The Hunted

by Ralph Compton

  There was that sound again. He looked around, spied movement off near one of the wagons. The old man! Maybe something, a critter, was at him. Charlie rolled to his knees, stood up stiffly, and did his best not to make a sound as he crept low toward the wagons.

  He rounded the corner of the last wagon and saw the four freighters kneeling, crouched around the body of who had been the boss of their outfit, Everett Meecher.

  “What in tarnation are you boys doing?” In the mornings, Charlie’s voice sounded even deeper, gruffer than normal, and this morning, after a night in the cold mountain air, it was a low, booming thing.

  They all looked up at him, and Rollie, whose back was to Charlie, spun and stared at him. Charlie hardly recognized him. For the flicker of an instant he felt sorry for the man. Charlie had really laid into him, buttoning up the young man’s eyes until they were nearly shut, puffed tight, yellowed, and purpled. And his bottom lip had swelled until it resembled a bright red chili pepper.

  Charlie couldn’t tell if Rollie was sneering or surprised, or if he could even see Charlie at all, so puffed were his eyes.

  “You’re the man I was looking for,” said Rollie. The words came out pinched and forced, no doubt because of his misshapen mouth, which stretched wide in what Charlie assumed was a grin.

  “What are you doing to Everett’s body?” Charlie stepped closer.

  “Why, Big Boy, I am taking what’s mine. The old bastard’s money, for one thing, and his Colt Navy revolver, for all the good the old thing is. He can keep his crusty old pipe and tobacco pouch. I expect he’ll have no shortage of flame to set it alight where he’s headed.”

  He wheezed a laugh and the other three followed suit, though their unease with the dead man was plain, given their downturned mouths, and the glances they cast at the corpse when Rollie turned back to Charlie.

  “That’s desecration. Leave Mr. Meecher be so’s we can give him a proper burial.”

  “Oh.” Rollie struggled to his feet, his Colt already in his hand. “I see how it is. You and that hussy yonder wrapped him up tighter’n a tick so you could get at all his money and the gun too. Huh? Don’t tell me you didn’t know the old fool kept all his cash in a special pocket sewed inside his trousers. Yessir. But I know. And you know how I know that, Big Boy?” He waved the pistol and stared at Charlie.

  “Nope,” said Charlie, thinking maybe he’d reached the end of his rope. He sure wanted to put less space between him and the talking end of that gun. Might be he could still best the fool out of it.

  “I’ll tell you, then, since you so kindly asked. You see . . . Big Boy, I am Everett Meecher’s nephew. At least I was until he died. So that makes me owner of the freightin’ business. And the wagons. And what’s in them.”

  “No, it don’t,” said Charlie, afraid of where this crazy talk was headed.

  “Oh.” Rollie cranked the hammer back. “But I do think so, Charlie. I damn sure do. I was his nephew, after all. His closest kin. You, on the other hand, ain’t nothing but a thief and a . . . well, we’ll save that for later, why don’t we?” He stepped backward. “Right now you got work to do.”

  “What’s that you’re saying?” said Charlie, taking a step toward Rollie.

  “Uh-uh-uh, not toward me. Toward him.” He waved the gun barrel at the dead man. “Bury his bony old ass. Now.”

  Charlie’s eyes widened.

  “Yeah, you heard me, thief. Anywhere. I expect it’ll be hard going for a bit, but the ground ain’t froze clear through to China yet.” This prompted a new round of forced laughs from his chums.

  Under persuasion of the business end of that six-gun, Charlie retrieved a steel bar and shovel from a tool locker under the supply wagon. The bar was carried for use in repairing axles and levering the wagons out of rough spots. He traded a glance with Hester and offered her what he hoped was a reassuring smile.

  Hester gave him a nod in return. “I’ll help,” she said, tucking a blanket around her sister.

  “Nope,” said Rollie. “Him only.” He waved the pistol at Charlie and tried to smile.

  Once Charlie located a decent spot that he felt would be a suitable final resting place for the old curmudgeon, he found that Rollie was right, curse his hide. The ground was hard as iron. But he kept at it, pounding and scratching away, and eventually, after a couple of feet down, he was rewarded with softer earth where the frost hadn’t sunk down yet. He levered up clods of frozen earth, then scooped out the loose dirt.

  It hadn’t taken long before he was soaked through with sweat, despite the chill air. He rewrapped the old man in the tarpaulin, then carried him over and gently set him in the hole.

  “Get on with it! We have miles to make up because of your foolishness.” Rollie wagged the pistol and knocked back another slug of whiskey. Behind him, his hungover cronies slowly got the animals harnessed and rigged.

  “Don’t you want to say anything over him? He was your kin and all.” Charlie leaned on the shovel, red-faced and sweating.

  “Him?” Rollie laughed again, then grimaced and gripped his face. He’d split his lip, and blood welled out between his begrimed fingers.

  Hester and Delia walked over to the grave by Charlie, and the three of them bowed heads. The two women looked at Charlie. He shrugged and Hester nodded at the body.

  Charlie sighed and cleared his throat. “Lord, I . . . uh, this here old man, Everett Meecher, he was . . . well, sir, he was something else.”

  “I’ll say,” said Rollie, snickering and taking a pull on the bottle.

  Charlie shook his head and continued. “The thing is, Lord, well, we’d appreciate it if you took care of him. And if you could, see to it that we make it to Gamble without too much fuss.” He glanced at Hester and Delia. “I think Everett would want that.” He gave Hester another quick look.

  She nodded back.

  “Amen,” said Charlie.

  The women echoed the word, and Hester bent for a handful of dirt to toss in the grave.

  Rollie strolled over and said, “So long, you foul old bird.” His finger squeezed the trigger and the wrapped corpse flinched as the bullet sliced into its middle, leaving a smoking hole in its stead.

  Charlie lunged at Rollie. “What’s the matter with you, you fool!”

  The younger man backed up, stumbling a bit, but still managing to crank back on the hammer. “Nothing a dead Big Boy wouldn’t fix. Now cover him up. We got miles to go yet.”

  It didn’t take long for Charlie, with Hester’s help, to fill in the grave and mound it over. They worked to secure rocks over the hump of frozen clods, and then Charlie drove in an old silvered branch at the head of the grave, and on a flat rock beneath it, Hester scratched in the old man’s name and the current year. That was all they figured they could do, with Rollie pacing and fondling the six-gun behind them.

  By the time Charlie hustled the two women over to Mabel-Mae, the sun had almost come out, but decided against the effort and ducked back behind the mass of low gray clouds. The mule stood, picketed and looking bored, and Charlie told the sisters to wait there for him. He retrieved their carpetbags from the wagon and carried them over to the mule. As he slapped a blanket on her back, he heard Rollie behind him.

  “What are you up to, Big Boy?”

  Charlie said, “I’m fixing to leave. I’m taking these women and my gear and my mule and we’re walking out of here. And that is that. I have had enough.” He turned to the wagon, reaching for his own gear. From behind, he heard a Colt crank back into the deadliest position of all.

  “I don’t think so, Big Boy. Oh no, no. You signed on for this trip, you see. And a deal’s a deal.”

  Charlie turned to see Rollie a dozen feet from him, a wide smile on his face, the revolver’s hard black snout once more aimed right at his own big chest.

  Charlie let out a long, disgusted sigh. “I didn’t sign on
to wet-nurse a passel of crazies, no, sir. And that’s all I’m seeing here. Leave us be and we’ll leave you be.”

  “Not a prayer, Big Boy. Besides, where you gonna go?” Rollie smiled that split-lip grin, his swollen eyes creased into yellow-black slits. “We got us Injun killers behind, in front, to the left and right. You’d be dooming the poor, pitiful town of Gamble, with all that gold hid away and ready for the plucking.”

  Charlie’s eyes narrowed.

  “Oh yeah, you don’t think ol’ Uncle Everett was the only one who knew all about the wonders of Gamble, how it’s fit to burst, how the town’s filled with gold ore and dust and whatnot.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Charlie didn’t think he sounded all that convincing.

  “Oh, come on, Big Boy. I heard the old man telling you all about it the other night. So you know the big news. Makes it nigh on impossible for you to leave now, don’t it? Besides, strength in numbers.” Rollie leaned forward, as if he were sharing a secret, though he was still a good ten feet from the big man. Everyone in the camp had hushed and seemed to lean in too. “You need us more than we need you, Big Charlie. If that’s what you’re calling yourself now.”

  With the suddenness of a gunshot, Charlie realized that Rollie knew something about him, something he’d worked long and hard to keep quiet, keep hidden. He thought back to that bar in Monkton. Had to be he heard it there, maybe from that bigmouth Dutchy. Charlie sighed again. It was becoming a habit he didn’t much like. And not being able to do anything about it was an even worse feeling.

  “I can see from that look on your face that you have decided to throw in with us. Smart move for a dumb workhorse. Now get that junk loaded back on the wagon, get them hussies settled, and let’s go. I’m the boss of this here outfit and you are sorely trying my patience.”

  Charlie ground his teeth together so tight he thought for sure they might powder, but he didn’t care. All he wanted to do was snap that whelp’s head off. “I should have finished you last night when I had the chance.”

  “But you didn’t, did you? Let that be a lesson to you, Big Charlie.” Rollie half turned, then looked back and said, “Or should I say . . . Shotgun Charlie? Now get a move on before I shoot that damned mule of yours. Right between its big, dumb eyes.”

  Charlie took a step forward but felt a firm hand on his forearm. He looked down to see Hester there, restraining him once again. They stared at each other for a long moment, the fog of blood rage fading from his vision. He backed down, and the air in his lungs seemed to leave him. But the feeling of wanting to cripple Rollie Meecher didn’t.

  Chapter 16

  Charlie guessed that the day ahead was going to be a bad one, mostly because of Rollie Meecher. It seemed every chance he got, Meecher wagged that pistol in his direction and shook his head, as if to say, “Oh, you wait to see what I have planned for you later.”

  They’d stopped to let the animals blow and give them a feed from the nose bags. For themselves, they made do with a cold lunch. Charlie slowly chewed a second strip of jerked venison and sank his head down as low as he could into his sheepskin-lined coat collar. He’d offered the coat and other clothes to the ladies as the temperature dropped, but they’d declined, hauled out more of their own garments, and wrapped up in more wool blankets.

  This was shaping up to be the worst day of the trip, and though he had doubted on previous days it could get much worse, it had managed to be so with each hour that passed. He tried to enjoy the view—though low dark clouds had scudded along above them most of the day, now and again a teasing shaft of sunlight lancing through and lighting the narrow cleft of a valley below the winding trail.

  With the aspens skinned of leaves and the pines doing their best to reach the sky, Charlie saw all around them the rocky outcrops and far below, raw tumbledowns of shale slopes lining the river. As pretty as it was, Charlie knew it would be even prettier after a heavy snowfall. Pretty if you’re a bird, Charlie, he told himself. That way you could fly right on over it to someplace warm.

  That line of thinking dismayed him because he normally loved winter, looked forward to snow in the mountains. But this trip seemed to have pulled any hope and good humor he might have had right out of him.

  “Charlie, can I ask you something?”

  He turned to see Hester, her wool blanket wrapped tight around her shoulders and head, trailing off her like a serape. Her arms were crossed and he thought maybe her usual hard look had softened, at least for the moment.

  “Ask away, ma’am.”

  “First off, you can stop calling me ‘ma’am.’ I’m Hester. Hester O’Fallon.”

  “Well, that wasn’t really a question.” Charlie smiled and nodded, touched the worn brim of his tall-crown hat. “But I’m pleased to meet you, after a fashion, Miss O’Fallon. I am Charlie. Uh, most folks call me Big Charlie. I reckon you see why.”

  “Yep. I’ve seen you naked.”

  Charlie’s face heated up and he scuffed his boot in the dead grass by the trailside.

  “Aren’t you the bashful one?”

  “Yes’m. You had a question for me?”

  She regarded him a moment, then said, “A gun. I wonder why you don’t wear one, is all.”

  “Oh, I got a Green River knife. Does me fine.”

  “That’s not really an answer.” Then she smiled and shook her head.

  “No, ma’am, I reckon not, but it’s as close as we’re liable to get just now. Here comes Rollie Meecher.”

  And up strode the freighting outfit’s new boss. Even from ten feet away, Charlie smelled the musky wood smoke, sweat, and boozy reek of the man.

  “Ain’t nothing I’d like to do more today than to let you two lovebirds chatter on and on, but we got time to make up. Now get mounted or be left behind.” He turned to go, then said, “Oh, and I didn’t really mean that. We ain’t leaving you all behind. ’Specially not such pretties as them two women.”

  “You keep away from me and my sister, Meecher.” Hester stood defiant, her jaw thrust out.

  “Oh, is that so?” Meecher stepped closer, but still out of easy reach. “Well, we’ll see about that. I may have taken a shine to that sickly one, I tell you. So you best tell your sister that she ought to shape up so ol’ Rollie Meecher, the head of this here outfit, can have himself a look-see, maybe a little fun tonight. You understand me?”

  “There won’t be any tampering with the women, Rollie. You leave off of them.” Charlie had angled in front of Hester, who looked none too pleased about it.

  “Oh, I see how it is. You two got something going on. Then you shouldn’t mind a professional man such as me taking up with your sickly sister.”

  “You touch my sister, jackass, and I will gut you where you stand.”

  “Ohhh.” Rollie’s puffy eyes widened and one corner of his mouth rose. “Bold talk for a dollar-a-thrill girl. Besides, she ain’t likely to find herself a man who owns his own business, now, is she? Consider me an educator of sorts, what they call a professor. After all, you and her are headed up to Gamble to make some sporting money, am I right? Old Rollie could teach you all a thing or three about what your customers will be needing most from you.”

  Charlie balled his fists and stepped forward. Rollie winked and backed away from them, then shouted, “Get mounted. If I have to say it again, that mule gets one in the eye.” His laughter echoed across the narrow valley.

  “We play along, Miss Hester, and it’ll all come out right, you mark my words.” He offered her a smile, but all he got was her stern look.

  “Charlie, I swear. Hoping that the best will come out of every situation won’t make it so.”

  He couldn’t think of a thing to say to that, so he nodded and climbed up into the wagon. She might well be right, but he was having a hard enough time fighting his own case of the sours that he didn’t want to add hers to it to
o.

  The next few hours passed in near silence, save for the increasing sound of laughter from Rollie, Bo, and Shiner. Norbert was still lamed from his dunking in the river, but looking as though he’d make most if not all of a recovery before long. Charlie guessed they were drinking again—still—and wondered if they’d miss Charlie and the women.

  Might not even give chase, considering the fact that their animals were all pulling beasts, hooked up and slow to move anyway, and it felt as if more rough weather was on its way. The air felt thicker, tighter somehow, as if everything had a big pillow wrapped around it beyond where they could see, up in the heavens.

  As much as Charlie hated to admit it, Rollie wasn’t wrong about one thing—he and the women needed Rollie and the other men more than they needed him.

  A man’s scream—it sounded to Charlie as though it was Rollie—jerked everyone to attention. Charlie reined up and looked for Hester, who rode Mabel-Mae close by the wagon and so, close by her sister.

  “Stay here!” Charlie jumped down out of the wagon and joined the other men at the front of the train.

  Just ahead of Rollie’s lead wagon sat a naked man, propped against a boulder. Or what had once been a man. He wore no clothes, and he’d been slit wide and deep, from crotch to breastbone, and his intestines and other guts looked to be removed, though by critter or man, Charlie couldn’t tell yet. Likely a combination of both.

  His left foot was mostly gone, and raw white nubs of bone stood up where his toes and foot bones had been. The flesh had likely been gnawed away by critters, in varying degrees on up to his knee on the left. The right foot was half there, and his arms had suffered similar treatment.

  His torso and arms had been shot several times, as the pocked blackened holes attested. And it looked to Charlie that the poor man had also been shot with arrows, as evidenced by the ragged holes, different looking than gunshot wounds, some with nubs of wood, maybe arrows, sticking out. He saw two of those in the man’s shoulders.