The Man With The Iron Fists

by Steve Lee

  Fish snatched up his rifle and emptied it into the flames. The burning thing that had been Martha seemed to hang there as if held up by the flames. Then it dropped back into the blaze and the screaming stopped and there was silence except for the sizzling and crackling of the flames.

  Fish was the first to break the silence.

  "You damn black-hearted bitch!" he yelled, slapping Scarlett back and forth across the face.

  "Just havin' a little fun!" she spat. "Don't mean beans! Ha!" Fish drew back his hand to close her mouth with a fist. But he held the punch as Jack stepped lightly up, whittling a stick to a point with his knife.

  "Having trouble, little sister?" he asked without raising his eyes from the knife. Fish dropped his arm to his side.

  "No trouble, thank you, brother," Scarlett smiled.

  Fish glared at the man with the knife.

  "I ain't scared of your piddlin' shiv, Mr. Smooth-as-a-damn-alley-cat!" He shook his rifle at him. "Anytime," he challenged. "Anytime, you hear!"

  "I'll try and keep it in mind," said Jack languidly, turning away at the sound of an approaching horse.

  Crow rode into the yard.

  "Well?" the clown asked, stepping out to meet him. Crow jabbed a finger upward and they saw vultures gliding in the smoke-sullied sky.

  "No more boy," said Crow.

  The clown glanced from Jim Sloane's broken body to the burning house which looked about ready to fall in on itself. When he spoke his voice was wistful.

  "Looks like the show's over," he said.

  II

  Kung Fu

  1

  Tod Sloane woke in Hell.

  Just like his Pa always said he would one day. He knew it was Hell because his body was blazing with pain from one end to the other and because there were three devils watching him. Tod closed his eyes fast. Too fast. The pain tore a groan from him.

  It didn't seem right, he thought when the pain allowed, that he should have been sent here and not up to the other place. He'd never done anything really bad, not that he could remember. Sure, he'd stolen a few apples from a store in town and blacked a couple of eyes and once, when she'd pulled her drawers down for him to see, he'd looked at Sadie Welch's bare ass — but she ought to be the one getting roasted for that.

  Painfully, Tod eased open his eyes, hoping the devils would be gone. They weren't. They stood there looking down at him through devilish slit eyes. There was a big, fierce-looking man-devil and two females. One of them was disguised as a little girl. Just showed how cunning these devils could be, thought Tod. She was probably the wickedest of the whole bunch.

  Tod watched the middle devil, the one looking like a woman, offer a small shiny box to the man-devil. He noticed the man-devil only had one arm and wondered if hell-fire had burned off the other. All around him smoke curled in the air. Strangely, it didn't smell like burnt flesh or brimstone but more like some kind of perfume.

  The big devil dipped his single hand into the shiny box and came up with a long needle. He heated the needle over a candle flame, his slit eyes on Tod. This is where the torture starts, Tod thought. First they stick me with needles then… the big devil leaned over him, the bright needle poised between two fingers. Tod tried to shrink back. A fresh wave of pain withered his body. The devil thrust the needle into his leg. Tod braced himself for the new shock of pain. It did not come. Instead, the old pain seemed to flow right out of him. Tod found himself falling down a long narrow black well. Before he hit the dark water below, he was asleep.

  * * *

  When he woke again, the devils were gone and filtered sunlight was on his face. He tried to raise himself and fire flowed through his veins. The pain had been no dream anyway, he thought.

  His head was propped on a rolled blanket so he had a good view of his surroundings. There was no doubt about it, he was in a covered wagon. And the wagon had stopped. He suddenly remembered the two wagons that had brought the clown and his friends out of the desert and fear grabbed his heart and squeezed some extra beats out of it. He saw again, vividly, his father getting whipped, heard his mother's shrieks… his breath came quick and shuddery. Was he a prisoner? Had they kept him alive just to have the fun of killing him all over again? If so, there was nothing he could do about it except lie and wait for them.

  The inside of the wagon was packed with stuff: boxes and bundles and all kinds of geegaws he'd never seen before, not even in town. There were even some funny-looking plants in the wagon. The place smelled as strange as it looked: sweet and spicy.

  By the bed was a small statue of a fat bald man sitting cross-legged and grinning. Tod didn't like it. It reminded him of the clown.

  Looking down, Tod examined his body — except it didn't look like his body anymore. It looked like it belonged to someone else. It was covered in bandages and all puffed out of shape.

  Tod caught his breath as the wagon-flap flew aside and someone climbed into the wagon. It was the woman devil. But now she looked more like a Chinese woman. He'd seen Chinese folk before in San Francisco but never close like this. The woman looked older than his Ma. Her face was thin and sad, but pleasant and reassuring. Her long black hair was tied in a braid that hung down her back over a jacket of shiny blue cloth. With surprise, Tod noticed she wore pants. Just like a man.

  The woman seemed startled to find him awake. She smiled at him, kindly. Tod tried to speak. He wanted to ask her where he was, who she was… but the words came out as a fit of dry coughing.

  The Chinese woman called out something he couldn't understand. Her voice was sweet and it sounded almost like she was singing. A moment later the little girl climbed into the wagon carrying a bowl. Like her mother, her hair was braided and she wore pants. Tod guessed her to be a couple of years younger than himself. The girl handed the bowl to the woman and stepped back, watching him gravely through wide green eyes.

  The woman held the bowl to his lips. It was water. He drank thirstily. When he looked up again, the big man-devil of his dream was in the wagon. Tod eyed the Chinaman warily. He hadn't forgotten that long needle.

  The man also had his hair long and braided but there was nothing womanish about him. His fierce look reminded Tod of an Indian chief he'd once seen. Though the chief had been a chained prisoner, he'd held himself proud and upright. The same as the Chinaman.

  The woman removed the empty bowl from Tod's lips. Tod found he could speak more easily.

  "Why am I… all trussed up like this?"

  The Chinaman looked at him with eyes that seemed to Tod to be able to see right down inside of him.

  "You have been… very ill," said the Chinaman, speaking in a slow correct way, sounding like a preacher who was sucking on a penny jawstopper. "The cloth holds herbs next to your body… they will make you well. What is your name?"

  "Tod Sloane."

  "I am Chang Fung. This is my wife Hsiao-Yu, and Su Fan, my daughter." As their names were spoken, mother and daughter put their hands together like they were praying and bowed their heads toward Tod.

  "How is your pain?" Chang Fung asked.

  "Painful," said Tod.

  The Chinaman nodded and reached for a familiar shiny little box. He saw the fear glint in Tod's eyes when he drew out the long-needle.

  "Ancient Chinese cure," he explained. "Please not to struggle… there will be no hurt."

  Tod wasn't convinced.

  Uneasily, he watched Chang Fung uncover his right leg and hold the point of the needle to his skin. He got ready to holler. The Chinaman pushed the needle deep. Tod made no sound. There was no need. It was like the Chinaman said: he had not felt the needle's sting.

  Puzzled, Tod watched Chang Fung twisting the needle, rotating it swiftly between thumb and forefinger. Tod lowered his head back onto the improvised pillow. It was strange but he could feel the pain dissolving inside of him. His whole body grew warm and relaxed. Chang Fung plucked the needle from the boy's leg.

  "Not so bad, eh?" he asked.

  Tod smiled fa
intly. He couldn't shake his head so he moved his eyes in a way that said the same thing.

  "How'd I get here?" he asked.

  "We found you in the desert, the life nearly gone from your body," Chang Fung answered. "You were fortunate the fire drew us to you."

  "Fire?" There was alarm in Tod's face.

  "The small farm on the edge of the desert… was that not your home?"

  Tod stared at the Chinaman with a kind of desperation. He didn't want to ask the question because in his guts he already knew what the answer had to be. But he couldn't hold it back either.

  "Ma and Pa… they're dead, ain't they?"

  Chang Fung held his eyes to the boy's. "They are dead," he said.

  Tod turned away from the three Chinese, fighting back the tears.

  They came anyway.

  * * *

  Three days later, Chang Fung and his wife carried Tod outside and sat him on a box. The sun seemed unfamiliar, blinding. His eyes red, Tod blinked at the three freshly dug mounds in the sand.

  Thrust into the sand before each of the two larger graves was a narrow wooden slat on which Chang Fung had painted the names of Jim and Martha Sloane and added some peculiar bird tracks of his own. Without asking, Tod knew the smaller mound was for Scamp.

  He watched Chang Fung light a handful of thin brown sticks then wave them in the air, snuffing out the flames. Smoke spiraled from the glowing tips of the sticks. The Chinaman gave some of them to the little girl, Su Fan, and she handed three to Tod. The smoke rose in his face, powerfully sweet.

  Hsiao Yu knelt before the graves holding some sheets of yellow paper about the size of dollar bills. She set the paper on fire. Flames ate the yellow sheets from her hand and they became black wisps of nothingness dancing in the heat of the air.

  "Halfway across the world we have traveled, further than you can imagine," said Chang Fung, placing his hand on Tod's shoulder, "so we could escape the violence of men… and now we find it here, waiting for us, mocking us." He shook his head at the ways of the gods.

  "Heaven is ruthless and treats all creatures like straw dogs." Tod did not understand the meaning of the words but he remembered them. Chang Fung looked down at him.

  "This land of America is not for the weak. We were foolish to think different… but you will not be weak. You will grow strong." The Chinaman seemed to be making him some kind of promise, Tod realized. He looked away, toward the blackened ruin that had been his home. He had no time now for the future, only for memories of the past. In the yard, chickens flapped aimlessly about, their clucking indignant. They too seemed to know their peace was gone forever.

  * * *

  The first town they came to, Chang Fung reported everything Tod had told him to the sheriff. But the town was astir with news of the coining war between the states and no one had enough time or interest to listen to a one-armed Chink's story about clowns and crazy folks that lived on the edge of the desert. Chang Fung returned to the wagon downhearted. He had gone in search of justice and brought back nothing but hollow promises.

  "Do you have no one else… no other family?" he asked Tod after they had eaten.

  Tod considered the question, picking the last couple of grains of rice from his plate. He was getting quite expert in the use of chopsticks.

  "Just Aunt Sarah, I s'pose."

  "Do you know where she lives?"

  "Sure," Tod answered, "In some tepee somewheres, I guess. Comanches scalped m'uncle and stole her away. Pa heard she was havin' such a good time she didn't wanna come back no more."

  Chang Fung nodded sagely.

  "You have seen the plants we carry with us," he said. "From San Francisco we have come in search of a place to grow the small oranges that are called satsumas. If it is your wish, you may join us… we will be happy to take you with us."

  Tod was confused. Emotions tugged his thoughts in different directions. He'd never expected to end up as a Chinaman. But these people had saved his life. He was grateful to them and he liked them. And he couldn't think of anyplace else to go.

  "O.K.," he said.

  Chang Fung nodded again and Tod could see he was more pleased than he wanted to show. Su Fan grinned at her new brother and laughed excitedly. Hsiao Yu threw her arms round him and hugged him like she was welcoming a long-lost relative. Tears of joy filled her eyes.

  "Chao Yu!" she cried.

  Tod looked questioningly at Chang Fung.

  "We also had a son," said the Chinaman in a low voice. "The journey here from the Middle Kingdom, the land you call China, was long. On the boat he died of a fever."

  Chang Fung looked at his wife and Tod saw his eyes too were moist.

  "His name was Chao Yu…"

  Tod tried to understand.

  * * *

  As they traveled, Tod's bones mended and his skin healed. Thanks to Hsiao Yu's knowledge of herbs, the wounds left few scars and these were small. But for the scars on his face, there was little she could do. Exposure to the sun had branded the wounds deep. A pattern of fine wrinkles marked the new skin on his forehead and under his eyes, giving his face a worn and leathery look. The scars were not ugly but they — and the unforgetting look in bis eyes — made Tod look older than his years.

  The hidden wound did not heal so easily. He had seen things that would never be forgotten, had felt emotions that would always be with him. Somewhere deep inside, Tod sensed a dark hole and in the hole was a raging fireball: a fierce blazing ball of hatred for the men who had killed bis parents. The fireball was always there. He could feel it when he helped Chang Fung with the chores, when he laughingly taught Hsiao Yu a few words of broken English, even when he played with Su Fan. At such times he tried to smother the fire. They would have been shocked to see its fiery reflection in his eyes. But the fire remained, as hellish hot as the inferno that had grilled his mother's flesh off her bones. And Tod knew it would stay until the day when its angry heat touched the clown and his killers and consumed them completely.

  2

  It was on the trail that Tod began his training.

  "We start on the ground," said Chang Fung. "The first thing you must learn is how to sit."

  "Sit!"

  Scratching his head, Tod watched the Chinaman take up a cross-legged position on the ground. He didn't look much different from the fat-bellied statue in the wagon.

  Tod followed his example as best he could.

  "Good… but keep your back straight."

  "You said you was gonna make me strong," Tod complained. "This is just givin' me leg cramps."

  Chung Fung smiled faintly.

  "If nothing else, Tod, this will teach you the patience you obviously lack." The Chinaman continued.

  "You must first know that there are two kinds of strength: physical strength, and inner strength, which we Chinese call the Tchi. Both are important, but of the two, inner strength is more important as you will learn. A man may be big and powerful but if he does not possess the inner strength to direct his energy, he will soon be overcome. In the same way, a small man may not have big muscles but if he has inner strength he can never really be beaten." Tod shifted uneasily. He wanted to pay attention to what Chang Fung was saying but the uncomfortableness of his position drew away his thoughts.

  "By the practice of meditation — sitting as we are now, letting our thoughts grow calm — we develop the Tchi. At this moment, I can see you are struggling with both your body and your thoughts. When you are able to sit like this, comfortably and quietly, you will have mastered the body. When you are able to follow my words without any distraction, you will have started to develop the Tchi."

  Tod frowned.

  "What I don't understand is how this helps you fight better?"

  "Imagine you are in a fight. You are very angry, you lash out with fury. Your enemy is very calm, he attacks carefully… who will win?"

  Tod shrugged his shoulders.

  "The other feller I guess… unless I'm bigger'n him."

  "Big or small
, you will lose. So first we must develop peace and inner calmness." The Chinaman gestured toward his crossed legs. "This is how."

  Chang Fung closed his eyes, becoming silent. Tod watched him intently. The Chinaman was completely motionless. He didn't even seem to be breathing. For several minutes, he remained that way.

  When he opened his eyes, Tod asked him, "If you can't see this Tchi stuff, how'd you know for sure when you've got it?"

  Chang Fung smiled tolerantly at his pupil. Looking around, he spotted a rock lying not far from the trail.

  "That rock," he said, pointing. "Bring it to me."

  Delighted to stretch his legs, Tod limped over and grabbed the rock. It was about seven inches long and several inches wide. And it was heavy.

  "Hold the rock so…" Chang Fung instructed, rising to his feet. Tod held the rock away from him in both hands like he was offering it to the Chinaman as a present. Chang Fung focused all his attention on the rock. Taking several deep breaths, he raised his hand about it, fingers outstretched and pressed tightly together.

  With a wild yell he slammed the edge of his hand down on the rock. Gasping his surprise, Tod jumped back quickly. The rock had fallen by his feet.

  Neatly smashed in two.

  * * *

  "Come on, weakling, hit me!" Dancing round him, the Chinaman taunted Tod.

  "O.K., you asked for this!" the boy cried, red-faced and humiliated. He rushed forward, swinging his fist at Chang Fung's head.