Blood on the Divide Read Online Free PDF Page B

pickles,” he muttered.
    Once, on the crest of a long hill, while the coffee was boiling and the meat cooking, Preacher rested his charges and pointed out to the seemingly empty vastness. “That’s the way I remember it,” he said to Betina, a note of wistfulness in his voice. “Not a white man as far as the eyes could see. It’ll never be the same no more.”
    â€œCivilization is moving westward. It’s called progress, Preacher.”
    â€œPain in the butt is what I call it.”
    â€œIt’s so ... big,” one of the girls said.
    â€œIt’s that, all right, button,” Preacher told her. “You get lost out yonder and we’d never find you. Remember that.” He watched as the heads of the horses came up and their ears pricked. “Get out of sight,” he told Betina and the kids. “Stay low and quiet no matter what happens. Take the horses and move into the timber. If anything happens to me, you know where to go, Bet. So move. Right now.”
    A moment later, the little party and their mounts had vanished into the timber and brush. Preacher kicked some dirt over a mess of little shoe prints and waited by the fire, his Hawken at hand. It wasn’t a long wait. Four men rode slowly toward him, coming from the west. Preacher knew only one of them, a no-good who called himself Son. But if the other three had tossed their lot in with Son, they were just as sorry as he was.
    â€œHi-ho, the fire,” Son called. “That shore smells like coffee to me.”
    â€œWhat the hell else would I be boilin’?” Preacher said sourly. “Hot water to bile my socks in? I ain’t got no socks so it must be coffee water.”
    â€œPreacher,” Son said, walking his horse up to the edge of the tiny clearing. “I thought it was you. You just as ill-tempered as I recall.”
    â€œI ain’t ill-tempered neither, Son. I just don’t like you. So don’t bother dismountin’. There ain’t nothin’ here for you or them with you.”
    â€œYou wouldn’t let no poor tarred travelers git down and stretch the kinks out whilst partakin’ of coffee and that there fine-smellin’ meat, Preacher?” Son asked.
    â€œNo.”
    â€œThen by God we’ll just take it!” one of the men with Son hollered. “And if you don’t like it, Slim, you can just go to hell!”
    Preacher slowly turned his head. The mouthy man had no way of knowing it, but he was only heartbeats away from sudden and violent death. He should have expected it; that was the way he had lived. “You think you’ll do that, huh?” Preacher asked.
    â€œYeah,” the man said with an evil grin. His teeth were blackened stubs. “But first I think I’ll kick your ass around this camp just for the fun of it.”
    Preacher shot him with the .54 Hawken. The big ball slammed into the man’s chest and knocked him out of the saddle, his arms flung wide. He hit the ground and lay still, his heart shattered. His horse trotted off a few yards and stopped. Son and the other two were in momentary shock.
    Preacher was on his feet, a cocked pistol in each hand. “They’s both double-shotted, boys. Who wants it?”
    Son and the two others stared at the dead man for a moment, their faces pale under the whiskers and dirt. Outlaws and scum, they were accustomed to always having the upper hand. They were not accustomed to this. They tore their eyes from the dead and stared at Preacher.
    â€œI just flat out ain’t got no use for you people,” Preacher told the trio. “Now flop your friend acrost his saddle and get the hell gone from here.”
    â€œYou’re a mean man, Preacher.” Son had found his voice and croaked out the words. He cleared his throat. “That was an unchristian and turrible low thing you just done. That poor wretch was only funnin’ with you.”
    â€œI didn’t