The Curse of Iron Eyes

by Rory Black

  The two Navy Colts in his belt were virtually useless at this distance. He knew it was pointless even trying to shoot back at the rider with the buffalo gun. There was no way that his pistols could compete with such a formidable weapon.

  But the buffalo gun had one drawback. Having such large bullets, it had to be reloaded after every shot.

  As he rode on, Iron Eyes began to formulate a plan in his mind.

  A plan that would require nerves of steel and perfect timing.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Iron Eyes noticed that the canyon pass was becoming narrower and narrower the further he rode into it. Whether this was a good or bad thing, he had no idea. The bounty hunter lashed the long ends of his reins across the bloodied shoulders of his galloping mount forcing it ever onward.

  Even wounded, Iron Eyes was still a terrifying sight as he balanced in his stirrups with his long black hair flapping on the collar of his trail coat like the wings of a fleeing bat desperately seeking sanctuary.

  With gritted teeth he watched as dozens of vultures swooped down the pass towards him. The great birds were travelling in the opposite direction to the bleeding rider as they caught the aroma of the eight dead bodies he had left out on the sand dunes behind him.

  Iron Eyes had left them the biggest meal they had ever had in the form of the dead Apaches. The vultures would not stop feeding off the human carcasses until the bones were picked clean or coyotes drove them off.

  But none of this meant anything to Iron Eyes. The sound of his mount’s thundering hoofs echoed all around him yet he paid no attention to the noise.

  All he could think about was finding somewhere in this godforsaken place that might allow him to take cover and ambush the man who had been trying to put a bullet in his back for the past fifteen or more minutes.

  Iron Eyes spurred the horse into the sweltering sun-baked pass and knew that this place was not designed to protect the hunted, only the hunter. Its smooth towering walls had little shape to them and that troubled the bounty hunter.

  If he stopped his horse, he knew that he could not climb the canyon walls. Nobody could. They were just too smooth. It was as if nature itself had sanded them down.

  Iron Eyes needed a corner, a jagged boulder or anything that might be large enough to shield himself and his mount from the deadly buffalo gun.

  He thundered on.

  There had to be a place where he could dismount and wait for the rider to get within the range of his deadly Navy Colts, he kept telling himself.

  Yet the further he rode, the less he began to believe that such a place existed within this canyon pass. For this place was unlike any other he had ever ridden through. Sweat was now pouring off the pony and himself.

  He had never known anywhere to be as hot as this pass.

  Iron Eyes continued to whip the now spent pony onward with even more urgency. He glanced down at his chest. His shirt and skin were covered in the blood that was still seeping from the knife wounds. His left pants leg was now also soaked in blood. He was bleeding like a stuck pig and knew he had to find somewhere to try and stem the flow of blood real fast.

  Then his keen eyes spotted the thing he had been looking for, a hundred or more yards ahead of him. Iron Eyes aimed the nose of his mount towards it.

  He hauled his reins to his blood-soaked chest and jumped from the back of the exhausted mount. A cloud of choking dust rose into the air and covered both man and beast for a few moments as the bounty hunter caught his breath.

  Iron Eyes held firmly on to his reins and stared at the sight before him. He then convinced himself that it was real and not a mirage created by the blood-loss or unbearable heat.

  It was really there.

  A large rock twice his own height was propped against the canyon wall. It must have fallen from high above to the canyon floor where it now lay, he concluded. For it was different from the smooth walls of sand-colored stone that made up the length of the trail he had ridden through so far.

  He looked up and stared at the top of the high canyon. His steel-colored eyes surveyed the entire length of it until he saw the slight blemish on an otherwise perfect surface. That was where the boulder had fallen from, he concluded.

  For a few moments Iron Eyes stood perfectly still and listened. If the rider who was after him had already entered the pass he would have heard the sound of his horse’s hoofs echoing by now.

  There was no noise.

  That meant the rider had yet to enter this devilish place.

  He still had time to put his plan into action.

  Iron Eyes led the pony behind the boulder and tied the reins firmly to a small jagged edge at its base. He then hauled the large water bag that he had confiscated from one of the other Apache mounts off the saddle horn and pulled out its crude stopper.

  He lifted the bag to his cracked lips and swallowed two large mouthfuls of the cool liquid. It felt good as it made its way through his thin body.

  Then he looked at the pony beside him.

  Iron Eyes knew that he needed this pathetic animal to get him out of this place. He removed his coat and laid it down on the ground before the pony’s front legs and poured a couple of pints of the precious liquid on to it.

  He watched as the grateful horse drank the water. Then he hung the bag back on the saddle horn again.

  Iron Eyes hauled his weapons from his belt, cocked their hammers and leaned against the large rock. He wanted to kill this man more than he had ever wanted to kill anyone.

  Even if there was no price on his pursuer’s head, he wanted to kill him.

  There was still no noise in the pass.

  All Iron Eyes could hear was the sound of the pony behind him breathing heavily as it tried desperately to recover from the long hard ride its new master had inflicted upon it.

  Iron Eyes wanted to hear the sound of his pursuer’s horse galloping towards him. He craved it like a mountain lion craves the taste of fresh meat.

  The pony snorted. He turned to look at it and noticed its ears prick forward. It had heard something his ears could not make out.

  Iron Eyes turned back and looked down the pass to where the dust that his pony had kicked up as they had galloped to this spot still hung on the hot air.

  He dropped on to the ground, pulled his long black hair away from the side of his head, and then pressed his ear to the sand.

  It sounded like a heart beating.

  Iron Eyes could hear the approaching horse’s hoofs but they seemed slower than he expected.

  The rider with the buffalo gun had slowed his mount to a mere canter as he trailed the bounty hunter in Devil’s Pass.

  Slowly he raised his head off the sand. Iron Eyes got back to his feet and knew that he might have a much longer wait than he had at first considered.

  His pursuer was smart and cautious.

  This was not going to be as easy as he had planned.

  He knew that the man who chased him might spot the boulder before he was in range of Iron Eyes’ Navy Colts.

  The bounty hunter picked his still-damp coat up off the ground and then searched its pockets for a cigar amongst the scores of bullets.

  His thin fingers found a twisted half-smoked cigar. He rammed it between his teeth. He then located his matches and dragged one along the boulder.

  He cupped the flame in the palms of his hands and sucked in the acrid smoke.

  For a brief few seconds as he held the smoke in his lungs, he could no longer feel the pain that racked his body.

  Then as he exhaled he heard the sound of the rider’s horse growing louder. Suddenly he realized that he had to do something that this man would never expect him to do, if he were going to survive.

  ‘Keep on coming, amigo,” Iron Eyes mumbled as he pulled his Bowie knife from his mule-ear boot and stared at its bloodstained blade. Iron Eyes ain’t finished yet.’

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Devil’s Pass was virtually silent as the man reined in his lathered-up mount. It had taken
the cautious rider with the buffalo gun perched on his hip nearly twenty minutes to reach the spot where he could see the huge boulder jutting out of the soft sand.

  Something was seriously wrong and the horseman was alert enough to sense it.

  But what?

  Every sinew in his aching body told him that this was not going to be as simple as he had first thought when he had trailed Iron Eyes into Devil’s Pass. He ran the back of his hand across his dry mouth.

  The brilliant sun was no longer directly over the pass and shadows bathed one side of the high canyon walls as the horseman steadied his restless mount. For the first time since he had started following the tall bounty hunter, he was nervous.

  His mind raced.

  Was this a trap?

  Had Iron Eyes lured him to this place to bushwhack him? The rider sat silently in his saddle as his suspicious eyes weighed up the situation before him.

  To the naive observer, it would have seemed that there was nothing wrong. But this rider was far from naive. He could feel the danger that lurked a couple of hundred yards ahead of him in the shimmering heat and taunting shadows.

  Iron Eyes was not a man who would be easily killed, and the horseman was well aware of that chilling fact.

  His finger continually stroked the large trigger of the buffalo gun as his eyes sought out the bounty hunter. The rider’s attention kept returning to the huge boulder and he wondered whether his prey was behind its granite bulk. He tapped his spurs gently and allowed his horse to move forward slowly.

  Then he reined in again and listened.

  He was scared.

  All he required was a mere glimpse of Iron Eyes and he would unleash the fury of the deadly rifle. He knew that not even the legendary bounty hunter could survive being hit by one of the buffalo gun’s bullets.

  He focused on the boulder, which was now half in shadow.

  Was Iron Eyes hiding behind it?

  Cautiously, the rider lifted his right leg over the neck of his mount and slid to the ground. The sand was soft beneath his high-heeled boots.

  He held the huge weapon in both hands and walked beside his horse towards the boulder. Every few steps, the man stopped and tried to see if his quarry was hiding behind the big chunk of rock.

  The shimmering heat haze that rose off the soft white sand, together with the lengthening shadows, began to play tricks on his tired eyes.

  He held the buffalo gun ahead of him and carefully edged his way closer and closer to the boulder.

  Sweat was now pouring down the hunter’s spine beneath his shirt. This was a game that he had no experience of. This was not the way he had planned it.

  This was getting complicated.

  Was this a cunning trick created by the devilish Iron Eyes, or was he allowing his own vivid imagination to get the better of him?

  One mistake now could prove fatal.

  He was determined not to make that mistake. All he wanted to do was get one clean shot at the infamous Iron Eyes and cut him in half with his lethal weapon.

  For revenge was the one thing that had driven the man onward for the previous three years in his relentless search for the man who was known as the living ghost. It was all the rider had thought about since his outlaw brother had fallen victim to the bounty hunter’s deadly Navy Colts.

  Vengeance meant an eye for an eye in this man’s mind, and he had travelled a long way to claim this God-given right. Yet he could not take his eyes off the towering boulder before him, for he knew that death might be waiting just behind it.

  His death!

  This was not the way he had thought it would be. With every step, he began to feel that he had somehow stumbled into a web of Iron Eyes’ design.

  And he was the fly in that web.

  He knew that he was still way beyond the range of Iron Eyes’ Navy Colts and he intended to keep that advantage if possible.

  He moved to his right and crouched against the canyon wall. He caught a glimpse of something moving behind the boulder through a two-foot gap at its base. Then he heard the distinctive sound of spurs softly echoing off the canyon walls beyond the massive rock.

  ‘Iron Eyes!’ the man whispered excitedly to himself as he felt a sense of relief filling him. The bounty hunter was lying in wait for him. He had been right to be cautious.

  His right thumb pulled back on the hammer of the hefty weapon until it locked fully into position. He knew that he had to try and make the bounty hunter show himself if he were going to be able to blast him into Hell.

  Then the unmistakable jangling of spurs rang out again around the canyon, sending a chill up his spine. Every muscle in his body told him that the elusive Iron Eyes was there OK. Just beyond that lump of taunting rock.

  He had to outwit the bounty hunter, even if it were only for a split second. All he needed was the time it would take to aim and fire. The buffalo gun would do the rest.

  The man looked at his horse and then back at the boulder. An idea began to hatch in his fevered brain.

  Could Iron Eyes be distracted if he were to send his horse galloping down the canyon past the boulder? Would the ruthless bounty hunter be drawn out from the impenetrable cover of the large rock just long enough for the gunman to get a target?

  There was only one way to find out.

  He stood to his full height and then kicked the rear of the animal as hard as he could. The horse raced down the narrow canyon towards the boulder, making an awful lot of noise as it did so.

  Without a moment’s hesitation, the man ran behind his spooked horse with the primed buffalo gun gripped firmly in his hands. The dust that kicked up by the hoofs of his mount gave him a little cover and he intended to use that to his advantage. As he got closer to the huge boulder his eyes were locked on to the gap between it and the rock face.

  His squinting eyes could clearly see movement beyond its huge bulk. Shadows danced on the canyon wall.

  The low-life Iron Eyes was hiding there, waiting to ambush him, he thought.

  His horse had only just passed the boulder when it slowed to a halt, then turned to look at whatever was hiding behind the large rock. It too had seen something behind the boulder, the man told himself.

  The man was now within the range of the Navy Colts. He had to act quickly if he were to survive a showdown with such a devious and skilled enemy. He would have to get a clean shot with his buffalo gun to finish the bounty hunter off with one bullet. The man knew that he would have little time to reload the mighty single-shot rifle in his hands if he missed his target.

  It was a thought too awesome to even dwell upon.

  This had to be done swiftly.

  He crouched into the floating dust and then ran to the opposite rock face. He could see the Apache pony clearly just behind the rock as it vainly fought against its bonds.

  Where was Iron Eyes?

  Knowing that he was risking walking into the deadly sights of Iron Eyes’ Navy Colts, he trained the barrel of his buffalo gun in the direction of the skittish pony and cautiously edged forward.

  Inch by inch, his boots moved along the canyon wall through the soft sand.

  Sweat poured from beneath his Stetson hatband and ran unchecked down his weathered face.

  Then he caught sight of the bounty hunter’s long trail coat against the boulder and the distinctive blue gun resting by its frayed sleeve-cuff halfway up the jagged rock.

  A sense of panic suddenly overwhelmed him.

  The long trail coat was covered in blood and Iron Eyes was motionless. A thousand questions raced unanswered inside the sniper’s brain. Had Iron Eyes died from the shot that had brought him off his pony earlier?

  With a speed that defied the heat of Devil’s Pass, he ran forward and squeezed the trigger. The buffalo gun blasted its deafening charge. The bullet hit the coat dead center and the boulder exploded into a thousand pieces.

  The man watched it fall to the ground.

  His eyes widened when he realized that the trail coat had been c
arefully placed against the side of the boulder. There was no one inside its already blood-soaked fabric.

  Where was Iron Eyes? His mind screamed as his fingers desperately pulled another bullet from the belt hanging over his shoulder. He opened the chamber of the weapon, pulled out the still-smoking brass casing, then slid the fresh shell into the chamber. He locked it into place.

  Then he heard the sound of spurs again.

  He hauled the hefty weapon around and stared at the spurs hanging on the saddle horn of the terrified Indian pony.

  ‘What the hell?’ he muttered as the thought that he had been well and truly tricked sank at last into his fevered brain.

  He stared at the coat on the ground, then searched the area behind the boulder for the man he was hunting. There was no sign of Iron Eyes anywhere.

  Had the bounty hunter somehow disappeared into thin air?

  That was the way it seemed to the confused man as he lowered the rifle and moved towards the tethered Indian pony and the long sharp spurs that had been deliberately left hanging on the saddle horn.

  Before he had time to think, he heard a sudden noise behind him. He twisted on his heels and fired his buffalo gun again.

  Blood splattered all over him.

  He watched in horror as his horse was nearly cut in half by the shot from his own smoking weapon. The pitiful creature was knocked backwards and crumpled heavily into the blood-covered sand.

  His startled gaze darted away from the body of the stricken animal and began searching the canyon for the bounty hunter, who had disappeared.

  Would Iron Eyes have abandoned his mount and chosen to flee this deadly place on foot? The large water bag was still hanging from the saddle horn next to the spurs. It seemed ridiculous to even consider that any sane man would choose to leave his pony and the bag full of precious water, but was the bounty hunter sane?

  The frightened man knew little of the prey whom he had hunted for so many years, except that Iron Eyes killed mercilessly, and without regret.

  Before he could move a muscle he caught sight of something out of the corner of his eye on the white sand. At first he thought that it might be a sidewinder or a lizard. His head turned and his jaw dropped as he focused on the sand to his left.