by John Benteen
Ten minutes, fifteen, passed. Sundance stood there beside the fire, von Markau’s pistol in his back. Once the Baron said, in a trembling voice, “Jim, you must understand—”
Sundance did not answer. There was nothing to say. It was bitched, all bitched, and fifteen good men were dead, thanks to von Markau’s patriotic fervor and stupidity. If the Apaches had been sober, no one would have got within rifle shot of them without the alarm being given. He only stood there, stoically, as the outer darkness came alive with the sound of many men approaching.
Gannon’s gang came into the firelight. The red-bearded man himself was first to appear, a rifle leveled. His handsome face had wholly recovered from the effects of Sundance’s beating. His teeth gleamed white in his ginger beard as he trained the gun on Sundance. “All right, Dutchy. We take over now. You can throw that pistol away.”
Von Markau made a sobbing sound. Then he threw the Smith and Wesson into the darkness. At that instant, the rest of them were there with drawn guns, surrounding them. Sundance saw the man called Jessup, Gannon’s black-mustached major-domo. At first he thought Jessup wrestled ahead of him a Mexican boy, arm held in a hammerlock. Then he tensed. That was no boy: it was Herta von Markau, eyes wide, face pale, hair falling from beneath her sombrero, breasts heaving under her tight shirt.
When he saw her, the Baron gave a wordless cry, took a step forward. Gannon swung the gun. “Stand hitched, Dutchy.”
Under the threat, von Markau froze. He and the woman looked at one another. “Herta,” he whispered, “how—”
She turned her face away.
Gannon moved forward, still grinning.
“That’s a right hot little piece you got there, Dutchy!” He jerked up the gun as the Baron rocked forward. “She didn’t hang around the fort long after you and Sundance took off. No, sir, she went into Tucson, where the action is.”
“Herta,” von Markau groaned, voice despairing. “You—”
She shook her head, staring at the ground. “Walther, I am sorry. I did not mean—”
“You betrayed me,” he whispered.
Gannon laughed again. “You’re damned well right she did. Come into town a-prowling. I spotted her right off. I mean, I can recognize a slut like her from a mile away, and I moved in. I’m a good sweet-talker, von Markau, and she was kind of all stirred up by what she called a ‘real frontiersman’. On top of which, I’m ten years younger than you. You’re a little long in the tooth for a kid like this, ain’t been keepin’ her happy, seems like—”
“He lies,” Herta von Markau whimpered. “It was only ... I was lonely.”
“Lonely,” the Baron said, and the contempt in the single word was like a blow.
“Oh, she was lonesome all right. Lonesome enough to bed down and git drunk with me. She don’t hold her likker well, Dutchy. She talks a lot. Told me about a treasure, even had a map—”
“I gave her a duplicate,” von Markau said dully, “in case something happened to me—”
“Shore. When I got my hands on it, me and my boys took off right away, brought her with us. Figured she might come in handy for bargainin’ in case things got tight. Besides, she keeps the blankets warm at night.” Gannon chuckled. “We trailed pretty far behind, but we made it up fast. Saw a damn fire, heard all sorts of drummin’ and singin’, knew it must be you and Sundance and them Apaches we cut sign of. But we shore never expected to find ’em all sittin’ ducks for us. When we finally come up, we saw ’em finishin’ off the bottles. Figured it would be dead easy, and it was.”
His mocking grin vanished. “Tie ’em up!” he snapped. “Hands behind their backs. And some of you check them Injuns. Put a bullet through every head, whether they look dead or not; we’ll take no chances.” And he swung his gun toward von Markau once again. “Where’s the jools?”
As men moved behind Sundance, jerked his hands back, wrapped thongs around them, the Baron’s glance went to the leather bag.
“Ahhh,” Red Gannon said, lust thick in his voice. He knelt beside it, gun still on the Austrian, opened the straps. Then he stood up, seized the bag, shook out its contents. A moan went up from the gunmen around the fire. Gannon crowed: “I told you boys, you stick with me, you’d strike it rich! Feast your eyes on that, but keep your damn hands off it. Nobody touches it until we fence it to a guy I know in Frisco!”
Sundance was tightly bound. Men whipped thongs around von Markau’s wrists. The Baron looked at his wife, and his voice trembled. “Herta, how could you do this to me?”
She only stared down at her boot toes, unable to meet his gaze. “All I can say,” she breathed, “is forgive me. If you can, forgive me. I can never forgive myself.” She shuddered. “I thought ... It was so lonely at the fort. An innocent affair. Like in Vienna.”
“Tucson is not Vienna,” von Markau said.
Gannon giggled. “Shore as hell ain’t.”
The Baron turned on him. Suddenly the Austrian’s face was scarlet. “And you, you swine!” He flung himself, bound, at Gannon.
Gannon’s rifle barrel came up, as the red-bearded man nimbly stepped aside. It made a sodden sound on von Markau’s skull. The Austrian pitched forward, lay unconscious beside the fire. Gannon looked down at him. “Well, ain’t he rambunctious? I got plans for Sundance, but on second thought, I don’t see no reason to bother with a Goddamn Dutchman. Hell, might as well cut his throat right now.” And he drew his Bowie from his boot. Sundance lurched forward. “Gannon!” Gannon hit him between the eyes. Sundance, stunned, fell backward. “Shut up,” Gannon rasped, “or you git the same medicine.” Then he rolled von Markau over, knelt beside him. The knife blade flashed in firelight.
Herta screamed, over and over, until Jessup hit her and knocked her out.
Chapter Seven
The buzzards were black dots in the sky’s stainless blue. Sundance saw them circling high above the canyon.
His head felt as if it were splitting. That had been a bad move, a foolish one, he thought, but the act had been instinctive. As Gannon had cut von Markau’s throat, he had thrown himself at the man. And Jessup had slammed him with a rifle butt, and the world had vanished in a burst of light.
He tried to move. Could not. Slowly, painfully, lifted his head. Then saw that he was spread-eagled, wrists lashed to pegs driven deep in the canyon floor, ankles tied in the same way. And he was naked, stripped of every garment.
He closed his eyes, let the pain subside, opened them again. Then he was looking into the grinning face of Gannon. The man crouched above him, von Markau’s Smith and Wesson in his hand.
“Well, good mornin’, Sundance,” he said. “Don’t you look purty all laid out like that?”
His sardonic grin vanished. “You think I forgot that beatin’ you handed me at Duppa’s? Gannon forgets nothin’. I coulda cut your throat last night, too, but that woulda been so easy. And easy ain’t the way I want you to die.”
He stood erect. “So I got you fixed good, now. Lots of bodies around to draw the vultures. You and her, Sundance. Because I’m through with her now, too, and so are all the boys. She might as well go the way you do, after what she called me last night. See?” He gestured. Sundance rolled his head.
Like himself, the woman was spread-eagled naked on the canyon floor, not five feet away. She lay with her head turned, eyes closed, and she was crying silently.
“Slow,” Gannon said. “That’s the word, Sundance. Slow. And hard, goddam hard.” He jerked a thumb upward. “The zopilotes, the buzzards. There are sixteen bodies here, Sundance, good buzzard bait. Bring every vulture in the territory. It won’t take long for them to eat the bones clean. You understand? First, the dead men. Then you and her.”
He grinned down at Sundance. “You ever seen buzzards pick a carcass? They come down in flocks, rip, tear at it, fight each other over it. The coyotes come in, too, and fight with ’em. It don’t take long to pick a body clean. And the thing about it is, halfbreed, the body don’t even have to be dead. Jest so long
as it don’t move, that’s all.”
He spun the cylinder of the Smith and Wesson. “A damned good gun.” Then he holstered it. “A fortune in jools, a fine pistol; a profitable trip. Not to mention the fun I had with her.” Then he said, “They go for the soft parts first, Sundance. Your eyes, your lips, down there ... rip them out with their beaks. It will take you a long time to die. Both of you. But, what the hell. I’ve seen Apaches stake out white men like that. And you ain’t even white.”
He waited for Sundance to say something. When there was no answer, he went on. “Well, I’ll drink to your bones in San Francisco with the money from the jools. We ride out of here the way we came in. Fast and hard, and God help anybody that tries to stop us. Incidentally, that appaloosie stallion of yours . . . the sonofabitch charged me last night; I shot him. Mean bastard. I didn’t kill him, but I’m purty shore I broke his leg. He’ll die slow out here, same as you . . .” He turned away. “Jessup!” he yelled. “Everything ready to move out?”
“All ready, boss.”
“Then mount up.” Gannon stood spraddle-legged over Herta von Markau. “Hey, Dutch woman.”
She did not answer, but Sundance could hear the rasp of her breathing.
“All right,” Gannon said. “Good-bye, then.” And he kicked her, hard. She made a muffled sound, still did not speak.
Sundance rolled his head, saw Gannon and his men mount up. He saw the leather bag tied behind Gannon’s saddle. Gannon reined his horse around, tipped his hat sardonically. “Hasta la vista,” he said. Then, with big Chihuahua rowels, he spurred the animal so hard it reared. At the head of his band, he galloped out of Dead Man’s Canyon.
Sundance lay there, listening to the sound of hoofbeats fading. When they had died, he raised his head, straining his arms against the ropes that bound his wrists.
From where Gannon had staked him out, he could see the bodies scattered everywhere, already turning from red to black in the ferocious heat. He dropped back, looked straight up. The black dots were larger now, like bits of charred paper, swooping and soaring in the hot air that arose from the canyon. Ten, fifteen, more than twenty of them .. . And more appearing over the rim. A feast, he thought, a feast for vultures.
He strained against the ropes that bound his wrists, his feet. Nothing gave; Gannon’s men were experts; the stakes were driven deep, the thongs lashed and double-lashed. He wrestled, tugged, until he was exhausted. Then he gave up, sank back. Now he could see the outlines of the wings of the lower tier of birds.
“Herta,” he said.
She only groaned.
“Damn it, Herta, come alive.”
Her voice was dull. “I do not want to live. I do not deserve to live.”
“You don’t want to die, either. Not this way. Those buzzards are getting lower. Do you want them to rip out your eyes? Try your ropes. Maybe they didn’t tie you as hard?”
He could watch her from the corners of his eyes, see her naked body, already reddening from the brutal sun, writhe and curl. Then she sank back. “I cannot free myself.”
Sundance lay with eyes closed. Well, he thought, it was a bad way to die. He opened his eyes again, and the vultures were nearer now.
With a kind of fascination, he watched the birds circle and swoop down. Now that there was no sign of life below, they descended swiftly. He licked his lips, mouth dry, afflicted with a terrible thirst. He sucked in his belly, had a ferocious desire to cross his legs, protect himself. But, of course, he could not move.
“Herta, are you sure . . .” He himself wrenched against the bonds again.
He heard her struggling. “I’m sure,” she panted, moments later.
Sundance said, “All right. I guess this is it.”
She was silent for a moment. Then she said, “Sundance. I do not care what happens to me. Whatever happens, I have earned. But for Walther, I grieve. And for you. It was so different ... In Vienna, one flirts, it means nothing. I . . . was bored, went into Tucson. Yes. Yes, he was very strong and very . . . different. He . . . aroused me. I am sorry.”
Sundance said nothing. Two vultures passed over his line of sight, low enough for him to see every detail of their wing feathers, the sun glinting off of raw, red heads. Then he heard the flutter of their pinions as they landed, each on a corpse outside his range of vision. He heard other sounds, too, closed his mind to them.
There was a chance, he thought, if they were lucky, that they themselves would be dead before the vultures got to them. He knew too well how quickly the sun could kill a man motionless in its full light, with no water to replace the moisture it squeezed out of him. He said, “Herta. Stay awake. Try to stay awake. If a bird lands on you, tries to land, raise up your head and scream. Scream as loud as you can.”
“Yes,” she answered dully. “All right.”
They lay motionless for a while. More vultures flapped down. One tried to land on Sundance. He saw the outstretched talons, the ugly beak, made for ripping, the obscene head. Just as it descended, he jerked his own head up, howled with all his might. Startled, the bird slid sideways, landed, ran over to the dead men.
The scene was repeated. More vultures swirled down. Twisting his head, he saw one about to settle on Herta von Markau. He bellowed; she came out of a daze just in time. Before the talons touched her belly, she jerked up her head, screamed shrilly. The ghastly bird veered off.
But now the sky was full of them above the canyon; this was a feast the carrion-eaters rarely found. It seemed that every vulture in this part of Arizona had caught the smell of death. Instinctively, most of them made for the bloating corpses. But some went for Sundance and for Herta. The two living victims yelled until their throats were hoarse, their voices only croaks. And as the sound they made diminished, and as the corpses around them were occupied by other birds, fighting, croaking horribly over their carrion harvest, the vultures came straight for them. Sundance, in a heatstruck daze, felt a wing brush his face, opened his eyes to stare into the eyes of a vulture, beak outstretched. He croaked, turned his head, and the bird hopped aside. But it came back, circling him slowly. And another lit beside it, and another.
And now, he knew, it was almost over. He jerked his head around, saw Herta von Markau ringed with hunched forms in black. She moaned listlessly, just enough to keep them at bay.
Sundance made one last frantic effort, straining at the ropes and stakes. Earth and sky alike were furnaces, mingling in brazen flames in his vision. He knew he could not last many minutes longer. His dark bronze body writhed, twisted, in one last desperate effort, as a huge black bird, talons outspread, blotted out the sun, about to settle on his head. He yelled at it, but the yell was only a whisper. He felt the cold touch of its claws on his face, the gouge of the horny nails protruding from each one. Then the buzzard had settled on his head. Its body stank terrifically. He rolled his head, but it held on; all he could see was blackness.
Sundance summoned every last ounce of strength, jerked up his head once more, convulsed his body, screamed. The vulture hopped back, and now it was standing on his stomach; he could see it in every obscene detail. His wrists moved in their bonds; then he stiffened. Something had cut his skin.
Not a rope. Something hard, metallic.
He turned his right wrist again. Yes, there, on the back of his hand. When he revolved the wrist, it scraped across the ropes, scraped his hand.
The vulture put its beak down on his belly. Sundance arched his body. “Herta!” he cried. “Keep them off! Keep them off as long as you can! Herta, wake up!”
He rolled his head, saw, through a shimmering haze, the girl rise and twist as another vulture tried to land on her. It dodged, settled beside her, began to walk awkwardly around her. “I’ve found something,” Sundance gasped. He revolved his wrist again. The thing slid back and forth across his bonds; rather, his ropes slid back and forth across it. It had to have a cutting edge, because it slashed the skin.
Now he moved his wrist faster. He felt metal gouge into the
back of it, slide across his hand, tearing at the buckskin thongs simultaneously. A buzzard lowered its beak toward his eyes; he bucked his head up and it drew back. But it squatted there, watching him. The one on his stomach challenged it, ran forward, flapping its wings. The two birds fought, all over and around Sundance’s face. Their talons gouged his cheeks, barely missed his eyes.
But something was happening now. The sharp object that gashed his arm and hand was chewing into rawhide. Suddenly he felt a thong go. He jerked, the other thongs slid. He pulled harder, folding his hand into a cone. The bonds loosened; his right hand came free. Sundance whooped a hoarse Cheyenne warcry, lashed out with the hand. It struck the vultures. Surprised at the assault, both staggered back, flapped their wings, ran away. Sundance raised his hand high, waved it. “Herta!” he cried. “Herta, I’m loose.”
The motion of his waving arm frightened the birds around the girl. One ran, another took slow, flapping, noisy flight. Herta von Markau turned her head, looked dully at Sundance. She was past comprehending.
Blood ran down Sundance’s gashed wrist. He did not care. He fumbled awkwardly at the thongs that bound his other hand. It took some time to get them free. But he could use his mouth, his sharp teeth, now that he could raise his right shoulder. The rawhide parted; then, dizzy, he sat up.
All the buzzards took flight then, flapped high, then dropped down on the corpses.
Sundance fumbled with the ropes on his ankles. He got them loose after an eternity; his hands were numb and awkward. Then he scrabbled to his feet, swaying with fatigue.
He stood there a moment, waiting for strength to come back. Then he dropped beside the naked girl, attacked the binding that held her. When her arms were free, he saw life come back into dull eyes. Slowly, she sat up, rubbing her wrists. “What—?” she murmured groggily. Her flowing hair was full of sand.
“We’re loose,” Sundance whispered. “Wait. ..” He whirled, scratched in the sand for the object that had cut the thongs on his right wrist. He found it, brought it out. It was an enormous spur, with a rowel bigger than the palm of his hand, each point filed by a hand long since dust to saber sharpness. What rusting had taken place in this dry canyon over centuries had not completely dulled the brutal cutting edge. Sundance thought of the cuirass, the piece of armor, on the slope. Once this spur had belonged to a conquistador, a Spanish invader of the Apache empire.