by Max Brand
“Lefty? He thinks that he’s going to die, and I wish he would. But he’s going to live. Rance is taking care of him, and he’s sure to live. You done him in proper.”
“I didn’t shoot him,” protested Bristol.
“No. That’s the howling beauty of it,” said Dirk van Wey. “You held him up like a light and let one of his own partners put him out. I never seen such a fool as Weston is … and I used to think that he was a bright kid. I’m a fool, too. That’s what I am.”
“It was dark,” said Harry Weston savagely. “It was dark, and there wasn’t any fair chance to get at him. That’s the only thing that saved his hide. I’d like to have a whirl at him now.”
“Would you, now?” asked Dirk, with something almost plaintive in his voice.
“Yeah. I mean it. I’m not afraid of him. I’m not afraid of any man that walks except you, Dirk. And you’re not human.”
“What about you, Danny?” asked van Wey.
“It goes for me, too,” said Dan Miller.
“You’d fight him ag’in, you would?”
“I’ll fight him right now,” said Miller.
Dirk van Wey pulled from his holsters two revolvers with barrels of an extra length—great guns that would have bent the wrists of most men, although they were mere toys to him.
“Well, boys, you’re going to have your chance, and that’s why I called Bristol from them rocks, where we could’ve snagged him dead easy, and no trouble to anybody. You’re going to fight him, the pair of you. Understand?”
They blinked at him. There was no answer. Then they stared at one another, but still without comprehending. But the first grim flash of understanding came to Jimmy Bristol as he listened.
“Those two down there,” said Dirk van Wey, “which of ’em is to live? Speak up, Bristol. One of ’em has to die, and one of ’em can live. I promised, and my promises go. I promised you the money and the hoss, didn’t I? And you got ’em. I didn’t say nothing, though, about taking ’em back ag’in.” His mirthless grin stretched his mouth once more. He added: “Speak up. Which man is it to be … the sheriff or old Joe Graney?”
“Graney,” said Bristol slowly. “I suppose it has to be Graney.”
“Good,” answered van Wey. “I’d kind of miss him if I didn’t have him around to cuff now and ag’in. He’s used to it, and I’m used to it. It’s fine to have him on the old ranch.” Then he turned to his two men. “Danny … and you, Harry … here’s your chance. I got the idea when I come back and found him gone with my hoss and the money. Kind of a funny thing, Jimmy. I waited till I thought you’d never begin to bust loose, or the boys would never go after your hide. And then I took a walk, and while I was a ways off, doggone me, but I hear the guns and start back on the run. But I was too late. I only come up in time to hear Lefty Parr yelling and Harry and Dan Miller cussing a little. And so I says to myself right then and there that it’s a pity I’ve missed watching such a good fight. I missed watching you open up them soft-shelled, fresh-water clams. And I says to myself that I’m going to take the first chance and put you together with ’em. Miller!”
Miller started. “Yeah, chief?” he said very mildly.
“You’re pretty good with a rifle, ain’t you?”
“I’ve handled a rifle now and then.”
“You’ve kept us in venison, anyways. And now you’re going to have a chance to shoot something better’n deer. Him!” He pointed toward Jimmy Bristol.
“Bristol,” he added, “are you any good with a rifle?”
“I’m fair.”
“Was it you that took the flying shot at me from the rocks?”
“Yes.”
“You’re good, then. It was an inch from my nose. Why didn’t you shoot ag’in?”
“The rifle jammed.”
“That’s a better reason than no reason at all. Harry, give Jimmy your rifle.”
Silently Harry extended the gun.
And then van Wey went on: “You two can have it out with rifles first of all. Then we’ll see. Stand up there, back to back.”
So they stood together, Dan Miller and Bristol, in the center of the little, moonlit plateau. Each had a Winchester rifle held in both hands, diagonally across the body.
“When I give the word,” said Dirk van Wey, “you’re going to start marching. I’m going to count to ten, and each of you is going to take a step every time I count. And if one of you tries to take them ten steps faster than I count, and if one of you tries to turn and start shooting before I reach the end of the count, I’m going to put a slug through the head of that fool. Y’understand?”
“I understand,” said Jimmy Bristol.
“I understand,” said the iron voice of Dan Miller. “Harry, I know this game. Put a bet down on me with the chief.”
“I’ll bet you a hundred,” said Dirk.
“I wouldn’t bet on the little runt,” said Harry Weston, “except that he’s too doggone small to be hit very easy. I’ll bet a hundred with you.”
“That’s a go,” answered Dirk. He began to laugh a little as he stood there, enormous, with his great shadow spilled behind him and the wind furling the brim of his hat, so that the moonlight could get at his ugly face.
“Look at the fun I show you, Harry,” said Dirk van Wey. “Look at the game I show you. And maybe better stuff than this is going to come afterward. I’ve got my hundred on you, Jimmy Bristol. Mind you, Dan Miller is sure a poison rat. You gotta move fast and shoot straight when I count to ten. Start in. One … two … three … four … five …”
It came to Jimmy Bristol, as he paced those grim steps through the moonlight, with his shadow sloping before him, that a rifle is not, after all, so very much heavier than a revolver. If it had been revolver play, he would hardly have feared for the outcome. He knew exactly what he would do. And if the rifle were longer and heavier, there was the stock that would fit under the forearm.
Suddenly he gripped the weapon in his right hand, alone, with his forefinger on the trigger and the stock extending up under the powerful cushion of his forearm.
“Ten!” shouted the thunderous voice of Dirk van Wey.
Jimmy Bristol whirled, leaping far to the side as he turned and swinging the rifle up like a revolver in his right hand.
Without aim, shooting only by the marksman’s sense that he had learned in the handling of a revolver, he took a snap shot at the body of Dan Miller.
The speed of that firing quite eclipsed Miller’s return shot. As it was, the sharp-faced little man merely pulled his trigger to fire a blind shot and then spun half around and dropped to one knee, groaning and cursing.
“Finish him!” yelled Harry Weston. “The dirty cur … he’s double-crossed me and beat me out of a hundred bucks when I’m broke. Finish him, Bristol. Kill him like the dog he is.”
“Go on!” shouted Dirk van Wey savagely. “Kill him like a pig, Bristol!”
With his two revolvers, he dominated the scene.
“No,” said Jimmy Bristol. “He got that through the shoulder joint, I think … and that means he’s never going to pull another gun in a fight as long as he walks.”
Dirk van Wey shouted with glee. “That’s better’n killing him! That means that every Chinaman can kick him in the face. I’m done with you, Miller. You can go rot, for all of me. Now I see what my men have been like. They’re glass, is what they are. They’re all glass. Nothing but glass.” He cursed loudly and then cried: “Now it’s your turn, Weston! Stand up and show us what you can do!”
XIII
Harry Weston was not dismayed. He merely smiled and threw back his head until the moon glimmered over his handsome face. He shied his sombrero to the ground.
“I want him!” cried Harry Weston. “Make it knives, chief!”
“Knives!” cried Dirk van Wey. “Why, you got a brain, after all. I ain’t seen a knife fight since I was last in Mexico. This is going to be a show. Here, Jimmy. Here’s a knife. This Weston is a hot trick with a knife. Yo
u wanna watch yourself.”
“I’m going to carve him down to my size, and then cut him in two,” said Weston, drawing a Bowie knife.
A knife of exactly the same pattern was tossed into the air and landed at the feet of Bristol. He picked it up.
“Down guns!” shouted van Wey. “Shell out, boys … on the ground with ’em!”
They laid their Colts on the ground.
“Now at it, wildcats! Yow!”
Harry Weston answered that yell with another. He hopped up a little, as though to test the limber speed of his legs. Then he came racing in, swerving a little from side to side, like a snipe flying down the wind. Bristol stood straight as a ramrod, so straight and still that Dirk van Wey yelled: “Watch out, Bristol! He’ll cut your heart out!”
Only at the last instant Bristol sprang sidewise, bending his body to avoid the thrust and slashing for the throat. He missed in his turn. They swept in a circle around one another, crouching. Weston leaped in, stabbing and slashing, yelling like a fiend. Bristol gave ground again. He stabbed at the body with the knife in his right hand, but in midair he tossed the knife into his left hand and slashed for the face.
He felt the grit of the keen blade against the bone, and Harry Weston reeled back with a scream. The handsomeness of that face was ruined forever. A dark tide of blood flowed down over it from the forehead.
Dirk van Wey yelled with laughter. “A two-handed man! A two-handed man!” he shouted. “Get out of my sight, the pair of you sick rats. Miller … Weston … move on! I’m through with you. I’ve found a man!”
They got on their horses, the two of them, and rode off. The hands of Weston were covering his face as Bristol saw him last. And Miller, bent low in the saddle, gripping his wounded shoulder, was leading the way. So they dropped below the shoulder of the hill and out of sight.
“I’ve found a man,” went on the booming voice of Dirk van Wey. “And a two-handed-man! Boy, I want you, and I’m going to have you. You and me do business together. You and me go halves. That’s what I think of you! Halves!”
“Or else what?” asked Bristol.
“Or else,” said the giant, “you drop that knife, and we have it out with bare hands.” His laugh once more was thunder as he said it. For what hands could match his?
But it seemed to Bristol that he saw, in that instant, the calm face of Joe Graney as he had sat among the rocks, puffing at his pipe and waiting for death, resigned utterly. And he saw the girl throwing out her hand as she cried: “If we never meet again …” Well, if he joined Dirk, they would never meet again. He would never dare to stand before her. He hurled the knife from him as far as he could fling it. “Come on, van Wey!” he called.
Dirk van Wey nodded.
“Maybe it’s better this way,” he said. “Maybe I was a fool to think of anything else. Maybe it’s better to have the feel of you in my hands. I’m going to break you, kid. I’m going to tear you and twist you in two … slow and easy.”
He thrust his two revolvers into their holsters along his thighs as he strode in.
To flee was impossible. Those guns would be out and spitting death if Bristol ran. In a frenzy he leaped straight at van Wey, all his might going into the drive of his right arm. Fair and truly, he smote the corner of Dirk van Wey’s chin. It was like striking a rock. There seemed no give in the head of the giant, but a sharp agony shot up the arm of Bristol, and he knew that he had broken the bones across the back of his hand. With the right he could not strike again in that battle.
He danced back, and Dirk van Wey followed, shouting, his face insane with the battle lust. His hat was off. His long, greasy hair flew back in the wind of his own running. He did not try to strike, but only to grasp with his hands, and once they secured their grip, the battle was ended, as Bristol well knew.
“Stand up to me, damn you, or I’ll salt you first and tear you up afterward!” shouted Dirk van Wey. And one of his hands dropped for an instant toward a holster gun to emphasize the point of the threat.
That instant was used by Bristol to leap straight in and drive his left to the face. It found not the jaw, but the cheekbone, and split the flesh. The shock of the stroke merely turned the arm numb.
The great hand of the giant found a hold on the arm with which Bristol had struck. The fingers of van Wey seemed to find the bone through the flesh. Only by hurling himself wildly away could Bristol gain freedom, and the empty sleeve remained in the hands of van Wey.
He threw the rag from him and rushed on, bellowing. He was drunk with the fighting now. Fists were useless against that head of iron and that body of well-ribbed India rubber. Bristol flung his whole body at the knees of the giant.
Van Wey went down under the impact, his head hitting the ground with terrific force. For the first time Bristol was on top. At last the balance had tipped in his favor.
Desperately the giant clawed at the revolver whose butt appeared above the edge of the leather holster that was strapped to his thigh. But Bristol knocked aside his hand and grabbed the butt of van Wey’s six-gun.
Dirk van Wey felt the drawing of the revolver and yelled with rage and fear. With a swing of his great shoulders, he flung Bristol from him, and as Bristol struck heavily and rolled, he saw van Wey stride after him, his other gun in hand, shooting as he came.
The stolen revolver was in the broken right hand of Bristol, but he could not waste time in shifting it to his left. The moon blazed against his eyes, but he could not even turn on his side to get a better light. He had to fire half blindly at the vast silhouette, and he knew, as he pulled the trigger, that he had fired lower than the body of the outlaw.
Yet van Wey, striding forward, at his next step crumbled suddenly and lay face downward on the rock.
It was as though a miraculous hand from the sky had struck him down. There was no sense of triumph in Bristol as he leaped to his feet and leveled his gun on the mark. There was only a profound sense of gratitude to—he knew not what. Fate, he might call it, or the great god of chance.
The giant propped himself up on both arms. He was quite calm. He seemed almost contented and happy as he boomed out: “Well, kid, you snagged me. I guess you busted the bone of the leg. Poison in both hands, eh? Oh, you’re the real two-handed man.”
And to the bewilderment of Bristol, Dirk van Wey began to laugh. It was as though the beast of him had been so contented by the battle that he cared not for his own defeat, his pain, or the death at the hands of the law that might now loom before him.
* * * * *
They put the wounded sheriff on a litter when the men from the town reached the place, with the girl on Pringle, showing them the way in the gray of the morning.
They made another horse litter, on which they heaved the bulk of Dirk van Wey.
Then they stood in consultation.
“This here is a wanted man,” said the deputy sheriff to Tom Denton, pointing toward Jimmy Bristol. “They want him pretty bad, too, down there in Tombstone.”
“They don’t want him so bad, brother. They don’t want him so bad,” drawled the sheriff. “It was a card game, by what I’ve last heard. And down there in Tombstone they’ve likely found out a good deal about the kind of hombres that were playing against Bristol in that game. Murder was what Bristol was sitting with in that game.”
“Five thousand dollars!” groaned the deputy. “Five thousand whole dollars locked up in that hide, and we gotta let it go?”
“We can keep that hide in jail,” said the sheriff, “till he’s wanted for trial, or out on bail. And when the gents in Tombstone hear what Bristol has done in this part of the world, they’re going to hand him his freedom on a silver platter.”
The other men grinned, and the rising sun gilded their lean, brown faces. The girl, who had brought all this power of the law to the place, drew closer to Bristol, watching him with the grave happiness of possession in her eyes.
“Come here, kid!” roared Dirk van Wey. “Come here, Jimmy.”
Bristol stepped to the litter and looked down into the brutal mirth of that grinning face.
“What tickles me,” said Dirk van Wey, “is that you done it with my own gun. I’m going to be laughing at that when the rope strangles me. Swipes my gun offen me and drops me with my own gat.”
“You went for the Colt first,” Bristol reminded him.
“Oh, yeah, yeah,” said Dirk van Wey. “But why bring up the little things? It was a good fight, was what it was. So long, kid. See you in hell, if not sooner.”
The horses that supported the litter of van Wey started on.
“Who’s going to guard Bristol?” asked the efficient deputy sheriff.
The sheriff bellowed at the deputy: “Why, you fool, he doesn’t need guarding, does he? D’you think he’s going to try to run away from all the glory that newspapers and the whole West can give him? D’you think that he’s half-wit enough to run away like that when a week in jail will make him free forever? But hold on … wait a minute. I’ll give him a guard, at that. I’ll give him a guard that looks as though she’ll keep him in hand the rest of his days. Miss Graney, will you take hold of Jimmy Bristol and deliver him safe and sound at the jail?”
She laughed at the sheriff joyously and without shame. She and Bristol were already on their horses when Joe Graney shouted: “Wait a minute! I’ll come along with you brats, so’s you don’t miss the way!”
They did not pause, but let their horses go on at the softest of dogtrots. Now and then, of a mutual impulse, the girl and Bristol would look at one another, but as a rule they stared straight before them, as though they were alone in a great space and had before them the longest journey in the world.
The Black Muldoon
When Frederick Faust’s “The Black Muldoon” was first published in Street & Smith’s Western Story Magazine in the issue for September 30, 1922, it was under the byline Peter Dawson. It is probable that Frank Blackwell, who edited the magazine, provided the Peter Dawson byline for Faust, and it was the only time in all of his publishing career that a Faust story ever appeared under this pseudonym, the name of a popular brand of Scotch whisky. Some fourteen years later, Jonathan H. Glidden was given the same pen- name by his agent, which he used throughout his career. “The Black Muldoon,” under whatever byline, remains a gripping narrative in which Faust explored the urgent question of what ultimately takes precedence in a person’s life: nurture, genetics, psychology, character, temperament, or fate.