The Stalking Death Read online

  “You talk funny,” the little girl said.

  “Emma Lou, that’s a terrible thing for you to say!” Emma Lou’s mother scolded.

  “There is no harm done, ma’am. ’Tis sure I am that the Scottish brogue that rolls off m’ tongue, sounds a bit queer to the wee lass.”

  “I didn’t mean bad funny,” Emma Lou said, trying to make amends.

  “’N it wasn’t bad the way I took it,” Duff said.

  “We’re going to see Gramma,” the little girl said. “She lives in Chugwater.”

  “Does she now? Chugwater is a mighty foine place, with many good people. If your nana lives there then she must be a good person, too, especially to have a pretty wee lass like you as a granddaughter.”

  “Do you like pie?” Emma Lou asked.

  “Aye, pie is one of my favorite things.”

  “What kind do you like best?”

  “Oh, cherry, I think. ’N what would be your favorite?”

  “I like anything my gramma makes. She has a store in Chugwater where she makes pies.”

  “Tell me, lass, your nana wouldn’t be Mrs. Vi Winslow, now, would she?”

  “You know my mother?” the woman asked, surprised by Duff’s comment.

  “Aye, but then Mrs. Winslow’s pies are so good that everyone knows her.”

  Suddenly there was the sound of gunfire outside, and the coach came to a quick stop.

  “Oh! What’s happening?” the woman asked.

  Someone’s head appeared in the window of the coach. The face was covered with a hood. “Everybody out,” he ordered, brandishing a pistol. He jerked the door open and Duff and the others had to step outside. In addition to the man who had ordered the coach emptied, there were two more masked men, both of whom were mounted. And like the man on the ground, they held pistols.

  “Now, you, driver, throw down the bank pouch,” the man on the ground ordered.

  “What makes you think we’re carrying a bank pouch?” the driver replied.

  “I ain’t a-tellin’ you again. Throw that bank pouch down.”

  “And I told you, we ain’t carryin’ a bank pouch,” G. F. Guy insisted.

  Without so much as another word, the outlaw shot the old cowhand who had been riding beside the driver. Hit in the head, the man tumbled across the wheel, falling to the ground. It took but one glance to know that he was dead.

  “Maybe you’ll listen to me now.”

  “Mister, you done kilt a innocent man there for no good reason,” the driver replied, the fear in his voice evident. “I told you, we ain’t a-carryin’ nothin’ of any value.”

  The masked man turned his pistol toward Wang.

  “No, don’t shoot the Chinaman,” one of the mounted robbers said. “There don’t nobody give a damn if a Chinaman gets kilt. Grab the little girl. If he don’t throw the pouch down, kill her. ’N if that don’t work, we’ll kill the boy.”

  “No! Take me instead!” Emma Lou’s mother shouted.

  As the coach robber on the ground reached toward Emma Lou, neither he, nor either of the riders, noticed the almost imperceptible nod between Duff and Wang. Then, moving so quickly that it was done before any of the three outlaws realized what was happening, Wang brought the knife edge of his hand against the back of the outlaw’s neck, and he went down. Even as the outlaw was going down, Duff drew his pistol.

  “What the hell? Kill ’em! Kill ’em all!” one of the two mounted outlaws shouted.

  The two men raised their guns, but neither of them got so much as a single shot off. Duff fired twice, and the saddles of both horses were emptied.

  Emma Lou had rushed to her mother’s side and wrapped her arms around her. Her brother, rather than being frightened, clapped his hands in glee.

  “You killed both of them!” he said. “They sure made a mistake tryin’ to steal from us, didn’t they?”

  “That they did, sonny, that they did,” the drummer said. He looked at Duff. “Mister, I don’t know who you are, but I’ll tell you true, I believe you’re near ’bout as fast as Wynton Miller.” He pointed to the man Wang had hit. “I suggest we tie this one up before he comes to.”

  “He will not wake,” Wang said.

  “What do you mean he won’t wake up? He wasn’t shot.”

  “His neck is broken,” Wang said.

  “How can you be sure about that?”

  “I am the one who broke his neck.”

  “Just by hittin’ ’im like that?”

  “Mister, I have seen Wang break boards, one inch thick,” Duff said. He pointed to the man on the ground. “’Tis for sure this man will nae be waking up.”

  “What are we goin’ to do with ’em?” the driver asked. “We can’t just leave ’em here, on the road.”

  “Would ye be for knowin’ the name of the cowhand?” Duff asked.

  “Yeah, we was talkin’ quite a bit. I don’ know his last name, but he tole me to call ’im Billy. He’s a rider for the Pitchfork brand. That is, he was,” the driver added.

  “We’ll put him on top of the coach, for now, ’n when we get back to Chugwater we’ll send word to Mr. Allen out at Pitchfork. ’Tis sure, I am, that he’ll be wanting to make some arrangements for the burial of his hand.”

  “What about these here others?” the driver asked. “Think we should throw ’em up there with Billy?”

  “Nae, Billy was a good mon,” Duff said. “I would nae wish to make him have to enter the hereafter with such brigands. We’ll throw their bodies across their horses, then tie the horses onto the back of the coach.”

  * * *

  The arrival of a stagecoach always drew attention from the citizens, but this time nearly half the town turned out, their curiosity aroused by the three horses, each horse with a body belly down over the saddle.

  Sheriff Sharpie approached the coach as soon as it stopped, and he looked toward the bodies.

  “You didn’t take the hoods off ?” he asked.

  “I dinnae want the wee ones to have to see their faces,” Duff said.

  Sheriff Sharpie nodded. “Yeah, I reckon I can see that. I’ll take ’em on down to Mr. Welsh. Looks like the county will be paying for the burials.”

  “The man on top o’ the coach is named Billy ’n rides for the Pitchfork brand,” Duff said. “I expect Dale Allen will pay for his burial.”

  “Billy? Oh, that must be Billy Hughes. A good man, he’s been with Mr. Allen for a long time, so I expect he will want to make the arrangements. I’ll send Deputy Logan out to the Pitchfork and let them know what happened.”

  “You said you were going to get some pie,” Emma Lou said.

  “Aye, lass, that I did. ’N what about you, Johnny? Will you be wanting some pie as well?”

  Johnny was Emma Lou’s older brother, and Duff had gotten to know the whole family better, for the last few miles of the trip.

  “I like pie,” Johnny replied with a broad smile.

  Fifteen minutes later Duff, Wang, Ethel Mae Joyce and her two children, Johnny and Emma Lou, were seated around a table at Vi’s Pies. Mr. Jordan, the drummer, declined the invitation to join them, because he had business to attend to.

  “Emma Lou told me that you liked cherry pie the best,” Vi said. “But didn’t I already know that, the way you go through a piece whenever you and Elmer pay me a visit? And Wang, fried bow ties and honey for you.”

  Wang smiled and dipped his head. “A thousand thanks, Madam Vi,” he said.

  “I’m so thankful to the two of you for saving the lives of Ethel Mae and my two grandchildren,” Vi said.

  “’Tis sorry I am about the violence in front of the wee ones,” Duff said.

  “Oh, don’t be silly, Mr. MacCallister,” Ethel Mae said. “I’m just thankful that you and Mr. Wang were on the coach. Why, there’s no telling what might have happened if you hadn’t been.”

  * * *

  As Duff, Wang, and the others enjoyed the dessert provided by Vi Winslow, down at the opposite end of the street,
several people were gathered around the three upright coffins, each occupied by the body of the would-be stagecoach robbers.

  “I don’t know what ever give them the idea that Jim Bob was carryin’ a bank pouch,” one of the onlookers said.

  “I don’t know, neither. All I know is, it’s a good thing Duff MacCallister ’n that Chinaman that works for him was on the coach, or more ’n likely that little girl woulda been kilt. ’N Mr. Guy, too, I’m a-thinkin’.”

  “You know who that feller there, in the middle is, don’t you?” one of the crowd asked, pointing toward the center of the three coffins. “That there is Zeke Bodine.”

  “Zeke Bodine? The gunfighter?”

  “Yes, ’n he’s got ’im a brother, Lucien Bodine, who’s even faster.”

  “If you want to talk about fast, what about MacCallister? The stagecoach driver told me that the two men he shot already had their pistols drawed but that didn’t make no nevermind to MacCallister. He drawed his own pistol ’n shot ’em afore it was that they could do anything.”

  “More ’n likely, Bodine’s brother is goin’ to raise some hell when he hears about this.”

  “Yeah, but that’s liable to be a while. I hear tell that he’s down in Texas now. Or maybe it’s New Mexico or Arizona. I ain’t quite sure where it is, but I just know for sure that he ain’t nowhere close around here.”

  * * *

  As Duff and Wang were leaving Vi’s Pies, they saw Dale Allen, owner of the Pitchfork Ranch. Though not as large as Sky Meadow, Pitchfork was quite large and employed a dozen full-time hands. Allen was driving by in a buckboard, but he stopped when he saw Duff.

  “I heard you were on the stage when Billy got hisself killed,” Allen said.

  “Aye, I was.”

  “Nothin’ you coulda done to stop it, I don’t suppose.”

  “I’m sorry. ’Twas no way to know that the brigand was about to shoot your mon.”

  “No, I don’t reckon there was,” Allen said. “Mr. Guy told me what happened, ’n how you saved the little girl. I’m glad you were able to do that.”

  “’Twas Wang who saved the lass.”

  “Yes, well, what’s done is done. And I’m damn glad that the son of a bitch who kilt Billy is dead now. I thank you for that.”

  Allen nodded at Duff, who returned the nod, then Allen slapped the reins on the back of his team, and the buckboard jumped ahead.

  * * *

  When Duff and Wang returned to Sky Meadow, Duff’s ranch, they were met by Elmer Gleason.

  “Well, that’s a good-lookin’ saddle you bought while you was over in Bordeaux,” Elmer said, running his hand across the tooled leather. “And what about you, Wang? Did you get the knives you wanted?”

  “Very good knives.”

  “You won’t be sneakin’ up on me to cut my throat in the middle of the night, will you?”

  “You do not need to worry,” Wang said.

  “Yeah, so you say. But who can trust a heathen?”

  “You will not feel a thing.”

  Duff and Elmer laughed.

  “Oh, did you hear about Clifford Potts?” Elmer asked.

  “Aye, I heard that he passed.”

  “Well, it warn’t no surprise to no one, bein’ as he’s been at death’s door for two or three months now,” Elmer said.

  “I’ll be attending his funeral,” Duff said.

  “Yeah, me, too. He was a good man.”

  Chapter Three

  Sulphur Springs, Texas

  Brad Houser was quite vain about his appearance. He bathed frequently, he kept his blond hair neatly trimmed, and he was clean-shaven. Most women found him a handsome man when first seeing him, but upon closer observation there was something about him that was off-putting. Though few could put it in words, they believed it was something about his eyes.

  His eyes were a very pale blue, but, as a woman once said when describing him, “His eyes don’t let you see into his soul. They are like the eyes of a perfect portrait . . . without life.”

  At the moment, a man named Robert Dempster was in Brad Houser’s office. An attorney-at-law, Houser was one of only two lawyers in town, and he represented the Bank of Sulphur Springs, which was owned by Dempster.

  “One hundred thousand dollars,” Robert Dempster said, a broad smile spreading across his face. “That’s the most money we have ever had, at any one time.”

  “Bob, have you told anyone else how much money you have on hand?”

  “Of course I have. Why, it’ll be in the newspaper this afternoon. Something like that is good advertising.”

  “Yes, I suppose it is,” Houser agreed.

  * * *

  Not long after Dempster left, Houser had another visitor to his office. Like Houser, the visitor had blond hair, but unlike Houser, his hair was long and unkempt. He had a purple and disfiguring scar that started just above his left eyebrow, darted down through the eyelid, sparing the eyeball but reappearing in the lower aspect of the socket, and ending just above the cheekbone.

  “I was almost unable to locate you,” Houser said to the man who was now sitting in the same chair that Robert Dempster had occupied a short time earlier. “I didn’t know what name you had taken.”

  “I wrote you a letter ’n told you I’d changed my name to Shamrock.”

  “I didn’t open the letter and didn’t even think about it until the letter I sent you came back undeliverable. Shamrock, like the clover? How did you come by such a name?”

  “I seen a saloon that was called the Shamrock Saloon, ’n I just likened the sound of it so I taken it for my own name. Anyhow, I don’t know why you’re so surprised. After you got me off that last charge, you told me I should change my name.”

  “Indeed I did tell you that,” Houser said. “Your real name had accumulated too much opprobrium.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means that people connected your name to the evil things you had done.”

  “Like the name you used for a while? What do you think people thought when they heard that name?”

  “That was no more my real name than this one is,” Houser said. “I not only shed myself of that name, I have also abandoned the persona of my former self. I take it that you have done the same thing. Is Shamrock your first or last name?”

  “It’s my last name. Sid is my first name. Sid Shamrock.”

  Houser nodded.

  “What’d you send for me for? I thought you said you didn’t want me comin’ round no more. You told me to keep away.”

  “Yes, but I also told you to keep in touch with me, so I could get ahold of you if it became necessary.”

  “Yeah, well, you done that, ’n here I am. What is it you’re a-wantin’?”

  “Have you any money?”

  “What? No, I ain’t got no money. That is, I don’t have none to speak of. You’re a big rich lawyer, what are you askin’ me that for? You wantin’ to make the borry of some money? ’Cause if you do, you done come to the wrong person.”

  “I don’t wish to borrow any money. I asked you about the state of your finances to see if you would be interested in a job I have for you.”

  “A job? You mean a job like goin’ to work ever’ day?”

  “No. I mean a job that will pay you ten thousand dollars.”

  “Ten thousand dollars?” Shamrock said, fairly shouting the words. “You’ve got a job for me that pays ten thousand dollars?”

  “Why don’t you go outside and shout it in the street?” Houser invited.

  “Why do you want me to do that?” Shamrock asked, clearly confused by the suggestion.

  “Never mind. Actually, I will pay you fifteen thousand,” Houser said. “I expect you to find someone to work with, and you can pay him five thousand.”

  “Who do you want me to kill?”

  “I don’t want you to kill anyone. As a matter of fact, if you do kill someone in the course of this job, you won’t get one . . . red . . . cent.”

&
nbsp; “All right, all right, I won’t kill nobody. What is the job?”

  “I want you to rob the Bank of Sulphur Springs.”

  “Are you kidding? You want me to rob a bank in your own hometown? I thought you was always a-sayin’ you didn’t want me to be doin’ nothin’ anywhere close to where it was that you was a-livin’.”

  “Yes, because neither your skills nor your demeanor are sufficient to the task of keeping my name out of it. But this is a job I have conceived myself, and if you follow my instructions explicitly, you will make yourself a tidy sum of money, and you won’t be in danger. But of course you must leave town immediately and never return.”

  “Yeah, all right, I can do that. Leave town, I mean. But what does expilla . . . explea . . . uh, whatever it is that word you say that I’m supposed to follow?”

  “It merely means that you are to do everything I say.”

  “All right.”

  * * *

  Two days later, Brad Houser spent the afternoon with Arnold Stone, a nearby rancher who was a client of his. Houser had helped him draw up a will.

  “You’ve done quite well for yourself, Mr. Stone,” Houser said as he examined the figures.

  “Yes, well, I came here right after the war, was able to get the land for a song, and then make a gather of cattle that, during the war, had run free ’n started multiplying.”

  “So ranching can be quite a lucrative profession.”

  “Well, if you got into it early enough, yes.” Stone shook his head. “Not that many opportunities left here in Texas now. If a man really wanted to get a start now, why, he’d have to go someplace like Wyoming, or Utah, or the Dakotas, I would think.”

  “Interesting observation,” Houser replied. He put the papers he had been working on in a small satchel. “You come into town sometime next week, Mr. Stone, and I’ll have these papers ready.”

  “Thanks. And thanks for coming out here to work on this for me. You didn’t have to, you know. I would have been glad to come into town.”

  “I didn’t mind at all,” Houser said.

  * * *

  In Sulphur Springs, Sid Shamrock and Abe Sobel waited outside the bank.