Do or Die

Chapter Eighteen

Ubel Gunther did not know what to think. He and his men were approaching Painted Rock from the northwest. Their view of the saloon and the street in front of it was blocked by the enormous boulder that gave the settlement its name, so they were quite close when they observed some men in wide-brimmed hats and slickers whooping and laughing while another was dragging someone dressed in a suit at the end of a rope. The rider reached the north end of the street and reined sharply around. As he did, an old Indian raced from concealment at the side of a house and slashed the cowboy’s rope with a tomahawk. The man in the suit rolled up against a picket fence. Before the rider realized the rope had been cut, the Indian had the man in the suit draped over a slim shoulder and was loping toward a stand of trees.

“What is that all about?” Hans wondered. He had his rifle out.

“Drunken cowboys,” Ubel guessed. “They won’t bother us if we don’t bother them.” He scanned the hamlet. “I don’t see Fabrizio or his party. We have beaten them here. Gut.”

The idea had come to Gunther two nights earlier. He had been warming himself by the fire when Trask mentioned they should reach Painted Rock in a few days. “Exactly how many, I can’t rightly say. But we’re close. The people you’re after won’t get there much ahead of you.”

“I wish we could arrive before they do and arrange a suitable reception,” Ubel said. Then it hit him: Why couldn’t they? He posed the question to Trask.

“They’re not more than ten to twelve miles ahead. Swing wide to the north, ride all night, and by morning you’ll be in front of them. All you have to do after that is head due southeast.”

“I should have thought of this sooner.” Ubel had shot to his feet. “We leave this minute.” At a snap of his fingers, Hans and the rest began gathering up their saddle blankets and saddles. Trask, though, continued sipping coffee. “You will join us, will you not?”

“I will not.”

“But we need you to guide us to the settlement. And don’t forget. My offer of an additional five hundred dollars still stands.”

“You just don’t hear so good, do you? I’m a tracker. Not an assassin. I also told you the day we met that as soon as my job was done, we’d go our own ways. That time has come. At first light, I’m lightin’ a shuck for Denver and my wife.”

“I have never met anyone who would pass up five hundred dollars,” Ubel commented.

“Blame my Arapaho half. I’m not as fond of money as most whites are. To me, it’s a means to an end, not an end in itself.”

On that philosophical note, they had parted company.

Ubel had done as Trask advised, and now here they were at Painted Rock with plenty of time to set a trap. Fabrizio and his friends would ride right into their blazing rifles.

Oscar was staring at the only log cabin in Painted Rock. “Why are those people tied to that building?”

Intent on the commotion, Ubel hadn’t noticed them. Nor the bodies of a man and a dog in the street. Neither were acceptable. Fabrizio would see the bodies and be on his guard when he rode in. It was all due to the rowdy cowhands, Ubel reasoned. Reaching under his jacket, he loosened his revolver in its holster.

The four drunks were fanning out and moving toward the trees. They stopped at the sight of Ubel and his men, and a big ox with a bushy beard declared, “I swear! This place is gettin’ more crowded by the minute!”

“Greetings, gentlemen,” Ubel said cordially, touching his cane to his hat. “Is it me, or are you doing your utmost to turn this quaint bastion of civilization into a model of anarchy?”

A cowboy with curly hair whistled in mock admiration. “Lord Almighty, but don’t he talk pretty? His tongue must be solid silver.”

“Maybe we should invite ’em for a drink,” suggested a swarthy cowboy with a bone-handled knife on his hip.

The youngest cowboy, who wore matching pearl-handled Colts, spat in the dust. “I wouldn’t be caught dead with a bunch of yacks wearin’ chamber pots on their heads. Especially when these yacks must be more John Laws.”

“I beg your pardon?” Ubel said. “You suspect we’re law officers?” The idea amused him. “Nothing could be further from the truth.”

“So you say,” the young one responded. “Then who the hell are you, mister? And what are you doing here?”

Hans leveled his rifle. “You will not talk to Mr. Gunther in that tone of voice, cowboy.”

“Is that a fact?” The young one’s Colts blossomed in his hands as if from out of thin air.

“No—!” Ubel exclaimed. He hoped to avoid a needless confrontation. But his hope was dashed when the young hothead shot Hans in the chest. Quick as thought, the young one swiveled toward Arne. The other cowboys were unlimbering their hardware, and the next instant the settlement rocked to artificial thunder. Hot lead flew every which way.

Bending low, Ubel spurred his mount toward a gap between the general store and the saloon. “Fol low me!” he shouted. He drew his revolver and twisted just as a slug whipped his bowler from his head. Another nicked his left arm. He saw Hans on the ground but still alive, feverishly working his Winchester. Oscar and Rutger were close behind him, but Arne must not have heard his command and was racing toward the cabin.

The cowboy with the bone-handled knife fanned his pistol twice. Rutger’s horse whinnied and tumbled, throwing Rutger clear. He hit hard but rolled and sprang erect, all in the same motion. Sprinting for the gap, he sent shot after shot at the dispersing cowboys.

Ubel galloped to the rear of the buildings. Swinging down from his saddle, he holstered his revolver and pulled the Winchester out. Moments later, Oscar joined him. Ubel led him on foot toward the front, where Rutger was reloading. The gunfire had stopped.

“I hit one,” Rutger reported. “The big one. I saw him stumble, but he made it to cover.”

All the cowboys had. Ubel didn’t see them anywhere. Hans was dead. Over near the cabin lay Arne’s horse. Arne was alive but wounded and had crawled behind it. He waved to them.

“Damn stupid cowboys!” Oscar fumed.

Ubel was thinking about the young one with the pearl-handled Colts. Not many could afford such pistols. A matched set cost a hundred dollars, three months’ wages for a cowhand. “Pearl-handled pistol,” Ubel said to himself and recalled something Leeds had told them before they killed him. “Damn me for not remembering sooner! Those are not cowboys! They are the Hoodoos!”

“Who?” Rutger asked.

“A pack of horse thieves and killers. The stableman told us Fabrizio and his friends were going after them for the bounty money.” Ubel had read the newspaper accounts. “The young one is Kid Falon. I do not remember the rest of their names. But they are not to be taken lightly.”

Oscar peeked out, then had to jerk back when a slug struck the wall inches from his head. “They are good shots.”

Ubel was incensed. This was the last thing he needed. Fabrizio’s party might arrive at any moment. “We must kill these Hoodoos, and quickly. Rutger, stay here and keep them pinned down. Oscar, come with me.”

It was common knowledge that all things being equal, a man with a rifle had an advantage over someone armed with a pistol. Rifles shot a lot farther and were more accurate. To capitalize, Ubel led Oscar to the rear of the buildings, past their horses, and out onto the prairie. They stayed low, using weeds and grass to screen them, and went over a hundred yards, well beyond the effective range of a revolver, then looped to the north to come up on the Hoodoos from the rear. Only there was no sign of them.

“Where did they get to?” Oscar whispered.

From the vicinity of where Arne lay sheltered behind his horse came gunfire. There was the heavy boom of a rifle followed by the lighter crack of pistols. Rutger’s rifle entered the fray, and after a long flurry of shots, silence fell.

Oscar glanced expectantly at Ubel, who would just as soon circle around the settlement and pick the Hoodoos off from the safety of the plain. But Arne and Rutger might need their help.

“Keep down.” Ubel jogged toward the northern-most house, a small frame structure. He ran along the north side, under an open window, to a yard bordering the street. He saw Arne sprawled across the horse, as dead as his animal. He did not see Rutger at the corner of the general store. “This is not good.”

“What will we do?”

A ladder propped against the front of the store gave Ubel an inspiration. “We will climb onto a roof and slay these Hoodoos when they show themselves.” He turned, took two steps, and froze.

“Howdy.” Kid Falon was leaning out the window, a Colt in each hand. “I’m plumb pleased you’ve made this so easy.”

“Listen to me,” Ubel said. His rifle was pointed at the ground. So was Oscar’s. “This is senseless. Our fight isn’t with you. In fact, I will pay you to help us kill the people we are after.”

The Kid grinned. “I don’t work for chamber pots.”

The last sight Ubel Gunther saw were the twin muzzles of the Kid’s pearl-handled Colts spewing smoke and lead.

Charley Pickett was riding alongside Melissa Patterson, as he always did since that night they had declared their mutual love, and she was telling him about an eccentric aunt of hers who once owned over fifty cats, when Enos Howard, who was in the lead, reined up and raised an arm for them to do the same.

“Did you hear that?”

“Hear what?” Charley asked.

“Shots,” the buffalo hunter said. “I thought I heard some a while ago and now I’m sure of it.”

“I heard them too,” Eli Brandenberg confirmed. Cradled in his left arm was a scattergun he never set down, even when he slept.

Tony Fabrizio was in charge of the pack animals, and as he came up, he asked, “Why have we stopped?”

“Could be trouble,” Enos said. From his saddlebags he slid his spyglass, and as he had done countless times, he searched the prairie beyond. “Nothin’ except some trees to the southeast. We’ll head for them. Everyone keep your eyes skinned and your hardware handy.”

Eli affectionately patted his scattergun. “Buckshot means buryin’, and I’ve got two barrels ready.”

“Be mighty careful where you point that cannon when you shoot,” Charley cautioned. When he was younger, he had used his pa’s shotgun on occasion, including the time he shot a raccoon that had been sneaking into the henhouse. The coon came bolting out a hole it had made in the fence, and he cut loose with 12-gauge buckshot. It blew the raccoon apart.

On they rode. Soon the trees were visible with the unaided eye. So were a cluster of buildings.

“That’s got to be Painted Rock,” Enos announced. “One of us should go on ahead to see if the Hoodoos are there.”

“No.” Charley vetoed the notion. “We stick together.” He would rather Melissa stayed out on the plain where she would be safe, but he knew better than to say anything. She would only refuse.

Enos was resorting to his spyglass again. “My eyes must be worse than I reckoned. I’d swear I see a bunch of folks tied to a cabin.” Slowing, he handed the telescope to Charley. “Have a look-see.”

The people were there, Charley confirmed, looking as miserable as could be. So were a lot of dead men and dead horses. And, strangely enough, a dead dog. When he mentioned the latter, Enos snorted.

“That would be Curly Means’s handiwork. Folks say he hates dogs as much as Southerners hate carpet baggers. And if he’s there, so are the rest of the Hoodoos.” Howard reined in. “It might be smart to sneak in on foot from here. Someone has to stay with the critters, though, so they don’t stray off on us.”

“That will be Melissa’s job,” Charley said, swinging down. As he had predicted, she didn’t like it.

“Why me? Why don’t we draw straws to see who stays?”

“Because I want you to.” Charley looked right at her when he said it, expecting her to object, but much to his surprise she gave in.

“If you think it’s for the best, I’ll do it. But if you run into trouble, give a yell, and I’ll come as quick as I can.”

Charley would do no such thing. He refused to place her life in more danger than he already had. But he smiled and nodded, then followed Enos, Eli, and Tony, who were hiking east instead of toward Painted Rock. “Why are we going this way?”

Enos pointed at a belt of cottonwoods bordering a creek. “We’ll come in from that direction so the trees hide us.”

They had to constantly remind Eli to keep low. A bundle of nervous excitement, he kept rising up onto the tips of his toes to scan the settlement and mutter, “Where are they? Where are they?”

The gentle gurgle of the creek was the only sound Charley heard until they had crossed it and crouched behind trees. Then he heard the soft sobbing of several women and the moans of a barrel-chested man who had been shot a couple of times either before or after he was tied to the cabin.

“I’ll be damned!” Enos whispered, his telescope trained on a pair of bodies at the side of the nearest house. He glanced at Tony. “It’s that fancy-pants from Denver, the one who has it in for you.”

“Ubel Gunther?” Tony took the telescope to see for himself. His bewilderment mirrored Charley’s. “Madrina di Dio. It is him. The other one is another of Radtke’s men. But what are they doing here?”

“Looking for us, I suspect,” was the best Charley could come up with.

“Who cares about them?” Eli Brandenberg was bobbing up and down to see over a patch of weeds. “I want to know where the Hoodoos are. Brock Alvord most of all.”

Enos reclaimed his telescope and after a minute swore lustily. “Looks like someone beat you to it, hoss. Alvord is one of those lyin’ in the street.”

“That can’t be.” Eli stood and stepped from hiding.

“Get down!” Charley whispered, but he was wasting his breath. Eli tramped toward the bodies, oblivious to all else. Charley started to go after him, but Tony grabbed his wrist.

“Would you make the same mistake he is?”

Gunshots shattered the deceptive quiet. They came from the saloon, or near it, and on their heels rose muffled shouts and the slam of a door.

“Some of fancy-pant’s boys must be alive and swappin’ lead with the Hoodoos,” Enos speculated. “It can work in our favor.” He beckoned them, then ran toward the frame house.

Charley preferred to hunker in the vegetation, but when Tony hurried after the buffalo hunter, he followed. Ubel Gunther and the other man had been shot through the head, their rifles left where they fell. Shoving the heavy Allen & Wheelock Army .44 into its holster, Charley snatched up Gunther’s rifle and tossed the other rifle to Tony.

“Here’s the plan, pups,” Enos said. “One of us stays and watches the street while the other two hunt for the Hoodoos.”

“We should stick together,” Charley reiterated. For their mutual protection, if nothing else. He heard a voice and looked out. Eli was standing over a white-haired body, talking to it as if it were alive. “Do you see what I see?”

“He’s gone loco!” Enos exclaimed.

Charley was inclined to believe it when Eli stepped back, cocked the scattergun, pointed it at Brock Alvord, and let the corpse have both barrels full in the face. There wasn’t much of it left. Giggling, Eli broke the scattergun open to reload. “That’s what you get for what you did to me!”

Suddenly another man was there next to Brandenberg. A mammoth, bearded brute who roared like a beast, threw both arms wide, and enfolded Eli in them.

Charley thumbed back the Winchester’s hammer and stroked the trigger, but the hammer fell on an empty chamber. He jacked the lever, feeding a cartridge from the magazine, but before he could fire, the big man lifted Eli off the ground and shook him as a bear might shake a badger.

“That’s Big Ben Brody!” Enos cried, whipping Clarabelle to his shoulder. He aimed, fired, and missed.

“Let go of Eli!” Charley hollered. He tried to fix a bead, but Brody was swinging Eli back and forth, and he couldn’t get a clear shot. They all heard the sharp crack of Eli’s spine and saw blood gush from Eli’s mouth. Big Ben Brody shook Eli a few more times, then cast him to the dirt.

Clarabelle boomed a second time. Brody was jolted sideways as if kicked by a mule. His legs, as big around as oak trees, buckled from under him, and he toppled, raising puffs of dust.

“I’ll be a nanny goat! I hit him!” Enos crowed and kissed Clarabelle. “I’m not as useless as I thought!”

Tony plucked at their sleeves. “We must hide. The other Hoodoos will be after us.”

“Let ’em come!” Enos bellowed. “By God, I’ve never been afeared of any mother’s son, and I’m not afeared now! I’m hell with the bark on! Part alligator and part snapper! Show me a coon out for my hide, and I’ll show you a hide fit for a rug!”

He would have ranted on and on, but Charley pulled him to the rear of the house, saying, “Hush up! One lucky shot, and you think you’re Daniel Boone!” He went to clamp a hand over Enos’s mouth to stifle another outburst, but it wasn’t necessary. The buffalo hunter was staring at another body a few buildings down.

“That’s not one of Gunther’s dandies. He’s wearin’ a slicker.”

“What are those sticks pokin’ out of his chest?” Charley wondered.

Rifles level, they crept closer.

“God Almighty!” Enos breathed. “That there is John Noonan, the Missouri Terror! Someone put four arrows into him and lifted his hair to boot.”

Not all the scalp was gone. About half. A knife had been inserted at the hairline, then the skin peeled back like the peel on an apple. Queasiness overcame Charley, and he averted his eyes. “Who would do such a thing?”

“A Shoshone.” Enos was examining the arrows. He tapped an empty sheath attached to the killer’s belt. “And he used Noonan’s knife to do the scalpin’.”

Tony’s brow knit. “What is a Shoshone doing in Painted Rock?”

“You’re askin’ me?” Enos snickered. “My brain would explode if I tried to make sense of this mess.”

A metallic click warned them they were not alone. A curly-headed man with the barbed tip of an arrow sticking from his shirt had a Colt fixed on them. He fit the description of Curly Means. Incredibly, he was grinning. “Where the hell did you three come from?”

“We’re just passin’ through,” Enos replied, holding his Sharps behind his back. “We couldn’t help but notice everybody is killin’ everybody else, so we ducked back here until all the shootin’ stops.”

Curly looked at Noonan. “So this is where he got to.” His Colt dipped, and he tottered against the wall, scarlet oozing down over his lower lip and chin. “Don’t this beat all? Done in by a damned redskin old enough to be Methuselah.”

“Who?” Charley asked, but it fell on ears that couldn’t hear. The Hoodoo’s eyes were glazing, and his Colt had fallen from fingers gone limp.

“I am so confused,” Tony said.

Enos moved ahead. “Stay behind me. There’s only one of these cutthroats left, but he’s the worst of the bunch.”

Charley knew who he was referring to: Kid Falon. They found another of Gunther’s men between the general store and the saloon. Inside the saloon were two more bodies. Townsmen, from the looks of them.

“This is a regular massacre,” Enos remarked. “Someone has a heap of buryin’ to do, and it won’t be me.”

“It won’t be me either,” declared someone behind them.

Charley turned.

Kid Falon stood in the doorway, his Colts trained on them. He took a step, his eyes as flinty as quartz. “Drop the artillery, or I’ll drop you.” When their rifles had thunked to the floor, he studied them, then said, “I heard a buffalo gun go off earlier. And now one of my pards is lyin’ out in the street with a hole in him as big as a pumpkin.” He gestured at the Sharps. “Guess which one of you I’m killin’ first?”

Enos licked his lips. “I don’t suppose you’d give me a sportin’ chance?”

The Kid’s laugh was more like a growl. “If life was fair, money would grow on trees.”

Others might have cowed in fear, but Enos jutted his chin defiantly and thrust out his chest. “I figured you for yellow. Do your worst, you polecat.”

Charley couldn’t stand there and let Enos be murdered. He was standing sideways, and he lowered his right hand to his .44, hoping Falon wouldn’t notice. But the Kid did and barked, “Don’t even think it!” The very next second, the Kid snapped his head toward the street as if he had heard something, and Charley clawed out the .44.

Kid Falon spun and fired.

Charley was in motion, diving for the nearest table. Enos and Tony were also seeking cover, Tony with his revolver out. Charley and Tony squeezed off shots at the same instant, but they both must have missed, because the Kid was gliding to the right, his pistols cracking one after the other. Charley’s hat went flying. He landed on his shoulder as holes sprouted in the table. Wood chips stung his face. He fired at the Kid, but his slug hit the wall. Tony was also shooting and having no more success.

Falon aimed both Colts right at Charley. He would not miss this time.

There was the crack of a shot. Charley flinched and waited for the dark to claim him but nothing happened. It was Kid Falon who pitched onto his Colts, briefly convulsed, and died.

In the doorway was Melissa, tendrils of gunsmoke curling from the barrel of her revolver. She rushed inside. “Is anyone hurt?”

Charley slowly stood and looked down at himself. He shook his right leg. He shook his left. He wriggled both arms and grinned. “I’ll be damned.”

Tony had taken a slug through the fleshy part of his left arm. It had gone clean through and was hardly bleeding at all.

“Good shootin’, Missy,” Enos complimented her. Chuckling, he rolled Kid Falon over. “This man-huntin’ sure was easier than I thought it would be. Maybe we should do it for a livin’. After we turn these buzzards in for the reward, how about if we go after the James gang?”

Some pieces of the jigsaw forever remained a mystery.

After freeing the settlers, Charley and his friends made a thorough search of the settlement but never came across the Shoshone. They did find a half-dead man with severe rope burns on his neck lying in a flower patch. Mrs. Shadley offered to nurse him back to health so they put him in her parlor. Months later, Charley heard the man worked for the government, and that when he was fit enough to return to Washington, D.C., Mrs. Shadley had gone along as his new wife.

Out of gratitude, the people of Painted Rock let them have whatever they wanted, including extra pack horses, canvas to wrap the bodies in, and a buckboard to transport them. By the second week of the trip back to Denver, the smell was so rank, they flipped a coin each morning; the loser had to drive the buckboard.

The Rocky Mountain News carried their story on the front page, and for a while they were the toast of the city. Walter Radtke didn’t dare touch them.

Enos soaked up enough liquor to kill twenty men, dallied with any woman who looked at him twice, then had to leave Denver in a hurry after the mayor’s older sister went to His Honor and accused Enos of trifling with her affections. Later, Charley was told Enos had drifted into Arizona, went off into the Superstition Mountains in search of gold, and vanished.

Tony Fabrizio wasted no time leaving for New York. He planned to send Maria the money for her passage. Then they would find somewhere they could live without fear of retribution. “If there is such a place,” Tony said the last night before he left. He shook Charley’s hand. “You have made my fondest dream possible. For that I can never thank you enough.”

“I am proud to call you my friend,” Charley said.

Tony gave them an address in New York City where he could be reached. Charley wrote to him twice but never received an answer. Charley liked to think things worked out, and Tony and Maria lived long and happy lives together.

As for Charley and Melissa, they were married two days after they reached Denver. Eventually they moved to Kentucky and bought a farm next to Charley’s parents. Five children and fifty years later, they often sat in their rocking chairs in the cool of the evening and reminisced about their days as manhunters.

One such night, with stars twinkling above and cows lolling in the meadow by their barn, Melissa looked thoughtfully at Charley. “Tell me true. If you had it to do all over again, would you do it the same?”

Charley smiled and clasped her hand.

“What do you think?”