The Black Heart Crypt

The stable owner, a doll all decked out in riding pants and one of them velvety chin-strap helmets, walked the big black stallion into a horse trailer hooked up to the rear bumper of a heavy-duty pickup truck.

She’d already tossed in a saddle and a bunch of what they called tack.

“You certainly know how to pick a horse, Mr. Ickes,” she said to Norman, who was really Crazy Izzy Ickleby. “Ebony’s bloodlines go all the way back to the first Arabian stallion brought to this continent in 1723.”

The purebred horse’s tail plume swished back and forth proudly as Miss Horseypants patted his glossy flanks.

“Look, doll, it’s getting dark. Whattaya say we quit flappin’ our gums and go into the barn there and settle up?”

“It’s a paddock, sir, not a barn.”

“Tomato, tomahto.” Izzy reached into Norman’s pocket and pulled out the wad of cash he had pinched from the hardware store.

“You intend to pay for Ebony with cash?”

“What, my lettuce is no good?”

“Well, I’m just surprised you would carry so much money on your person.”

“Sure, sure. I’m lousy with dough.”

“Very well. I’ll write up the papers.”

“Swell.”

“After, of course, you give me the five hundred thousand dollars.”

They closed up the horse carrier and went back into the small office at the front of the stables.

“I don’t mean to be rude, sir, but might I see the rest of your cash?”

“Sure, sure.”

Izzy reached down into his coat pocket. The one with the pistol packed in it. He whipped the weapon up and bashed the lady hard on the head with the butt of it.

The dizzy dame crumpled to the floor. She was out cold.

“Ooh, that was incredible,” said Norman’s voice inside Izzy’s head. “I never knocked anybody out before. I never even punched a person.”

“Stick around, kid. I’m just gettin’ started.”

Izzy dragged the unconscious dame into Ebony’s empty stall, tied her up to a hitching post with a bunch of leather bridles, stuffed a wad of hay into her kisser, and gagged her tight with a cowboy-style kerchief he found hanging on a hook.

“That ought to hold her,” he said when he finished binding and gagging the stable owner.

“Now can we please go kill Stephen Snertz?” Norman’s voice begged inside Izzy’s head.

A black raven swooped into the stables and landed on the top rail of a stall.

“Haw!” it croaked.

Izzy got the picture.

“Sorry, Norm. No can do. Snertz will have to wait. Seems Barnabas wants to go on a pony ride.”