by Ralph Cotton
“What the hell is stopping you, boy?” Glick asked, impatiently. “Cut it off! He told you he can’t feel nothing anyhow.”
“Here, Mr. Glick,” said Stanley, “you do it. I just can’t.”
Glick looked at Stanley, then at Shala, and said quietly, slinging thick blood from his knife hand, “All right, I’ll do it. But by thunder, if I have to do all the work, I’ll be keeping all the reward, my half and your half too.” He shook his head. “How will you ever square up accounts with me, if I’m the one keeps earning all the money?”
“I can’t . . . feel nothing!” Boland said in a louder, stronger voice, blood spewing from his lips.
“No, Mr. Glick!” said Shala as the old man took a step toward the gunman on the ground.
Glick stopped and stared at her.
“Stanley, you’ve got to do it,” Shala said. “Do it now!”
Stanley gritted his teeth and closed his hand tight around the knife handle. He reached down and grabbed a handful of Boland’s damp, sweaty hair.
Chapter 11
As soon as the three had finished their gruesome handiwork they’d moved farther away, leading their horses and mule in a meandering maze of trees, rocks and brush. Dark blood dripped steadily from a burlap bag hanging down the mule’s side. Seeing the grim, tight expression on Stanley Lowden’s face, Glick chuckled to himself, reached out a hand and patted one of the two coconut-sized lumps in the soggy, blood-soaked bag.
“There now, that wasn’t so bad, was it?” he said to Stanley. “There’s some fools think if you cut a man’s head off, his brains’ll run down his neck like sorghum molasses. Of course you’ll always know better after today, eh, boy?” With the same hand he reached over and slapped Stanley on his broad back.
It was too much for the young man. He veered away and stopped, feet spread, and bowed forward into a long gag, leaving a puddle of steaming sickness on the ground between his boots. Shala turned and started over to him, but Stanley waved her away with a shaky hand.
“Leave him be, young lady,” Glick said. “Some have a stomach for what has to be done; some don’t.” He gave Shala a look meant to assure her that he was a man who could stomach anything. After making his point, Glick eyed her up and down, in a way that made her feel as if her clothes had been stripped away and fallen to the ground beside her.
“Stanley, keep quiet,” she said in a lowered voice, resisting an urge to cross her arms against Glick’s lusty stare. Instead of shying away from his eyes, she jutted her large breasts just enough to let him know she didn’t mind him looking. In fact, make him think you enjoy it, she told herself. She gave Glick a trace of a coy smile. Glick felt a hot rush shoot up his spine.
“I—I will,” Stanley rasped, straightening a bit and wiping a hand across his lips. “Jesus,” he whispered to himself, still suffering from the sound and sight of sliced human tendons, muscle and flesh. He saw Boland’s wide-open eyes staring up at him above a bloody foam as life slipped away with each push and pull of the blade. Another bolt of sickness reared in his stomach, but he suppressed it, shook his head and took a deep breath.
“No wonder you two couldn’t make a living at game hunting,” Glick put in, seeing what he thought to be a look of disappointment in Shala’s eyes as she turned her smile away from him and stared at her husband.
“There’s a . . . big difference,” Stanley managed to say, collecting himself.
“We had a run of bad luck,” Shala added in their defense. “We’ll do all right as soon as we get back on our feet.”
“Well, I’d say your days of hunting elk and buff for their hides and for restaurant blue plates are over,” Glick said. He gestured toward the three heads in the dripping bag. “Your part in this will come near taking care of me, paying me off.” He paused for a moment, looking back in the direction they’d traveled, and tacked on, “Not to mention we’ll more than likely pick up another or two here shortly. You could have a nice purse coming your way.”
“Oh no,” Stanley said, his voice going weak again at the thought of more bloodshed.
But Shala caught what the old assassin had said, and she came back right away, saying, “Wait a minute. You said our part will come near taking care of you? We owe you only eight dollars for our livery fees.”
“Well, true, you started out owing me only eight dollars,” said Glick, growing less liberal with his money now that the pair had some cash coming their way. “But what about all the staples I’ve provided on the trail? There’s food, coffee—”
“All right, I get it,” said Shala, seeing what he was up to. “What’s it going to take to take care of you, Mr. Glick?” As she spoke she cut a glance toward Stanley. Seeing him stare off and rub his watery eyes on his sleeve, she reached up as if toying with the idea of unbuttoning the bib of her woolsey shirt. “Whatever it is, I think I can pay it, with interest.” She spoke just low enough to exclude Stanley from hearing her.
Glick felt another hot surge run up his spine. He swallowed a knot in his throat, and tried to slow things down a bit, lest she throw off her clothes and mount him there in the dirt. “We’ll have to wait and see after we grab a couple more of these hard cases,” Glick said, dodging her question. “But we’ll be getting down to settling up soon enough, you can count on that.”
“I hope so, Mr. Glick,” Shala said, putting a little underlying heat in her words, in the same secretive voice. “Believe me, I do want you taken care of. Me too, for that matter.” She paused with another look toward the unhearing Stanley and added, “Maybe tonight?”
Oh, yeah, Glick thought, too stricken to respond. She was ready for him. He’d shown her what a real man was all about. His age didn’t mean anything. She needed a man like him. All he had to do now was speed things up a little. Stanley was no problem, not even worth considering. All it had taken was time and patience. Glick grinned. Shala Lowden was all his now—this warm, big-legged woman, luscious, ripe and eager for the picking—all he had to do was harvest her, he told himself. Oh, man! He was certainly ready to do that.
“Stanley,” he called out in a hushed voice, “when you’re through wiping your eyes and your mouth and everything you’ve lost control of, we need to get moving.” As he walked over to Stanley, he gave Shala a wink as if the two of them now shared a secret.
“I mean it, Mr. Glick. I can’t handle this, money or no money,” Stanley pleaded. “I’m not cut out for this kind of killing.”
“Of course you’re not cut out for it, lad,” Glick said sympathetically, once again patting Stanley on his broad back. “Few of us are.” He guided the young man toward his horse as he said, “This time won’t be like before. Now that I see you’re shy about lopping a head off, I’ll handle all that. You just help me set the trap, get it ready, line it up and all.”
“All right,” said Stanley. “I’ll help out every way I can . . . except not what I did before.”
Squeamish, Glick thought with a smile. The foolish boy couldn’t even put into words what he’d done, cutting off a man’s head. “That’s a good lad, Stanley boy,” Glick said. “You just do some of the lifting. I’ll do any cutting needs to be done.”
“Thank you, Mr. Glick,” Stanley said weakly.
The Dutchman turned to Shala, but said to both of them, “This time, we work a little different. Those peckerwoods are most likely scouring the trail by now.” He pointed at Shala. “I want you to ride five miles back. When you come upon a game trail leading up into the rocks, ride it up and pitch us a camp there. Nobody can see it, nobody will look. Sweep your tracks off the trail if you have to.”
“I’ve got it,” Shala said. She stepped up into her saddle, eager to get things going, looking forward to making some money and getting away from the smelly old assassin for good. Sure, she could play up to him this way, keep him at bay as long as she chose to, but she didn’t like it. She would even actually sleep with the rotted old ghoul if it came down to that, and anything else that would settle things between them.
After all, she reminded herself, she’d been prepared to spread her legs for three strangers in order to save her husband’s life. She grimaced a bit thinking about it.
“Stay there and wait for us,” Glick said, pointing a pale finger at her. “Don’t make us come hunting for you. These rocky hills could be crawling with outlaws any minute.”
“I said, I’ve got it,” Shala repeated in a stronger tone, giving her husband a glance before turning her horse with the pack mule and the bloody head bag in tow.
“Wait a minute,” Glick said, stopping her. “On second thought, maybe I’d better just hang on to this bag for a while.” He stepped forward and took the bag of heads from her saddle horn.
“Are you afraid I’ll take off with them?” Shala asked, veiling the disgust she felt for him.
But instead of answering her, Glick stepped back and gave her horse a light slap on its rump. Before Shala was out of sight, Glick looked at Stanley and saw him holding a hand to his stomach, staving off another round of nausea at the sight of the bloody head bag. Giving Stanley a shove toward the horses, Glick said, “We’re going to have to toughen you up, boy, else you’re not going to last in this man-hunting game.”
“I told you, Mr. Glick, I’m not cut out for this business. As soon as we’re finished here, Shala and I are gone.”
“We’ll see,” said Glick, looking the large, strong young man over. They stepped over to their horses, picked up their reins and led the horses up a steep path, back toward the trail. “Maybe you’ll change your mind before we’re finished. Leaving too fast is something a man can come to regret if he’s not careful.”
“I don’t know what that means,” said Stanley, “but I’m no man hunter. There’s nothing either of us can do to change that.”
“Than I’m truly sorry to hear it,” said Glick, walking on behind him. “But I’ll ask again later, just to make sure.”
Angelo Sabott listened to Al Heakland, the two of them sitting at the head of the men alongside the trail. “We need to send somebody, boss, just to see what happened to them. For all we know there could be a big posse gathered back there, ready to take us all down this way, one, two, three of us at a time.”
“If we’re going to hit the mining depository when the safe is full, we need to keep moving,” said Sabott. “Bobby Zackarow and his boys will be waiting on us. Besides, I’ve got a little stop I want to make on the way. It should make us a good chunk of money.”
“But this makes four good gunmen we’ve lost this trip,” said Heakland. “We’re going to be running shorthanded if we ain’t careful.”
“I realize how many men we’ve lost, Heak,” said Sabott. He also realized that the fewer men he had, the greater his share of the money would be. He’d given it some thought. So long as he had enough men to keep him covered while he got out of town, he wasn’t too concerned about being shorthanded.
“Boss, I think we need to check and see what the hell happened. Did they fall off the trail? Did they get cold feet and abandon us? What?” Heakland shrugged in bewilderment.
“Men like McQuin and Boland don’t get cold feet,” said Sabott. “If you want to ride back, go ahead. But don’t take nobody with you. Like you said, we’ll be shorthanded if we ain’t careful.” He gave Heakland a smug grin, knowing that was no doubt the last he would hear on the matter.
“I just thought we ought to,” Heakland offered. Then he sat in silence.
“That was most considerate of you, Heak,” Sabott said in a polite tone. “Now, either ride back there or shut the hell up about it.”
After a few minutes when Sabott knew nothing else was going to be said about the two missing men, he raised a gloved hand and gestured the riders back onto the trail. As they rode away at a walk, across a canyon filled with meandering trails and tall-standing pine and scrub cedar, Glick motioned for Stanley to move back out of sight toward the horses. A moment later, Glick walked to him, wearing a smile, and said, “Just like I figured, they’ll be circling through here in an hour or sooner. We best get busy cutting and bending.”
“Show me what to do, I’ll get it done,” Stanley said, holding a large coil of rope over his shoulder, a small hatchet in his hand.
“That’s the spirit, Stanley boy,” said Glick stepping over and looking down a steep hillside that stood above the winding, high trail. Among the tall, slender young pines standing on the hillside, Glick pointed out one and said, “There’s the tree we need, right there.” He looked at Stanley and said, “How’s your climbing legs?”
“Fit as ever, I expect, why?” said Stanley, looking down at his legs as if inspecting them.
“I need you to shinny up that pine to the very top and tie the rope on to it good and tight,” Glick said.
“Way up there?” Stanley looked up at the swaying treetop, more than seventy feet in the air.
“Yeah,” Glick said. “You’re not afraid of heights too, are you?”
“No, I’m not,” said Stanley, a bit embarrassed. “What are you going to do?”
Glick started to get impatient, but he stopped himself, took a deep breath and said, “You’re going to tie off the top of the tree. I’m going to walk our horses up the hillside to where they can bend it over as far as it’ll go. Then we’re going to stake it off to the ground good and proper. Do you follow me?”
“Yeah, I understand,” said Stanley. “Then what?”
Glick stared at him. “We’re going to reach another rope up the hillside and tie it off around a good heavy boulder—make it like a slingshot, so to speak. When Sabott’s men come snooping down along the trail, we’re going to cut the pine loose and let it hurl that rock down atop them.”
Stanley looked at him, bemused, then asked, “Will that really work?”
“Ask the French,” said Glick. “The Gauls were doing something similar hundreds of years ago. They hurled big rocks against castle walls until they battered them to the ground.”
“No fooling?” Stanley looked impressed.
Glick gave him a stare. “Yeah, Stanley boy, no fooling.”
“All right, here I go,” said Stanley. He handed Glick the hatchet, climbed up and stood atop his horse to get a handhold on the lower pine branches. With few limbs on the barren young tree, he would shinny a few feet, then climb hand over hand, from one limb stub to the next until he stood swaying at the thin, limber treetop.
“That a boy, Stanley, now double the rope, tie it off good and tight and throw it down to me,” Glick called up to him, trying to keep his voice lowered.
When Stanley had the rope doubled and tied around the tree no more than four feet from its tip, he dropped the loose rope ends to Glick and started back down. “No,” said Glick in a hushed tone, “stay there until you can line us up on a good large rock.”
“All right,” said Stanley. He rested, clinging against the treetop with his feet on the last short stub of a limb.
“That a boy, Stanley,” Glick said, “I won’t take long. Hang on tight while I pull it over to the hillside.”
“Don’t worry, I will,” said Stanley.
Glick led the horses up the steep hillside, the doubled rope in hand, until he reached another pine standing parallel to the one housing Stanley in its swaying top. Wrapping the doubled rope around the second pine, Glick tied it off to both horses and nudged them forward, drawing the treetop, Stanley and all over toward the hillside. “Whoa, boy,” Stanley said quietly as he saw himself being drawn over closer to where Glick led the horses.
“Don’t fool around there, Stanley. This is not a game we’re playing,” Glick cautioned him.
“I know,” said Stanley. “It just seems so strange. I started out way out there. Now I’m all the way over here, no more then ten feet from the ground.”
“Keep a serious air about you, lad,” Glick cautioned him again. He stopped the horses when the limberness at the uppermost treetop curved over toward the hillside in an almost half circle.
“I’m serious, Mr. Glick,”
said Stanley. “Are you going to stake it off, so I can come down?”
“That’s the idea,” said Glick, stopping the horses and keeping them standing in a train while he hurried back to the tree trunk.
“Better hurry, Mr. Glick,” said Stanley, “I don’t think the horses will stand there long before they—”
Stanley didn’t get to finish his words. At the tree, Glick had picked up the hatchet. With one hard, two-handed swing he severed the taut doubled rope against the thick trunk. With a snap and a loud whooshing sound the pine sprang forward with the hurling impact of a cannon blast.
Glick grinned, watching the young man sail outward in a high arc, his arms and legs flailing in thin air. A long scream resounded, fading as he sailed farther away, over another hillside across the deep canyon. “And he’s off,” Glick said, as if calling a horse race. Dusting his pale hands together, he said, “I always wondered how that would work. Now I know.”
Chapter 12
Inside the shade of pines at the bottom of the canyon, Sam, Memphis Beck, Hector and the wounded outlaw Hook-nose Cleaver had been sitting on the ground, finishing their coffee, when they heard a sound in the treetops on the steep hillside above them. The sound came crashing, tumbling and breaking its way down through the high branches. The three men looked upward just in time to see Stanley Lowden come falling the last few yards and land with a thud only inches from the campfire.
“Sweet Jenny’s ass!” shouted Hook-nose Cleaver, discarding his tin coffee cup and jumping up and away quickly. “What in God’s name?”
The other three came to their feet, their hands instinctively grasping their gun butts. Yet, upon seeing the condition of the man, thinking him dead, they let their hands fall away and stood staring in disbelief. “It’s the Lowden fellow I told you about, Stanley Lowden,” Sam said, as bewildered as the other three. He stepped forward, stooped down and checked the battered man’s pulse.
“He’s got a peculiar way to come calling,” Cleaver said, glancing up as pieces of broken branches and bits of green needles showered down around them. “Dropping in on folks this way.”