He knew of Dewayne's attempts to put a stop to these bounty hunters, and others like them. He had witnessed from concealment, the arrest of several of them. Faden's “Will” dictated that upon the eventuality of his death, or incapacity to make reasonable judgments, all of his belongings (other than the pocket watch, which would be buried with him) were bequeathed to Dewayne. So therefore Dewayne was within his rights to post the land as he had done. Legally, these outsiders were trespassing on private property, and Faden was the self-appointed enforcer of this law.
The man was by this time screaming for, and demanding help. Faden moved to the relative sanctuary of a large boulder atop the highest point of his property. This afforded him a vaster scope of the suffering man, and would give the other three absolutely no chance for a clear shot at him whatsoever. Faden peered through the scope, and shot the man in the left elbow, which doubled his shrieks of pain.
One of the two still standing made a mad dash for the injured friend, taking cover behind the prone body of the man shot in the forehead. One of the other two headed back down the trail in the direction they had originally came from. The last one began a maneuvering tactic intending to come up on Faden from behind.
Faden smiled as all of this was taking place. The five were obviously rank amateur's intent on easily earning a large sum of money. The man putting the sneak on Faden didn't know it, but he would have to scale a sandy bluff some three hundred feet in elevation, with not a single trace of cover to speak of. He would have to start this climb by treading and swimming in a hole thirty feet deep with the river current tugging at him all the while. He had to do all of this without catching a bullet from the barrel of Faden's rifle, which wasn't very damn likely. They should have had the good sense to question someone familiar with the terrain before coming after him. Faden shot the man he supposed was going for help in the back of the head. He placed just enough shots in the lifeless body below to keep the man taking refuge there down. He then turned his full attention to the man intent on taking him from behind.
He waited until he saw a hand on the boulder, which was half in, half out of the water. The poor, misguided fool did exactly what Faden had figured he would; he lost his footing in the shifting sand of the river. He threw the rifle away from his body and began to swim in the swiftly flowing river current. Faden shot him in the ass, barely grazing the skin. The man would now have stories to tell his grandchildren about his bounty hunting days. Faden knew he wouldn't be back as he yelped in pain and dove below the surface.
This left one man for his undivided attention. He made his way slowly down hill, stopping ever now and then to pump some shots into various body joints of the injured man. He felt he had to keep the guy moaning so that the healthy one wouldn't think that he had forgotten about him in all the excitement.
Faden halted twenty feet from the carnage, which littered the open glade, and instructed the unharmed man to throw all the weapons into the brush. After Faden was sure the man had complied, he warily walked up to him. Deliberately and mercifully, he shot the barely living man on the ground, through the heart. It was very doubtful that the man would have survived with even the most thorough medical care, having lost so much blood. Several of his major arteries had been severed with the multiple wounds. The man had the appearance of being an active outdoorsman who probably only enjoyed strenuous sports. He would have been a cripple, confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life. If given a choice, he more-than-likely would have preferred to die, then to have to face all the people he had bullied around while healthy.
The one remaining hunter, shocked by the brutality of what he had just witnessed, began, “You sadistic, heinous son-of-a-bit—"
"What were you all planning on doing to me? I'm relatively certain you weren't going to take me on a picnic.” Faden halted further comment by hitting him a good one on the point of the jaw with the butt of his rifle. The man fell over backwards without a sound. Faden carved his initials onto the chest of the unconscious man. He then did likewise to the other two, and wiped the blood from the razor sharp tip of his hunting knife on the forehead of the survivor.
He remarked to no one in particular, “Teach you to trespass on my land.” He then walked to the man who had thought to seek help. This man, with the back of his head blown away, he hung in a tree with a note pinned to the flesh of his bare chest warning future bounty hunters of their fate.
Faden started the trek for the Oscar bluffs with a state of mind that would brook no interference. He was liken to a wounded animal, extremely dangerous to himself, and anyone who had the misfortune to get in his way.
He only wished to be left alone. The girl wasn't hurt physically, after all. He hadn't intentionally hurt anyone that hadn't meant to harm him. He had sincerely believed he was doing right by Sinda Rilla. That she had taken such umbrage at the treatment he gave her, after professing eternal love for him, caused him the greatest of torment. He screamed like a panther into the night as he continued to walk. He made up his mind that this would be the last time he would run. He didn't give a damn if they sent the National Guard after him the next time, he was going to stay and fight to the very end. The only reason he was leaving this time was because of some primeval instinct which dictated he procure peace with his Maker. To accomplish this feat he would fast for three days and allow a vision to instruct him what to do next. In his present state of mind he didn't care how many he took with him when the time came for him to depart for the unknown.
He arrived at the cave in a weakened condition, and half out of his mind from starvation. He still lacked four hours of the self imposed seventy-two of fast he had set for himself. He smoked a pipe filled with peyote, which had cost him dearly before this ordeal had begun.
For hours he was swept with a phantasmagoria that scared the Be-Jesus out of him. His malnourished body trembled with jolts of adrenaline as he fled from the fiery monsters, which pursued him so unmercifully. Then, he saw a familiar face, and the man behind the face was weeping. It was a face that probably had never seen a tear of sadness in its lifetime, yet here the tears fell shamelessly as if the owner didn't care who knew he was saddened. It turned out to be Dewayne, and he kept telling Faden that he was so sorry for what he had done. He apologized over and over again.
Faden reached out to him, to assure him that whatever he had done was okay. Everything was all right ... but when he touched the man his index finger spouted a stream of blood, and he jerked his hand back as if he had been burned. It dawned on his subconscious that this wasn't Dewayne before him; it was the vile evil Ben Roachman.
Ben held an unborn fetus by the heels, and as Faden watched in horror, the man took a voracious bite from the baby's buttocks. Blood and gore squirted from his mouth as he attempted to speak around the grossly filled cavern in his face. He offered the, not more than half formed, infant to Faden.
Faden screamed in silent terror as the fetus, which oddly had his own facial features, spat out a pocket watch. For some weird reason or the other, Faden was on the ground and was scampering back on his haunches as the watch became a six-foot diamondback rattlesnake, coiled and poised to strike. There was a wall at his back. He realized he was in the closet of the rectory once again, and he sensed that this was going to be the end of him. Terror clutched at his mind; his belly cramped so terribly that he feared he was going to puke although there wasn't anything in him to vomit up. He then heard the voice of an angel; an angel named Sinda, calmly singing to him to hold on. She told him the snake was his friend, if only he would believe. The snake was his soul's double from the Happy Hunting Ground, and was there to assist him.
Quick as lightning, the snake turned and struck Ben, time after time, but he must have been immune to the snakes venom because he just sat there laughing hysterically. Faden had had all he could stand. He was sick and tired of being scared. He screamed, “Nooooooo!” at the top of his lungs, and rose, intent on charging the leering devil. But he couldn't because he was once again
a frightened ten-year-old boy, and the object of his intense hatred was his smiling, opened-armed, Mother.
She patted him gently on the head as she had done when he, as a child, did something that pleased her. He watched in horror as the snake, which now sported Ben's head, struck Chelsea. She began to disappear within a wisp of smoke, but as she was dissipating, she called out to him to beware of Ben because his evil wasn't finished yet. He was a shell of a man with the soul of Satan. Although she winnowed through his fingers, Faden tried again and again to clutch at her, all the while promising he would be careful, and never take candy from, or ride with strangers.
Faden came back to consciousness, mortified beyond belief, and puzzled by the last thing the apparition resembling his mother had said to him. “Faden, I approve of Sinda, and she sends you her love."
Perspiration drenched his body and he was trembling out of control. He took deep breaths and held them for as long as he could, hoping to abate his terror and stave off the panic that threatened to overcome him. It was hard to distinguish fact from fiction, born of hallucination, so real to life had the vision been.
He didn't really know just what to make of his vision, and may never know without a shaman to interpret them. He supposed he would just have to listen to what his White man's blood told him. If the trek and vision hadn't accomplished anything else, it had at least bought him some precious time. He may not have achieved the peace with his Maker that he had sought, but from here on out it was going to be, “Shame on the ass of anyone who got in his way!"
Faden walked home, taking little care for hiding. He walked with a lightness of spirit that he hadn't felt in a long time. Whether he was at peace with his Maker, or not, he was tranquil within himself. Nothing was out of sync except for the memories of Sinda.
He longed to hear her voice, was desperate to talk to her, and yearned to touch her, because he loved her so much. But he knew he was destined to never see her again. He wanted to hate her for the betrayal, but couldn't, so he lied and told himself it didn't matter. What he had done was wrong, he realized that now, and she had been well within her rights to turn him in, even if it meant deceiving him in the process. She probably believed that it was the only way she was going to be free of him.
Once again, his daydreaming had almost gotten him killed. There were four men in this bunch, and Faden muttered in a tone that only he could hear, “Let the games begin!” He should have been weak from the fasting, but the squirrel he had for breakfast had infused him with an uncanny amount of endurance. He felt invincible. He waved the rifle in the air above his head, and screaming like a banshee, he charged the four men. The tactic had the desired effect and the men scattered from the clearing, diving headfirst for the cover of underbrush that surrounded their makeshift camp.
The suicidal charge itself had been unnerving enough, but his off-key singing of...
"I run through the bushes,
And I run through the bramble;
I run though the briars,
Where a rabbit wouldn't go;
I run so fast that the hounds can't catch me,
Down the Beaver Creek;
To the Red River, Oh!"
caused the would-be glory hunters to lose their enthusiasm for the sport of man hunting.
One of them remarked to the other's, “It's bad enough that he would charge into an enemies camp like he did, but what really bothers me so much is the way the son-of-a-bitch seemed to enjoy doing it. I've heard tales of this guy, but didn't believe them. Now I see they hardly lent credence to his true bravery. I've got a wife and kid back in Texas, and I'm going to them while I still can."
The others followed suit, and Faden would have to find other participants to carry on his vendetta against. He no longer wanted to be left alone. He desired and needed to shed the blood of others. He harbored a death wish for himself and anyone else who hoped to bring him down. Something had gone terribly haywire inside of him. He wanted to kill, not the innocent, of course, but those who would desire to take him out for the reward. Those who didn't give a damn whether or not he was guilty, but only cared about the amount of money placed on his head. These vultures that lived off of the suffering of others were scum to his way of thinking, and deserved whatever fate destiny threw at them. He had always subscribed to the axiom “live and let live,” but these buzzards were trying to do the job meant for trained professionals, above and beyond their meager capabilities. Did they think that killing a man would be no different than slaying a defenseless deer? He had no feeling of remorse for anything that happened to them.
The four men came back into the camp to gather their possessions when they figured he was long gone. Just for meanness, he put a bullet into the middle of their campfire, scattering sparks and the men in every direction. “Come and get me!” he shouted to the heavens for the entire world to hear, but for today there wasn't going to be any takers. He ate a delicious leisurely meal from the staples he had taken from the four men.
CHAPTER XII
SAND...
The sand was everywhere, in his eyes, mouth, and nose. It was in his stores and his drinking water. His fingernails were filled with the grit, and would only become packed with the stuff again just moments after he cleaned them. His body was chafed all over by the sand trapped in his clothes. The winds had blown for twenty-six hours straight with a velocity of thirty miles an hour, and gusts of fifty or better. Sand had pelted Faden and the men that had been searching for him. The only positive thing to come from this was the wiping away of all traces of him.
Faden's jaw was swelled to almost twice its normal size. A grain of sand had found its way into a cavity he hadn't even known he had. The pain was becoming unbearable, and he knew he had to do something fast before the infection became so intense that he couldn't. He had managed to keep the ache under control for a while with doses of the whisky Jim had left for him, and by taking all but two of the Tylenol he had packed in his wares. It was around one o'clock in the morning the best he could figure it. He would have to wade the river, but this would be the most direct route for him to get to Byers, Texas, some five miles to the west of his present location. Five miles as the crow flies, that is. He calculated that it would probably take him a couple of hours to reach the small town, putting him there around three A.M., if he started right now. The Fish House was nearer, but although they had aspirin, he knew he needed an antibiotic, as well as a painkiller. The drugstore in Byers would be the closest place to acquire these items. Barring trouble, he should be back home about five A.M., while the land was still cloaked in darkness.
He took the last two Tylenol and made the trip to Byers without incident. It was 3:15 A.M. when he twisted the padlock on the back door in two. Luckily, there wasn't a soul stirring in the small town. Security measures were lax in the area where everybody knew everyone. Faden scooped a handful of antibiotics he recognized from having to take them before, and about fifty Tylenol No. 3 pills. He placed the contents of medicine into his pocket in a waterproof bottle. He deposited more than enough money to pay for what he took on the cash register, then stepped out into the alley, and ran face to face with the town's young paperboy.
The kid was visibly shaken, but had the presence of mind to point an accusing finger at Faden, and say, “You're Faden Casteel!"
Faden smiled, and quipped, “I know that.” as he put the damaged lock back on the hasp and staple.
"My dad says you didn't do all the things they blame you for.” Remarked the boy, eyeing him suspiciously.
"Is that right? Who is your daddy?” asked Faden, as he edged his way to a darker portion of the alley.
"Sonny Coffee. He says y'all used to hunt Devil's Hollow together. He claims you are the best snake hunter ever."
Faden chuckled at the memory of hunting with Sonny until the sore tooth reminded him that nothing was that funny anymore. “Your dad is a pretty fair hand at it too. I haven't seen him in a long time, though.” Then, changing the subject, he said, “W
e've kind of got a situation here. As you are well aware, I have to be getting on down the road, and I can't have you sounding the alarm before I am able to get away. You understand my dilemma, don't you?"
"Not a problem, sir. If my dad says you're innocent, then I guess you're innocent.” Replied the boy, with maturity far beyond his years. “Dad says you are a good man, and as far as you breaking into the drugstore, I didn't see a thing. The old fart that owns it won't even let me have credit to buy the catcher's mitt I need for summer league. I always pay my bills, ask anyone in town. Dad whipped him one time when they was a-drinkin’ and he decided to take it out on the rest of the family. I hate the mean sum-bitch!"
Faden enjoyed the conversation more than he could have imagined; the exchange of words and sound of another human voice was something that he missed dearly. “A mean old fart, is he? I tell you what; I've got a lot of cash on me that I'm not going to needing where I'm headed. I'll give you enough for the mitt, plus some for gas. You tell your daddy that I said for him to drive you over to Wichita Falls, and buy you a glove there."
The boy reluctantly took the money, and asked, “But what can I do for you? I can't accept charity."
"You just be the best damn catcher you can be, and maybe think of me every once in a while when you throw out a runner on second base. That will be pay enough. I don't care if you tell your dad about this conversation, but I'd just as soon you didn't mention it to anyone else, at least for the time being, anyway. Is it a deal?” he asked, reaching out to shake the boy's hand.
"Sir, I appreciate the loan, and I promise to pay it back someday when your trouble is all cleared up. You don't have to worry about me telling anyone besides dad. Everyone in this fleabag treats us like poor White Trash because dad drinks too much, and can't manage to keep a job since mom died. I try to tell them that he's just having a hard time getting over her death. He'll snap out of it one of these days, you just wait and see if he don't."
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