Purgatory Crossing

Book 3: Nathan Stark Western

by William W. Johnstone, J.A. Johnstone

Genres: Westerns; Action & Adventure Romance; Thrillers

Synopsis

A new action-packed historical frontier Western in the popular Nathan Stark series by the bestselling legends William W. and J.A. Johnstone.

A legend, his name is mentioned alongside Buffalo Bill Cody and Wild Bill Hickok. He casts a stormcloud-sized shadow across the untamed Western frontier. Men on both sides of the law fear his wrath. For Nathan Stark is the army’s avenging angel, waging war against the hostile  Indian tribes that threaten the nation—and murdered his family in cold blood.

In Arizona Territory, the Apache have been raiding both sides of the border, slaughtering anyone who gets in their way. This is the same Indian band that kidnapped the children of the Navajo chief whose scouts serve the U.S. Army—and the Navajo will not engage the Apache as long as the chief’s children are in harm’s way.

Now, Stark and Crow scout Moses Red Buffalo have been tasked with rescuing the Navajo. But they aren’t the only ones on the trail of the kill-crazy Apache. A group of unhinged scalphunters are looking to collect the Mexican government’s bounty on the Apache. Now the territory is about to explode in an avalanche of violence and death . . .

Release date: January 21, 2025

Publisher: Pinnacle Books

Print pages: 400

Sample

A lone buzzard circled high above the mesa, too far up to cast a shadow. Like all desert creatures, he survived by adapting to the harsh climate. He moved sparingly in the heat. Took care to drink whenever he could. And patiently observed the stillness below for the movements of creatures that would one day die and upon whose carcasses he would feast. For everything dies eventually, and opportunists thrive in harsh climates.

The buzzard had known many fat seasons. For a time, the creatures in the wilderness below had been frantic in their activities. The buzzard recognized Man and knew him to be different from other creatures, had learned to track and follow his armies for the refuse and bodies left in their wake. For a time, the sands below had exploded in a blood-soaked fury of battles. Those had been the best times for the buzzard. But those days had passed.

The desert had returned to stillness as Man migrated away, back to the softer lands in the East from which he had come. The sands blew, erasing traces of his passage and returning the desert to stillness. For the buzzard, the lean seasons returned.

Now a plume of dust rose from a single man on a horse on the mesa below. The buzzard circled, assessing the creature’s relative fitness and the likelihood of survival. Instinct had taught the bird to read the signs of health and vigor, even from this lofty altitude. He could tell the man and mount far below were fit enough, yet it remained to be seen if they would survive the other perils of this wilderness.

He would return later and find out.

Nathan Stark, Army scout, lifted his gaze and tilted back his hat. High above the mesa, a lone buzzard had been circling. Now it peeled away to points west in search of sustenance. Stark knew that buzzards did not hunt but, rather, waited for others to die so that they could feed. And there was plenty of death out here in this desert.

He brought his gaze back down, repositioned the brim of his Stetson, and leaned forward to stroke the neck of his horse. Feeling the sweat beading in the hairs of Buck’s coat, Stark reined to a halt, dismounted, pulled one of the large canteens from the assemblage dangling from his saddle horn, and unscrewed the cap. Buck stamped immediately upon smelling water.

“Thirsty?” Stark chuckled, untied the kerchief from around his neck, and removed the Stetson. “We’ll take care of you, buddy.”

He reversed the Stetson, poured a quantity of water inside, and set it on the ground before Buck, then squatted as the horse leaned down to take a drink. Stark moistened the kerchief in the hat and wrung it out before retying it around his neck. Then he examined his surroundings.

Bleakness.

Nathan Stark was a well-proportioned man with broad shoulders and a steely gaze. A thick shock of black hair framed his lean, firm-jawed face. He moved with the practiced ease of an experienced trail hand and navigated even unfamiliar territory with a scout’s professional eye. When his term of service with the Confederacy ended at Appomattox, he continued his chosen profession as an army scout, going to work for the Union forces. He had served under numerous generals as a civilian subcontractor, including the infamous George Armstrong Custer. Hard, blood-soaked trails were familiar to him.

He had journeyed through Arizona Territory before. There had been much cavalry activity here before the War Between the States. Arizona had voted to join the Confederacy ... a dream that had ended after the Battle of Picacho Peak. Cavalry had played its decisive role in that engagement, as it had throughout the Territory’s history. For here was an unwelcoming and unforgiving land whose inhabitants, both human and animal, resisted newcomers.

Stark knew the people native to these sands: the Navajo, the Yuma, the Apache, the Papago. Some farmed, like the Navajo and Papago. Others hunted and gathered, like the Yuma.

And some raided.

Like the Apache, he thought. The harsher the climate, the greater the likelihood of conflict over scarce resources.

Cavalry out this way had their work cut out for them. The Apache were canny, aggressive opponents. They had set to raiding and killing the earliest settlers with brutal efficiency and then engaged the mounted military sent to oppose them. Amazing horsemen, the Apache inflicted coordinated guerilla attacks upon the sophisticated, drilled soldiers they fought against. Dealing with them became something of an art form, a sub-specialization of the grueling and terrible years known collectively as the Indian Wars.

A succession of generals had made their bones fighting those wars. Sherman had served on the frontier, calling for the utter extermination of the Sioux. Sheridan had worked to deplete game on traditional hunting grounds and force hostiles onto allotted reservation land. And men like General Crook had been given the thankless task of fighting the Apache—an enemy well aware of how things had gone for other tribes and determined to resist a similar fate at all costs.

The heat of the day was coming on. The air shimmered as the ground temperature rose. The animals were still and a thick coating of dust lay upon everything. As Stark watched, a lizard crawled to the top of a nearby boulder and paused, its tongue flicking in and out of its mouth seeking moisture in the heat.

The Apache somehow survive in this horrible climate, he thought. No wonder they’re so tough.

Buck drank his fill, raising his head and shaking his mane. Still squatting, Stark tilted the opening of the canteen to his lips and took a long, deep, grateful pull of water. And as much as he liked a drink of beer or whiskey now and again, the water trickling down his throat in that dry furnace heat was the most delicious thing he had ever tasted, prompting feelings of gratitude within him that were downright religious.

All them fellas in the Bible were always hanging around in the desert, Stark thought. And considered that he might, squatting there in the sand, understand something about how they must have felt. Folks said, Hard times make hard men, he remembered.

He stood, dumped water from his hat and replaced it, recapped the canteen, and remounted. Then he and Buck resumed their journey.

Hard men had been the topic of discussion with the man who’d sent Stark on this assignment. He had made the acquaintance of Mr. Alexander Obediah Greerson, Indian Agent, at Fort Billings, Montana. The man had been about as blunt as could be.

“We created the worst possible outcome in the Arizona Territory. Did it to ourselves,” Greerson admitted, gazing around the sparsely furnished office the fort commander had placed at his disposal. “The first waves of settlement from down south in Mexico encountered brutal Apache resistance. So when Americans began heading out that way, we were prepared. We sent scouts ahead of the earliest wagon trains. Began building forts and settlements. There was a military presence there before the War Between the States. An effective one. Good men served on the frontier, learned the craft of cavalry warfare, and implemented what they knew skillfully. For a time, we had the frontier under relative control.

“Then the war broke out. We had to bring those units home. Some went with the Confederacy. But those were federal troops out there, so for the most part, they rejoined the ranks of the Union Army. But the ensuing few years caused a great deal of attrition. We lost a lot of good riders during the war with Johnny Reb. When we turned our attention back to the Arizona Territory, it was with depleted ranks. And the game had changed.”

The war had given the tribes the time to regroup and become better organized. The resulting war on the settlers approached levels of brutality rarely seen before. A new generation of leaders was emerging ... men toughened by the experience of first contact with the bluecoats. Men determined to take revenge. One of them was named Geronimo.

Of course, Stark knew the name. Anyone familiar with the war on the frontier did. It was a name to strike naked fear into the hearts of any man living in the Arizona Territory. For here in this sun-baked, coyote-haunted, scorpion-strewn land, it was a name synonymous with Death itself.

Geronimo.

The man was a force of nature. It was one thing for someone to command a room when he entered. But it was another thing for mere mention of that man’s name to silence a room in his absence. The Apache war chief had risen from prominence within his own band to a broader prominence within the Apache nation itself. He cast a long shadow over the Arizona territory—a blood-soaked trail of vengeance and death that threatened even the very military itself.

He was the master of the desert these days, a great tactician who fought the war-hardened cavalry divisions to a standstill with a mixture of brilliance and brutality. General Crook had been given command of the region precisely because of his long familiarity with Geronimo and his demonstrated talent for rescuing victory from the jaws of defeat. For the Union Army was facing defeat at the hands of a force half its size, commanded by a man who still lived as a primitive savage.

“Your orders are to board a train for Arizona Territory, disembark in Tucson, and journey south on horseback.” Greerson had produced a map from the inside pocket of his tweed coat, unfolded it, and pointed at one section with a stubby finger. “When you come down through the hills near Tubac, there is a telegraph station ... here on the plains beyond this mountain pass.” He tapped it twice. “It will take time for you to get there, and the situation is fluid. They will take stock upon your arrival and issue your orders by telegraph. The Army is coordinating closely with Indian agents on this. And we’re much obliged for your help.”

Now Stark was approaching the last leg of his journey through these hills. His sense of this was confirmed when he and Buck came around the side of a low rise to find a road cutting across the stony plain. Not a track but an honest-to-goodness road someone had taken the trouble to cut through this section of the wilderness to accommodate the increasing numbers of settlers and supply wagons flooding the Territory.

“Well, look here, Buck.” Stark patted the horse’s neck. “Signs of civilization. We’ll be settled somewhere nice and cozy—a hotel room for me and a nice cool stable for yourself—sooner than you think!”

The road was indeed a sign of civilization. And they didn’t have to travel it overly long to learn about the state of things in the Territory. Some enterprising soul had attempted to set up a trading post along the road. Keen to be the first to greet those coming into the area, he had built a large, comfortable storefront of hewn logs.

Even at a distance, their charred forms attested to the carnage that had befallen the place. Black smoke drifted lazily skyward from the ruins. Sections of the building had been knocked over, with logs piled in a haphazard heap where they had fallen instead of burning.

This looks fairly recent, Stark thought. He reined Buck to a stop a quarter mile off and looked around. Had the Apaches stormed down from their hidden base in the hills to do this? It seemed unlikely but not impossible. He set his tracker’s eye on the road. There were signs of a group coming through here fairly recently. He dismounted and knelt to study the tracks.

A small group, he reckoned. And shod. Which meant the riders had been white or Mexican, but definitely not Indian.

That was as far as he got before he heard a gunshot and a woman’s scream. Then he was back on Buck and riding full gallop toward trouble.

Buck streaked along the road toward the smoking log structure. Stark leaned forward in the saddle, knees tensed against the mount’s sides as his right hand swept toward his holster. The building loomed before them now, with Stark urging Buck around the corner with a sharp pull of the reins. They rounded the edge on a greased streak and pulled up short, the scene before them ghastly.

To his way of thinking, it appeared as if the store owner and family had been making ready to light a shuck. For whatever reason, the cost of doing business in the region had become too high, so the father had drawn a covered wagon up to the side door of the building. Stark guessed the family kept their quarters in the rear of the log structure—the man had probably been preparing to load his wife and kids inside the wagon along with some supplies when the marauders struck. And now he lay dead, his body a heap where it had fallen from the driver’s box to land in a gory tangle on the grass.

Stark registered the group of men a split second before they saw him and Buck. And that second made all the difference.

The raiding party was eight strong—six ragged and filthy men who stood in a crescent, ranged around two more of their number, who held the dead man’s wife by her arms as she twisted and struggled to get loose. A nearby boy and girl looked on, their shoulders grasped by members of the “audience.” Stark saw all this in the instant before the nearest men turned. Then their eyes widened in alarm.

Stark palmed his Colt into his hand, swung one leg over Buck, and dropped to the ground. Then all hell broke loose.

Two of the raiders advanced on Stark, fists and voices raised ... until they saw the gun in his hand, at which point they backed off. Not everyone came armed to the party, but a few did. One man turned, raising a sawed-off shotgun.

Stark’s response was instinctive. He turned sideways to minimize his profile, raised his arm, and fired, the Colt like an extension of his hand. A neat round hole appeared in the shotgunner’s forehead, and he keeled over backward, collapsing to the grass.

Then three men’s guns were parting leather, including one of the two holding the dead shopkeeper’s wife. He let go of her arm and she immediately spun, kicking the other man holding her in the shin so sharply that he went down.

Stark’s gun spoke: two loud booms that scattered the group. Two gunmen ran, but a third stood his ground, his piece unpouched and coming up, sight centering on Stark a moment before the scout snapped off a shot that tore the man’s throat wide open. He died choking on his own blood.

The children chose that moment to act, both struggling against the grip of their captors. The little girl managed to break free, but the boy’s efforts earned him a brisk cuffing upside his ear. He yelped, head snapping sideways just as his mother broke free of her assailant. With a low growl that chilled even Stark’s blood, she launched herself at the man who had struck her son, teeth bared, fingers clawed wide. She hit the man with surprising speed and force, knocking him off-balance. Then her nails were raking his face, seeking his eyes.

The man screamed, thrashing against the woman’s grip. The little boy tore free and grabbed his sister’s hand.

One of the other gunmen fired, drawing Stark’s attention from the melee. The gunman had retreated behind the wagon, firing from behind the rear edge. Stark dropped to his knees, scanned behind the wheels, and spotted legs. He aimed and let fly, firing away. The bullet tore the leg in half at the knee and the man groaned, slumping to the ground alongside the amputation. Stark put him away with one in the wide screaming mouth before spinning and launching himself toward the mother and her children.

The man who had cuffed her son was now well and truly beaten. She had wreaked such havoc upon his face that he held his hands up to it now, moaning and sobbing as he sank to his knees. The mother had gathered her kids to her and was spinning around, seeking a place to run.

“Inside!” snapped Stark. He waved at the door.

He only had to tell her once. Grabbing both her children by the wrists, she made for the doorway as the remaining men came at Stark.

His ammunition was almost exhausted. Coolly as he could, he dropped the cylinder and began reloading, staring down the group of marauders descending upon him. Two noted his action and traded a glance. With a grin, they turned toward the doorway through which the family had disappeared.

One man found his courage—and his weapon. He snapped off a shot that narrowly missed Stark. A moment later, the scout had his Colt loaded and was spinning the cylinder back into place before triggering a shot of his own.

The gunman stiffened and collapsed. And the other men scattered. Two took to their heels while the other leaped into the rear of the wagon, possibly hoping to find a weapon. But somehow Stark doubted that he would. The father seemed to have been preparing his family to go hide in the wilderness for a spell ... get away from whatever had been bedeviling his business. Most likely, it had been this gang of marauders Stark was set on finishing off. With that in mind, he stepped around the rear of the wagon.

A steel skillet flew out of the wagon, narrowly missing his head. It was followed by a China plate, then a porcelain bedpan. Stark frowned and ducked, biding his time until the man within showed himself. And very shortly, he did, springing to his feet from behind a crate with another skillet cocked back in one hand and ready to fly. Stark fired, catching him in the chest and pushing him back to collapse with a crash among the family’s effects.

He turned. The girl was in the doorway.

“Please! Mister!” she cried, plainly distraught. “My mother!”

That was all Stark needed. He turned and swept across the threshold, pulling the girl after him. “What about your ma?” he asked, looking around the blackened interior. “Where is she?”

“They went out the back door,” she moaned, wiping tears from her cheeks. “They took Danny, too! Just grabbed him and dragged them off!”

“It’s okay. It’s okay.” Stark squeezed her shoulder. “Come on.”

He steered her into a side room and shut the door behind her with a promise to return. And he would. But meanwhile, she would not present a target for the remaining marauders.

Out of sight, out of mind, he thought.

There was a back door. He sidled toward it, gun up, flattening himself on the wall beside the opening. Silence. He counted to ten and took a quick peek around.

The two men had their backs to the store, having dragged the mother and son outside a short distance from the structure. They had forced them both to their knees. At first, Stark could not fathom the reason. Until it suddenly dawned on him that they intended to kill both.

It was illogical. Insane. And yet ...

They’re going to slaughter them! He shook his head at the realization.

Then he was moving, booted feet crossing the threshold and emerging outdoors. The mother had decided to resist and was trying to struggle to her feet. As one of the men turned to cuff her, Stark shot the other one on the run with studied calm. The bullet tore the man’s life from his body. He was slumping to the ground when his partner turned.

There!

Stark swung the barrel of the Colt toward the second man. But he suddenly grabbed the woman by the hair and yanked her upright, dragging her in front of him as a shield. Stark cursed his bad luck.

“Steady on, friend,” said the man. He flashed a smile, twisting his fingers in the woman’s hair clutched in his fist. He flashed a smile that was as dull as it was malicious. “Surely we can come to some arrangement regarding this little dainty! I’ll share if you will.”

“You’ll let her go,” Stark replied woodenly. “You’ll do it now and we’ll finish this, or else I’ll just end you here. Trust me. You don’t stand a chance.”

“Well! I’d say that’s downright unneighborly!” The man yanked the woman’s hair brutally, causing her to loose a shriek. “Here I am offering to share, all gentleman-like, and there you are, being a rude, condescending so-and-so!”

“It’s a hell of a thing to call a man rude when you’re dragging a woman around by her hair like that!” Stark thundered. “Let her go!”

The woman chose that moment to rear up like a snake and bite down hard on the gunman’s hand. He screamed and released her, stepping back and raising his bleeding hand to examine it. The woman scuttled away and the man turned, leveling his pistol on her.

Stark squeezed the trigger. And nothing happened.

He cursed, tossing the Colt aside. It wasn’t the first time in his life a gun had jammed on him, but the event was a rarity. He quickly drew his knife, grasped it by the point, and threw it at the man.

The blade sank into the gunman’s shoulder, causing him to drop his iron. By then Stark had launched himself forward in a cannonball tackle, grasping the varmint around the elbows and waist, and pitching the two of them to the ground. Stark’s teeth clinked painfully together as they landed. Then the man beneath him managed to land a punch on Stark’s head before the struggle began in earnest.

Both rose to their knees. The knife fell from the man’s shoulder and they both grabbed for it, fingers slipping across the blood-moistened handle. The blade evaded both of them, tumbling into a crevice in the ground. They returned to pummeling one another.

Stark blocked an awkward punch, then reared back and brought his forehead down sharply on the bridge of the other man’s nose. The man howled and drew away, panting moistly through blood and snot. Stark’s hand shot to his neck, finding tendons and squeezing, glorying in the rage and the kill.

The man gagged, hand rising to break the choke hold. Stark gritted his teeth and doubled down, squeezing as hard as he could, his opponent’s face widening in a terrifying rictus. It then reddened to a mottled purple until Stark felt something snap between his fingertips and the man sank like a sack full of potatoes.

He was done.

Stark staggered upright and looked around.

The log structure still smoldered moodily. The bodies of dead men lay strewn within and to either side. And huddled together nearby were the woman and her two children. Beyond the wagon lay the body of the dead father and husband, and for that Stark felt terrible sorrow.

“I’m sorry about what happened here,” he told the woman. “I’m sorry about what happened to your store. I’m sorry I couldn’t get here sooner.”

Gratitude welled up in the woman’s eyes. She was a plain woman, her face weather-hardened and unadorned with makeup of any kind, yet she was handsome in her way. Strong and kind, Stark suspected. She radiated that kind of light, even amid profound grief.

“We are grateful to you, Mister ... ?”

“Nathan Stark, ma’am.”

“Well, Mr. Stark. My name is Annabelle Reed. And you saved my life and the lives of my children, Steven and Sarah. I can’t thank you enough. I know my dear husband would thank you, if he could.”

“I’m sorry for your loss, ma’am.”

“He was a good man.” She fought back tears. “The least I can do is give him a decent burial.”

They buried Richard Reed a short distance from the store. Stark used Buck to help drag the outlaws’ bodies away, then dug Richard’s grave while Annabelle gathered her wits and sewed her husband a shroud of burlap. The children fashioned a simple wooden marker—crossed sticks secured by strips of hide. When all this was done, they moved Richard’s body and lowered it into the grave.

Stark stood across the mouth of the hole from Annabelle and the two children. At some point in the afternoon,. . .