Rage of Eagles (27 page)

“No good-byes for John Bailey and his family?” Dan asked.

Falcon shook his head. “No. John will understand. I'll write him a letter once I get back to Colorado and make certain my kids are all right.”

The men shook hands all around. “Good luck with your new lives, boys,” Falcon told the mountain men. “I might drift back up this way one of these days.”

That was probably a lie and the mountain men all knew it.

“See you, boy,” Big Bob said, lifting a hand in hail and farewell.

Falcon sat his saddle for a moment, smiling at his friends. Then he turned Hell's head and rode out of town and out of the people's lives. He did not look back.

“I didn't like that man when he first arrived in town,” the doctor said, walking up and wiping his hands on a bloody apron. “But I soon discovered that first impressions can be wrong. ”

“He's the spitting image of his pa, that's for shore,” Stumpy said. “And behaves just like Jamie, too. Them Noonans is gonna be mighty sorry when Falcon MacCallister catches up with them.”

“Takes a sorry son of a bitch to threaten to kill somebody's kids,” Dan remarked. “I don't believe I ever heard anybody say they was deliberately settin' out to kill children.”

“That's low, for a fact,” Big Bob said. He smiled for a moment. “I got me an idea, boys.” He motioned for his friends to follow him off a few yards. “I got me an idea on how to finish Nance Noonan's little empire. You boys interested?”

“Shore,” Wildcat said quickly. “If it'll help Falcon, let's do it.”

“It might involve some breakin' of the law, sorta,” Big Bob cautioned.

“Oh, my!” Dan feigned great concern and alarm. “How awful. My goodness, Bob. How could you even think of doin' anything that might be agin the law?”

“I'm shocked right down to my socks,” Stumpy said.

“You ain't wearin' no socks,” Big Bob told him.

“Yes I is too!” Stumpy said. “I put me on a clean pair last week.”

“Oh,” Big Bob replied. “Well, 'scuse me. Gather round, boys. We gonna have some hard ridin' to do in a few minutes. This is what we're gonna do....”

Somebody rustled the entire Double N herd that night and set Stegman's .44 herd into a wild stampede, running the cattle all over three counties. The men Noonan had left to guard the herd offered no resistance to the rustlers. A range detective later told a court of law that he'd heard that a group of men rode up to the herd early that night. They talked with the cowboys for a moment—it appeared that some money exchanged hands—then the Double N cowboys rode off and were never seen again. And neither was Noonan's herd.

The Nance Noonan empire was crushed, utterly destroyed in one night. Stegman's little domain was likewise trampled into the dust of northern Wyoming. The two men who were once cattle kingpins with dreams of starting a kingdom all their own were ruined financially.

And to make matters worse, they had Falcon MacCallister dogging their back trail with blood in his eyes.

Nance Noonan's wife had left him years back and Rod Stegman had sent his wife to visit friends in San Francisco the week before the slaughter in town. Rod had given her ample funds to see her through any hard times. Which was good thinking on Stegman's part, because she was never going to see her husband or brothers again.

Nance and his brothers and sons and Stegman and his brothers and sons were camped about twenty-five miles from town when a lone hand who'd decided to stay loyal to the brand rode in with the news of their herds.

“We still got some cattle bein' held in other places,” Noonan said, after he'd finished stomping around and kicking this and that and cussing to beat the band. “There ain't neither one of us totally ruined.”

Stegman looked at his brother-in-law without speaking. Nance just didn't get it: They were finished. They were dead men. Nobody makes threats like he was told Nance had made to a MacCallister and lives for very long. If it took ten years or a lifetime, Falcon would find them both and kill them. It wouldn't make any difference if Nance was to get down on his hands and knees and beg for mercy and forgiveness.... Falcon would just shoot him right between the eyes and walk off. And it didn't make one bit of difference that Rod hadn't been there when Nance made his threats or even if Rod would ride off now and turn his back on Nance Noonan. Not one bit of difference in the world.

Rod got up off his blankets and walked over to the coffeepot, pouring himself a cup. He looked around him. The kin of he and Nance were sprawled on the ground, and it was not a bunch to inspire a great deal of confidence.

“Should have stayed where we were,” Rod muttered. “We had it made and didn't have sense enough to realize it.”

Jack Noonan walked over to the coffeepot and poured himself a cup. He grinned at Rod, exposing rotting teeth. “Me and the boys been talkin', Rod. We figure we can take over that Colorado town where them MacCallisters is settled. What do you think about that?”

Rod Stegman just stared at the man. Take over a town where the MacCallisters lived? The man was a bigger fool than he looked.

“I been told them MacCallister women is fine-lookin',” Jack continued. “Blond-headed and big-titted, all of 'em. Gits me excited just thinkin' about it.”

The wives and kids of the Stegman and Noonan clan had been put on stagecoaches and sent off to safety before the raid on the town. Most would never see their husbands again.

“How's your wife, Jack?” Rod asked sarcastically.

“Ugly,” the man replied.

A rifle shot split the night and Jack Noonan went down to the ground in a lifeless heap, the front of his shirt bloody.

Rod Stegman hit the ground and rolled behind a mound of earth. “Falcon MacCallister,” he muttered. “Didn't take long for the bastard to find us.”

“Douse them fires!” Nance hollered.

Another rifle shot blasted the night and one of the Stegman cousins grunted and sat down hard on the ground, both hands pressing against his bloody stomach. Then he started hollering as the pain hit him.

The fires were killed and the camp went dark. Max Stegman continued his screaming in pain.

“MacCallister!” Rod yelled. “Leave us be, man. You've done ruint us. We ain't got nothin' but the clothes on our backs. Go on and let us be.”

The dark silence of the night was the only reply to the man's pleas.

“Shut up your damn beggin', Rod,” Nance called. “Or I'll shoot you myself.”

“You go to hell, Nance,” Rod replied. “My life means more to me than a little bit of pride. I think you're crazy. You and that damn flappin' mouth of yours is what brought all this mess down on us.”

Howard Noonan Jr. said, “Shut up your face, Rod. You yeller coyote.”

Rod Stegman then offered Howard Jr. a few suggestions about where to put his words, his guns, and his horse. The saddle, too, if it would fit.

Some hundred yards from the camp, lying on a knoll, Falcon listened to the exchange and smiled.

He couldn't catch all the words, but enough of them to know those in the camp were falling apart.

Falcon backed off the knoll and walked to his horse. He mounted up and rode away. He had done all he could do for this night.

Tomorrow was another day.

Rod looked over at the dark shape of his cousin, still sitting on the ground, still screaming in pain. “Damn,” Rod muttered.

“Jack's dead,” one of Nance's boys called. “Gettin' cold already.”

“Wrap him in his blankets, Wardell,” Nance ordered. “We'll bury him in the mornin' and say some words.”

Say some words?
Rod thought.
To the Good Lord? You think He's gonna listen to anything we have to say? You're gettin' crazier with every passin' hour, Nance. The Lord quit us in disgust years ago.

“He's gone,” a lookout hollered. “I heard his horse a few seconds ago. He's headin' south from here.”

“Then let's head north,” Roan Noonan suggested. “And see if we can lose that crazy man.”

We'll never lose him,
Rod thought.
You people are walkin' around dead and don't even know it. Hell, so am I!

“What do you think, Rod?” Nance called.

“I think we're dead men,” Stegman said. “All of us. Falcon MacCallister ain't never gonna quit huntin' us until the last man is down.”

“The last one of us ain't gonna be in the ground anytime soon,” Nance came right back. “Tomorrow at first light, we're gonna start huntin' Falcon. The odds is on our side that we'll get him. Hell, we got him outnumbered by twenty-five or thirty men.”

Wouldn't make any difference if we had him outnumbered a hundred to one, Rod thought. “All right, Nance,” Rod called. “We'll try it your way come first light.”

“I want four men on guard at all times,” Nance called. “Work out the schedule and get in position. If we don't, Falcon will circle around and pick us off one at a time. The son of a bitch is worse than a damn stinkin' Injun.”

“Hell, he married a squaw,” Moe Noonan called. “That makes him just as bad.”

“For a fact,” Penrod said. “Anybody who would marry up with a red nigger is low as a snake's belly.”

“We'd be doin' the world a favor by killin' all them half-breed kids of hisn,” Hodge Noonan said. “That's the way I see it. An Injun is an Injun. I don't care what their last name is.”

Max Stegman's cries were much quieter now: hideous moans in the night. He was almost unconscious. There was nothing anyone could do for him.

“You be right, brother,” Penrod called. “You shore be right 'bout that.”

Idiots, Rod Stegman thought. He wondered how he could slip away and get gone from this pack of fools.

But it was almost as if Nance was reading his mind. “Don't be thinkin' of takin' your kin and slippin' away, Rod. You're in this same as the rest of us: to the end.”

Rod's temper flared white-hot. In the flames of the newly rekindled fire, he faced Nance. “To hell with you, Nance! I'm done takin' orders from you. Me and my kin is through with all this craziness. This thing 'tween you and Falcon is nothin' but revenge now. It's stupid. It ain't gonna solve nothin' one way or the other.”

“You bracin' me now, Rod?” Nance asked, defiance in his voice.

“You bet I am, Nance. Yeah, I am. I'm done. At first light, me and mine are pullin' out and you and yours can go right straight to hell. 'Cause that's where you're headin' real quick if you keep on movin' toward Colorado with doin' harm to Falcon's kids on your mind. I ain't havin' no part of hurtin' no more kids. I'm through with it, and I'm through with you.”

“You don't say?”

“I do say, Nance. It's over.”

Both men were conscious of their kin moving around, lining up alongside one or the other of the two men who were facing each other in the flame-danced night.

“And I say you're with me to the end of this game.”

“Go to hell, Nance.”

“No man talks to me like that.”

“I just did, Nance.”

“You're a fool, Rod.”

Stegman laughed. “That's sure the pot callin' the kettle black, Nance.”

Nance's eyes narrowed in hate and anger. “You callin' me a nigger, you bastard?”

Rod sighed. He knew he was no mental giant, but compared to his brother-in-law, he was a genius. “No, Nance. That wasn't what I meant.”

“You're a liar!”

“Forget it, Nance. Just forget it.” He called over his shoulder. “That's it, boys. We're out of here tonight. Pack it up and let's get gone.”

“You'll die here 'fore you walk out on me!” Nance yelled. “Drag iron, you coward!”

Nance went for his gun and Rod did the same. Both men were reasonably fast on the draw, but this time Nance was a hair faster. He shot his brother-in-law in the chest just as the camp exploded in sharp lances of gunfire.

Rod went down, falling backward and landing flat on his back on the ground. “Damn!” he whispered to the gunsmoke-filled night. His legs trembled once and then he was still. He closed his eyes and died.

The gunfight was over in only a few seconds. The Noonan crew had the Stegman crew outnumbered and outgunned, and it was carnage.

When the smoke had cleared and the men could once more hear, after their ears had cleared of the yammer of gunfire, Nance looked at the lifeless form of his brother-in-law and said, “We're better off without him anyhow. You .44 men that can still walk, drag your dead outta here and keep on goin'. I don't never want to see none of you again. If you're owed money, ask him for it!” He pointed at the body of Rod Stegman and laughed insanely.

Long after what was left of the .44 outfit had dragged their dead off and saddled up and got gone, Nance sat in the dark and sipped coffee. His thoughts were hate-filled. “Kill all them damn MacCallisters,” he muttered. “Ever' one of them. Goddamn Falcon MacCallister to hell. I'll burn that damn town to the ground. That's what I'll do.”

Several miles away, Falcon rolled up in his blankets and dropped off to sleep. He didn't worry about anyone sneaking up on him, not with his big horse Hell picketed close by. His last thought before sleep took him was this: It would be good to see family again.

When Nance rolled out of his blankets the next morning, he found that half a dozen of his own kin had quietly packed up their few possessions and slipped away during the night, taking off for safer parts.

Nance cussed for a moment, but it was halfhearted. The move really didn't surprise him very much. He looked out past the camp: The bodies of Rod Stegman and his men had been dragged out a few dozen yards and covered with rocks and brush. He felt no emotion at the loss of his brother-in-law. The only emotion Nance was experiencing was the one involving his someday killing Falcon MacCallister. That emotion filled him with a great deal of satisfaction.

Nance didn't notice that he and his men were stinking and filthy, their clothing dirty and soiled. He didn't notice that they all looked like a bunch of bums. He didn't care about going back and trying to round up his cattle and starting over. He just wanted to kill Falcon MacCallister and the man's kids.

Nance Noonan had quietly slipped over the line into the darkness of insanity.

The only brothers he had left alive, Penrod and Hodge, were watching him closely. They knew something was very much wrong with their brother, but they didn't know what. Neither one of them was smart enough to understand it was insanity that had taken over their brother's mind. They would figure that out before too much longer.

Nance sat on the ground long after the sun had edged over the horizon and drank coffee and muttered to himself. He drew strange symbols in the dirt while his kin waited for him to tell them to mount up and ride.

But Nance was slipping deeper into the world of madness. He was no longer capable of telling anybody anything that would make any sense.

Most of Nance's cousins saddled up their horses and rode out without saying a word to Nance. Penrod and Hodge and the few kin who were left made no attempt to stop them.

Nance's brothers began talking, talking about Nance. Nance didn't hear them, or if he did hear the words, they didn't register in his sick mind. Words to Nance were now incomprehensible.

One of Nance's cousins walked over to him and slipped his guns out of leather. Nance didn't notice. He continued to hum and talk to himself and draw those strange symbols in the dirt. Occasionally, he would laugh out loud and look around him with eyes that were strangely vacant.

Nance soiled himself, peeing in his already dirty underwear. That was what finally got through to Penrod and Hodge.

“I think somethin' done snapped in his head,” Penrod remarked in a low voice.

“He's gone crazy,” Hodge said. “I seen an ol' boy lose his marbles one time. He acted just like Nance is actin'.”

“What are we gonna do?”

“Hell, I don't know.”

Only a few miles away, to the south, Falcon had fixed his breakfast, packed up his gear, and was riding back toward the camp of Nance and his Double N crew. He had made up his mind to finish this little war that day. Hell ate up the distance, moving Falcon closer to what he thought would be a showdown. It would be, but not the kind that he imagined.

Penrod walked over to his brother and shook him by the shoulder. “Nance. We better get movin' now, boy. You hear me, Brother?”

Nance didn't look up. His brother's words were nothing but a roaring in his head.

“Nance, we got to do somethin', boy. We got to move out of here. It's time to go.”

Nance hummed a little song. Penrod walked away from his brother and sat down a few yards away. He rolled a cigarette and smoked it, then rolled and smoked another one. He did not know what to do. He couldn't just leave his brother out in the middle of nowhere.

Penrod looked around the camp at the others. At that moment he saw them all, including himself, for what they really were. They were all filthy and nasty and they all needed a good long hot bath . . . some of them more than one.

“Pitiful,” Penrod said, loud enough for all to hear. “We sure don't look like very much.”

“You sure as hell don't.” Falcon spoke, just a few yards away.

Heads turned, eyes wide in surprise that anyone could slip up on them that easily.

Falcon stood there, both hands filled with .44s. “Unbuckle your gunbelts and kick them away from you,” Falcon ordered. “And if you want to die, just touch the butt of a gun and I'll start shooting and I won't stop until my guns are empty and all of you are on the ground.”

Gunbelts quickly hit the ground.

“That's better,” Falcon said. “Now then, what's wrong with Nance?”

“Somethin's gone bad in his head,” Penrod replied. “He's real sick, MacCallister. We got to get him to a doctor.”

Falcon looked at Nance. The man was slobbering down the front of his shirt and humming a little melody over and over. Falcon could smell the stink of him from where he stood. It was really rank. Nance had soiled himself, from the way he smelled, more than once.

“A doctor won't be able to do Nance any good,” Falcon said. “Just commit your brother to an asylum, probably.”

“Reckon where one of them is?” a Noonan cousin asked.

“I don't know,” Falcon said. “I don't know what I'm going to do with you, either. I came back to kill you.”

That produced a babble of excited voices. Penrod's voice finally overrode all the others. “We're done huntin' you, Mr. MacCallister. That was all Nance's idea anyway. Yeah, we went along with it, 'cause he was the boss. But he ain't nothin' no more. He's . . . goofy.”

Falcon certainly couldn't argue that. Falcon looked at each member of the Noonan clan. They were a sorry-looking bunch, for a fact. All the fight was gone from them. They were finished; there was no doubt in Falcon's mind about that.

“All right, Falcon said. ”Pack up your possibles and get Nance on a horse. There's bound to be some sort of asylum for the insane down at the capital. Take him down there. But hear me good, boys: Stay clear of Colorado. If I see any of you there, I'll kill you. I won't say a word to you; I'll just shoot you where you stand. You understand all that?“

They all did, and said so several times in very excited voices.

Falcon nodded his head. “Leave your six-guns where they are and ride out of here. Keep your rifles to hunt meat. Move! Get gone right now!”

The Noonan clan was gone in five minutes. Out of sight. Heading for the capital. Nance sat his saddle and hummed and slobbered and peed his underwear.

Falcon walked out from the camp to look at the hastily covered bodies of Rod Stegman and his kin. Coyotes had already been working on them during the night, pulling away the branches and small logs and moving the rocks to get at the bodies. Falcon looked up into the sky. Great black carrion birds were gathering, slowly circling in patient expectation of something to eat.

“Hell with it,” Falcon muttered. “It's all over, far as I'm concerned. I'm going home.”