by Rory Black
Iron Eyes was thoughtful. ‘After I’ve had a long sleep in the hotel yonder, I might consider it.’
‘We’ll give you a share of whatever you recover,’ the bartender piped up amid a crowd of nodding heads.
‘How much?’ Iron Eyes wondered.
‘I reckon a quarter would be fair,’ Sam offered.
‘And free whiskey?’ the emaciated bounty hunter said.
‘Deal.’ Sam nodded.
Iron Eyes stared around the faces in the room. He nodded and then started back toward the swing doors. As the emaciated bounty hunter reached them, he paused and looked over his wide shoulder.
‘One of you can take my horse down to the livery and get him bedded down. I’ll probably set out after nightfall,’ he said as he placed a bony hand on the top of the doors. ‘I’m going to the hotel and getting me some shuteye.’
Sam walked after the bounty hunter.
‘You will help us, won’t you?’ he repeated. ‘I’m begging you for the rest of us. We’ll be ruined if them outlaws get away with our life savings, Iron Eyes.’
A smile etched his scarred face. He stepped to the edge of the boardwalk and cast his eyes up at the hills due south of the town. He glanced at Parker for a moment.
‘There was one thing you forgot to mention, Sam,’ Iron Eyes drawled as he looked out into the blazing sunlight. ‘By my reckoning it’s a mighty important detail.’
‘And what was it I forgot to tell you, Iron Eyes?’ Parker asked.
The bounty hunter placed the whiskey bottle in one of his deep pockets and raised an eyebrow. ‘You said the Brooks gang headed south after they done their robbing and killing. Right?’
Every one of the townsfolk was staring at the tall emaciated bounty hunter as he rested a bony hand on the porch upright thoughtfully and awaited an answer.
‘So what if they rode south?’ Parker asked.
Iron Eyes lifted his arm and pointed a bony digit at the trees south of the remote settlement. Ominous black smoke was trailing up into the cloudless blue sky from deep within the depths of the trees. He tilted his head and pushed his long hair from his skeletal features.
‘Seems to me that Ten Strike has got some neighbours down yonder, Sam,’ he noted before spitting his cigar at the sandy ground. ‘They’re the feathered type and if my reading of them smoke signals is right, they’re real angry about something.’
‘That’s just a forest fire,’ someone in the crowd remarked. ‘We get lots of them this time of year.’
‘Damn smart forest fire,’ Iron Eyes argued. ‘It says that three white riders just killed one of their young bucks. They ain’t too pleased about it.’
‘Is that what it says?’ Parker loosened his collar. ‘We ain’t ever had no trouble with them Injuns. That’s why we never said nothing about them.’
Iron Eyes gave a muted chuckle.
‘I hope you’re right, Sam,’ he said. ‘Trouble is, I’ve never met an Injun yet that didn’t want to kill me. Don’t know why but they don’t cotton to me.’
Parker edged closer to the thin tall bounty hunter.
‘And what do you do when they try to kill you?’ he ventured.
There was a cold silence and then Iron Eyes shrugged.
‘I kill anyone that’s trying to kill me, Sam.’ He exhaled. ‘They’ve come close a few times to finishing me over the years. I didn’t always look like this.’
‘Is that how you came to be so scarred?’ Parker asked the brooding bounty hunter.
‘Partly.’ Iron Eyes smiled as best as his mutilated face would allow and eased himself away from the wooden upright. He glanced at the faces of the men and women briefly and then turned away. ‘A lot of white varmints added to my tally of scars, Sam. Not just Injuns.’
Sam Parker could see his fellow townspeople urging him forward to confirm that the bounty hunter was going to try and retrieve their life savings from the ruthless Brooks gang.
‘Tell me, Iron Eyes. You still willing to try and get our money back for us?’ Parker asked sheepishly as the bounty hunter started to head toward the hotel.
Iron Eyes glanced over his shoulder and stared through his hair at the rotund man.
‘Sure, I’ll get your savings back. After all, I’ve gotta go after them bank robbers to collect the bounty on their heads, Sam,’ he said dryly. ‘Their hoof tracks lead south so that’s where I’m headed. I’ll trail them hombres even if it costs me my scalp.’
‘That’s mighty brave.’
‘Being brave and being stupid are kinfolk from the same litter, Sam.’ Iron Eyes stepped down on to the sand. ‘Tend my horse and get him watered and fed.’
They watched as the gaunt man continued down the street and entered the hotel. Sam Parker pushed his way through the crowd back to the bar and held his empty glass out.
The bartender filled the glass with whiskey.
‘You kinda shied away from telling Iron Eyes the whole truth there, Sam,’ he said to the older man as he watched Parker down the fiery liquor. ‘We all know that them Kiowa are real ornery when they’re riled.’
‘And if Iron Eyes read them smoke signals right, they’re mighty riled.’ A stammering voice piped up from within the crowd.
Parker exhaled.
‘I got me a feeling that Iron Eyes gets a tad ornery himself when he’s riled up.’ He sighed as the bartender refilled his glass. ‘I wouldn’t wanna be either a bank robber or a Kiowa when that sorrowful looking critter heads south.’
The bartender placed a toothpick in his mouth and rotated it around his teeth.
‘I heard tell that Iron Eyes can’t be killed, Sam. They say he’s already dead but don’t know it. They say he’s a ghost that can’t get into either Heaven or Hell. He’s trapped here with us living folks.’
Parker lifted the whiskey glass to his lips and poured its contents down his throat as the bartender’s words tormented his mind.
‘If that’s true,’ he gulped, ‘we just hired ourselves a dead man to go up against a pack of vicious outlaws and a bunch of vengeful Injuns.’
Even though the Hogleg saloon was full to overflowing, it suddenly fell silent as they considered the odds of anyone actually surviving either breed of adversary.
Maybe only a dead man could, they eventually reasoned.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Darkness enveloped the dense forested hills to the south of Ten Strike as the bank robbers continued to spur their mounts deeper into the vast unknown. The three ruthless horsemen had ridden until the sun eventually set before they drew rein and stopped their lathered up mounts. They had not seen the signal smoke but they knew that the brutal slaying of the lone Kiowa brave had not gone unnoticed by the rest of the slain warrior’s kinsmen.
The war drums told them that. They echoed through the tree-covered hills like the beating of countless hearts. Neither of the bank robbers could tell where the drums were coming from, all they knew for sure was that they seemed to be everywhere.
Ben Brooks dismounted first and held on to his leathers tightly as his eyes scanned the surrounding trees for any sign of more Indians.
Sol Cohen slid silently from his saddle and bit his lip as he pulled his weary horse up to the side of the brooding Brooks.
‘You shouldn’t have killed that Injun, Ben,’ Cohen said nervously as the noise of the incessant drums drilled into his skull. ‘We could have just beat the tar out of him and left him back there. Killing that young buck was just plumb stupid.’
Brooks grabbed the shirt collar of Cohen and dragged him closer. Even the darkness could not hide the fury burning in his eyes as the gang leader snorted into his cohort’s face.
‘I killed that young buck, Sol,’ Brooks growled, ‘because he was in our way. I killed him just like I’ll kill you if you ever dare to question me again.’
Jody Laker steered his horse right up to his partners and let his snorting mount draw their attention.
Brooks glanced up at Laker and was about to rage at him when
he noticed that the young outlaw was staring through the twilight at something else.
He released Cohen and squinted. ‘What you see, Jody?’
‘I’m looking yonder, Ben.’ Laker pointed up the rise where the trees were entangled. ‘Do you see it?’
Brooks took a step forward. ‘All I see is moonlit trees and shadow. What the hell do you see?’
Cohen began to nod. ‘I see something up there as well, Ben. Whatever it is, I don’t reckon on it being sociable.’
Brooks gritted his teeth. He was angry.
Angry at the fact that he had not figured there might be Indians in this part of the territory to hamper their escape from Ten Strike. Angry that he had lost his temper and killed one of them and angrier that the constant sound of war drums was slowly driving him out of his mind.
‘I don’t see nothing,’ he insisted. ‘There ain’t nothing there. You boys are seeing things.’
Laker tapped his spurs and allowed his tired horse to step between his partners. He leaned over the money bags and then dismounted.
‘I don’t see things that ain’t there, Ben,’ he said. ‘I see trouble and I see feathers.’
Brooks looked at Laker and then returned his eyes to the eerie half-light. He was about to start arguing again when he too saw something move beyond the wall of trees.
Brooks turned to his alert young cohort. ‘You’re right, Jody. There is something up yonder and if your eyes reckon it’s Injuns, then I ain’t gonna disagree.’
‘What’ll we do, Ben?’ Cohen was nervous as he turned on his heels and studied the trees which surrounded them. ‘We can’t fend off a whole tribe of Injuns. We ain’t got the ammunition.’
‘Our horses are spent, Ben,’ Laker added as he kept his eyes glued on the distant movement as his hand rested on one of his six-shooters. ‘If we don’t get ourselves fresh horse flesh, we’ll never get out of this forest.’
‘You’re both right, boys,’ Brooks admitted. ‘We ain’t got enough bullets and these horses are tuckered.’
Cohen moved closer to Brooks. ‘We should leave the trail and head into the woods. We’re sitting ducks out here.’
Brooks rubbed his neck. ‘I don’t recall any Injuns in these parts the last time I rode this way. I just don’t understand where they come from.’
Laker held on to his horse’s bridle. ‘Maybe they got themselves kicked off their homeland like all them other tribes I heard tell about. Maybe the government brought them here.’
‘However they got here, the fact is that they’re here,’ Cohen said bluntly. ‘And they’re gonna scalp us the first chance they get.’
‘That’s crazy talk,’ Laker said.
The beating drums continued to echo off the trees all around them. It felt as though they were closing in on the outlaws.
‘Sol’s right, Jody,’ Brooks said as he glanced around the countless shadows which encircled them. ‘I let my hatred of Injuns cloud my judgement back there. I seen that young buck and just shot him without thinking. Now we got the whole tribe festering to skin us alive, boys.’
Neither Cohen nor Laker had ever heard Brooks admit to making a mistake before. It unnerved them to see their leader so uncertain.
‘Which way is the trail out of these hills, Ben?’ Laker asked. ‘Which way was you intending to lead us away from that little town back there?’
Brooks inhaled deeply and aimed his finger to their left.
‘The trail leads thataway,’ he said. ‘By my figuring, if we cut up through them trees opposite and head straight and true, we should be able to rejoin the trail in about two miles.’
‘And that would mean we don’t have to tangle with them critters hid down yonder.’ Cohen grinned. ‘I don’t cotton to trying to fight a bunch of Injuns in the open.’
Brooks grabbed his saddle horn and stepped into his stirrup. He hoisted his weary body up and onto his saddle, and gathered up his leathers.
Laker swung himself onto his saddle and pulled his horse’s head back. As he steadied the tired animal, Cohen clambered back onto his own mount.
‘Lead the way, Ben,’ Laker said. ‘You know the trail off this tree-covered mountain. You lead and me and Sol will follow.’
Brooks led the two outlaws off the dusty trail and into the dense trees. He continued to spur as they attempted to out flank their feathered foes.
Yet no matter how far they journeyed, the sound of pounding war drums grew no fainter.
CHAPTER NINE
Moonlight filled the sparse hotel room and woke Iron Eyes from his deep sleep. He was instantly aware that he had slept through the hot afternoon hours of blistering sunlight and awoke as soon as darkness entered the room. The emaciated man sat up and swung his feet onto the floorboards. He dragged his boots on and then pulled the large Bowie knife out of the boards where it had been embedded before he had slept. He slid the blood-stained blade into the neck of the right boot and stared at the window.
The light of the moon crossed from the window to his boots as Iron Eyes allowed his mind to awake. After a few moments he stood up and stretched the knots in his painfully lean frame free. He walked to the window and stared down into the street as an old man dutifully lit each of the street lights with a flame on a long pole.
Iron Eyes picked his whiskey bottle off the wooden sill of the window and drained its contents. His innards warmed up as he picked up his ragged trail coat and put it on.
The bounty hunter had fallen asleep as soon as his head had touched the solitary pillow on the wide bed. He picked up his spurs and attached them to his boots and then looked down at the bed sheets.
The shape of his thin body was carved into the surface of the bed. His pair of matched Navy Colts rested to either side of the impression where he had left them.
Iron Eyes reached across the bed and picked both deadly weapons up and then pushed them into the deep coat pockets to either side of his hips. The sound of the guns mixing with the countless loose bullets in his pockets filled the room as the tall bounty hunter turned and strode to the room door.
His bony left hand released the bolt and then he stepped out onto the landing. By the time he had reached the staircase he was totally awake.
The hotel clerk looked up from his newspaper when the sound of Iron Eyes’s spurs filled the lobby. His face could not disguise the fear which rippled through his body at the sight of the hideous bounty hunter descending the steps.
Iron Eyes looked through the hair which hung over his face at the terrified man behind the desk. He continued walking until the boardwalk was beneath his boot leather.
Only then did he stop and look all around.
The street lights glowed like fireflies. The small town was quiet apart from the saloon. He turned his wide shoulders and started down toward the Hogleg as his eyes surveyed the street as they always did.
He reached the saloon and looked over the swing doors into its smoke-filled interior. Sam Parker was sat with a gathering of equally old men at a card table as he noticed the bounty hunter.
He rose with Iron Eyes’s saddle bags and rushed to the swing doors. They rocked on their hinges as the breathless man handed the bags to the thin figure.
‘I put four bottles of rye in these bags for you, Iron Eyes,’ Sam said as the bounty hunter accepted the bags and swung them on to his shoulder. The satchels balanced to either side of his lean frame.
‘Obliged.’ Iron Eyes nodded as he began to walk along the boardwalk with the smaller man at his side toward the livery stable. ‘How long have I bin up in that room?’
‘Only a few hours,’ Sam answered. ‘Four at best.’
Iron Eyes patted his clothing and then fished out a long black cigar. He put it between his teeth and then ignited a match with his thumbnail. As smoke filled his lungs, he tossed the match at the sand and stepped down from the boardwalk to cross toward the stable.
‘They went south?’ Iron Eyes checked through a cloud of smoke.
Parker nodded. ‘That�
��s right.’
As both men reached the open doors of the livery, Iron Eyes turned and squinted to the south of Ten Strike. He scratched his jaw.
‘With any luck them Kiowa will have killed the varmints already, Sam,’ he drawled. ‘I was intending on collecting the bounty on their sorrowful hides but there might not be too much left when them Injuns are finished with them.’
A nervous smile lit up Parker’s face. ‘Do you reckon?’
Iron Eyes shrugged. ‘Nope. Just wishful thinking on my part, Sam. Ben Brooks and his boys are too ornery to make my job that easy.’
Parker touched Iron Eyes’s arm. ‘You won’t forget about the money, will you? We sorely need that money, son.’
‘If I find the bank money I’ll bring it back.’
Iron Eyes continued on into the livery stable and glanced at the blacksmith. The man did not have to be told that the bounty hunter had come for his horse.
Both Parker and the tall bounty hunter watched as the blacksmith led the palomino stallion out of a stall and began to saddle the high-shouldered animal.
‘How are you gonna catch them bank robbers?’ Parker asked Iron Eyes. ‘Have you got yourself a plan?’
‘I got me a plan OK.’ Iron Eyes snorted as smoke drifted from between his teeth. ‘A real good plan, Sam.’
Parker looked up at the strange man as he watched his horse being readied.
‘What’s your plan?’ he asked.
Iron Eyes looked down at Parker through his hair. He tilted his head and then walked to where the magnificent stallion stood in its finery. The bounty hunter did not speak as he placed his saddlebags across the back of the mount and secured them to the ornate cantle.
As the blacksmith walked back to his supper next to the forge, Parker approached the bounty hunter as Iron Eyes stepped into his stirrup and mounted the animal in one fluid action.
‘You said you had a plan, son.’ Parker pressed the expressionless horseman. ‘What is it?’
Iron Eyes glanced down at Parker. A cruel grin came to his scarred lips as his bony hands gathered up his long leathers in readiness.
