The Black Blade: A Huckster Novel

by Jeff Chapman

  Coyote-shifter took the shot in the flank. The animal lifted off the ground, flying several feet, as if the buckshot hadn’t yet realized it had struck flesh and carried on, taking the beast with it. Coyote-shifter struck the ground with a wheezing whimper and churned up a cloud of dust. Blood sprayed in a red fountain like a hot springs geyser. His back legs twitched a couple times with life that wouldn’t quit and then stiffened, while his mouth lay open, tongue licking dirt, yelp forever arrested.

  Wilbur lumbered through the trees with all the grace of a blindfolded ox. He snapped the shotgun’s breech closed and directed the barrels at us. A stupid grin parted the black stubble of his neglected beard. Staring down the barrels of Wilbur’s shotgun for the second time in two days brought me as close as I’ve ever been to leaving Orville to his fate.

  “Well looke’ here what crawled outa the ground. You’re one lucky bastard you are. Escaped my gun in the cornfield and now I saved yer hide from that there—” Wilbur waved a hand at the carcass. “Coyote or whatever the hell it is.”

  I couldn’t count on a malfunctioning gun for a second time. The only option left was talking. Question was what angle to take? Isobel held the blade behind her back.

  “Think about it, Wilbur. Can you honestly tell me you trust Marzby? You think he’s just gonna hand Nellie over to you?”

  “It’s all I’ve got. And if Marzby don’t, I’ll blast him and his Pig-man to hell.”

  “You think Marzby hasn’t thought of that? He wants us to be fightin’. You’re playin’ cards with a double-dealin’ cheat. Throwin’ loaded dice.”

  The corner of Wilbur’s mouth twitched, and his eyes narrowed as his mind chewed over what I’d told him.

  “We’ve got to work together,” I said. “Do somethin’ Marzby won’t expect.”

  “You should know all about cheatin’. That’s what you do, ain’t it? Take money from honest folk for nothin’?” Wilbur spat at my feet. “You and yer fat partner’s lies is what’s got us into this mess.”

  “I ain’t never purposely cheated nobody.”

  Wilbur pulled back both hammers, which clicked with the finality of church bells.

  “You hand over that black blade, nice and friendly-like, and I won’t blast a hole through yer chest and out yer back. You hear me!?” His voice rose as he talked until he was shouting.

  Desperation clearly brought forth the worst in Wilbur—the dumb, unthinking, brutish kind of worst. My mind raced, fearing he wasn’t bluffing. He’d already tried to kill me once. If he hadn’t seen Isobel with the blade, and I was plum certain he hadn’t, I could convince him I dropped it and buy us time searching for it, maybe even send him into the cave.

  “Well?” Wilbur advanced a step, stirring up dust as he slammed his boot down.

  I opened my mouth to unleash a series of life-saving fibs when Isobel cut in.

  “Jimmy ain’t afraid of you,” she said. “From what I heard tell. You couldn’t hit a barn if you was standin’ inside it.”

  “You little brat. Your pa needs to tan your hide ’til you learn some respect.” His eyes twinkled, and a wicked grin rendered his angry face almost agreeable, but looks have deceived many. “Or maybe you ain’t got no pa. Maybe your mama is one of those soiled doves?”

  An insult is grease on a fire, my grandma said. Wilbur had thrown grease and oil and black powder in the fire. Isobel screamed like a she-panther. I caught her by the waist as she charged Wilbur, brandishing the knife and her half-staff. So much for my plan to buy time.

  “My pa’s gonna crack your head open and dig your grave.”

  Wilbur laughed. I struggled to hold Isobel and avoid getting my own head bashed in as she kicked and flailed. That girl was a wildcat when riled and stronger by half than she looked.

  Wilbur’s mirth twisted to anger. “You were gonna trick me. That little goober’s got the knife.”

  With his shotgun leveled at us, I feared the end had come. I turned my head and dragged Isobel back as she shrieked and cursed to make a riverboat deckhand blush. I fought her as if my life depended on getting her away from Wilbur, which it most assuredly did. Wilbur didn’t shoot. Maybe a thin streak of decency kept him from killing a young girl.

  When I looked, Wilbur was slack-jawed, staring to his left. I followed his gaze to a pool of congealing blood where the Coyote-shifter’s body had been sprawled.

  “What the hell?” said Wilbur.

  Nothing weird surprised me much anymore, but Wilbur obviously had never encountered the strange. My grip on Isobel slackened. That girl didn’t quit. When I felt her breaking free, I squeezed her tight again.

  “Stop it,” I said to Isobel, “and shut up.”

  Her wide eyes studied me like a whipped puppy, but the calm didn’t last long.

  “Ain’t nobody calls—”

  “Shut. Up.” I said. “Or I’ll cut a switch and tan your hide myself.” She must’ve seen her father’s look in my eyes, for she finally quit fighting. Their power is here, the Wise One had said. Here might mean that cavern, perchance where they would reincarnate. “Wilbur, we gotta skedaddle. That coyote is comin’ back.”

  Wilbur’s eyes looked as empty as the sockets in a sun-bleached skull. He stared at me, uncomprehending, until anger burned away his fog. “You gots somebody else out here. Think I’m some dumb hick farmer? Think you can trick me? Come on outa yer hole,” he shouted, “’fore I start shootin’.”

  “Wilbur! That wasn’t no ordinary coyote. He’s magic, a shapeshifter. Marzby’s got magic. The Coyote-shifter’s inside that hill right now, and he’s gonna come after us and that blade with a vengeance. We gotta get as far away from this place as we can. Double quick.”

  Wilbur chewed his lip. “Can that horse gallop with you two astride her?” Wilbur nodded toward Maggie.

  “Fast enough,” I said.

  Wilbur spat in his hand and held it out to me. “You don’t try to run off, and I won’t shoot you. Deal?”

  “Deal.” I spat in my hand before we shook. Not what I’d hoped for, but at least we were moving.

  Isobel and I rode ahead on Maggie. Wilbur and his shotgun, which he cradled across his arm, followed. It wasn’t comforting to have a gun aimed my back, even less so when the horse was picking its way across rock-strewn ground. I urged Maggie to walk quicker. The farther we moved away from Skull Hill, the less powerful the shapeshifters would be. I was staking our lives on a hunch.

  “Orville would’ve done a better bargain,” said Isobel. “He would have talked that no good scoundrel out of his shotgun.”

  I rolled my eyes. “If Orville was here, we wouldn’t be here and you’d be home. Instead, I’m breakin’ my promise to your ma.”

  “When do you think I’ll get home?”

  “Not tonight and probably not tomorrow neither. Wilbur ain’t gonna let you go until this business is done.”

  “My Pa’s gonna have to cut some more switches for all the switchens I’m gonna get. But I’m inclined to stick around anyways. Orville needs all the help we can muster, and my mama never taught me to pass by a friend in need.”

  As we road beneath an oak, a crow cawed overhead. Three of the black birds watched us. Six beady eyes. In all the commotion to acquire the blade, I’d forgotten about our feathered escorts. If we were to have any chance of surprising Marzby, we had to finish off those birds.

  As we rounded the end of Skull Hill, I peered over my shoulder, expecting to see the Coyote-shifter sprinting behind us, but all I saw was Wilbur, one hand holding the reins, the other with a finger itching at the triggers. Attempting an escape appeared most inadvisable. I coaxed Maggie into a trot as we left the rocky ground for some level grassland.

  Wilbur brought his quarter horse up beside us. The shotgun eyed us with its two barrels. From her vantage in front of me, Isobel twisted round to scowl at him. Wilbur ignored her.

  “Where’s that coyote you said was gonna come after us?”

  “How should I know? Maybe he’s still tr
yin’ to knit his gut back together.”

  “I can’t speculate on what happened to that coyote. The past couple days have seen too much that’s unnatural and strange. But I don’t trust you and I won’t hesitate to shoot the both of you.”

  “I’ll keep your mistrust under advisement,” I said. We decided to make for Marzby’s ranch as the crow flies and forgo any well-traveled paths. Faster and less conspicuous, Wilbur claimed, and he insisted he knew the way. Possession of the blade proved more contentious as Isobel refused to part with it, and I wasn’t about to make her do so.

  “How do I know you ain’t gonna run off with it when we camp tonight?” said Wilbur.

  “I wouldn’t trust you as far as a chicken can fly,” said Isobel.

  These two could trade insults the whole livelong day. “It’s like this,” I said. “We need you and you need us to beat Marzby. Like you need a horse to bust sod.”

  “And how you plannin’ to beat Marzby?”

  “He lured us with sneakin’ and treachery. I figure we’ll give him the same. The details will present themselves, when the time comes...” My voice trailed off as did the strength of my plans.

  Wilbur snorted. “What you’re sayin’ is you got no idea. Well I got one. Get me close enough and I’ll give him both barrels.”

  I nodded. It was the kind of plan I expected from Wilbur, the kind of plan I figured Marzby expected too.

  We camped for the night on what Wilbur said was the north fork of Misery Creek. Isobel and I divvied up the last of the bread from her mother and some beans. Wilbur had his own grub, including hunks of mighty fine smelling bacon, a more substantial portion than us, but he didn’t offer to share.

  Wilbur’s notion was to follow the creek in the morning and come upon Marzby’s ranch from behind. I deferred since Wilbur knew the territory. Isobel knew every tree and bush between her farm and town and Skull Hill, but not much beyond.

  The perplexing question was what to do once we got to Marzby’s spread. If we could catch Marzby in the outhouse, we’d be home free. Wilbur had two saddlebags stuffed with buckshot shells. Said he’d blast the outhouse to splinters and Marzby to a bloody pulp and bury the stinking bastard where he belonged. If we had to wait too long for the outhouse assault, Wilbur favored going in through the front door, blasting everything in sight, whether it moved or not.

  We turned to sleep with no clear plan.

  “Sleep on top of the knife,” I whispered to Isobel.

  “I’ve done better than that.” Her teeth glimmered in the moonlight, and I knew as sure as gold is yellow that the blade was safe.

  “What’re you two whisperin’ ’bout?”

  “How I hid the knife so you can’t never find it,” said Isobel.

  Wilbur glowered at her. “Just see I don’t find you two gone in the mornin’.” He turned away to snuggle with his shotgun. “I found you once, and I’ll find you again.”

  He hadn’t let go of his gun since we’d met him today, not even to eat. I hoped he didn’t have a nightmare and mistake me for Marzby. Isobel stuck out her tongue.

  I stretched out on the ground, resting my head on my knitted hands. A chill crept out of the earth like night crawlers reaching out of their holes. A recipe for rheumatism my grandma would have warned. I’d given up Maggie’s saddle blanket to Isobel, and Wilbur wasn’t going to share nothing of his. Sleep eluded me, but the blame was not with the creeping chill.

  Despite my best arguing and reasoning, I couldn’t convince myself we’d shaken the coyote and the opossum. What if their strength extended with darkness? What if they could scent the blade? Might as well be a blazing signal fire on top of a hill. How could I relax with Marzby coming up ahead of me and shapeshifters following behind? Long after Wilbur commenced snoring and Isobel ceased her tossing and turning, I listened for every rustle, snapping twig, and howl, fearing the worst.

  When the moon had passed its apex, my gaze meandered across the wash of stars and settled on the tree branches arching over Wilbur. My heart lurched to my throat. I didn’t believe my eyes. Was I dreaming? Nope. When I punched my fists into the ground to sit up, I yelped as a sharp-edged rock threatened to slice my fingers open.

  Two snow-white faces watched me. Huge yellow eyes glowed in the moon’s gray light, floating, disembodied. In my exhausted state, I couldn’t discern nothing. Souls sent to claim the blade? More of the Wise One’s henchmen?

  As if answering my question, one of the faces dropped and swooped toward me. The eyes grew, a fierce yellow charging at me. I rolled to my side. A silent wind whooshed over the back of my sweating neck, cold as death’s passing. The owl glided over the grass, silent as fog, dropped to the ground and then bounced up without breaking the rhythm of its flight. The owl pumped its wings on the way back to the tree. A limp mouse hung from its talons.

  I wasn’t the first person to be spooked by a barn owl nor the last, but these were Marzby’s owls. He knew where we were. Knew we had the blade. Been watching us all the livelong day. I shivered, my spine quaking in fear. What was stopping him from bringing his Pig-man here to finish us off? If we were to have any hope of surprise, let alone success, we needed to lose those crows, who would take the watch in the morning. For once, Wilbur was the right man for the task.

  Chapter Sixteen

  “Jimmy,” Isobel hissed. “Jimmy.”

  My eyes opened to Isobel’s face hovering above me. Her unbraided hair hung down past her eyes like thin curtains in the dawning sun.

  “Got one biscuit left. You best wake yerself up if you want it.”

  Isobel shoved a stale biscuit into my hand as I sat up. A small fire flickered. On the other side, Wilbur nibbled on back bacon skewered on a stick.

  “Thought we’d lost you to the sleep fairies,” said Wilbur. “I woulda kicked you in the ribs, but yer Isobel spoke up for you.”

  “Good mornin’ to you too,” I said.

  Wilbur chuckled and turned his skewer to evenly heat his meat. Grease droplets formed on the bacon, and I swore I could taste each one before it fell into the flames, raising a sputter. Wilbur’s shotgun rested in his lap.

  “Do you kick your wife in the mornin’?” said Isobel.

  “My wife is the soul of my life. Don’t expect either of you to understand true devotion.”

  “Dangnabbit, you two.” I meant to elaborate but the stale biscuit soaked up every last drop of saliva in my mouth. “Water,” I croaked.

  “I filled all the canteens this mornin’,” said Isobel, “while Wilbur tried to find the knife.”

  A swig of cool water washed the biscuit down my throat. “Stop snipin’ at each other. It’s counter to our cause.”

  I expected a round of recriminations, so I glared at the both of them in turn. Isobel stomped off, saying she was going to get more water. Wilbur tore a chunk of bacon with his teeth and chewed it with a smile, rubbing salt in my hunger. I chewed on my biscuit in peace for a moment until I caught sight of the birds. Three crows fidgeted in the limbs above Wilbur.

  For all I knew those birds could understand our talk, so I leaned over the fire and whispered, trying not to part my lips. “Wilbur.” When he looked my way, I touched a finger to my mouth. For once the contrary oaf didn’t argue with me. I grabbed a stick and pretended to stir the fire, leaning closer to Wilbur until the brims of our hats met.

  “The crows in the tree behind you. Shoot ’em,” I hissed.

  Wilbur narrowed his eyes and cocked his head.

  “They’re Marzby’s. In the branch over your head.”

  The link to Marzby seemed to decide him. He pulled back both hammers and slid his hand along the forestock. In one motion, quick as a snake bite, he turned and twisted onto his back, jammed the stock against the ground and let loose with both barrels into the tree.

  The blast thumped in my chest and rang my ears. Buckshot splintered the bark, shredded leaves and cut twigs. Black feathers exploded in every direction and then joined the leafy debris raining down on
the lifeless birds shattered and bloody on the ground.

  I grinned as my spirit jigged for joy. We’d struck a blow against Marzby, and I’d learned a new respect for Wilbur the marksman. My escape from the cornfield was more luck than I’d imagined.

  “Mighty fine shootin’, Wilbur.”

  “An easier target would be hard to find.” Wilbur ejected the spent shells and snapped the breech closed after loading two new ones. “How’d you know they were Marzby’s?”

  “Crows have shadowed me by day and owls by night ever since Marzby left us on that hill. Too peculiar to be coincidence.”

  Wilbur opened his mouth to speak as a scream came at us from the direction of the creek. This wasn’t no cry of terror, but a war cry like as come from a Comanche charging with a spear.

  Isobel rounded a clump of trees, making straight for Wilbur with all the dumb, single-mindedness of a charging buffalo. The blade glinted black and sharp in her hand above her head. If not for the fury twisting her face, I would’ve laughed at the slip of a girl attacking an armed man.

  She must’ve heard the shotgun blast and assumed the worst. Wilbur raised his gun with the grim determination of someone putting a horse out of its misery. If you assume the worst, my grandma said, you’ll find it as sure as flies find a pie. And Isobel was about to find herself bleeding like a sieve.

  “Isobel!” I shouted and waved my arms. I would have had more luck flagging down an express train. She only saw red.

  “Stop, you little brat,” said Wilbur.

  Isobel kept coming.

  “I’ll shoot.”

  I didn’t give no consideration to the consequences. A double-barreled blast could take off both my feet, and the black blade could punch through my skull with no resistance. All I considered was the tragedy that didn’t need to be.

  Grasping the shotgun barrels in one hand, I pushed down and leapt into Isobel’s path as I raised my other hand—all I had time to do before she crashed into me. Recognition came too late to avoid contact but soon enough to save me from a plunging knife. Her eyes widened from angry slits to surprised Os, and the arm with the blade fell forward, its killing tension gone. When we collided, I embraced her and rolled with her onto the ground away from Wilbur.