Chapter 10

Josh and I had split the reward money from the Wainwright capture, so I had less money than I would have had if I had been operating alone, but I now had a partner that I could count on to watch my back. The swap was more than welcome!

Martha and Josh got along very well, but I could not see anything coming of it. Well, what do I know? I am just a man.

Anyway, I spent two weeks at home sleeping with my wife. No sex, though. The midwife had told her to forgo sex for at least four months to let her insides recover from the pregnancy and birth. Neither Helen nor I knew any better, so we went along with what the midwife recommended. That was hard on me in more ways than one, but I managed to survive. On the other hand, them night feedings started to get to me, again.

I survived for two weeks before I talked Josh into going out with me bounty hunting. As usual, we headed for Arbuckle to collect the latest wanted posters. We had an uneventful trip and were a little bit disappointed when we were left alone. Was it because there were two of us?

We picked up a few new posters at Arbuckle. We had not heard anything to cause us to have an opinion, so we flipped a coin, a Mexican silver peso, and wound up heading northwest. Well, that was sort of toward El Paso, so it might mean some good luck for us. We did have a good feeling about this part of the trip because we had a windfall almost immediately. We came upon a stagecoach robbery about two hours out of Arbuckle.

There were four bandits, and they already had the coach stopped and the passengers standing around with their hands in the air. There was no sign of the crew, so we figured that they must be dead. There was one woman and two men as passengers. While we were still too far away to be of any help, one of the bandits grabbed the arm of the woman. A male passenger tried to object, and he was immediately shot in the gut by another of the bandits.

The passenger fell to the ground, and Josh and I assumed that he was dead. The next thing we knew, there was another gunshot, and the second male passenger fell to the ground, also presumably dead. All four of the bandits now pointed pistols at the woman and ordered her to do something. She pulled her dress over her head and was left standing in the road wearing only her boots.

By this time, Josh and I were riding as fast as we could push our horses toward the site of the robbery. The woman was dragged to the ground on her back and one of the bandits was in the process of dropping his pants by the time we were close enough to do some good.

The bandits were so interested in the upcoming rape that they did not even know that we were riding toward them. Josh pulled his Winchester from its sheath and stopped his horse so that he would have a stable firing platform. He fired a shot at the man about to penetrate the woman and hit him in the back. That was enough to tell the other three bandits that they had company.

Those three drew their pistols and turned to face us. Josh had not moved after his first shot, and he fired again, knocking down another of the bandits. By this time, I was close enough to use my pistols, so I began shooting at the other two bandits. I am embarrassed to say that it took me five shots to kill the other two bandits, but I was on the back of a galloping horse, so that is my excuse.

I must say that I was unforgivably lucky that I was not hit by a bullet, but my horse was hit by two shots. He did not die immediately, and that was why I survived. He came to a full stop and slowly sagged to the ground, and that was why I was able to escape any injury. Dammit, I was really pissed off: that was a good horse!

The woman was now lying on the ground and crying in full-blown hysterics. I cannot say that I blamed her, but that did make it more difficult to help her. Josh and I had to struggle to get her dress back on her, and that seemed to break her complete concentration on herself. At least, I guessed that was what happened, but she looked around at Josh and me and fainted dead away.

I wiped her forehead with a cloth dipped in water, and that brought her back to consciousness. "Oh, my God! My husband!" She rose to her knees and embraced the first man to be shot by the bandits. "John ... John, open your eyes and speak to me!"

I bent down to her and said, "Ma'am, he cannot do that. I hate to say this, but he is dead." (Yes, I know, I am famous for my tact and considered choice of words.)

The woman looked at me in disbelief and turned back to the dead man. That was when she fainted again.

Josh said, "We need to find the crew. Can you climb up to the driver's box? My knees do not like that sort of thing anymore."

I nodded and made the climb. Both the driver and the shotgun guard were lying on the floor of the box, both quite dead. "I found them, but they are both dead. I can drive the team as far as the relay station if I do not try to push the mules." I climbed back down and said to Josh, "Let us put the dead passengers and the woman inside the coach. We can put the dead bandits in the boot. I will just push the crew to one side enough to let me sit on the driver's seat. You can ride your horse, and we can tie the four horses of the bandits to the rear of the coach. Help me strip my stuff from my horse and we can leave."

It took nearly an hour to do all of that and get the tree limb from in front of the mules. Once all of that was done, I drove the mules while Josh rode beside us. Actually, the mules were very easy to drive. In fact, they pretty well drove themselves once I got them started. Mules are very smart, and they will usually do the right thing if given the chance.