Outlaw's Reckoning

by Ralph Compton

  Gus kept his head drooped and his arms trembling, even after he’d managed to work up more than enough slickness between his wrists. One of Dan’s hands left his shoulder. Soon the ropes binding his torso to the back of the chair began to loosen. Those were the ropes that he couldn’t have gotten to on his own. Now there only remained one more obstacle.

  “Help him up,” Smythe said.

  Dan grabbed his arms and pulled Gus to his feet. Pain lanced through Gus’s wounded shoulder, which he played up with a groan. Dan kept hold of one side, while someone else took the other. It wasn’t Smythe because that one’s voice was still closer to the door when he said, “Stand up, Gus. We don’t want to draw too much attention to ourselves.”

  Gus didn’t listen to Smythe. He was too busy listening to everything else in the room. More specifically, he listened to the footsteps knocking against the floor around him. Bennett and the other gunman were lighter than Dan, which meant Dan was still behind him and those other two were on either side. There was no mistaking where Smythe was, which only left that one stubborn obstacle.

  When he started to take a step, Gus stumbled and nearly fell. He tried to catch himself, but that only caused his feet to get more tangled up beneath him.

  “We should probably just carry him,” Bennett said.

  There was a pause before Smythe let out a frustrated sigh. “That’ll make us stick out like a sore thumb. He can’t walk the way he is?”

  “His legs are tied together.”

  “Loosen those ropes. Just give him enough room to walk. If he tries to make a spectacle, we can just drape him over Dan’s shoulder and hope too many soldiers don’t take too close of a look at him. If they do, well, that’s Mr. McCord’s fault.”

  That was obviously meant as a threat, but Gus didn’t care. Once he heard the few words he’d been hoping for, the rest was gravy. Maintaining his balance while swaying slightly, Gus drew upon his experience of being drunk to keep up the illusion of a man who could barely stand. It only had to hold up for a few more seconds.

  Since the pair of hands on his right side had moved away, Gus figured the third gunman was the one who was now tugging at the ropes around his ankles. The instant those ropes loosened up a bit, that final obstacle in his path was gone.

  Everything Gus had done to this point came to fruition. Every punch that had landed brought all those men to the conclusion that he was too weak to fight back. The weakness made them confident enough to give him a bit of slack, since he couldn’t use his hands or see what was around him. Fortunately, there wasn’t much of anything in that room that Gus hadn’t already seen.

  The instant he felt some slack in the ropes around his ankles, Gus snapped one leg out toward the man tending to those ropes. His shin knocked solidly against the closest man’s jaw, sending him straight to the floor. Before that one’s back hit the ground, Gus turned and pulled both arms apart from each other. The ropes around Gus’s wrists sliced into his skin, but between the sweat and blood that had soaked into the ropes, Gus was able to slip one hand free of the bindings.

  “Get him!” Smythe shouted.

  But Gus hadn’t stopped moving. He spun on the balls of his feet, grabbed the chair he’d been sitting in and picked it up. Since he didn’t have to waste time uncovering his eyes, Gus turned to where he knew the room’s single lantern was hanging and tossed the chair toward that spot. The chair hit the post, shattered the lantern and extinguished the faint light that had illuminated the room. Now everyone was just as blind as Gus. The only difference was that nobody other than Gus had bothered to memorize every detail within the shed.

  A gun was fired, but the bullet hissed through empty air. Gus had already moved to another spot and was keeping low to avoid any wild punches.

  Extending both arms out and to the sides, Gus rushed in the direction where he knew Dan had previously been, and was able to find the bigger man fairly quickly. Gus felt his left forearm bump against something big and solid, so he wrapped it up in a bear hug and swung it to one side. Dan let out a surprised grunt as he was nearly taken off his feet. Gus may not have been strong enough to toss the big fellow, but he could shove him into a wall.

  Another shot went off, followed by a third.

  “Find the bastard before you shoot the wrong man!” Smythe scolded. By the sound of his voice, Gus knew Smythe was somewhere near the door.

  Dan stumbled and tripped, so Gus punched him in the face as many times as he could manage. When his knuckles hit Dan square in the nose without any resistance from the big man, Gus moved on.

  There was commotion coming from outside the shed. Gus ignored it and circled around to approach the door from the side. Lowering his shoulder, Gus put all of his faith in what he could hear as well as what he could remember. That faith was justified when he slammed into a body that must have been Smythe.

  “Who the hell?” Smythe growled as he reflexively pounded his fist against Gus’s back.

  The grip of Smythe’s pistol hit Gus a few times, but he shook off the pain. Since he knew this was his only chance to escape, sheer desperation kept Gus moving. He dug his feet into the floor and pushed until Smythe’s shoulders hit the wall. Then Gus pulled back and slammed Smythe into the wall again. When he felt Smythe start to move, Gus snapped his head up and caught Smythe on the chin or on the side of his face. Either way, Smythe let out a painful yelp.

  Gus reached out quickly to find both of Smythe’s arms. There was a struggle, but Smythe was still reeling from getting the wind knocked out of him and Gus was able to pry the gun from Smythe’s grasp. As soon as Gus’s finger found the trigger, he had a choice to make. He could either start shooting or he could just get out of there before the other men in that room got their bearings. The decision was easy to make once Gus heard the sounds of voices and commotion directly on the other side of the door. The next thing he heard was the pounding of a very angry fist with the voice to match.

  “What’s going on in there?” someone shouted from outside the shack.

  Using noise to refigure his position within the darkened space, Gus pointed Smythe’s gun at the door and pulled his trigger. Gunshots filled the room to put a powerful ringing in his ears and the stench of burned powder in his nose.

  As Gus had expected, those bullets punching through the door were enough to kick the commotion outside into a frenzy. He slammed his elbow against Smythe and then turned away from the door. On his way across the room, Gus finally bothered to pull the scarf away from his eyes. By the time he reached the window at the other end of the room, he could finally see the dull glow of moonlight and torches through the dusty glass.

  The scant light drifting through the window was like a beacon to Gus. It wasn’t a large opening, but it was just big enough to accommodate him as he climbed outside.

  Behind him, angry voices filled the shack. Smythe hollered for his men. The men shouted as they swung at each other in the dark. Outside, soldiers barked orders and demanded to know what was going on. Before long, the door was kicked in and both groups of armed men were introduced to one another.

  As all this went on, Gus hurried away from the shack as quickly as he could. The shooting had drawn plenty of attention to the little structure, but focused it upon the front door. The soldiers formed a firing line and sent a few men to go inside. Gus had to grin at the predictable clockwork nature of military men, which allowed him to slip away before the soldiers surrounded the building.

  There were a few more sheds nearby and several tents beyond those. Gus barely made it to the closest of the sheds before soldiers rushed past him to get to the shack. He almost didn’t want to look back, out of fear that he’d be recaptured. All it would take was one man who’d seen the wanted notices to recognize his face. For that matter, Smythe had only to point Gus out and it would all end with a noose around his neck.

  Gus took a quick look over his shoulder, only to find soldiers armed with rifles surrounding Smythe’s shed. Folks outside were trying to get a
look at the commotion, but Gus was able to ease his way through them. A few of the people were chattering excitedly, but Gus kept his head down and kept moving.

  Once he’d made it to the tents set up a ways from the shed, Gus made the one move he knew Smythe wouldn’t be expecting: He went to get a drink.

  Chapter 19

  It didn’t take long to find a bottle of whiskey in Fort Verde. Gus wouldn’t exactly call the place a saloon, but it was a large tent where drinks were served to off-duty soldiers and anyone else who happened to be passing through. There were a few men outside, but they were craning their necks toward the commotion that Gus had just left behind.

  “What’s going on over there?” one of the men asked. “Was that shooting I heard?”

  “I think so,” Gus said as he kept his head down and his feet moving.

  Inside, the saloon was filled with a collection of crooked chairs and cracked tables that looked to have been tossed out from somewhere else. Gus pulled his hat down low over his eyes and leaned against the bar so he wasn’t looking anyone directly in the eyes. Fortunately, there weren’t many other people in there to worry about.

  “What’ll it be, mister?” the barkeep asked.

  Suddenly, Gus froze. He patted his pockets and realized that Smythe had been more concerned with knocking him out and taking his weapons than with stealing his money. Taking the few coins he had and setting them onto the bar, Gus asked, “This enough for a whiskey?”

  The barkeep squinted and stared hard at him. “You a friend of Colonel Riley?”

  “Can’t say that I am.”

  “Good,” the barkeep said with a smirk. “Then I won’t charge you extra.”

  A glass was set in front of him and filled with a healthy splash of liquor. Gus took the drink and sipped, rather than toss it all down. The whiskey burned in a dozen or so places that had been cut or bruised during the last few hours. He gritted his teeth and waited until the pain dulled and the liquor trickled down his throat.

  “You look like hell,” the barkeep said. “I bet you’ve got some stories to tell.”

  “Not really.”

  “All right then, let me know when you want another dose.” With that, the barkeep let Gus be.

  Standing still in the middle of that fort was putting a strain on every one of Gus’s nerves. Despite the cold expression on his face and the steadiness of his hands, he couldn’t stop thinking of all the different sorts of trouble that would be stirred up if he was discovered for who he truly was. He and Doyle had stolen enough Army money over the years to put them on the top of several different generals’ most-wanted lists. Forts like this were also spots where lawmen stopped to resupply or just sleep somewhere other than a camp of their own making.

  Of all the places for Gus to be, Fort Verde was not even close to a good choice. For that reason, Gus settled in and took another sip of whiskey. Right about now, Smythe and his men were explaining what had happened. Since there had been shooting, one or two of his men might even be hurt. All of them could be headed for the stockade. At the very least, Smythe would be dragged in front of one of those important friends he’d mentioned to do some explaining.

  In that time, Gus continued to reason, Smythe would probably spout some story about how he’d captured an outlaw and brought him back. He would concoct a tall tale about how that outlaw had made his escape and bolted amid a hail of gunfire. The word might be spread, and if there was a reward notice with Gus’s picture on it, that would surely be passed around as well.

  Sitting in the eye of that storm seemed like a better idea than running for the hills like a madman. Gus wasn’t foolish enough to shoot his way out of Fort Verde, but he also couldn’t stay for much longer. He needed to get out, he needed to be quiet about it and he needed to go soon. There were already men examining him a bit too closely.

  One of those men was a tall, slender man with short, dark brown hair. The man had been sitting toward the back of the saloon when Gus had first walked in, but was now standing. More than that, he’d moved up from the back of the room to the middle. Since it wasn’t too big of a place to begin with, the difference meant a lot to someone who couldn’t afford to stay in anyone’s sight for very long.

  Gus not only felt like he was backed into a corner, but was starting to feel like he’d made a fatal mistake in not trying to bust his way out when he had momentum on his side. Since there wasn’t a way to reverse what had come before, Gus finished his drink and took a moment to allow the whiskey to burn down to his gullet. When he shifted his eyes toward the other part of the room, that tall fellow had taken another step closer.

  “Sounds like someone’s in trouble,” announced a portly sergeant whose uniform shirt was only partly buttoned. “A bunch of rowdies are getting hauled in to see the colonel. If they wake ol’ Riley up, there’ll be hell to pay.”

  “Wouldn’t be the first time,” the barkeep chimed in.

  As those two men talked back and forth, Gus set his glass down and left. Keeping his head down and his eyes pointed straight ahead, he watched from the edge of his vision to see if anyone was following him. By the looks of it, talking about the commotion was more important to the men in that saloon than actually doing anything about it. Those soldiers were off duty and the rest were too drunk to care. Still, Gus wasn’t about to celebrate a clean getaway just yet.

  He stepped outside of the saloon and walked with purpose in his steps. Even though he was scouting as he went, he moved as though he knew exactly where he was going and had no time to waste in getting there. Only when he turned to walk between a pair of the more solid buildings in Fort Verde did Gus take a look over his shoulder.

  The path behind him looked clear, but something still nagged at him.

  Gus stopped and leaned against one of the darkened buildings. The whiskey was having its effect on him and his heart wasn’t slamming quite so hard within his ribs. There was still a commotion going on, but all Gus could hear was a bunch of angry voices coming from the vicinity of Smythe’s shed. Since there weren’t soldiers searching the area in force, Gus figured Smythe was busy explaining the shots that had been fired through the door. Smythe was a smooth talker, to be certain, but even he would have a rough time making a story about an escaped outlaw seem like anything more than a diversion. Gus hoped to figure a way out of there before Smythe got some breathing room.

  After watching for a few more seconds, Gus was confident that he could move a little farther toward some horses that were hitched to an unwatched post nearby. When Gus looked around to make certain he could steal one without being spotted, he saw the tall man from the saloon step outside. Rather than take a gander at the ruckus by the shed or get a breath of night air, the man looked around quickly to find Gus. He kept his hands down by his holster and started walking.

  The tall man didn’t come at Gus straightaway. Then again, Gus didn’t expect he would. Instead, Gus knew the man would walk in a slightly different direction before circling back to approach him from another angle. That was how bounty hunters worked.

  It had only been a hunch at first, but now Gus was fairly certain of it. The tall man had the eyes of a bounty hunter: sharp and narrow like a hungry rat’s. He carried himself like he wasn’t just ready for a fight, but looking for one. And when he’d spotted Gus back at the saloon, there had been the slightest hint of smug victory in the tall man’s beady eyes. Those were all things common to most bounty hunters and Gus McCord definitely had plenty of experience where those bastards were concerned.

  Before the tall man could circle back, Gus ducked around the other side of the building he’d been leaning against. It didn’t take long for him to find a perfect section of wall that was busted out and covered by a flap of canvas. All Gus had to do was take half a step back into the canvas for the shadows to fall over him as though he was just another section of the wall.

  Gus stayed put, even when his instincts told him to run. If that man really was a bounty hunter who was good enough to
track him this far, he’d be good enough to track him a bit farther.

  Fort Verde was full of sounds that night. They came from the saloon as well as the group gathering around Smythe’s shed. Horses’ hooves crunched against the ground. Wagon wheels turned and a subtle set of footsteps approached the spot where Gus was waiting.

  Gus’s heart skipped a beat when he saw the shadowy figure walk around the corner. Seeing it up close, he wasn’t immediately sure if that was the man he was after or not. Once that figure turned toward him, Gus was able to catch a glimpse of those narrowed piglike eyes.

  The man looked at the shadows where Gus hid and studied them. Before he could be fully discovered, Gus lunged out with both arms extended. One hand grabbed the man’s jacket and the other reached for his gun belt. As he pivoted his entire body to swing the man around, Gus found the holster at the man’s side. It was empty.

  The man’s boots scrambled to find purchase in the dirt as Gus shifted his weight and pulled him around with even more force. Acting reflexively, the man swung both arms out to regain his balance or try to get free of Gus’s grip. Once Gus saw the gun in the man’s hand, he grabbed hold of it and twisted. The man let out a yelp as his finger was caught within the trigger guard. Gus thought he heard a snap, but twisted a little harder just to be sure. When he pulled the gun away, Gus didn’t feel any resistance.