by Joe Millard
They hoisted the heavy chest up and were starting to ease it down into the coffin when Apachito and his men burst over the rim of the gully and came racing down the slope, yelling. A rifle banged and a slug richocheted off the lid of the chest, leaving a silvery trail.
Dandy dived for the ground, yelling, "Let it down! Let the chest down and slam the lid quick!"
They could hear the guttural voice of Apachito bawling, "The money chest! They're tryin' to hide it in the coffin!"
The hunter finished letting his end down and whirled, his gun in his hand. Shadrach had dropped to one knee and was steadying his custom-made killing machine across his left arm. With its enormously longer barrel, its range was far greater.
The gun blammed thunderously. Up the slope an outlaw threw up his hands and pitched sideways out of his saddle. He fell under the pounding hooves of the horses coming behind. When they had passed there was only an unmoving bundle of crimsoned rags on the ground.
"Our deal's off," the hunter said through his teeth. "I'm going to try to get Apachito first. With him dead, some of the others might get cold feet and pull out. It's our only chance of getting out of this alive."
Shadrach was frenziedly screwing the skeleton stock on to the butt of his pistol. He made no reply but his face mirrored the intensity of the inner struggle between avarice and survival.
The Man With No Name had dropped to one knee. He tried a long shot elevating his pistol for maximum range, but the distance was still too great. He saw a spurt of dust kicked up by his slug a few yards in front of the charging pack. He snapped out the cylinder and replaced the empty with a fresh shell from his belt.
Shadrach had the gunstock against his shoulder. He fired again and one of the running horses stumbled and went down, throwing the rider over its head, then rolling over him. There were howls of rage and scattered rifle shots that went wild. The hunter weighed his chances of reaching his shooting stand, some fifteen yards away, where his rifle and the half-dozen pistols lay, loaded and ready for his act.
Abruptly and unaccountably, the situation changed. The charging outlaws were almost to level flat at the base of the slope. One of the riders suddenly yelled wordlessly, pointing northward, up the ancient riverbed. Then the others were howling in panic, raising a great cloud of dust as they jerked their mounts around and went racing back up the slope.
The bounty hunter was on his feet, running to a spot where he could see past the stage and up the gully. A wall of water, ten or twelve feet high, stretching across the ancient riverbed from slope to slope, was racing toward them at express-train speed.
He bawled, "Flash flood! Run for your lives!"
No one stopped to argue. They were all too familiar with the devastation and death that could come roaring down from a cloudburst high in the mountains. Dandy caught Molly's hand and ran desperately toward the slope below their wagons. Hunk and Cora raced at their heels. Laura darted around to the side of the tent and pulled open the door of the lion's cage before running after the others.
Shadrach was running toward the opposite slope, shouting, "Come on, come on! This slope is closer."
The hunter swerved aside to jerk the picket pin out of the soft ground and free the white horse. The black horse, saddled and bridled, was hidden somewhere in the willow thickets that lined the stream behind the tent, but only Hunk and Cora knew exactly where and there was no time to look for him now. He could only hope the black would panic in time and tear himself free before the wall of water struck.
The bounty hunter dug in his toes and ran as he had never run before in his life. The wall of water was so close he could see its top crested with foam and littered with debris. He hurdled the little mountain stream, not yet swollen by the flood waters, and raced on with the speed of desperation.
Shadrach had reached the slope and was looking back, gesturing violently. His mouth was open in a yell but his voice was lost in the deafening roar of the flood.
Elmer, the lion, bounded past the hunter, uttering his coughing roars. He raced up the slope past Shadrach and vanished over the rim. A moment later the black horse pounded past, dragging a broken willow branch to which the reins were still tied.
The hunter was at the foot of the slope and hurling himself upward. A scant fifteen feet would put him safely above the flood. He was almost in the clear when the wall of water slammed into his pistoning legs with the force of a rock slide. He staggered, off balance, and would have fallen if Shadrach had not reached down to catch his wrist and haul him clear of the clutching current. Above the thunder of the flood, he heard a faint rending crash as the wall of water struck and demolished the wooden stage.
He threw himself down, gasping for breath. On the opposite slope he could see Dandy and the others, safely above the torrent. Down below, the trapeze, anchored by its guy wires, was still standing. As he looked, the dressing tent tore loose and was borne downstream, with two of its corner poles still tied on and trailing behind like the legs of a swimmer. Ahead of it, Dandy's bass drum was bobbing headlong in the lead. A large black object suddenly popped up behind the tent, turning over and over in the rushing current.
The hunter yelped, "The coffin!"
He leaped to his feet and the two raced downstream in wild pursuit. On the far slope, Dandy had also seen and recognized the object He was galloping in pursuit waving his arms.
Up near the rim of the gully, Apachito and his band had reined in to watch the flood. They, too, saw the coffin and spurred the horses into a chase, yelling crazily. Angling down close to the flood they quickly caught up.
Their horses could stay abreast of the speeding coffin, but the three men on foot were hopelessly outpaced. They could only stumble on, watching the coffin dwindle to a speck and then disappear in the distance.
Shadrach stumbled to a halt, gasping, "We'd better—stop—for a—breather."
He dropped to the ground and the hunter sank down beside him. Across the gully, Dandy staggered up abreast of them and dropped as if he had been slugged. Shadrach was the first to recover his breath.
"You've probably done as many damn fool stunts in your day as I have in mine, but running to this side and letting the flood cut us off from our horses was the all-time prizewinner." He struggled to his feet. "I guess all we can do is keep plugging along and hope the coffin drifts over and grounds on this side."
On the far side Dandy dragged himself wearily erect and cupped hands to his mouth to shout, "I've about had it. I can't keep on any further. You two keep going and good luck. I'm turning back to see how much of our circus gear I can salvage."
He waved and trudged wearily back upstream. The bounty hunter and his rival resumed their downstream course, driving themselves to a stumbling trot. There was no sign of either the outlaws or the coffin, which had maintained a tantalizing midstream course as long as they could see it.
"What if the coffin does drift to this side?" the hunter asked. "Have you thought about what we can do? If we try to drag it out of the water, Apachito's men can pick us off with their rifles. If we don't, they'll just wait for the flood to go down enough to wade their horses across. You know how these flash floods are. The dry ground soaks them up and they're gone almost as fast as they came. By tonight, the stream will be back to a trickle and the rest of the gully will be bone dry."
"I know," Shadrach said. "I've thought of all the questions, but none of the answers, and we're running out of time." He pointed to a line of sodden debris marking the high point of the flood. The surface of the water was already some two feet below it and sinking rapidly. "Even if we got the chest, we'd have to lug it between us and try to outrun their horses. I'd say we just keep going and play out the hand whichever way the cards fall."
"I don't see we have any choice," the hunter said. "But that rascal, Dandy, has me bothered. Do you suppose he could be up to something cute?"
Shadrach's head snapped around and he demanded sharply, "What do you mean?"
"As money-hungry as he is
, it isn't natural for him to give up and turn back like that when the stakes are so high."
"Maybe he's just gotten some sense," Shadrach said. "With Apachito's mob in front of him, he'd never get near the coffin, anyhow. He'd be gunned down the moment he showed. He's only saving his precious neck by backing off while he can."
"Maybe," the hunter said, "but I can't quite buy it. He stands at that table day after day, risking a bullet or a lynch rope to cheat the suckers out of a few dollars. Now, with a cool half million or a fat reward at stake, you can't make me believe his neck suddenly got all that precious."
"Anyhow," Shadrach said in a tight, shrill voice, "it isn't important now. There's the coffin."
CHAPTER 15
The foothills of the Malhoras—the Misfortune Mountains—were not actually hills at all. Some prehistoric upheaval of nature had torn them in half along their spine, reducing the outer portion to a jumble of massive broken rocks at the foot of a sheer rock cliff. The flood waters had slammed against that cliff and spread out through the rocks. The coffin was trapped in an eddy, its forward motion halted but the current was sweeping it around and around in slow, majestic circles.
Shadrach scrambled over the rocks, the hunter at his heels. There was no sign of the outlaws on the far side of the flood. At each revolution, the coffin swept past within a couple of feet of the base of a high, flat rock. Shadrach scrambled onto the rock and flung himself prone, stretching an arm down to the limit of his balance.
The coffin sailed by, its lid barely brushing his fingertips in passing. He made a futile lunge that almost toppled him into the water.
He panted, "Grab my ankles and hold them down hard. I've got to reach a few inches lower the next time it comes around."
The coffin completed its ponderous circle and bore down once more. Shadrach squirmed further out over the water, the hunter leaning hard on his ankles for counterbalance. This time he had sufficient reach to stop the drift and guide the coffin into a narrow space where it could be hauled up onto the rocks.
Across, on the far side of the flood water, a rifle slammed, the sound echoing from the cliff. The slug screamed off the rock, inches from Shadrach's face, peppering him with fragments of sandstone. The hunter gave a mighty heave, hauling his rival onto the rock and down behind it an instant before a second slug furrowed the flat top.
Crouching behind the rock, they watched bitterly as the coffin sailed past once more. This time around, its circle was more of an ellipse. The reason was becoming apparent as the water level dropped. There was a hole or passageway at the foot of the cliff and the flood water was pouring into this, creating a current that was sucking the coffin out of its orbit around the eddy.
As they watched helplessly, the coffin was swept out of the eddy. It hung for a moment at the base of the cliff, then was swept from sight into the vortex below the rim of a cavern that was beginning to show above the water.
The coffin plunged into the vortex and vanished under the cliff as a chorus of yells burst from the rocks on the opposite side. The hunter risked a look and got an unforgettable picture of the whole gang scrambling over the rocks and racing toward their horses, ground-haltered back on the high level above the gully. They leaped to their saddles and pounded away down the base of the cliff.
"It's obvious," Shadrach said, "they know where that water is going, but we don't."
"And equally obvious," the bounty hunter said, "that we know something they don't."
Shadrach stared at him. "What?"
"The coffin is empty. We put the money chest inside, but it isn't there now. We carried that chest and we know how heavy it is. If it were still inside, the coffin couldn't possibly ride that high in the water. It's as empty as my head must be for trusting Dandy Deever."
*****
Dandy trotted upstream at a brisk and steady pace. There was no longer any evidence of the exhaustion that had appeared to prostrate him. His eyes glittered and his hands opened and closed as if grasping a fortune.
He almost fell over Hunk, who was down on his knees at the water's edge, hauling in the sodden canvas of the dressing tent.
"It don't appear to be hurt much," he said, as Dandy skidded to a stop. "It was caught in the willows. Dry it out good and get a couple comer poles and it'll be as good as new. Molly and the girls are out wadin' and pokin' and they've found most of what was lost. Except for the stage, of course. Them planks is all busted up and most likely scattered from here to Mexico City by now."
"It's not important now," Dandy said impatiently. "Bring the tent if you want to and come along."
He resumed his brisk trot. Hunk wadded up the wet canvas and stumbled after him. They came upon Molly and the girls a few hundred yards downstream from the circus site, wading in water that was now barely knee-deep. Molly's skirt was tied up around her waist and the ruffled bottoms of her pantaloons were water-soaked. She waved to Dandy.
"Hi! We're having great luck at finding things, including Nameless's rifle and three of his pistols."
Laura gave a little cry of triumph and thrust an arm into the water up to her shoulder.
"Make it four of his pistols, Ma."
"All right, all right," Dandy shouted. "Let the rest go and start packing the wagons. I want us on the road within half an hour."
The three gaped at him and Molly said, "Aren't we staying over for a performance tomorrow? And what about Nameless and his friend?"
"You heard me," Dandy said with unaccustomed sharpness. "And Nameless can catch up with us if he's a mind to." He turned to Hunk. "Start tearing down the trapeze on the double, but come running when I call you."
Hunk dropped the wet canvas and went splashing out to where the spidery frame of the trapeze protruded from the water. Dandy snatched up a thick branch deposited by the receding flood and waded out, using the trapeze as a guide. When he reached the approximate spot he wanted, he began ramming the heavy end of the branch into the bottom, walking slowly back and forth, crisscrossing a small area.
Suddenly the end of the branch struck wood with a hollow thump. Dandy gave a yelp of delight.
"Hunk, come here quick and give me a hand."
He squatted down in the water, heedless of damage to his trousers and jacket and fumbled along the bottom until his fingers found the edge of a trap door. He caught hold and tugged hard. The trap door tipped up sluggishly until it stood on edge. Beneath it was a large expanse of smooth metal. Hunk came splashing out
"Find the handle on your end," Dandy barked, "and help me lift the chest out."
With Dandy grunting and red-faced, the cords of his neck standing out, they got the money chest up and out of the water. As they stumbled up to the wagons, Molly's eyes went wide and her hand flew to her mouth.
"The money chest!" she gasped. "Dandy, what are you up to? You let them go chasing the coffin without telling them the money was no longer in it. You—you aren't planning to keep the bank's half-million dollars?"
"Molly," he said indignantly. "How could you even think such a thing? I may con a sucker now and then if he looks prosperous and cheat them at the shell game or monte, but you know I'm no crook. The bank is offering twenty-five thousand dollars for the return of their money, and since it was my coffin trick that saved it, I'm not sharing the reward with anybody else."
The wagons were packed in record time, the teams hitched and ready to go. The hunter's bay gelding was left picketed to await his return. Molly was still unhappy.
"You're not being fair with Nameless, Dandy. After all, he gave you a sensational act. How will he know which way to go to catch up with us?"
"All right, all right," Dandy snapped irritably. I'll leave a note on his saddle telling him which way we're heading."
He got pencil and paper and scrawled, "The women are so afraid those outlaws will be back for revenge that we're pulling out. We're heading back north, the way we came. If you want to catch up, you'll be more than welcome. Dandy."
He folded the note and tucked it
under the cantle of the hunter's saddle. As he turned, Molly gave a startled yelp.
"Wh-what are you doing with—with that?"
Hunk had gathered the body of Curley Bick from where it fell and was tucking it under the canvas at the back of Dandy's wagon.
"That," Dandy said, "happens to be worth three thousand dollars, dead or alive. I'll stop and collect the bounty from the sheriff on our way through town and—uh—hold it for Nameless."
"Why not just leave it and let him take care of it?"
"Wife," Dandy said, "if the vultures were to get to him first, there wouldn't be enough left for identification." He gathered the reins and put a foot on the wagon wheel. "If you're through asking fool questions, let's get going."
"You haven't told me which way we're going, Dandy."
"Straight south," Dandy said, "through Crazy Woman pass."
*****
