by Steve Lee
The dust bit at his lungs. He coughed and clamped his free hand over his mouth. Terrified riderless horses charged blindly through the smoke. He leapt aside to avoid them. One reared at the sight of him and he had to roll beneath its thrusting hooves. Twice he stumbled over bodies. The bodies of many of his men Uttered the plaza. Not enough was left of some of them to be called a body.
Gradually the smoke cleared.
Through the thinning curtain of smoke, El Muerte saw about half his men were on their feet, many of them shocked and dazed. Others were alive but lay groaning where they had fallen, too injured to stand. As if by a miracle a few men had managed to stay in the saddle. Riderless horses were chasing around the plaza, kicking and bucking when men made a grab at their trailing reins.
'Get those horses!' El Muerte ordered, his voice a scream.
The bandits chased after the panicked beasts in a scrambling, shouting pack that only panicked them more.
El Muerte's own horse lay on the ground in a panting sweat. One of its legs was broken and the explosion had driven a big sliver of the coffin deep into its flank. El Muerte knelt beside the shuddering animal and gentled it, his voice low and soft. Then, seeing it was hopeless, he slashed the horse's throat with his machete. A hot gush of blood muddied the sand. El Muerte dragged his saddle-bags free of the horse. From inside he took a bundle wrapped in black velvet. The way he clutched the bundle said he'd kill anyone who tried to take it from him.
The sound of galloping horses jerked his head alert. Three of his men were taking off galloping out of the plaza down one of the small narrow calles leading off from it.
'Come back, you bastards!' he screamed. 'Halto, you pigs of cowards!'
The bandits paid him no attention. They rode straight out of the plaza as fast as their digging spurs could persuade their horses to carry them. A few seconds later the voices of the escaping bandits were heard to rise in shrill agonised screams that died as suddenly as they began. That was all it took to break the already demoralised spirits of El Muerte's men. All who still had horses dug spurs into their flanks and rode wildly towards another of the small calles.
'Traitors! Wait for me!' El Muerte shrieked as they galloped past him. He didn't have a horse and he didn't like the idea of being left behind by those who did.
Nearby a pistol lay on the ground where it had fallen from the twitching hand of its dead owner. El Muerte dived for it and came up shooting at the nearest deserter. One of the bullets hit the horse instead. The horse buckled, spilling its rider. The bandit rolled, then scrambled up, one hand tugging at the grip of his pistol. El Muerte fired again. The bullet delivered a soggy punch to the man's face and knocked him flat.
The rest of the escaping horsemen didn't get very much further. They'd ridden half-way down the narrow passage when they discovered the other end was blocked by a barrel large enough to fill the width of the calle. The barrel was rolling their way and it looked heavy and there was a fuse sparking at its side.
Suddenly the men on horses were as mad-anxious to get back to the plaza as they had been to escape from it a minute before. The bandits jostled frantically to swing their horses round in the narrow calk. Horses plunged into each other, shrilling in protest. One bandit flew from the back of his rearing mount. He fell directly in the path of the lumbering barrel. By the time he'd leapt to his feet, the barrel was almost on him. He limped away from it as fast as he could. Which wasn't fast enough. The barrel rolled straight over him, crushing him face-down in the dirt.
The struggling mess of riders had just made it back into the plaza when the barrel caught up. It hurtled into the thick of them, ramming horses, snapping their twig legs with its weight.
Then it blew.
* * *
When the almighty roar of the blast had died to a hollow growl, Sloane raised his head from the roof-top where he lay and peered down into the plaza. The whole square was aboil with smoke and dust which made it impossible to see if anyone had survived the explosion. Then he heard coughing and a near-hysterical voice shouting in rapid-fire Spanish and Sloane smiled a thin smile because he knew El Muerte was still alive. Which meant he could still be killed.
Attached to the heavy buckle of Sloane's belt were three metal stars, each about the size of a sheriff's badge. The stars looked like ornaments which is what they were meant to look like. Sloane plucked one of the stars from his belt, holding the razor-sharp spikes of the shuriken with familiar care. Then he heard someone running in the plaza below, heading his way.
The running bandit gaped in surprise when the savage-faced gringo in the dirty white suit dropped from the roof directly in his path. He recognised the man he thought was dead and his open mouth started to fill with a scream. But then Sloane's hand flashed out with a heel-of-the-hand blow that drove his nose right back into his brain.
Sloane stepped past the crumpled body and into the rolling mass of smoke. The ground was littered with debris — horse debris and human debris. The bone-devil was going to be cleaning up in more ways than one, Sloane realised and smiled grimly.
He saw the next bandit the same instant the Mex saw him. The bandit threw up his pistol to fire. Then he shrieked and dropped the pistol, one hand clawing at the metal shooting star piercing his eye. He wrenched the star from his head and shrieked louder when his eye came with it.
'I can't abide to see a man sufferin',' said Sloane appearing at his side. Then he did the bandit a merciful favour. He killed him.
Clutching his bundle in one hand and the raised pistol in the other, El Muerte advanced cautiously through the blinding curtain of smoke. The shrieks of pain that speared the silence rattled him. And so did the abrupt way they ended.
'Rafael… you still there?' he called.
'Si, jefecito,' came the answer, sounding strained and desperate. 'And Jesus and Pacito also…'
From the sound of his voice, Rafael and the others were close by, El Muerte decided. But they could as well have been the other side of a mountain so thick was the fog of smoke and dust between him and his few remaining men.
'And Julio?'
'I do not know,' Rafael called back. 'He was here just a moment ago.'
'Julio — are you there?'
No answer.
'Julio!'
Silence.
'Is anybody else here?' El Muerte appealed. He could not believe that out of his forty men only three were still alive.
'Just me,' replied a voice that wasn't Julio. An American-sounding voice. Close by.
El Muerte peered into the veil of smoke, straining to catch sight of movement. He raised his pistol higher, earing back the hammer. He knew he had to get the intruder to speak again and betray his position.
'You… Who are you?' he urged. 'Don't you got no name?'
'You know who I am…'
'Tell me!' El Muerte appealed, aiming his gun into the crowding darkness, finger tightening on trigger.
'The one what's gonna kill you,' the stranger's voice promised.
El Muerte squeezed off two shots in the direction from which the voice came.
He listened. The voice had sounded so familiar. He shook his head. No, it couldn't be, he told himself. But, with a sinking feeling, he knew he was right.
'Better luck next time,' Sloane called sympathetically.
El Muerte gritted his teeth and resisted an angry urge to shoot again. He checked the cylinder of his pistol and confirmed his fear. He only had one shot left. He wasn't going to waste it.
'Rafael… Pacito… Jesus… Don't split up!' he ordered. 'Keep together… He is between us. Move towards me and we will catch him in the middle!'
'Si, jefecito,' Rafael answered. 'We are coming…'
Clutching his precious bundle, pistol ready in his other hand. El Muerte took a cautious step forward into the swirling dust.
Sloane watched the three jittery Mexicans advancing slowly towards him across the dust-whipped plaza. He was crouched low, knowing they would be searching for him at eye-
level. He let them approach until they were so close he could hear Pacito's teeth chattering. Then he rose swiftly in their path behind a leaping roundhouse kick that instantly shattered Rafael's Winchester into two pieces. The next instant he was amongst them, his hands chopping them down with the effortless ease of a machete hacking through rotten branches.
El Muerte hurried forward at the sound of men fighting. Men fighting and dying… That was something he could understand. Something he could come to grips with — not like the taunting voice of a stalking enemy he could not even see. One last choking cry and then the fighting stopped and the uncomfortable silence rushed back to surround El Muerte.
'Rafael?' he called. 'Pacito…?'
No answer came. And then El Muerte knew he was alone. There was just him and a man without a face who had promised to kill him.
The dust was settling now and the smoke rapidly fading. Shapes began to separate themselves from the swirl of dust. One of the shapes became a man. El Muerte stood stock-still, his breath held back. He watched the man moving towards him, blind and unsuspecting. He took careful aim at the broad centre of the man. He wanted to make his last bullet count.
He fired. The man grunted and stumbled back, hands grabbing at his belly. Then the man caught his balance and staggered forward once more, moving sluggishly as if struggling against a fierce blizzard. After a few steps he pitched forward onto the ground by El Muerte's feet, a low moan escaping his lips as he died. El Muerte looked down at the dead man. It was Rafael.
The empty gun dropped from El Muerte's fingers. He stared at the body. After a time he raised his eyes and, as he expected, Sloane was before him — a stark grim figure looming phantom-like out of the dust.
'You are either a ghost or a man with a very hard head,' said the bandit. He tossed the bundle he carried lightly to the ground and drew the machete from its sheath.
'If you are a ghost you cannot harm me. If a man…'
El Muerte shrugged. Then he charged. He swung the machete in a broad swooping arc aimed at Sloane's neck. Sloane failed to meet the appointment. He side-stepped and the machete sliced empty air, whistling with disappointment. El Muerte tried again, this time slashing low at the American's stomach. Sloane's upthrust knee hammered the bandit's hand and, the same instant, his right hand flashed out in a fast snatching motion.
Springing back out of reach of the machete, Sloane held up his hand — dangling an object for the bandit's benefit. The object was tiny and golden and tinkled sweetly.
El Muerte's earring.
Pain gouging through him, El Muerte clamped a hand to the side of his head and felt the ragged tear in his ear. His eyes bulged furiously in a face that seemed suddenly filled with teeth. Screaming defiance, he pressed his attack, slashing and hacking with frenzied determination. The hissing blade cut patterns in the air. It never touched Sloane. But Sloane's hands and feet touched El Muerte. They touched him and they battered him.
As the two men fought, the villagers of Lascara filed solemnly into the plaza. They moved slowly through the dying wisps of smoke, picking their way over the bodies littering the ground. At the head of the procession was Father Francesco and immediately behind him came El Muerte's victims. Some limped and some hopped on crutches. Those that could see led those who could not.
The Unfortunate Ones of Lascara were the guests of honour at El Muerte's birthday party. They'd each brought a present too. Every one of them gripped a knife or machete or some other kind of sharp cutting blade.
Silently, the grim procession shuffled into the plaza, forming a circle around the two men fighting at its centre. A new kind of fear tugged at El Muerte's heart when he saw the villagers surrounding him. He knew what he'd done to them and what they would do to him if they got their hands on him. The knowledge spurred him to attack Sloane with greater ferocity.
It didn't matter how fierce his attack was. Sloane still managed effortlessly to block and counter the strokes of his blade. With growing despair El Muerte realised that the American was playing with him, biding his time for the right moment.
The moment came soon enough. When he saw that all the villagers had taken up their positions in the plaza, Sloane knew it was time to end the party-games and get down to the serious business of handing out the presents. As El Muerte lunged at his face with the machete, Sloane's left shot out and caught the upraised wrist in a grip of tightening steel. Then he chopped at the bandit's arm with the hardened edge of his right hand. The arm broke with a sound of dry wood snapping.
The bandit fell back howling. Sloane didn't mind. It was El Muerte's party and he could cry if he wanted. El Muerte's machete fell from pain-stretched fingers. His face was a mask of agony and hatred, the lips peeled back over grinding teeth. But El Muerte was no party-pooper. He wanted ' the party to go on. Gathering his strength, he ran forward and kicked high, the heel and spurs of his boot leaping up at Sloane's face.
Sloane dodged the raking spurs. Simultaneously, he caught the booted foot at the height of its kick. His right hand slammed down against the rigidly-held leg and shattered it. In the same fluid motion he snapped his elbow straight and backfisted the bandit's groin.
El Muerte collapsed. His broken body writhed in the dust, jack-knifing in pain.
Sloane stooped and picked up the velvet-wrapped bundle from where El Muerte had dropped it. He looked inside. The crystal skull leered at him with its grin of bare-faced evil. He covered up the skull, returning his attention to the bandit groaning at his feet.
'I came a long way to kill you, Mister El Muerte,' he said, 'but I guess these people got their claim staked first.'
Sloane turned to face the watching villagers. 'He's all yours,' he said. 'If you want him — come and get him!'
They didn't need further persuading. The ranks of villagers closed round the bandit chief, all anxious to offer him their congratulations on the Day of the Dead.
El Muerte tried to crawl away. But he was slow and the villagers were eager and fast. When the terrible screams began, Father Francesco averted his head, his lips mouthing prayers.
'Yo soy la Muerte!' the bandit screamed. 'You cannot kill Death. You cannot kill me!'
The villagers weren't convinced. But just to make sure they kept their blades busy until long after El Muerte quit his squirming and screaming.
Chapter Twelve
Sloane swung down from the big pinto the villagers had given him and dallied the reins round a low branch. He looked up. From where he stood, he could see the fierce glow of a blazing fire over by Don Luis' hacienda. He sat down, leaning his back against the trunk of a sweet-smelling jacaranda. His head and body ached and he felt very weary. He closed his eyes.
For a long time he sat there in the same position, unmoving except for the regular ebb and swell of his breath. Gradually, mind and body relaxed. Soon he felt the Tch'i, his inner strength, flowing through him, filling his body with power and energy. He would need all the power his inner strength could give him in the battle ahead. Sloane had destroyed El Muerte. But he knew El Muerte had been like a deadly fist carrying out instructions received from the brain. Now he had to destroy the brain that guided the fist.
When he felt ready, he opened his eyes and stood. He snapped into a rapid series of exercises, limbering his muscles. Then he headed for the hacienda. Carrying a bundle wrapped in black velvet.
He made it unseen to the hacienda. He was close enough now to hear the crackle of the big leaping fire in the grounds of the hacienda. Men's laughter came from the direction of the fire. Head bent low, Sloane crept closer to the flames. They'd built the fire near the same spot where he had fought Toro. He took cover behind the big cannon that overlooked the scene. He peered over the top of the cold black barrel.
More than twenty vaqueros were gathered around the fire, smoking and laughing and loudly celebrating the Day of the Dead. It looked like they were going to have themselves a barbecue. Sloane didn't need to be told who was going to get barbecued. A short distance from t
he vaqueros sat Billy. He was trussed up like a Thanksgiving turkey.
Sloane scanned the faces caught in the glare of the fire. He couldn't see Aguilar or Toro. Or Don Luis. After a time, Sloane moved silently away from the cannon and slid back into the darkness beyond the fire. He was no longer carrying the velvet-wrapped bundle.
* * *
Joe had spoken true of his horse. It was the goldenest palamino Sloane had ever clapped eyes on. Its mane and the thick mass of tail-hair were snow-white — but the rest of its sleek body was as bright golden as a bullion bar in the sun. The horse snorted and restlessly shifted as Sloane looked it over.
'Easy, boy, easy…' he coaxed and reached across the rails to gentle the animal. But his scent was unfamiliar. The palamino tossed its head to one side and moved back stiff-legged with a low, restless whinny. Its unease spread to the other horses penned in the corral and soon all of them were snorting and stamping.
'Que passa, caballos?'
Sloane ducked behind the corral as a vaquero clutching a carbine hurried over to investigate the disturbance.
'Sta bueno' the guard told the shuffling horses to reassure them. Then, to reassure himself, he began a slow sharp-eyed prowl of the perimeter of the corral.
Sloane rose suddenly before him, his foot swinging up for an under-the-chin kick that lifted the Mexican's heels off the ground. The Mex flew back, his head chasing his hat and the rest of his body coming along for the ride. He landed in a heap, his neck at a crazy angle.
The brief flurry of violence made the horses jumpier than ever. They roamed from one end of the corral to the other, heads nodding with growing impatience. Sloane stripped the guard's poncho from his body and struggled into it himself. Then he tugged the body over to the corral and heaved it into a water trough, water spilling over the sides. He pushed the body beneath the water and held it down until it stayed under the surface without his help. He untied the corral gate and held it open.
