Chapter 6

Nathan and I parted company at Hermit. Now that's a crazy name for a town! Three hours out of Hermit, I realized how much I had relied on a partner to ride with me. Specifically, I came upon eight Comanches who had just attacked a buckboard. A man way lying dead in the driver's seat and a woman was struggling with two of the Indians who were dragging her down from the seat.

I really had no choice if I was going to live with myself, so I pulled up one of my shotguns and raced toward the six Comanches still on their horses. They were all watching the struggle on the buckboard and not paying attention to what was going on around them. I was able to get very close before I was noticed, and, by then, it was too late for the Comanches. I fired one barrel and then the other when I was so close that I couldn't miss.

I dropped the first shotgun and snatched the second shotgun into firing position. My horse was running free so that I could use both hands on the shotgun, but he was headed where I wanted him to go, so that was no problem. I cocked and fired the second shotgun and managed to total six dead or painfully wounded Indians in only a few seconds. The 12 buckshot from each barrel did wonders on that bunch of Indians.

I dropped my second shotgun to let it hang by its sling from the saddle horn as I grasped the reins with my left hand and my pistol with my right. I swung around and raced directly at the Indians on the buckboard. Though the White Man had been killed with an arrow, neither Comanche was so armed. In fact, all they had with them were their war clubs and knives. I took advantage of the situation by riding close to the buckboard and firing my pistol at nearly point blank range. A bullet entered each chest, and that was the end of those two Indians.

The woman fell to the floor of the buckboard and burst into tears. The wounded, but not dead, Comanches who had been shot by the buckshot had ridden off while I was taking care of the two molesting the woman. I didn't know where they went, but I didn't really care; nevertheless, I was not about to let my guard down.

The woman continued to cry while I reloaded my weapons. When that was done, I moved from my horse to the buckboard and tried to comfort the woman. She was not in hysterics, but was crying over the death of the man and the relief at her rescue. I tried to comfort her, but I still followed Nathan's advice and kept an eye out for the return of the Comanches.

It was a damned good thing that I did, too, because shortly afterward, a gang of about 20 Comanches showed up, and they acted somewhat put out with me! I grabbed the woman's arm, I still didn't know her name, yet, and pulled her with me under the buckboard. On the way, I grabbed the shotguns, my Henry rifle, and all of my ammunition and water from my horse.

Being under the buckboard was going to give us a great advantage if the Comanches stayed mounted, and Nathan's lecturing said that they would if they possibly could. They did not have guns, only lances, war clubs, and bows, though there were more bows than I had hoped for. Still, I did not expect us to be showered with arrows, because the Comanches would try not to kill the horses, which might be done accidentally if they were not very careful with their arrows. They would not be able to reach us from their horses with their lances and war clubs.

When we got under the buckboard, I asked, "Can you shoot a 10-gauge shotgun? By the way, my name is Craig McCallister."

"I'm Jane Upton, an', yes, I can shoot the shotgun, but I would rather use the Henry, ifen ya don't mind."

That was good news to me, so I handed her the Henry, and the first thing she did was to make sure that the magazine was fully loaded. It was a relief to know that the woman knew what to do under these trying circumstances. She levered a cartridge into the chamber and lay in a very professional-looking prone position, just waiting for the Indians to get into a favorable killing position.

Jane certainly seemed to know what she was doing, so I concentrated on the shotguns. I had my two Starr DAs to fall back on when I needed them. I noticed that Jane was wearing a holster with a Navy Colt, but she did not seem to be interested in trying to bring that into action.

The Indians rode up to within 100 yards, and that was when Jane proceeded to open up on them with the Henry. She took the time to aim each shot, so I quit worrying about her. There were over 200 rounds for the Henry, and I could tell that she was trying to make every shot count.

The Indians were at another disadvantage, and I wondered how many of them realized it. Their usual practice of riding in a circle around us as they probed for a weakness in our defenses was ridiculous. We were too small a defensive force to make that worth the effort, though it was probable that they would ride around us just to demonstrate to their fellows how brave they were.

I left it to Jane to guard her side of the buckboard while I took on the back and the other side. The Henry did not lend itself to rapid movement from target to target, so she was limited to a narrower field of fire than I was. The shotguns covered a broad area with each shot, and it was easy to move my pistols around, so I could more readily cover the side and back. The horses protected us from the front, so that was not a problem.

If the Indians would dismount and charge us in a body, they would have us, no argument there. However, that was not the Comanche style, at least according to Nathan Wimple, and I sure as hell hoped that he was correct. They were much more likely to attack us singly or in very small groups in order to demonstrate their bravery. That we could handle, so we were not as worried as we might have been if we were being attacked by Apaches or some other tribe.

The Comanches were now close enough for me to start using the shotguns. The roar of the shotguns seemed, somehow, to give us a psychological advantage, since they were much louder than the Henry. The Indians knew what a shotgun could do, and I think that they considered the use of one to be downright unfair!

Inside of 10 minutes, we had killed or wounded 11 of the Comanches, and we could see that there were 10 left. Now that there was less of a mass of Indians to overpower us, Jane was concentrating on trying to knock off the war chief. If she could do that, the chances were that the rest of the Indians would leave us alone.

The war chief was staying out of easy range, but Jane's fourth shot at him did the job. It had taken her that long to get the elevation right, but she really did an excellent job when she did get it right. The war chief was well beyond the settings for the Henry's sights, but the bullet could kill at that range if she could only hit her target.

She looked like she scored her hit low on the war chief's right side. It was kind of a detail that the man did not die immediately—he was dead from gangrene in a few days if he did not bleed to death before then. He fell from his horse, and that attracted the attention of all of the active Comanches. They rushed to him and helped him back on his horse. He was due for a very painful ride home, providing he even made it that far. The Indians left with their war chief, but we knew that they would be back to pick up their wounded and dead and the loose horses, so it would be best for us to get out of the vicinity as soon as possible.

We laid the dead man in the back of the buckboard. "Jane, do you want me to drive? Also, where do you want to go?"

"Yes, you drive. I am at a loss an' do not know where to go. That is my father in the back of the buckboard, an' now I do not have any living relatives. I do not know what I will do. Here I am, 17 years old an' not married. I'm too old ta have an easy time findin' a husband, soz I guess there is nothin' fer me ta do but become a saloon whore.