Shotgun Charlie

by Ralph Compton

  A tremor rippled through Arthur Hunnecut’s entire body, and he had to try twice to speak. “How is it you know my wife’s and daughter’s names?”

  “We do our homework, as Cestus likes to say,” the Attica Kid said. Suddenly leaning in close, he said so only the banker heard, “Now open that damn safe, or so help me, I’ll pay your missus and your girl a visit sometime when you’re not around. And you don’t want that.”

  “You wouldn’t,” Hunnecut gasped.

  The Attica Kid stepped back. “When I was little, I used to drown kittens in a bucket for the fun of it. I broke the neck of a puppy just for somethin’ to do. And when I was twelve, there was this boy who used to pick on me and tease me because I was smaller than him and he reckoned he could get away with it. One day he was doin’ it and I took a rock and put out his eye and broke most of his teeth, besides. Later there was this gent who—”

  Hunnecut help up a hand. “Enough. You’ve made your point abundantly clear. You’re a hideous killer of women and children, and if I don’t do as your lord and master wants, my wife and daughter will be added to your string.”

  “I couldn’t have put it better my own self,” the Attica Kid complimented him.

  His brow dotted with beads of sweat, Arthur Hunnecut went through the gate and over to the Diebold safe. Bending, he quickly worked the combination and turned the handle. There was a loud click, and he pulled the door wide open. “Happy now, you scoundrels?”

  The Attica Kid glanced at Cestus Calloway, and grinned and winked.

  “The puppy was a nice touch,” Calloway said.

  In short order the safe was emptied and the tellers handed the bulging burlap sacks to Bert Varrow and Ira Toomis. Varrow hefted his sack and whistled. “This will be some haul.”

  “Bring it here,” Calloway said, shoving his revolvers into their double-loop holsters.

  “Must you?” Varrow replied as he carried the sack over.

  “You know the rule.”

  “Cestus and his damn rules,” Mad Dog said.

  Backing toward the door, Calloway beamed at the banker and his patrons. “We’re obliged for your cooperation. Remember to tell everybody how decent we treated you, and that no one was hurt.” He paused and flicked a finger at the deputy’s gun belt on the floor. “Mad Dog, bring that with you. We don’t want Deputy Mitchell gettin’ ideas.”

  The outlaws filed out. The last to leave was the Attica Kid. Standing in the doorway, he twirled his Colt forward and backward and then into his holster, and patted it. “Do I need to tell you what happens if you poke your heads out?”

  “When the marshal hears of this, we’ll be after you,” Deputy Mitchell said.

  “You do that,” the Attica Kid said. “And be sure to tell the marshal that Ben Larner can drop a buffalo at a thousand yards with that Sharps of his.” Spurs jangling, he backed out.

  By then Calloway was in the saddle and reining away from the hitch rail. Some of the people on Main Street had noticed the flurry of activity and stopped to stare. “Folks, this is your lucky day!” Calloway hollered. “The bank is givin’ away money for free.” Laughing, he reached into the sack, pulled out a fistful of bills, and cast them into the air.

  The astonished onlookers gaped.

  “Get it while you can!” Calloway yelled and, gigging his mount, he made off down the street. He threw another handful of money at several women who had come out of a millinery and more bills at a group of boys who were playing with a hoop. Then he let out a yip and, with a thunder of hooves, whopping, and hollering, the outlaws galloped off.

  No one tried to stop them. No one fired a shot. It was, as the True Fissure would later report, “as slick as anything.”

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