A Coffin Full Of Dollars (23 page)

"Shut up, shut up,
shut up!
" Apachito yelled wildly. "Get that goddam trash out of here. I told you there'd be a hanging today, but it's going to come
ahead
of the rest of the show instead of afterward." He whirled toward his pack. "Come on, you goddam numbskulls! Loosen the rope and give him a drink. What the hell is the fun of hanging a man who's already dead?"

Battered, bloody, dazed and half strangled, Shadrach felt the slip knot yanked loose from his throat. He sucked in a great lungful of air that burned like fire. The neck of a bottle was mashed against his swollen lips and raw whiskey gushed into his mouth and over his lacerated face, eating like acid into the cuts and scrapes.

Dimly he could hear Apachito roaring, "What the hell do you call that thing up there?" and Dandy's reply, "A trapeze."

"You've got it wrong, dummy. It's a gallows. Throw the rope over and hoist the sonofabitch onto a horse. And be goddam sure you let him down
just
before he quits kickin' so we can sharpen him up and hang him again."

He heard the slap of rope against metal and a shout of triumph. The noose was rammed down over his head and tightened around his aching throat. Rough hands hoisted him into the saddle of a skittish horse that side-danced, almost unseating him.

A harsh voice called, "
Now
, chief?" and Apachito's guttural replied, "
Now!
"

There was the vicious sound of a whip slashing against flesh and the horse lunged under him. The rope tightened with a jerk that nearly tore his head off. His vision filled with a blaze of multicolored lights.

CHAPTER 25

Every eye was focused on the man being hanged. No one even noticed when The Man With No Name came around the back of Hunk's wagon, the cocked pistol swinging at his side. Shadrach was being hoisted onto the nervous horse. The rope noosed around his throat ran up and over the trapeze swing and down to a half-dozen eager hands at the side. The bandit who, with considerable logic, was called "Ape" stood behind the horse, holding a whip.

Ape looked toward Apachito. "
Now
, chief?"

The bounty hunter leveled the pistol, using his left forearm for a rest, concentrating his whole attention on sighting.

"
Now!
" Apachito barked.

The whip slashed down, the horse bolted forward, the rope tightened and the hunter fired. Two feet above Shadrach's head the rope parted with an audible
twang!

He dropped back into the saddle. The terrified horse went into a succession of spine-jolting buck-jumps. Shadrach, off balance and still dazed, with his hands tied behind his back, was trying frantically to recover his balance and get his feet back into the stirrups. He had almost succeeded when the horse gave a violent, twisting, sun-fishing jump and Shadrach went flying out of the saddle to land heavily on his side.

At the sound of the shot the outlaws all whirled around. For a long moment they were too stunned at the sight of the bounty hunter to do more than gape. Apachito was the first to shake off the paralysis of shock. Yelling, he dived off his horse on the far side, using the animal as a shield.

Two of the outlaws made the fatal mistake of grabbing for their weapons. The hunter's hand was a blur of motion, slapping the hammer of his gun. The two shots sounded almost as one and the pair paid the penalty for their rashness.

As the hunter swung his gun toward the others, Apachito burst from behind his horse. Diving into the roped-off stage area, he caught Molly around the waist, swung her in front as a shield and put the muzzle of his pistol against her head.

"Drop your gun before I count five or the whip-woman dies. One..."

"
Molly
," Dandy bleated wildly. He flung out his hands toward the bounty hunter in a gesture of appeal. "For God's sake, do what he says. He isn't bluffing."

"Apachito never bluffs.
Two
..."

"No, no, no!" Shadrach yelled. He was on his knees, struggling to reach one of his boot heels behind him. "Don't do it. Use your head. Don't listen to Dandy."

"
Three
..." Apachito said.

Shadrach finally got his hands on the boot heel and twisted. There was a
click
and a thin sliver of razor-sharp steel sprang out of a hidden recess. He began to saw his bonds against it while sweat ran down over the dried blood caked on his face.

"Don't be a damned fool," he cried hoarsely. "Can't you see he's got to kill all of us to protect the secret of his hideout here? Hang on to your gun and we've still got a fighting chance."

The rope binding his wrists parted and he scrambled to his feet, massaging numbed wrists.

"
Four
..."

The bounty hunter opened his hand and let the pistol fall to the ground. The outlaws whooped triumphantly and snatched out their guns.

Apachito yelled, "Don't kill him! The other one we will finish hanging now, but this one we will keep alive for a very,
very
long time."

Shadrach moaned, "Oh, you damned fool! Oh, you crown prince of idiots! I
told
you."

Apachito lowered the gun he had been holding to Molly's head, let go of her waist and stepped away. He leered at the hunter, then glanced past him and screamed like a woman.

The hunter whirled around. Bounding toward them from the direction of the pass was Elmer, the missing lion, looking more gaunt and moth-eaten than ever. Some obscure feline instinct had led him here to the circus wagons and the people who meant food and shelter.

Apachito screeched again and lit out in the direction of his headquarters cabin. Most of the outlaws, infected with the leader's panic, raced after him in mindless flight. One, however, bolder than the rest, held his ground and took careful aim at the approaching beast.

The hunter's hand flashed under his poncho and came out with the extra pistol he had tucked into his waistband for emergencies. He shot from the hip without aiming. The outlaw dropped his unfired gun and went down, a dark stain spreading over the region of his heart.

Shadrach caught up the outlaw's gun and loosed a shot at the knot of men ramming their way into the headquarters cabin. When nothing happened, he swore wrathfully.

"Damn these short-barreled popguns with no range. If that bastard hadn't taken my cannon, there'd have been one less of those rats to deal with." He glared at the bounty hunter. "You skunk! I forgot about the extra gun you'd tucked away. You had no intention of
really
surrendering."

"I had to lure him away from Molly before the shooting started."

Molly was on her knees with Laura beside her, both hugging Elmer and trying to dodge the affectionate caresses of a tongue like a blacksmith's file. Cora in her clown outfit, was clinging to Dandy. One side of his face was liberally smeared with her makeup.

"Come on," the hunter said under his breath. "I've got a hunch we're next in line for a hugging, if we hang around here. Let's go cash in the rest of our bounty chips."

They stripped the gun belts from the fallen trio and trotted off toward the big cabin where Apachito and his surviving followers had holed up. On the way the hunter reloaded his own familiar gun and slipped it back in its holster, returning the spare to his waistband.

The cabin in which the outlaws had taken refuge was very nearly an impregnable fortress. The log walls would turn a cannon ball and the heavy single door was barred with an oak timber. The two glassless windows, one in either side wall, were fitted with iron bars. Inside was a well-stocked arsenal of guns and ammunition.

"What's the plan now?" Shadrach panted as they neared the cabin, approaching from the front to keep out of a possible line of fire from either window. "Do we lay siege and starve them out?"

The hunter shook his head. "That could take forever. For all we know, they might have a month's food supply stored there somewhere."

"So what else can we do? If we try busting in, we could get our heads blown off, and they can see out through those bars a lot better than we could see in to pick them off."

"Dynamite. He used some today to blow the face of that cliff off, and he must use plenty of it breaking open safes and strongboxes. He's too smart and too jumpy to store it around their living quarters, so there's got to be a magazine, probably out in the woods somewhere."

"Oh, great," Shadrach said ironically. "So to save time we spend maybe weeks hunting for something you're only guessing exists. And while we're hunting, what's to prevent their slipping out and making their getaway?"

"But we won't be hunting. We'll be bluffing, old boy." He moved to the corner of the cabin and raised his voice. "Oh, Apachito! Thanks for the fine supply of dynamite. It's more than enough to blow this place to matchwood. Unless, of course, you'd prefer to push your guns out the window first and then come out with your hands up."

He waited but only silence answered him,

"All right," he called. "You got one chance and that was it." He dropped his voice to a conversational tone. "Let's get started. Shad. I figure two sticks under each corner ought to be plenty. You take the two back corners and I'll take the front."

"Right," Shadrach said, taking his cue. "But give me a good length of that fuse. I want to be far away when these logs start flying."

The bounty hunter picked up a stick and began jabbing it into the dirt under the base log. From the open window came a low murmur of voices, with Apachito's harsh guttural voice overriding the others.

Suddenly a strange voice called, "Hold up out there.
He
can stay here and get hisself blowed to hell if he wants to, but the rest of us are coming out. Here's our guns to prove it's no trick."

One after another, nine holstered guns with their belts were pushed out between the bars. There was the scraping sound of the bar being lifted from the door.

Suddenly Apachito's voice said, "Hold on a minute. I'm going out with you, after all." He raised his voice. "Here's my gun and the big, long one I took off the other fella."

Shadrach snatched his own custom-made gun eagerly. "Now I don't feel so naked."

He spun the cylinder, checking the loads, then took his place beside the hunter, both guns covering the door as it opened. One by one the nine survivors sidled out, holding their empty hands out wide and moving into a rough line. Apachito was the last to appear. He stood in the doorway a moment, glaring at the pair, then moved to the end of the line.

Casually he reached up with his right hand and scratched an itch that seemed to start on his lower ribs and reach around to the small of his back. His hand disappeared behind him for an instant. When it reappeared it was gripping a cocked pistol that had been tucked into his waistband at the back.

He was still raising the gun when the hunter's slug took him between the eyes.

The other nine were frantically clawing at their backs. The hunter's hand slapped the hammer of his gun again and again. Beside him Shadrach's huge gun was bellowing. Then it was over as suddenly as it had begun.

Dandy charged up and skidded to a stop, staring with bulging eyes at the ten bodies on the ground.

"My God," he muttered. "A complete and total wipe-out. At last we can all breathe again and stop wondering what that monster will come up with next." He grabbed the hunter's hand and pumped it. "Saving our lives seems to be a habit with you. If there is anything I can do to show our appreciation..."

"Now that you mention it," the hunter said, "there is. I can't think of anything I'd rather have right now than a nice, hot bath. I'm sure Molly and the girls won't mind if I borrow their bathtub just this once."

Dandy gaped at him, the color draining out of his face. "B-bath? Tub? Oh—well, I don't know. Molly and the girls are almighty finicky about letting anyone else, even me, use their tub. I—I'll go ask them, but d-don't get your hopes up."

He whirled and galloped off toward the wagons. Shadrach scowled at his rival.

"Do you mind telling me what that silly exchange was all about?"

The bounty hunter grinned and said, "Sometimes, old boy, you amaze me by overlooking the obvious. I was sure you'd notice that the bathtub has almost the same capacity as the money chest, so what better place to hide a half-million dollars?"

When they got to the wagons, Dandy was on his back beneath Molly's rig, struggling to untie the lashings holding the tub up against the wagon bed. At the sound of their steps he turned up a stricken face and his pallor increased markedly.

"Dandy, Dandy," the hunter said. "I don't know what we're going to do with you—trying to cheat your best friends as well as the bank."

"I don't know what you mean," Dandy squawled. "M
-
Molly said maybe, after she has
her
bath, she'll let you..."

The hunter squatted down and rapped Dandy on top of the head with his knuckles.

"You're putting a terrible strain on this thing, Dandy, trying to think up answers. Now, I'll finish untying the tub while you trot along and unpack the money chest and bring it here to us. And don't keep us waiting."