in his hand as he stood there tensely, obviously aware of a threat. Preacher didn’t say anything because he didn’t want to distract Nighthawk or warn whoever might be lurking out there in the darkness.

  A heartbeat later, there was no longer any question about what was wrong. A towering shape loomed out of the shadows and loosed a terrible roar.

  The single most terrifying creature in the mountains—a grizzly bear—had come out of the night to attack the camp.

  A huge paw with deadly claws jutting from it swiped at Nighthawk with blinding speed. But Nighthawk’s reflexes were incredibly swift, as well. He ducked under the grizzly’s attack and struck with the tomahawk, aiming the blow at the beast’s belly as it stood up on its hind legs. Then Nighthawk dived to the side as the bear continued lumbering forward.

  Snapping and snarling ferociously, Dog darted toward the bear and drew its attention away from Nighthawk. The grizzly made a swipe at the big cur, too, but Dog was too fast and avoided it.

  At the same time, Audie scrambled out of his bedroll and scooped both infants from the ground. He scurried away to put some distance between himself and the unwanted visitor to the camp.