Sundance 4

by John Benteen

  Archie turned slowly from the bar. The yellow eyes turned to slits; the snaggled teeth showed in a lopsided grin. “Captain Jack got down on his knees and cried like a baby,” he said.

  “You’re a liar,” Sundance said. He poured and drank again, and now, at last, the red mist came, blotting out everything else. He sucked in a long breath, feeling good, muscles loose and ready. “Captain Jack died like a man.”

  “There ain’t no way an Injun can die like a man,” Archie said with surprising mildness. “If a Injun ain’t a man, how can he die like one?”

  Knowing he was being baited, Sundance grinned. “Your time comes, you do half as good as he did, you can be proud.”

  Archie ignored that. “Now, take you. Way I read your looks, you’re half Injun. That means you ain’t but half a man. You see, I know Injuns and how they die. I’ve killed a lot of ‘em.”

  “Is that a fact?” Sundance said.

  “It is. Last time was in the Modoc war. Four of them redskins surrendered and was bein’ hauled up to Klamath in a wagon. They thought they’d git off light. Didn’t work that way. Me and some of the boys here, we took ‘em away from their guards. You ought to of heard them holler when they died.”

  Sundance pushed back his chair, stood up, drained the glass he had just poured. Everything in the barroom shimmered, now, and the rage, the madness, was upon him. He said thickly, “Archie, you got a awful lot of mouth. How your guts stack up?”

  “Well, now ... my guts? They’re white—all the way through.”

  Sundance grinned. “I figured your liver was, anyhow.” The odds, of course, were ten to one against him, counting Mort, the bartender, assuming that the three poker players would throw in with the other white men. The way he felt now, that was just fine. The more the merrier. He said, “I’ll take you. Any way you want it, I’ll take you.”

  Somebody along the bar laughed. Archie still did not appear aroused. “Any way?” he asked. “Even knuckle and skull?”

  “Especially knuckle and skull,” Sundance said.

  “Why, that’s a white man’s way of fightin’. I didn’t know a Injun could fight that way.”

  Sundance stood there loosely, hands at his sides, fists clenched. “Why don’t you come on and see? Maybe you’ll learn something new.”

  Archie laughed softly, happily, turned to face Sundance head-on. “I think I’ll just do that,” he said. His shoulders were wide, sloping, his arms long, his fists huge and hairy. “But I warn you, gut-eater, I aim to kill you. With my hands.”

  “Do that,” Sundance said, looking at him through red mist, “if you can.”

  “Yeah,” said Archie. Then he charged.

  He came in like a runaway locomotive. Sundance laughed and stood his ground. He saw Archie’s fists coming at him through the red mist that swirled before his eyes. Time seemed to slow, every second was like a year, every fraction of a second like a minute. He seemed to have plenty of time to step aside, seize Archie’s hurtling right arm, put out a foot simultaneously, and send Archie flying, tail over tincup, to hit the wall with a thunderous crash. Then he gave a Cheyenne war whoop and dived at Archie as the man tried, dazedly, to struggle to his feet.

  He hit Archie hard, got his hands in Archie’s throat.

  Archie gagged, tried to knee him, but the kneecap glanced off Sundance’s thigh. Archie pounded at Sundance’s back, head, with ham like fists battering, but Sundance did not feel the pain. He dug fingers deeply, without mercy, into Archie’s throat. He felt tendons, arteries, beneath his grasp.

  Archie cried out. He got his knee up again, this time caught Sundance in the belly with it. Sundance hung on desperately as Archie used the leverage of his leg to pry him loose. Then his grasp broke; suddenly Archie’s knee had hurled him backward. Men jumped aside as he staggered across the room, came up hard against the bar. Archie did not waste a second. Spitting, coughing, he was on his feet, charging again. Sundance hit him full in the face with a left jab, and it did not slow him a bit. Archie lashed out with both hands. His right rocked Sundance’s head, but Sundance did not even feel the pain. He hit Archie in the belly with his own right, and Archie smashed him twice in the face with a left, and Sundance tasted the salt of blood. Archie’s contorted visage swam before him in that red mist; he jabbed and jabbed again with his left, even as Archie smashed him with another roundhouse right, and he saw Archie’s nose crumple beneath those blows and Archie’s face flood with scarlet. Archie dropped back, and Sundance kicked him in the groin. Archie screamed and fell, doubled up. Sundance rushed at him to stamp his head. Archie rolled unexpectedly, caught Sundance’s moccasined foot, twisted. Sundance crashed down, sending a chair flying as he did. Archie got to his knees, lunged forward. Sundance rolled, grasped another chair with an out flung hand. He brought it down across Archie’s back and head and the chair shattered. Archie seemed not even to feel it.

  He sprayed Sundance with blood from his streaming nose as he fell across Sundance’s body, thumbs seeking and finding Sundance’s eyes. Sundance had a split second in which to keep from being blinded. He clubbed savagely with the chair leg left in his hand, battering Archie’s head. Archie sighed and rolled away, and Sundance’s eyes were safe. Both men scrambled to their feet simultaneously. Still spraying blood, Archie charged in. Sundance missed his attempt at blocking the blow; then he was flying through the air. He came down on the poker table where the three men had played for matches; the impact of his two hundred pounds broke its legs, and he fell amidst its wreckage, but he was on his feet again before Archie could kick him. He laughed, for in this condition he felt no pain, only a wild, savage joy. The preliminaries were over. Now it was time to kill Archie.

  He bored in, his body a weaving blur, his fists lashing. Archie hit him, but not as often as Sundance’s blows landed. The two men slugged back across the room, the sound of fists on flesh like an ax in hardwood. Archie fetched up against the bar. The spectators were white-faced, open-mouthed. Archie raised both fists, warded off Sundance’s right and left with them, kicked out with a booted foot. It hit Sundance’s flank, knocking him whirling. Then Archie’s out flung hand seized the bottle of cheap whiskey.

  He raised it high, brought it down hard. Glass shattered as he smashed it on the bar. With six inches of jagged neck in his hand, he grinned beneath the blood and lunged for Sundance, the bottle aimed straight at Sundance’s eyes.

  Sundance dropped to his knees. A shard of glass nicked his earlobe as Archie’s thrust missed. Then Sundance was on his feet and whirling as Archie rushed by. He reached out, grabbed Archie’s collar from behind with one hand, his belt with another. Archie must have weighed two-twenty, but with the whiskey in him, Sundance didn’t notice. He lifted Archie like a feather, held him high. Archie squawked.

  Then Sundance threw him.

  Archie hurtled across the bar, smashed into the few bottles on the shelf behind, and then the mirror. Glass smashed and tinkled. It fell in shards all around the body of the man in black, as he dropped to the floor behind the bar. Sundance did not wait; one hand on the counter supported him in a vault across the mahogany. He came down with both feet on Archie’s face as the man lay sprawled on the duck-boards there. He raised his right foot for the killing stomp.

  Then something struck him on the shoulder with stunning force.

  Sundance lurched aside, whirled. The bartender stood there with the bungstarter upraised, eyes wide in terror at what he had done—or failed to do. Sundance laughed savagely. “You, too, eh?” he snarled. Then he picked up the bartender by collar and pants-slack, lifted him easily, and threw him across the bar. The man’s body struck the crowd of onlookers, and they tumbled backward like ninepins hit by a ball. Sundance laughed again, took a look at Archie. Archie was out, dead to the world, maybe truly dead. Sundance was over the counter in a great, graceful leap.

  Men picked themselves up off the floor as he backed toward the table he had occupied when Archie had challenged him. His bottle was still there.
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  Panting, he seized it, drank straight from it, a long, deep, swallow. Then he faced the crowd. “Who’s next?” he jeered, watching it shimmer in a red mist.

  “We all are!” somebody bellowed. The bunch of them surged forward at once—every white man in the room still conscious—eight of them. Sundance giggled foolishly, grabbed a chair, raised it high, and swung it like a war club as he charged them. Men went down beneath that assault. He lashed back and forth with it, and they cried out and yielded. Then he was close to the swinging doors, and his head cleared a little, and he realized that he’d had enough of this, it was time to wind it up. As they mustered themselves for another charge, he threw the chair, ran toward the door.

  And collided with another half dozen men surging in.

  He hit them head-on, that knot of bearded hard-cases, and it was like running into a brick wall. He lurched backward, and a voice cried out, “Git him, boys! Git that red bastard!” Then all six of them were on him as well as the other eight from behind. Caught in the middle, the drunken Sundance laughed, gave a high, spine-chilling war whoop. His fists lashed out, and he felt bone crunch. Then somebody hit him hard, and he went down, and somebody else hit him, and hands were on him, clutching his arms. He kicked out with his feet, and a man screamed. Then they all had him, he was buried beneath a pile of hard, savage bodies. He saw a clubbed fist raised above him as a thousand pounds of flesh pinned him to the floor. He tried to roll his head, free his arms, but he could not. He was still laughing when the fist drove home, and the world seemed to explode in a great flash of light.

  He awakened with every muscle and tendon sore, every nerve shrieking with agony. Somebody was doing something to him, but it was a moment before he realized what. Then he understood. He was on horseback. And his hands were tied behind him.

  He opened puffed eyes. Night wind blew cool upon him. He was mounted on a scrubby pony, on a flat beyond the town, the few lights of which glimmered ahead of him. And somebody was doing something to his neck. He cocked an eye upward, then tensed. What they were doing was fitting a noose around his throat.

  Sundance’s head cleared immediately. “What the hell?” he grated. Then he was looking down into a puffy parody of a face. Only the yellow eyes beneath black brows in that drunken visage were recognizable. Archie’s puffed lips moved slowly. “So you’re awake, half-breed? Good. I want you to feel this.”

  Sundance jerked at the bonds that held his wrists. They held; he eased off.

  “Thought you was big, huh?” Archie said thickly. “So big you could fight th’ whole town of Hell, Yes! Well, we’ll see if you’re too big fer th’ buzzards to eat.” He backed away a pace, and now Sundance saw the ring of men around him, the big oak that arched above him. Looking up, he could see the rope slung over its limb—the rope that terminated in a loop under his jaw. Its other end was in the hands of a half dozen men beside the tree trunk.

  “We’re gonna hang you, half-breed,” Archie said, “jest like they hanged them four Modocs up at Klamath. You talked high about a Injun dyin’ like a white man. We’ll see how you die. Because we ain’t gonna break your neck all at once. After I chouse this horse out from under you, we’ll letcha choke a while. Then we’ll ease off, give you time to howl before we h’ist you up again. This’ll be a long hangin’. You’ll have plenty of time to show us what kinda guts a Injun’s got.”

  Sundance stared down at him, and he saw no mercy in that puffy, swollen, furious face. His head throbbed with the after-effects of the unfamiliar whiskey, but he realized this: he had drunk himself into a death sentence. And there was no way out, none at all.

  Archie slapped the end of a braided quirt against his boot. Somewhere in the distance, a lobo wolf howled mournfully. On the edge of town, a jackass brayed. A man stood by the horse’s head, holding the cheek strap of its bridle.

  “You boys take up the slack, now,” Archie said. “I want him to swing clear when the horse goes.”

  The noose tightened even more around Sundance’s throat, raw hemp biting in. Sundance sat rigidly, fully aware now. So this was how it was to end, all his years of effort. Still, there was no one to blame but himself. He had known what would happen if he went over his limit.

  He sucked in a long breath of clean, cool night air, maybe the last he would ever take. He savored all the odors of the hills, pine and sage and nearby running water. He thought of Captain Jack and cursed himself for his own idiocy. Jack had depended on him and— All right, he thought. Forget that. If they want to see how an Indian dies, I’ll show them. He raised his head, began to sing, a Cheyenne death song. A quick jerk of the rope cut it off, in a strangling gargle.

  “Don’t mess up the night air with that crud,” Archie said. “You ready, ‘breed? Sim? Josh? All you fellers. I’m gonna slap this horse, now.”

  He brought up the quirt; then it came down, hard. The horse ran from under Sundance.

  The noose closed tightly around his neck as his body’s dangling weight pulled it shut. He determined not to kick, held his feet still. He gasped for air, but there was none; the rope cut it off. His lungs were bursting; strange lights were exploding behind his eyes. He felt himself going away.

  From seemingly a great distance, Archie laughed. “Ease off a spell, fellers.”

  Then his feet touched the ground, and never had solid earth felt so good. The noose eased a little; he drew in a sobbing gulp of air. When he opened his eyes, Archie’s grinning face was very close to his. “Well, Injun? Ready to holler? Le’s hear you beg.”

  Sundance sucked up the last moisture in his mouth, spat full in Archie’s face.

  In the moonlight, the lumpy features twisted. Archie stepped back. “Swing the Goddam Injun!” he rasped. “Swing him high!”

  Then the noose tightened again. Sundance’s feet left the ground. This time, he knew, it was for good. He closed his eyes, tried not to make a sound. Again those flashing lights, and—

  There was an explosion. At first he thought it was inside his head, along with the lights. Then he heard men shout; and he heard a voice say, cold and hard: “The first barrel missed. The second won’t. Turn loose that rope.”

  Suddenly, Sundance crashed to earth. His legs gave way beneath him, and he crumpled, face down in the dirt. But the noose had slacked again, and he could breathe once more, and he drew in great pumping breaths of air. He did not know how long he lay there before he managed to raise his head.

  But finally he could do that, and when he did, he looked around. The men had fallen back, the rope trailed without a hand on it in the dust.

  Sundance lurched awkwardly to his feet, turned. He saw the rider in silhouette against the star-sprinkled sky. The man was tall and lean and mounted on a mule, and shadowy as he was, Sundance saw that in his left hand he held a Colt and in his right a double-barreled shotgun with which he covered the crowd.

  The man spoke.

  “So your neck ain’t broke.”

  “No,” Sundance gasped.

  “Good. I got here just in time. All right. Somebody cut him loose and take that noose off. And I mean what I say—the first wrong move, and the next barrel of blue whistlers will chop you all down.”

  Sundance stood there, trembling slightly, sucking in breath, as his hands were freed, and then the rope was jerked from his neck. Archie’s voice rang out, thickly, through swollen lips. “Wade, you’re a damned fool. You can’t get away with this.”

  Wade laughed softly. “You come to see me down on Lost River, Archie, and we’ll talk about it.” Then his voice rapped out. “Sundance. Can you ride?”

  “Hell, yes,” Sundance said.

  “Then swing up behind me. We’ll find your horse and gear and then we’ll clear out of this damned hole. Don’t be afraid. These buzzards are tough when the odds are twenty-to-one, but cut those in half and they lose their guts.”

  The man gave him a stirrup. As Sundance swung up, the rider spoke to Archie. “Where’s his horse and gun?”

  Archie stoo
d there, unanswering. Wade put the mule forward, trained the shotgun on him. “You’d better answer.”

  “Wade, you’ve done a bad thing,” Archie grated. “This wasn’t your put-in.”

  “You tell me,” Wade said. He kept the shotgun on Archie, the Colt threatened the rest of the crowd. Archie made a sound deep in his throat. “That Goddam stud’s right where he left him. Nobody couldn’t git close to him. Here’s his gunbelt.” He went to his horse. Wade watched him intently. Archie lifted Sundance’s weapons off his saddle, brought them over.

  Sundance took them, looked full into Archie’s eyes. “This isn’t over,” Sundance said quietly. “There’s a long way to go before it’s settled yet. Nobody puts a rope around my neck and gets away with it. Archie, you ought to have let me stay up there the first time you pulled.”

  “Let that go,” Wade said. “We’re getting out of here.” He touched the mule with a knee; the animal, well-trained, backed and crabbed, so Wade could keep the crowd covered. Sundance had his own gun out now, eyes searching for any flicker of hostile motion among the men. But there was none. Wade’s shotgun and the authority of his presence, kept them frozen.

  When they reached the town’s street, Sundance whistled loudly. A deep whinny answered him, then there was the pounding of hooves. Eagle, reins trailing, was there then, and Sundance leaped smoothly from the mule’s rump into the saddle. He gathered up the trailing leathers. “All right, Wade. Let’s fog out of here!”

  “Right.” Wade lashed the mule with the reins.

  Long-legged, fast, it headed down the street like an arrow loosed from a bow, but Eagle would have outpaced it if Sundance hadn’t held him back. Both men rode twisted in the saddle, watching their rear. From the outskirts of town at the hanging tree, there was a babble of angry shouting. Men ran into the street; suddenly gun flashes blossomed. The lead went so wild that Sundance could not even hear its whistle; they were firing pistols and the range was too great.

  Wade chuckled, pointed the shotgun high, pulled the trigger. Its blast was thunderous, its flame a long, orange tongue. Immediately the shooting ceased, although he’d put the round of buckshot well over their heads. “Chicken-livered bastards,” he yelled, as he thumbed in new rounds. “Don’t worry. They ain’t got the guts to come after us!”