by Rory Black
Then her weary eyes saw the proud black stallion, which she recognized as being one of her father’s prized horses.
‘Pepe!’ she called to the stallion, as Iron Eyes carried her toward it.
The elegant head of the thoroughbred turned and snorted mutual recognition.
Iron Eyes lifted her up into the beautiful saddle upon the graceful horse, and stepped back to watch her. He watched as she sat there patting and talking to the black horse. He did not dwell upon what had happened to her before he had managed to get into the bandits’ stronghold, although he was certain that she was marked for the remainder of her life.
He went back and mounted the bandits’ pony that had carried him to safety, and rode up to her.
She looked down upon him from the high-shouldered stallion as he sat upon the smaller horse. It seemed quite strange to the tired girl to be back upon the back of her favourite horse, and finally she knew that she was indeed free once again. The vermin were destroyed by this thin man who said little but did much.
‘Come on, Miss Valdez,’ he said as he spurred his horse forward. ‘Your poppa is waiting for you back at the hacienda.’
Suddenly as she rode the familiar horse after the strange ghostlike man, she felt a tear rolling down her cheek. For the first time in ten days she was shedding tears of happiness and joy.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Iron Eyes stood alone in the lovely courtyard of Dwan José Valdez’s hacienda. He had done everything and more for the man who owned this place and much more. Yet he was feeling grim reality burning into his very soul.
He had washed the blood off his face and boots, but it remained as a stain on his memory.
The gold tooth that he had plucked out of the Snake’s dead mouth had been accepted by his elderly host with glee. The evil had been vanquished in this beautiful land. If any of the bandits were still in the land of the living, it was doubtful if they would ever show their faces anywhere near this place.
The gold that was bulging in his saddle-bags seemed somehow worthless to the tall bounty-hunter, as he dwelled upon the lanterns that were being lit around the courtyard as night once more approached.
His Apache pony was saddled and ready, even though he had been invited to stay for as long as he wished. Iron Eyes was ready to leave this place.
Jane had left the rancho whilst he had been away and taken her ox-drawn wagon to a place where she hoped to find something resembling happiness. The tall ghost of a man felt a mixture of anger and sadness at her leaving before his return. What she had feared was that the strange man with a chunk out of his ear would not return.
By leaving this beautiful place she would never have to be told that Iron Eyes had been killed in his attempt to rescue Maria Valdez.
The cigar was a good, relaxing smoke, and its thick smoke filled his lungs whilst he stood beside the pony His reflection in the fountain water-trough showed a face that Iron Eyes did not recognize. This was a man who could never say what he meant or do what he wanted to do. He had chosen a trail that was paved with gold and little else.
The reflection showed Iron Eyes as he had never seen himself
Then he heard the distinctive footsteps coming down the tiled steps behind him. He knew it was Dwan José without even turning around to look at the man.
‘You leave, my tall friend?’ Valdez asked, placing a fatherly hand upon the bounty-hunter’s shoulder.
Iron Eyes seemed unable or unwilling to make eye contact as he answered, ‘Might as well go.’
‘Why?’ The elderly man seemed concerned for Iron Eyes, who had done him the greatest favour any man could do for another.
‘I got places to go and people to hunt,’ came the reply from the dry, thin lips. ‘Besides, you say that the Hardy brothers were here. I might just try to catch up with them.’
‘To kill them?’ Valdez frowned.
‘They got money on their heads too,’ Iron Eyes said, with little fire in his voice. ‘I might just collect that before someone else does.’
‘Iron Eyes.’ There was sadness in the older man’s voice.
‘Not that I’ll try to catch up with them.’
Valdez was not convinced by the man’s answer, and knew the true reason. ‘You are sad, my tall one. It is because your Jane left here whilst you were saving my child, is it not?’
Iron Eyes grunted.
‘Stay, amigo.’ Valdez stepped in front of the taller man, forcing him to look into his face. ‘Stay here. You are a hero to my people and myself. Stay.’
‘Can’t,’ Iron Eyes said in a low voice. ‘I gotta ride.’
‘You go after Jane?’
‘Nope,’ Iron Eyes replied. ‘She don’t need me and I don’t need her.’
‘But she was so concerned about you, my friend.’
‘Then why did she light out?’ Iron Eyes felt betrayed by the woman with the wagon.
‘She was angry at me for asking you to save my daughter,’ Dwan José answered. ‘I think she was terrified that you would be killed and she could not face that.’
Iron Eyes untied his reins from the hitching-pole, and stared at the beautiful hacienda. ‘You got a fine place here, Dwan José.’
Valdez watched as the bounty-hunter mounted slowly. ‘You are a strange man.’
‘Because I have no woman?’
‘Because you turn away from those who care, Iron Eyes.’ The words of the elderly ranch-owner were closer to the truth than either of them could admit.
‘I ain’t got nothing but my guns, Dwan José.’ Iron Eyes rested his hands upon the handles of his weapons and tried to look impressive.
‘Stay here and you will never have to lift a finger again.’
Iron Eyes puffed on the cigar. ‘I like lifting my fingers.’
‘You will continue hunting men and killing them?’
‘It’s what I do.’
‘You go to catch up with Jane?’
‘Which way did she head?’ Iron Eyes sucked on the cigar and blew out the smoke.
‘She headed north toward the border.’ Valdez walked beside the man as he rode slowly toward the arched gateway ‘You can catch up with her very quickly, I think.’
Iron Eyes patted the saddle-bags. ‘Thank you for the gold, Dwan José.’
‘Thank you for giving me back my Maria, amigo .’ Valdez stopped as the tall rider paused for a moment before looking down at him.
‘I think that little lady got hurt real bad by the Snake.’
‘This I understand.’ Valdez bowed his head in regret.
‘They paid the price.’ Iron Eyes nodded as he puffed upon his cigar. ‘I made them pay the price in full.’
‘Thanks to you,’ Dwan José reached up and shook the bounty-hunter’s hand, ‘she is now safely home.’
‘You better keep an eye on her,’ Iron Eyes advised. ‘I seen women go loco after that sort of thing.’
‘My Maria is strong.’
‘No woman is that strong.’ Iron Eyes flicked the ash off his cigar. ‘They just pretend to be.’
There was silence from both men for a moment.
Then the older man watched as the lone rider spurred his mount and rode into the dusky desert.
The sun was setting and the sky was burning as red as hell itself above their heads. As the phantom-like man rode, he raised a fist to the sky and yelled out to the watching Mexican.
‘The sky’s on fire.’
‘Si, my tall friend,’ Dwan José Valdez agreed.
‘The sky is on fire!’
Iron Eyes drove his spurs into his mount’s flesh, and the horse started to move faster into the wilderness.
Dwan José Valdez shook his head as he realized that Iron Eyes was not heading north after the woman named Jane. Iron Eyes was heading east, after the Hardy brothers. If he caught up with them he might just send them to where he had sent their late brother.
There was always room for one more outlaw in hell.
Soon the dust rose behind the hoov
es of the Indian pony, and the lonely bounty-hunter was no longer visible to the tired old man.
Riding with death as his only companion, and the smell of blood in his nostrils, Iron Eyes was gone.
And now an exciting preview of the next book in the Iron Eyes series, IRON EYES THE AVENGER, coming soon!
Chapter One
The tall gaunt man stood in the main street carefully tying the reins to his lathered-up sorrel to the twisted hitching rail outside the large saloon.
This was only one of many saloons that littered the handful of streets that made up the growing town of Tombstone. Here in the wilderness of Arizona, towns came and went with alarming speed but Tombstone had somehow managed to survive for nearly five summers, the haunt of numerous gunfighters and loose women and hundreds of creatures harder to pigeon hole.
The icy gun-metal eyes stared up at the roughly painted sign which read Big Horn Saloon. The tall man moved to the rear of his horse and checked his two Navy Colts. They were primed and ready as he slid them back into the belt that surrounded his painfully lean middle. This was a trail that the bounty hunter hoped had finally come to an end. It had been a long, tiresome hunt that had started down in the southernmost regions of Texas when he had seen the Wanted poster tacked to the worm-eaten board outside the sheriff’s office. The photograph was of a man who looked as if he had been lynched before the picture had been snapped. The name had read: ‘Frank Carter. Wanted Dead or Alive. $3,000 Reward.’
That was all it took to fire up the interest of the ruthless Iron Eyes. He had started his trek up through Texas and then across New Mexico before arriving in Arizona. It had been a long, arid land for the most part that offered little to the average man. Yet here there were people choosing to stay amongst the high cactus and numerous scorpions as well as all the other deadly creatures that ruled the uncompromising land. Here there were many ways to die, far worse than being shot. This was a place where every grain of sand held the potential of shielding something deadlier than bullets. Yet here there were towns that survived and prospered.
The death-like figure of Iron Eyes had little in common with these or any other sorts of people for he was cast from a different mould. Clad in a long coat with deep pockets that he kept filled with bullets for his pistols and rifle, he had ridden on and on, never sleeping unless it was in a hotel bed as he feared the snakes and creatures that dominated the landscape. His long, lifeless black hair flapping as he thundered across the hostile terrain, Iron Eyes had sought out and found Tombstone after visiting over a dozen towns on his quest to collect the reward. In each town he had been given instructions as to how to get safely to the next. All who encountered him never told him a lie and he knew that fear loosened many a tongue. Four hundred miles and two dead horses later, he had arrived in the infamous Tombstone.
What he had so far witnessed of Tombstone had not impressed him. It was the same sort of town that he had visited many times during his life. After a while when the scent of the prey fills not only the hunter’s nostrils but his very soul, the towns all start to look exactly alike.
Iron Eyes had noted all the key points of Tombstone with his usual accuracy. He had decided which of the hotels he would use and where the sheriff’s office was. Those two factors were all that made any sense to the deadly man: somewhere to take his victim in order to claim the bounty and a place to sleep.
There were many who had watched as he had ridden the half-dead horse over the thick sagebrush toward the town. Many who had wondered who the lone rider was. Upon seeing the face of the deadly bounty hunter none came close to him.
He had a face that refused to grow whiskers like most men of his breed, yet he did not look either to be an Indian or a white. Iron Eyes seemed to fit into the category of unique. When he had dug his spurs into the scarred flesh of the sorrel as he rode down the long street, people just vanished from sight.
Iron Eyes had always had that effect upon the people who cast him a second look. He was dangerous, and every single sweat pore of his body seemed to ooze out a silent warning to those who came close enough to smell it. He slid the Winchester out from its holster beneath the saddle and proceeded to load it as his narrow screwed-up eyes darted around every pane of glass within distance.
When satisfied, he stepped up onto the sidewalk and walked into the dim saloon. The long bar seemed quieter than it ought to be considering at least two dozen men and at least seven females were gathered inside. Iron Eyes stopped within three feet of the swing doors holding the rifle in his bony left hand. For a long while he simply stood with his head lowered so that his chin rested upon his breast bone. The cold grey eyes moved around the faces of each and every person in the Big Horn whilst his ears listened to every sound.
The saloon customers knew why he was there and what he was there for; it was written on him like the carvings on a gravestone. He had a way of discharging terror by simply being alive. It mattered little to Iron Eyes how long the crowd remained silent as it put the odds in his favour.
The long legs wearing the mule-ear boots strode towards the bar and the pyramid of small glass tumblers that were guaranteed to allow a maximum of three fingers of liquor and not a drop more into their crystal cavities.
‘Drink, stranger?’ the bar keep asked nervously as the crowd moved further away.
The bounty hunter laid the carbine onto the damp surface of the bar and nodded. ‘Rye.’
Without blinking, Iron Eyes rested his right boot onto the brass rail next to the shiny spittoon and gazed into the long mirror behind the array of whiskey and brandy bottles. The only face that he did not look at in the glass reflection was his own.
That he left to others with more curiosity than sense. He had seen the look that masked these folks’ faces before many times in the past. It was always the same, the look of terror. The look of total horror. A vain man might have been upset by that expression of fear which always greeted him, but not Iron Eyes. He had no self-esteem or vanity. He had only the years of death that had ridden on his shoulder as he progressed from hunting animals to hunting men. He had lost count of how many souls he had sent to their Maker, but every single face of every single victim was branded into his memory.
The barman placed the glass of rye before him and stepped back as if expecting to be hit, or worse. Iron Eyes tossed a silver dollar onto the bar and smiled as he lifted the glass to his mouth and sipped the throat-burning liquid. Then he saw the face reflected in the long mirror before him. It was the same face that was on the Wanted poster within his deep coat pocket. It was the face of Frank Carter hiding in the shadows behind a small card table. The tall bounty hunter finished his rye and then placed the empty glass down onto the wet, wooden top of the bar.
‘Same again, mister?’ the nervous bartender asked.
A split second later, Iron Eyes had drawn both his Navy Colts and swung around on his heels to face the cornered outlaw. Every person in the saloon fled to the rear of the long room, as if that gave them safety from being hit by any stray lead that might start flying.
Frank Carter had been starting to move, as if he were attempting to make a quick exit whilst the tall bounty-hunter’s back was turned, yet now he just froze. Carter’s face went pale as he regained his balance and slowly stood upright.
Sweat rolled down his face as he realized he was holding his pistol in his hand.
‘You after me, stranger?’ Carter croaked drily.
Iron Eyes’ teeth seemed small and dagger-like as, grimly, he moved away from the bar towards the panting man. ‘I ain’t got you yet, but soon you’ll be mine, Carter.’
Frank Carter felt his gun shaking in his nervous hand as he wondered whether or not it would be a wise move to try and shoot his way out of this situation. ‘I ain’t Carter.’
‘You are.’ Iron Eyes’ thumbs pulled back the triggers until they locked, and continued his slow methodical approach.
Carter tried to escape from the corner of the saloon where he seemed penned in by
small round tables. There was no escape from the man with death in each of his steel-coloured pupils.
‘Quit running, Carter,’ Iron Eyes commanded the man, as he found himself in the corner next to a window and the peeling swing doors. ‘There ain’t no escape from justice.’
‘Justice?’ Frank Carter suddenly managed to find the nerve he had thought had deserted him and quickly raised his .45 and fired. The bullet went into the huge coat yet the tall man did not miss a step as he closed in on his prey.
The look of astonishment on Carter’s tortured face was all the ghost-like creature required.
Faster than the blink of an eye, the two matched Navy Colts were raised and the triggers squeezed in unison. The outlaw felt the force of the impact as the two shots hit him square and sent him reeling out of the swing doors into the bright street.
Iron Eyes followed the bleeding man out of the saloon as his loose coat flapped in the warm breeze. Being as pitifully thin as he was had saved him from taking the bullet from Carter’s weapon in his middle. The bounty hunter kicked the outlaw’s dropped pistol aside with his heavy boot as he moved toward the wounded man.
Frank Carter stumbled as blood poured from the two neat bullet holes in the centre of his shirt and fell onto the boardwalk. The tall ghost-like figure that followed him was silent and determined as his thumbs cocked the hammers again on his guns. Carter was still clinging desperately to what life was left in his rancid body as he focused into the barrels and then up into the thin face beneath the long, limp black hair that swayed in the afternoon breeze. The steel-cold eyes stared at the victim as a sadistic grin etched its way across the face that would have suited a corpse far better than the bounty hunter. Pleas for mercy went unheard by the painfully thin man .who stood aiming his trusty weapons down at Carter. The face seemed to actually enjoy the torture that was being inflicted upon the bleeding outlaw.
‘Who are you?’ Carter’s voice asked, as it choked on the blood that was filling his throat.
