Chapter 4

I raced to the two other exterior doors and dropped the bars across them, too. Fortunately, Pa had never removed the iron bars across the windows he had installed to keep out marauding Comanches 12 years ago. Thus, my house was as nearly impregnable as any fort, as long as they didn't resort to fire. Of course, I could suffer a lot of broken glass, but I could live with that. Somewhere along the line, Pa had acquired a Henry rifle, and I had plenty of ammunition for it. As the saying goes, "I was loaded for bear and aching to meet one."

The response to my initial shot had been a fusillade of bullets striking my front door and the surrounding windows, so my initial firing ports were already open. I emptied my Walker Colt, 4 shots, at the men still on their horses. I was still so mad that I was jerking off the shots, so I didn't hit anybody, but it wasn't for lack of trying.

I came to my senses when the hammer hit on the empty cylinder chamber, so I stepped back away from the windows and took the time to reload the Walker. This time, I figured that I might need the extra shot, so I loaded all 6 chambers of the cylinder. Meanwhile, those galoots outside kept pouring bullets into my front door. I figured that, at the the rate they were going, I could pay for repairing the damage by selling the lead from all those bullets!

The door was thick and made of hickory, so it was going to take them a month of Sundays to knock it down just by shooting at it. I hoped that they kept wasting their ammunition shooting at that door; the more they shot at it, the less they would have to shoot at me. Now that I had calmed down, I realized that I needed to shoot something more accurate than my pistols, so I got the Henry from the gun rack. I poked the barrel just a little ways out the window and fired a shot at an arm and shoulder I could see sticking out from behind a big old pecan tree near the front door. I didn't want to stick the barrel out too far, because I didn't want to give some brave fool the idea to grab it as I tried to get off a shot.

My shot at the man behind one of my favorite shade trees missed, but my second shot at the same man, who must have been a slow learner, winged him bad enough to put him out of the fight. I hoped he was stupid enough to come to Dr. Amy Horten later on for treatment! I knew just how I was going to "treat" him if he did!

I now had 4 men to fight, a tough task, but not impossible. They certainly didn't have enough men to beat me unless I got awfully careless, and I didn't plan on that. I wasn't sure if I wanted help or not. My house was just on the edge of town, so somebody was bound to hear the shooting if it went on long enough. That was sure to bring help, I thought. But my main concern was not letting anybody escape, if I could help it.

The battle had gone on for about 10 minutes. At first, the rate of fire had been furious on both sides, but it had slowed down as we needed to reload. I wasn't sure about them, but I was using paper cartridges that I had made up, myself, to reload, so I could reload the Walker or the LeMat in about 60-90 seconds, and I could reload the Henry about that fast. I didn't think that my enemy was so well prepared, but I wasn't going to take a chance this early in the game.

I had two extra pistols which were also loaded and ready for use. They were both Walker Colts, so I didn't have a problem switching from one gun to another, except when I was using my LeMat. Actually, I had worked on the guns so that they all had as near the same trigger action as I could get them, just in case the Comanches had ever decided to come back. This was near enough to that situation that I was mighty glad that I had done so. Anyway, I had 18 bullets in the Colts, 9 in the LeMat, 14 in the Henry, and one shotgun load in the LeMat. Since I reloaded at every opportunity, I was never short of something to shoot.

They never let up the pressure at the front door, and I was beginning to get a little pissed at them for the mess they were making of my front yard. My flower beds might never recover! Hey, there was a boot sticking out of cover too far. With a little luck I just might ... Got him! It's going to be a while before that galoot can walk comfortably, if ever. He's pretty much trapped, now, because that ankle will never hold up for him to get on a horse. I quit worrying about him and looked for another target.

I was now down to 3 men to fight, so I was making progress. I needed to wrap this up pretty soon, since my patient with the bullet hole in his arm was in need of treatment. The powder smoke was working in my favor. There was a cloud collected in front of my firing port, so the galoots outside had a hard time getting a good aim at me. On the other hand, their smoke was giving away their position whenever they tried to move to another firing position. It was obvious to me that I was going to win this fight if only they would stay around long enough.

Dammit, they must have figured that out, too. Somebody, I guess it was the "captain," called for a retreat. They crawled back out of the decent field of fire and climbed on their horses. The two wounded men were helped on their horses, and the whole bunch skedaddled. I fired off a few parting shots with the Henry, but I doubt that I hit anyone. I was angry that they had escaped, but I now had time to look after my patient, Andy Taylor. Given that I had to make a choice, I had rather look after Taylor than fight with the damyankees.

As quickly as I could, I changed back into my "doctor" clothes and hurried in to look after Taylor. He was still where I had left him, but lying on the floor. He had fainted, I supposed from a combination of pain and loss of blood. As gently as I could, I dragged him back into the examining room, but he was too heavy for me to put up on the table with just my own efforts. At that moment, I heard a banging on my front door, so I grabbed up one of my Colts and rushed to the door; I was afraid that the damyankees had come back.

It was the marshal and several townspeople who had formed a posse to come to my rescue when they heard the shooting. I gave them a quick rundown on what had happened, giving Jake Esposito the credit for chasing off the damyankees. I thanked them for coming to help and recruited a couple of men to put Andy up on the table for me. Once that was done, I shooed them out and became a doctor, again.

Andy was still occupied with his faint, which was a good thing. I was able to do a thorough job of digging out the bullet and cleaning the wound. I sewed it up and was sure that he would recover completely, once he had a chance to renew his blood supply. I left him to wake up on his own and went to clean up the mess left by the attack.

Three inches of well-seasoned hickory sure makes a wonderful barrier to pistol balls. There was some chipping, but very little actual damage. The small window panes that outlined the door were almost all broken, but they would be simple to replace, though that much glass would be expensive. I hope that Jake can collect a couple more bounties pretty soon to pay for it.

I got back in to see him just before Andy started waking up. He was pretty groggy, but I gave him some willow bark tea for the pain and told him to stay where he was. One of the men who had come with the posse was coming back soon with a buckboard to take Andy home. Andy's house was close enough to town that the marshal was going to deputize a couple of men to keep an eye on the place until Andy could look after himself. Fifty cents a day was a good wage at time, so they were happy to get the job. Andy's wife would do the nursing, and I would check on him from time to time.