J.B. SPOTTED JAK AND RYAN through his binoculars for only a moment before they barreled around the corner of a building and disappeared. He saw the dogs next, baying and leaping over rubble close to the ground.
“Dark night!”
“They have set loose the hounds,” Doc said, “or these old ears deceive me.”
“Your hearing’s fine, Doc.” J.B. shifted, checking his weapons to make sure they were all in place. The moves were as natural as breathing.
Doc peered over the side of the building, his face filled with worry. “We cannot leave them to be run down by those foul beasts, John Barrymore.”
“Won’t do them any good by dying with them.” J.B. reseated his fedora on his head and glanced back at Dean. If the boy showed any signs of disobeying his order, and Ryan’s orders by proxy, the Armorer fully intended to cold-cock the youngster and pack him out on his back if he had to.
But Dean held his position, his only expression a tight grimace. “Dad and Jak have been up against a lot longer odds than this.”
“That’s right,” J.B. answered, but he knew he’d have been hard pressed to figure out exactly when at the moment.
“Ryan’s going back for Krysty,” Mildred said.
J.B. considered that. “Top of the building, they might be able to hold on for a while. Mebbe get lucky and find a way down inside it.”
“Could be whatever’s inside is every bit as bad as what’s outside it,” Mildred pointed out.
“Let’s not be so bastard hopeful,” J.B. said.
“I’m stating facts, John.” Mildred turned her accusing gaze on him. “Those are your friends down there. Our friends. We can’t just give them up.”
“We aren’t,” J.B. protested. “But we stick to Ryan’s plan.”
Mildred turned away from him.
J.B. felt himself grow cold inside. Not many had gotten past the hardened exterior he’d manufactured for himself. Traveling Deathlands as he had, he knew acquaintances came and went on a regular basis.
But he cared about Mildred. Their relationship wasn’t as open as Ryan and Krysty’s because he was a very private person, but it was more open, more true, than anything the Armorer had ever had before. He also cared what Mildred thought about him.
Still, he didn’t defend himself. Talking about things wasn’t in his nature. He held the Uzi in his hands, letting its familiar hard lines comfort him. He turned his attention to the riders Dean had spotted earlier. Pride touched him when he noticed Dean was still watching the riders instead of peering through the tumbledown buildings trying to spot his father. The boy had learned well that his attention had to be centered on things he could do something about.
The riders had halted some fifty yards away, creating a ragged semicircle of horses and men. Dust kicked up around the animals’ hooves, drifting toward the ville on the brewing storm winds.
J.B. studied the riders, reading them as a baron’s raiding force. They dressed well and carried armament enough to guarantee few would dare to cross them.
“Anybody know who’s a baron in these parts?” the Armorer asked.
Dean shook his head, not looking in J.B.’s direction, either.
Mildred didn’t bother to answer.
“The talkative fellow we chanced to have a discourse with yesterday,” Doc replied in a quiet voice that barely carried above the baying of the hounds, “mentioned that there were no barons around Idaho Falls that he knew of. This territory was reputed to be free, except for the gangs of coldhearts and clutches of civilians who claimed parcels of it for themselves. But he did also state that he’d seen men reputing themselves to be in the employ of Baron Shaker.”
“Shaker?” The name meant nothing to J.B. But then barons rose and fell virtually overnight in the rougher areas out west. The region wasn’t anything like the East Coast baronies.
“That is the name,” Doc answered. “Unless I do disremember.”
“That man say anything about what Baron Shaker might want here?”
“No, just that the baron’s men possess the appearance of knowing exactly what it is that they’re searching for. And that they don’t intend to leave without it.”