by Rory Black
He looked all around the street. Only when satisfied that there were no guns aimed in his direction did he untie the reins of the grey from his stirrup. Then he led the grey to the side of his own mount. He wrapped the reins around the wooden hitching-pole, then used an even tighter knot to ensure that the animal who carried his precious cargo did not wander away.
Iron Eyes stepped up on to the boardwalk and turned the doorknob of the sheriff’s office. The door was locked up tight.
The deadly hunter of human vermin licked his dry lips and then moved to a wooden upright. He continued to study Hope. There were at least four side-streets from the main thoroughfare. As always, Iron Eyes was working out the safest route out of town should he be required to make a fast departure. There had been many times when the collective weaponry of a settlement had been turned on him.
He trusted no one!
Then the morning silence was broken. Iron Eyes heard the sound of a buggy’s springs to his left. He tilted his head and stared through the limp strands of hair which hung before his gruesome features. Three well-armed horsemen trailed the buggy as it started down the main street towards him. Iron Eyes focused on the driver of the single-horse vehicle. It was the same man who had watched his approach from the veranda of the town’s largest house, he thought.
‘I wonder who them folks are?’ Iron Eyes asked himself in a low whisper. He dropped his hands into the deep coat-pockets and pulled out his pair of Navy Colts. He tucked their long barrels into his belt. Their grips stuck out from his thin waist. ‘If’n ya want trouble, keep a comin’!’
They did.
Fontaine led his small trio of riders down the middle of the main street towards the two exhausted horses tied up outside the sheriff’s office and the tall thin man who aimed his deadly stare at them.
The buggy slowed as Fontaine eased back on the reins, then pushed the brake-pole forward with his highly polished right shoe. The three horsemen encircled their employer and aimed their horses’ noses at the bounty hunter.
There was no hint of emotion on Iron Eyes’ hideous face.
‘I see that you’ve been busy, stranger!’ Fontaine said as he stepped down from the buggy and dusted his clothing off with gloved hands.
‘Yep!’ Iron Eyes snarled through gritted teeth. ‘It got anythin’ to do with you?’
Fontaine smiled and removed his hat. He held it across his midriff and stepped a little closer to the man who continued to rest a shoulder against the upright.
‘I’d like it if you showed me a little respect. I happen to own this town and most of the range, mister! If I wanted to, I’d have you shot for trespassing. Do you understand?’
There was still no emotion on the carved features of the bounty hunter. He continued to stare at Fontaine and the three gunmen astride their horses behind him.
‘You could try, dude!’ Iron Eyes sighed. ‘I’d not recommend it, though! You might die!’
The gunmen eased their mounts forward. They stopped when their employer raised a hand.
‘Easy, boys! We got us a spirited man here! We don’t want to spook him, do we?’
‘Let me and the boys see to him, boss!’ Riley requested angrily. ‘We’ll teach him a lesson he’ll not forget!’
Iron Eyes straightened up. He narrowed his eyes.
‘Try it, fat boy!’ he growled at the horseman. ‘It’d be a pleasure killin’ you!’
Fontaine waved his hand again. ‘Easy! We don’t want to wake up the folks around here this early! I’m sure Iron Eyes is just a tad tired!’
The bounty hunter’s eyes darted at the well-dressed man below him in the street. He tilted his head and stared through his limp strands of hair.
‘You know my name?’
Fontaine smiled again. This time it looked even less friendly.
‘It was just a lucky guess! Your reputation precedes you!’
Iron Eyes raised his left hand slowly and plucked a cigar from his shirt-pocket. He bit off its tip, spat it out, then gripped the long length between his teeth.
‘Then ya know I’m a bounty hunter?’ he asked, producing a match from the same pocket and running his thumbnail across it. He raised the flame to the cigar and sucked in the smoke. ‘Ya know that all I want is my bounty money!’
Fontaine toyed with his hat.
‘This is awkward for me, Iron Eyes!’
‘How come?’ Iron Eyes asked from a cloud of smoke.
‘I own the bank that is meant to pay bounties, but I also used to employ young Daniel here!’
‘So?’
‘It grieves me to pay out money for having one of my boys gunned down, Iron Eyes!’ Fontaine shrugged. ‘It sets a bad example, if you get my drift?’
Riley edged his horse closer to the grey and pointed at the body tied over its saddle. Flies had gathered on the dried bloodstains on the back of his fellow outlaw.
‘Look! Kane was backshot! Ya shot him in the back, Iron Eyes!’
Iron Eyes sucked in more smoke.
‘Sure I did! He was ridin’ away from me! If’n he’d bin braver, I’d have shot him in the front!’
Fontaine bit his lip. He knew that anyone who looked the way Iron Eyes looked might be capable of killing them all if he was forced. It did not pay to square up to anyone of his kind.
‘I reckon I can make an exception in your case, Iron Eyes!’ he started. ‘I’ll pay the bounty and claim it back from the authorities down in Texas!’
Iron Eyes nodded.
‘That’s smart!’ he declared.
Fontaine stepped back up into his buggy and gathered the reins together. He stared at the grim bounty hunter.
‘My name’s Brewster Fontaine, Iron Eyes! It’s a name that you ought to be wary of!’
‘The only names that interest me are the ones on Wanted posters, Fontaine!’ Iron Eyes said bluntly. ‘You on any Wanted posters?’
‘Don’t push your luck!’ Fontaine snarled.
The bounty hunter looked at the three mounted gunmen. He inhaled deeply, then glanced back at their employer.
‘I can’t recall ever seein’ you on any posters, Fontaine, but I sure recognize them boys of yours! Must be at least two thousand dollars sitting on them horses! Temptin’! Yep, mighty temptin’!’
‘They ain’t all my boys, Iron Eyes!’ the businessman declared loudly. ‘I got a whole army of guns, if you’re interested? So don’t mess with me! OK? Even you couldn’t take on all of my boys!’
Iron Eyes chewed on the cigar.
‘OK! Just don’t forget to have that bounty money ready at the bank when I come callin’!’
‘You better spend it fast, Iron Eyes.’ Fontaine smiled. ‘I have a feeling that you ain’t going to live long!’
The most powerful man in Hope released the brake and lashed his reins across the back of the horse harnessed in the traces before him. The buggy sped off with the three outriders eating its dust.
Iron Eyes tapped the ash from his cigar and then spotted a white-haired man coming towards him from the opposite direction. The man had a gleaming star pinned to his black vest.
‘You responsible for killin’ that critter, boy?’ the sheriff asked. He pulled the office key from his vest-pocket and pushed it into the lock.
‘Yep!’ Iron Eyes replied, staring down at the man.
‘That’s one of Fontaine’s boys.’ The sheriff opened the door and wandered slowly inside. ‘No wonder he was lookin’ a mite ornery!’
The bounty hunter trailed the lawman into the office interior as the man raised the blinds and allowed the morning sun to flood in.
‘You belong to that Fontaine critter too, Sheriff?’ Iron Eyes asked.
The sheriff looked at the tall man and shrugged sheepishly.
‘In a way, son! In a way!’
Iron Eyes rested a hip on the desk.
‘Is it true that he’s got himself an army of hired guns?’
The sheriff nodded fearfully.
‘If eighty or ninety gunslingers make an army,
then he’s got one! Why?’
Iron Eyes sucked on the cigar and tightened his eyes.
‘I never had me a fight with a whole army before!’ He sighed.
CHAPTER FOUR
In common with all saloons in towns on the edge of civilization, the Spinning Wheel rarely closed its doors for long. Just for enough time to brush out the old sawdust and replace it with fresh. Enough time for cigar smoke to filter its way out of the numerous bullet holes in its weathered wooden walls.
The Spinning Wheel was a two-storey structure half-way down Hope’s main street and directly opposite the solid brick bank building. It suited the bounty hunter perfectly. He was dry and required a place to wait until the bank opened up its doors for business.
He had left the aged sheriff to dispose of Kane’s body and led his tired mount to the place which stank of a mixture of human sweat and stale liquor. Yet its aroma meant nothing to the tall bounty hunter. His flared nostrils still had the acrid stench of death in them. Kane’s body had started to rot fast when the morning sun had risen over the range. It had taken hours to reach this town with the lifeless carcass. The smell of sweat was a welcome change.
Iron Eyes strolled in through the swing-doors and watched as the bartender scattered fresh sawdust from a pail on to the freshly mopped floor.
‘Ya open for business?’
‘Yep. I’m open for business!’ The bartender nodded and returned behind the long mahogany counter which was stacked with thimble glasses. ‘What’ll it be?’
Iron Eyes strode up to the bar, rested a boot on its brass rail and pointed at the bottles on a shelf in front of a rectangular mirror.
‘A bottle of ya best rye!’
The bartender lifted one of the bottles off the shelf and placed it before the bounty hunter. Iron Eyes’ thin hands placed a gleaming ten-dollar gold piece down on to the wet surface.
‘Don’t see many gold pieces in these parts,’ the bartender noted as he scooped it up and moved to his cash register. ‘First one I seen in over a year.’
‘I always insist on being paid in coin!’ Iron Eyes said. He pulled the cork from the bottle-neck and sniffed at the whiskey. ‘I don’t like paper money!’
‘What line of work ya in?’ the man asked, gathering up the change to return to his only customer before dropping the gold coin into the register’s tray.
Iron Eyes took one of the small thimble glasses from the stack and looked at it.
‘I’m a hunter!’ he replied before replacing the glass and lifting the bottle to his lips.
‘What kinda hunter?’ the bartender asked innocently as he watched Iron Eyes take a long swallow from the bottle. ‘Ain’t much game in these parts. What’s ya speciality?’
Iron Eyes lowered the bottle and sighed.
‘Men! I hunt men!’ he answered.
‘Men?’
‘Bad men!’ Iron Eyes added.
The bartender felt his legs start to shake. He had served thousands of customers in his time, but none quite like this strange man.
‘You serious?’ he croaked nervously.
Iron Eyes nodded slowly and went to return the bottle to his lips when he saw movement in the street through one of the saloon’s windows. He rested the whiskey on the counter and stared at the growing crowd of well-armed men which was gathering between the saloon and the bank.
‘I’m a bounty hunter, barkeep!’ he explained. He pointed one of his bony fingers at the crowd. ‘They work for Fontaine?’
‘How’d ya know that?’
‘Lucky guess!’ Iron Eyes stretched his long legs and strode to the nearest window. He stared at the men. Each of them was a hired gun. Every one of them wore a fancy shooting rig. Only gunslingers and outlaws could afford that sort of armoury, he thought.
‘They lookin’ for you?’ the bartender asked fearfully.
‘I’d not bet against it!’ Iron Eyes said. He turned and walked back to the bar, the man and his bottle. ‘Don’t get scared. They ain’t ready to start nothin’ yet!’
‘How can ya tell?’
Iron Eyes lifted the bottle, took another swift swig from its neck, then returned it to the wet circle on the wooden counter.
‘There ain’t enough of them yet.’
‘What ya mean? I can count twenty or more from here.’
‘That ain’t enough!’ Iron Eyes said. ‘Fontaine wants to try and impress me before he sets his pack of dogs on me. They reckon he’s got around eighty or ninety gunmen on his payroll, don’t they?’
‘At least that many!’ The bartender nodded.
‘Then we got us a whole lot more comin’, barkeep!’ Iron Eyes dragged both his Navy Colts from his deep coat-pockets and pushed their blue steel barrels into his belt. ‘That kinda critter don’t dare fight alone. They like to be part of a crowd.’
‘You tryin’ to say that them boys out there in the street are cowards?’
Iron Eyes pulled out a half-smoked cigar and rammed it between his teeth. The bartender struck a match and leant across the counter. The bounty hunter accepted the flame and sucked it into the cigar.
‘I ain’t sure what they are just yet!’ he said. ‘But they don’t seem too eager to cross the street and come on in here, do they?’
‘What does Fontaine have against ya, mister?’ There was genuine concern in the bartender’s voice. ‘What ya done to upset him?’
Iron Eyes inhaled on the cigar and stared through the smoke at the far smaller man.
‘I killed one of his boys and he owes me a lotta reward money!’
‘That ain’t good! A lotta folks around here have died for a lot less than that!’
Iron Eyes gave a crooked smile.
‘But it is interestin’ though, ain’t it? Makes ya wonder what that Fontaine varmint intends doin’ to me! He’s just dumb enough to try and get them boys to kill me.’
‘How come ya ain’t scared, mister?’ the bartender asked, curious. ‘Who the hell are ya? How come ya ain’t scared?’
‘They call me Iron Eyes!’
There was a shocked expression on the man’s face. ‘I’ve heard a lotta stories about you. They say that you’re the most deadly bounty hunter there is! They also say that ya can’t be killed!’
‘What’s your name?’
‘Ted. Ted Cooper,’ the bartender stuttered.
‘Some stories about me are a tad tall, Ted.’ Iron Eyes returned his gaze to the windows. The crowd was getting larger with every passing moment.
‘Which of them are true?’
‘Ya might find out darn soon, Ted,’ Iron Eyes said wryly. He then heard the sound of hoofs echoing from the street. Iron Eyes straightened up and bit his lower lip as his eyes focused on the rider with the morning sun on his back. Through the open saloon doors he could see Frank Riley whipping his mount towards the rest of the men.
‘That’s Frank Riley! He’s Fontaine’s top gun!’ Cooper observed.
‘I know who he is! I also know that he’s worth over a thousand bucks dead or alive!’ Iron Eyes muttered. He looked around the large room. ‘Where’s the stairs up to the second floor, Ted?’
The bartender raised his eyebrows. He then pointed at a door in the corner of the room.
‘There! But what ya wanna go up there for, Iron Eyes?’
‘Would ya believe that I got me a real cravin’ to take in the scenery?’ Iron Eyes replied.
‘Nope.’ Cooper shrugged.
‘You ain’t as dumb as ya look, Ted!’ Iron Eyes pulled his guns from his belt and cocked their hammers. ‘Keep ya head down until the shootin’ stops!’
The bartender watched as the tall figure walked slowly towards the door. Iron Eyes gripped the handle and paused.
‘Guard my bottle, Ted Cooper! Guard it with ya life! I’ll be back!’
The bartender nodded silently as the bounty hunter disappeared into the shadows. He could hear the bloodstained spurs jangle as Iron Eyes ascended to the second floor.
CHAPTER FIVE
&nb
sp; Like moths being drawn to a naked flame, more of Fontaine’s henchmen gathered in the main street as Frank Riley rallied his troops. The gunslinger had received his orders from Brewster Fontaine and was executing them to the letter. Fifty-eight of the most ruthless men on Fontaine’s payroll were in town and every one of them had been gathered up and ordered to stand between the bank and the strange bounty hunter. If Iron Eyes wanted his blood-money, he would have to face each and every one of them to get it. Most ordinary men might have taken the hint and decided that it was just not worth the trouble.
But not Iron Eyes. He was not so easily frightened.
Riley remained mounted as the well-paid hired guns stood across the front of the bank building. Some had walked there whilst others had ridden from the furthest corners of the sprawling town of Hope. But they had all come as commanded for fear of disobeying their paymaster.
‘Remember, boys,’ Riley shouted. ‘I don’t wanna see Iron Eyes gettin’ into the bank! Them’s my orders! He don’t get in there and he don’t get no bounty! Savvy?’
There were noises that drifted in unison from all the gunslingers’ lips as they nodded at Riley.
‘Good!’ The top gun laughed. ‘Now get ya guns out of them holsters and cock them hammers!’
Again, as one, the gunslingers all drew their guns and pulled back their hammers.
‘Can we kill him?’ a voice called out from somewhere in the middle of the crowd.
‘We might have to kill the bastard!’ Riley laughed. ‘He might be one of them loco folks that don’t take tellin’!’
Every one of the gunslingers gave out a loud cheer that filled the street. These were men who had tasted the thrill of killing many times and savoured its unwholesome flavour.
Riley swung his mount around and grinned at the bounty hunter’s pitiful horse tied up outside the Spinning Wheel. He knew that even if Iron Eyes did manage to escape their guns, he would not get far on that animal.
It had been ridden to exhaustion.
‘We got the back-shootin’ bastard cornered, boys!’ Riley chuckled out loud as he steadied his horse. ‘I don’t figure he’ll try to cross the street to get his money! I got me a feelin’ Iron Eyes will run when he sets eyes on us!’
