Noose Jumpers: A Mythological Western

by Trevor H. Cooley

  The boy was quick and efficient and when he was done Sandy frowned, his plan in shambles. The thin rope was only as thick as twine, but stronger than it looked. With his two middle fingers tied together it would be nearly impossible to grasp his rifle much less fire it.

  Not that it mattered, because the Coyote called out to his son, “Get his horse. Take it up to the cart.”

  The boy untied the horse’s lead from the tree where Sandy had left it and headed into the darkness. Sandy watched his rifle disappear with him.

  The Coyote kicked dirt onto the fire, putting out the flames. Then, his form lit only by the soft glow of the few coals that remained uncovered, he picked up the bedroll with one strong hand and thrust it into Sandy’s arms. “You carry that. Let’s go.”

  The bounty hunter nudged Sandy in the direction that the boy had gone and he had no choice but to walk up the dark trail. He stumbled a few times at first, tripping over rocks that jutted from the ground, but his eyes soon adjusted and he saw that the Coyote had been right. The moon was rising.

  Sandy could see the upper half of the silvery sphere peeking over the mountain tops on the distant horizon. It was a three quarter moon and a bright one. They wouldn’t have any problem travelling that night. This also meant that it would be bright enough for his escape.

  The thought emboldened him and he went back to his original plan. Keep his captor off balance. There was one thing he had decided not to mention until now. “So,” he said loudly. “I hear you have a backer.”

  Sandy couldn’t see the bounty hunter because the man was walking behind him, but he heard his footsteps falter and there was surprise in his voice. “A . . . what?”

  “A backer, I said. And I hear it’s a powerful one,” Sandy added.

  “What do you think you’re doing, Sandy?” Pecos said. The wind that arrived with the specter’s reappearance was as stiff as his voice and Sandy wasn’t able to grab his hat this time. He watched in dismay as it tumbled from his head, disappearing into the scrub brush.

  The Coyote jabbed him in the back with the barrel of his rifle. “Who told you this?”

  Sandy turned to face him. The Coyote was cocking his head, his expression hard to read in the shadows. “My backer,” Sandy replied. “I have one too. He’s standing right next to you.”

  Pecos swore.

  “You are telling me you have . . . a legend?” the Coyote asked. He looked past Sandy to a point beyond his shoulder as if waiting for a confirmation.

  “I guess you could call him that,” Sandy replied.

  “You hole-headed idjit!” Pecos barked. “I told you not to go telling folks stuff like that!”

  “Why not?” Sandy said back to the specter. “Surely his backer already told him about you.”

  “It still ain’t something you bring up!” Pecos snapped. “There’s certain proprieties when it comes to this sort of thing.”

  “Well, you never said anything like that until now,” Sandy said.

  Unexpectedly, the Coyote responded to Sandy’s conversation with a specter he couldn’t see by laughing. “Whatever your legend is saying to you, he is right. You must be new to this.”

  “Why do you say that?” Sandy wondered.

  “Because someone who knew what they were doing would not be stupid enough to tell me about their backer,” the Indian replied with a smirk. “Telling people that you have a legend is one quick way to get yourself killed. Has he really not told you how this works?”

  Sandy blinked at the man. “Evidently not.”

  It hadn’t occurred to him that other people with backers might want to kill him. Why would that be? And what else had the specter not told him? He turned a glare Pecos’ way. “We’re gonna talk about this later.” He then looked back at the bounty hunter. “So has this changed your plans, Coyote? Have you decided to kill me now?”

  The bounty hunter snorted but there was no mirth in it. He really didn’t like being called Coyote. “Why would I bother? You are a no name. I had not even heard of you before ‘Tough Jim’ told me about you.” He spat. “Killing a nobody will not help me in our little competition. It serves me better to drag you back to face that sheriff.”

  Sandy winced at being called a nobody. He might not have been as sensitive to such insults as Tom or Luke, but he took pride in his accomplishments. He would have protested the slight, but something else the man said tickled his mind. What ‘little competition’ was he talking about? Did it have something to do with the backers? Sandy opened his mouth to ask just that question, but was interrupted as a sudden howl pierced the night’s silence, loud and haunting.

  “A wolf,” said the bounty hunter, his face pale in the growing moonlight. He glanced around warily.

  Sandy was unsure why someone as experienced traveling the wilds as the Coyote would have such a concerned reaction to a simple howl. He listened for a moment, but the howl wasn’t echoed. “If so, it’s a lone wolf. Nothing to worry about.”

  “We must go now,” the Coyote said and when Sandy didn’t immediately start walking, raised his gun. “Move!”

  Shrugging, Sandy turned around and continued his walk up the path. The trail grew steep and the way he was forced to carry the bedroll was awkward. Sandy’s legs and back were complaining, but he forgot all about it when they reached the top of the rise.

  Pecos let out a long whistle and the Coyote let out an exclamation in Navajo that Sandy couldn’t quite make out.

  The three quarter moon had fully crested the horizon and illuminated the valley below. The Rio Grande, gleaming like a silvery snake, stretched from the north to the south as far as his eyes could follow. But directly in front of them, a bank of fog had risen, reaching across the serpent-like river in a thick band like a manacle made of cloud. A rope of fog then led away from the river in an unnaturally straight line heading over the long miles directly into the hills where they stood.

  “Like I thought would happen,” Pecos said. “She’s coming to us.”

  “The skinwalker!” The bounty hunter grabbed Sandy’s arm. “We may be too late! Hurry!”

  The path before them took a downward slope and the Coyote rushed down it, pulling Sandy along with him. “Nakai!”

  They rounded a jutting outcrop of rock and the place where the unnatural line of fog ended came into view. A thick wall of mist at least 12 feet high had come up from the valley and surrounded a circular area ahead of them. The boy and the Coyote’s cart were blocked from view. The bounty hunter paused only briefly before pulling Sandy directly towards it.

  Sandy heard a whinny, then saw the hindquarters of his horse emerge from the fog as it backed slowly towards him. The beast seemed unharmed, but he caught a glimpse of its terrified eyes, wide and rolling, before the Coyote pulled him into the fog.

  The air inside was thick and cold and moist, almost impenetrable. He could see nothing but silvery gloom. Their first few steps were slowed as if they were moving through a barrier of solid water. Then they stumbled suddenly forward. The mist inside the fog wall settled down to about the height of their knees and they could see what was in front of them. The sight froze them in their tracks.

  The Coyote’s Pup was sitting cross-legged on the ground, his arms folded, his eyes closed. Beyond him was a large muscular horse with a silver coat; one of those Percheron draft horses Sandy had seen in the city. It was attached to a sturdy looking two-wheeled cart with a relatively long bed.

  Floating in mid-air above the cart, his back to them, was a large man with a wide physique. His head lolled on his broad shoulders and Sandy noticed that a gag was tied behind his head. He wore a sweat-stained shirt and his suspenders held up pants that were wet on the insides of his legs. Urine dripped from the toes of his boots.

  “Tough Jim Sanchez,” Sandy said under his breath as he realized who the floating man must be. The Coyote had evidently still been keeping the man prisoner. What Sandy didn’t understand was why the man had wet himself or why he was floating in the air above
the cart bed.

  He glanced at the Coyote and saw that the bounty hunter had averted his gaze from the cart. The Coyote lowered himself into the mist and, like his son, closed his eyes and sat cross-legged. He folded his arms across his chest, his rifle resting across his legs.

  “What are you doing?” Sandy asked in a whisper.

  At the sound of his voice, Tough Jim’s limp form swayed as it was jerked abruptly to the side. Sandy saw that the man hadn’t been floating in mid-air after all. He was being held aloft. The witch was standing on the back of the cart and was lifting his heavy body up with one arm, her hand plunged into the center of his chest.

  Sandy’s bound hands drooped and his bedroll fell to the ground.

  “Yep. That’s her,” said Pecos. His presence stirred the mist around him and Sandy tried to take comfort from the fact that the specter had been able to follow them into the fog. “Ain’t changed a bit. Remember what I told you.”

  “Right,” Sandy said, but he couldn’t remember any of Pecos’ instructions at the moment. His mind had gone blank.

  The witch wasn’t at all what he had expected; not some withered old crone wearing rags. She was tall and lanky. Her extended arm was corded with muscle and her dark skin was painted with swirling white lines. A cloak made of wolf pelts was settled around her shoulders and the shirt and long skirt she wore under it were deerskin. Her hair was long, dark, and curly, hanging in ringlets around her face.

  Sandy couldn’t make out her features, so for the moment she seemed ageless. The moonlight only illuminated the tip of her nose, but he knew that her eyes were fixed on him. There was a baleful weight to her gaze that caused his chest to clench as if her hand was gripping his heart instead of Tough Jim’s. He felt an accompanying tightness in his abdomen and understood why Tough Jim had been unable to hold his piss.

  He cleared his throat. “Hello, uh . . .”

  “Call her Martha,” Pecos suggested.

  “Martha,” Sandy said. “I, uh-.”

  She hissed with the intake of air. “What did you say?” With a casual flick of her wrist, she flung the weighty body of Tough Jim away from the cart. It soared several yards through the air before disappearing into the mist with a dull thud. “You!” she said in a voice as dry as paper. She pointed to him with a long-fingered hand that glistened in red wetness. “Approach me.”

  “Do not heed her, Tucker,” the Coyote advised calmly from his position sitting on the ground. His posture was relaxed, his eyes still closed. “Follow our examples and sit. This woman has joined the Witchery Way. Cross your legs and fold your arms. Do not look into eyes or she will steal your face. Do not speak to her. She will try to use your fears against you.”

  “Watch your tongue, man of the Dineh who walks the way of the white man!” the woman snarled. She hopped lithely down from the bed of the cart and stood before the Coyote, her presence towering over him. She stuck her hand out towards him, still dripping with the dead outlaw’s blood, and a rattling sound echoed from the darkness under her cloak.

  One of the white painted patterns that was wrapped around the skin of her exposed arm shifted in the moonlight. The pattern swelled, the paint taking on the form of scales. Then, as if shedding its skin, a rattlesnake broke free of the paint and slithered across her extended palm. It landed in the bounty hunter’s lap and coiled, rearing back its head. Its mouth opened, revealing fangs that dripped poison as it continued its warning rattle. To the Coyote’s credit, he didn’t make a sound or move a muscle.

  “If you speak another word, it shall be your last,” the witch promised. She lowered her arm and the empty white paint snakeskin slid from her arm and fell to the ground. Then, dismissing the Coyote from her mind, she stepped towards Sandy.

  One step was as far as she went. The witch paused in front of Sandy’s backer and sniffed at the air. Hunching over, she mumbled something and waved her hand across her eyes. A chuckle passed her lips and she turned to face the specter. “Pecos Bill, it is you,” she said, her dry voice amused. “So you’ve went and become a backer. That explains why this killer knows my name. But why did you tell him?”

  Sandy’s eyes widened but if Pecos was surprised, either that the witch was able to see him or that she had called Sandy a killer, he didn’t show it.

  “There’s power in a name, Martha,” Pecos replied. “You taught me that. Knowing you have such an every-day moniker takes away some of the mystery. Besides, I wanted to remind you that you ain’t impervious. If he said your full true name, you’d fall over just as dead as any mortal woman.”

  “True,” she admitted and tossed her hair to the side, allowing the moon to reveal her face.

  Once again Sandy’s expectations were off. He had expected the witch to be of Indian heritage, but this was a black woman. Also she appeared to be only of middle age, perhaps in her forties. If not for the ghoulish white skull outline painted on her face, he might even have found her pretty. Then her lips split in a venomous sneer and Sandy rethought that assessment.

  “It is a pity you’re already dead, son,” she said. “Tonight is a three-quarter moon and you are in sight of the Rio Grande. I would have liked to claim your life as promised.”

  “It’s a true shame,” Pecos agreed with a chuckle. “But it’s too late for that, Martha. I went another way. You can’t touch me now.”

  The skinwalker raised a bloody finger. “Not necessarily true. But you are not my purpose tonight.” She turned her full attention on Sandy. “This is the one I’m here for.”

  14: Under a Three Quarter Moon

  An excerpt from the Tale of Sandy Tucker

  Legend goes that when Pecos Bill was just four-years-old, his parents were moving their large family (Some accounts say 12 children, but I’ve heard the number as high as 18.) westward. Now, Bill had been an ornery cuss right from the beginning and his parents became so tired of his hollerin’ and carryin’ about that they kept him in the tail end of the wagon, as far from their tender ears as possible.

  They was crossing the shallows of the Pecos River one hot day and one of the siblings (Likely Todd. He was the next oldest to Bill and meanest of temper.) pushed little Bill overboard. The poor boy hit the water and was rushed downstream, bobbin’ up and down like a cork until he came ashore and was found by a helpful band of coyotes. (See chapter 12, appendix A for my refutation of this particular part of the tale.)

  How the four-year-old survived his dip in the drink is hard to guess. Some tales say he was held aloft by helpful fish. Others say that he simply learnt to swim awful quick. Myself, I figure it was just plain luck he didn’t drown.

  Now most folks believe that he came to be called Pecos Bill because he was raised on the river’s banks. Truth be told, there is a fallacy in this argument. Though little Bill may have fell into the Pecos River, he wasn’t in it long. See, the Pecos River is a tributary and Bill was swept right into a larger body of water. Near as I can tell, Bill didn’t come to shore until he was several miles down the Rio Grande. – From the sadly under read and mostly accurate book, Pecos Bill and Tall Paul Bunyan: The Truth Behind the Tales, by Gregward E. Anthony, published 1928.

  Sandy became aware that an odd silence had settled around them. Encased in walls of fog as they were, it was as if they had been transported to another realm; a world where the witch controlled every aspect.

  Now that the witch was looking directly at him, Sandy could see her eyes clearly for the first time. A chill ran up his spine and his abdomen clenched again. The woman had no irises around her pupils and her pupils were so large that there was only a narrow outline of white around them. The Coyote’s warning suddenly came to mind and Sandy averted his gaze, focusing his eyes on her mouth. One of her teeth was gold-capped.

  “You’re here for me?” he asked.

  “Oh, I seen you coming a long time ago, quarter blood,” she said, drawing nearer.

  Sandy took a step back. What was it Pecos had told him? The most important thing is to stay calm.
She feeds off fear. She always tells the truth and she can always smell a lie. “Do you know why I’m here, then?”

  “A question burns inside you.” The witch took another step closer and he took another step back.

  “Questions,” he corrected.

  She smiled eagerly and he saw that another of her teeth was going to need to be capped. One of her bicuspids was blackened, half rotted. “Answers require payment.”

  “Be confident,” Pecos reminded him. The specter’s expression was wary, but not overly concerned.

  Sandy firmed his resolve and this time when she stepped closer, he did not back away. “I can pay. I have money in my saddlebags.”

  “Ah yes. Gold and paper,” she said boredly, then shrugged. “I have little use for those but I suppose they can do as payment for one question.” The witch reached out and touched his chest with one fingernail. “After that it’ll get more . . . interesting.”

  Sandy wanted to ask her how much of his gold and cash she was talking about, but he feared that asking her would count as his first question. He tried to think of the best way to frame his question to get the most bang for his buck.

  “What is your name?” she asked, leaning in closer. “I need to know who I’m dealing with.”

  She brought her eyes closer to his and Sandy moved his gaze from her mouth up to her forehead. Was there a reason not to tell her this? He couldn’t think of any reason not to. She had already heard his last name when the Coyote said it. Besides, Pecos wasn’t warning him against it. “Uh, Sandy. Sandy Tucker.”

  “There is no need for you to avert your eyes, Sandy Tucker,” she breathed. “I’ve got no desire to ‘steal your face’ as the bounty hunter so rudely assumed. You must allow me to see into you if I am to be of any help.”