Adrian
recoiled at the challenge. “How in hell could he know that?” He wondered,
silently.
“See
that? Caleb? See that?” Rob yelled. “That look is a confession. He did it! He
shot Jeb!”
“Give
him a drink of water from the canteen,” Caleb commanded.
“What!?”
Rob queried, unbelieving of his ears. “Why? Just shoot the dirty bastard.”
“Just
give him the canteen,” Caleb repeated his intention. Grudgingly, Rob complied.
The
cool water seemed to revive Adrian. “Thanks!” He said to Caleb who ignored his
word.
“Ain’t
no use shooting me---again.” He offered. “That buffalo gun done killed me.
Dead!”
“You
ain’t dead---yet! I just go your upper shoulder.” Caleb replied, ice in his
voice. Pulling the “short” sword from its scabbard. “I got something special in
mind, for you,” he continued with a mirthless smile which chilled the lawman to
the bone.
This
was a mean one! Adrian realized, sizing up his enemy. It became painfully
obvious that he should have been more careful---much…more! Too late! Now!
In
the fading after-light of dusk, an eerie pale glow hung over the gruesome scene.
“You
ain’t planning on using that half-pint tooth pick on me?” Adrian pleaded,
hopefully.
Caleb
just smiled, twirling the weapon in his fingers. “Naw! I got a “big bang” just
for you.
“Gather some dry wood, Rob.” Caleb ordered
Rob. “Build us a nice, but, very small fire.”
Caleb
bound their captive’s feet together with a length of rope wrapped around his
boots.
Adrian
laughed. “You afraid I’ll ‘run’ off to the river and swim away to escape?”
Caleb
didn’t reply; he removed Adrian’s bandana and folded it against his bleeding
wound, not being mindful to be gentle in the process; though he could have been
less attentive.
Then,
he answered the sarcasm. “Naw! Just don’t want you bleeding to death. That’s
all.”
He
paused, smiling. Then, “I got something ‘real’ special in mind for you.” Adrian
winced.
Once
the flames were blazing enough to provide a modicum of warmth as the darkness
brought with it a sudden chill on the damp night air, the “Texas-gang” gathered
close to the comfort; Caleb fished two of his last six biscuits from his saddle
bags, skewered them onto the blade and warmed them while Rob put water in the
pot and set it into the fire to heat for coffee.
Adrian
salivated at the sight of the food preparation activity and to the smell of
warm biscuits.
Damn!
He was going to miss supper in town, too, apparently. His shoulder hurt like
the devil.
Lightning
flashed in the western dark sky; more rain. Not at all unusual on the spring
prairie.
“You
just going to sit there and watch our ‘prisoner’ die?” Rob queried, around a
biscuit.
Caleb
gestured toward the western sky threatening a storm. “See that thunderstorm
winding up yonder? It’ll be here in a little over an hour, I reckon.”
“Yeah.
So?” Came his impatient brother’s confounded challenge. “You plan to drown
him?”
Caleb
took a sip of his coffee; then, he offered a malevolent smile which spread into
a pleasurable grin as he reached for his saddlebags. Dragging them close-by, he
searched inside.
Rob
watched with a curious interest; Adrian knew he would not like Caleb’s find. He
was right! His shoulder pained him so much that there was absolutely no chance
to try anything.
Caleb
sat his cup on a near-by dead log; he pulled out a folded piece of paper from deep
inside his saddlebags and carefully unfolded the package and laid it on the
ground revealing a black, greasy-looking substance. Rob stared in wonder;
Adrian in nervous consternation.
Caleb
let their curiosity build by very slowly removing his next object from the
compartment.
A
coiled, stiff string of some kind; the black circle was about six inches, in
width. He smiled.
“That
looks like dynamite fuse?” Bow-leg stated as a question begging for
confirmation.
A
curt nod gave the young man his desired agreement.
Caleb
unrolled his bedroll, then folded it into a neat square about two feet per
side.
Then
he pulled his leather gloves from beneath his gun belt where always secured
them when they were not on his hand. Putting them on, he pulled them tight,
then uncoiled the little circle of braided string, reeling off a length about
eighteen inches long. Giving a look to his ‘prisoner’ and then to kid brother
Rob, he straightened the segment straight, inspected it for quality, then held
one end between his right forefinger and thumb, an inch from its termination
point, and, while pressing the remaining length into the black grease blob on
the paper, dragged the entire length through the goo. This process, he repeated
four more times. Finally, satisfied with the results of his handiwork, he laid
the greased fuse on dry grass so air could circulate around it.
He
carefully wiped his greasy gloves vigorously together to spread the grease over
their surface so it could soak in, thus helping to soften and preserve the raw
hide. Finally, he wiped them clean against another patch of dry grass.
Satisfied, he removed both, laying them near-by.
Then,
like a magician pulling a rabbit from the hat, Caleb reached deep into his
saddlebag and came out with a white bundle of cotton batting like a seamstress
might employ as filling. Gently, he laid the package on the flattened bed roll,
checking it with his hand in a fluffing motion to guarantee its softness. On
this cushion, of sorts, he gently laid the cotton package with great care.
Very
carefully, gentle as a mother’s kiss, he uncovered the parcel; inside laid two
cylindrical cotton tubes, each about ten inches long. These, he separated very
gently, careful to keep them on the cotton blanket. He wiped at his brow, now glistening
with a sheen of sweat.
Sipping
a mouthful of water and taking a deep breath to relax his breathing, he
continued.
Taking
each tube, in turn, he unrolled the contents, laying them carefully on the
cotton padding, side by side, but separated from one another. Dynamite! Rob let out a low whistle.
Done
with that danger, Caleb visibly relaxed. The explosive sticks were cool and
dry.
Finally,
glad to have completed the task, and, relieved, he allowed a slight smile.
Rob
sat, wide-eyed; Adrian licked dry lips, wishing for a drink of water. This was
insanity!
“You’re
not going to use that stuff on me!?” He almost yelled in disbelief. Caleb
nodded.
“You’re
inhuman! Insane! Both of you!” Adrian shouted. “They’ll hang you bastards!”
“You’ll
have more chance the ‘Jeb Frazier’ got,” Caleb retorted. “Back shot! Remember?”
Adrian’s
eyes blinked, wildly. There it was: They did
know about Frazier! This was Revenge!
Reading
the lawman’s mind, affirming his guilt, Rob added, “Yeah, We know all about
it.”
The
storm had gathered in the west and was moving quickly toward their location;
its breadth spread wide across the prairie promising to be violent and
enveloping the town a mile away. A reasonable timetable said that the deluge
should slam them in about a half an hour.
“We
got just enough time to set theses blasting caps, get the fuses in, slap a bit
more grease on the setting to keep any water out,” he allowed a glance at
Adrian, “attach them to our ‘guest-of-honor’, drag our guest to the river---“
He paused. Then, “Light the fuse and…throw him in.”
Adrian
shook his head and attempted to stand; to fight! Searing pain precluded any such
exerted movement. Damn! The luck! He had to figure some way---out! But…What!?
“I’ll
give you money!” He pleaded. “Five thousand? Ten! More! How much will it take?”
“Sorry,
Sheriff! No deal!” Caleb stated, working with the caps and fuses, being very
careful.
“It’s
cold-blooded murder!” Adrian was in a panic; the storm was only twenty minutes
away; they could feel the cool breeze which precedes such a weather event. The
end was very near!
“I
didn’t mean to shoot Frazier!” Adrian pleaded, in vain. “It---it…was an
accident.” He lied.
Ignoring
the reprobate’s vacant pleadings, Caleb said to Rob as the former finished his
handiwork of setting the blasting caps, inserting the fuses and waterproofing
the connections with grease, “Cut about eight feet of rope from the sheriff’s
lariat and bring it over here. Also, untie his horse so he can run free; he’ll
head back to the livery when he gets tired and hungry.”
He
gave a wry smile. “Sheriff Adrian won’t be needing him---anymore…ever!” he
added.
Caleb
bound the law dog’s hands together behind his back; Adrian screamed at the pain.
The
impending storm threatened, now, about ten minutes way; the town was already
getting wet. That, Caleb knew, would force any stragglers off the street,
inside, for shelter. Good!
Caleb
hurriedly repacked his contents into the saddle bag and buckled the leather,
tightly.
Lightning
was now close enough that the flashes lighted the three men in yellow-white
bursts.
Rob
and Caleb grabbed their victim under the arms; Adrian screamed in pain; they
ignored him. Within minutes, the Good Sheriff would be beyond physical hurt.
“Evaporated” to the ages!
At
the water’s edge, they sat him down. Cringing, he could smell the stench of a
watery grave.
The
first cold raindrops plopped on their hats; Adrian pleaded and begged; then,
prayed; then, cried. A cold wind tore his words away from the group; lightning
exploded; the rain increased.
Caleb
stuck the dynamite sticks into Adrian’s waistband under his gun belt; he lit
the fuses!
Getting
him roughly, and, quickly, to unsteady feet, they gave him a huge push into the
swift current of the river and turned to run for cover. Making barely twenty
feet, a deafening explosion and violent concussion threw the pair, headfirst,
into the prairie grass along the shoreline at the base of the willow trees
bending severely in the wild wind of the torrential storm as lightning flashed
with a vengeance and thunder clapped as it echo-roared across the dark prairie vacancy.
“Adios!
Adrian!” Caleb said as the pair regained their feet. He allowed a smile toward
Rob.
Bow-leg
couldn’t manage a return agreement; “Revenge” turned out not to be so sweet.
Ezra’s
killing had bothered the young man, but, he had not been directly in it, not
even a witness. Adrian was another story. He could still smell the fearful
man’s sweat, now mixed with an acrid odor of gun powder-like dynamite among
sulfur from lightning-action and fresh rain.
Suddenly,
he felt sick to his stomach; he threw up. In the storm, brother Caleb did not
notice.
At
the horses, the pair quickly donned rain slickers, then, saddled up, exchanged
halters and lead ropes for bridles, and mounted.
Reining
the steeds southward, along the tree line beside the flooding river, with rain
slickers shining a wet reflection of the intense lightning, the “Texas-gang”
made tracks for Waco!
About
a mile down-trail from their impromptu camp where Sheriff Adrian had met his
deserved demise and with the intensity of the onslaught diminishing, somewhat,
though the torrent had been to their backs, thankfully, one of the trusty
equines trampled on a “hat”, of sorts; unseen, in the darkness, the rider’s
steed stepped on the resembled crown of a hat, much worse for wear, as it
showed scorch-marks around the edge where a one-time brim had been blown away!
The wild-wind must have carried the ruined accoutrement down-range. C’est la vie!
Sheriff
Adrian’s mount showed up at the livery the very next afternoon; Horsehide found
the nag inside the stable, standing at his stall door, waiting for food. The
hostler had not seen the sheriff return; it seemed strange that Adrian had
simply abandoned the horse without removing the saddle, bridle and currying the
animal before returning it to the stall. He undertook the tasks.
Around
dusk of the same day, Deputy Jasper showed up, inquiring of old Horsehide as to
whether or not he had seen the sheriff; the wrangler told him the story of the
“magical” horse.
When
the good sheriff had not appeared by the next morning, Jasper rode out to the
Van Gangen ranch only to learn that the lawman had, indeed, been there, but,
had ridden out to return to town, late that same day. On his return trip to
town, Jasper searched for any sign, but, the storm had removed all traces. They
organized a search to look for Sheriff Adrian. Nothing!
Someone
among the elite citizens fathomed a theory, after much consultation salted with
plenty of cold beer and warm whiskey down to the Albino Prairie Dog Saloon one
afternoon, that the good sheriff must have got swallowed up in the quicksand at
the south crossing.
Immediate
consensus among his “genius” cohorts on hand acceded to the “errant”
conclusion.
So,
it became a subtle “secret” among the shakers and doers of the budding little
metropolis that the flooded river had gotten the lawman; “blown” away in the
horrendous storm, that night!
Within
a half year of time passing after the cold-blooded murder of Ezra van Gangen,
which to date remained unsolved, thereby leaving a murderer running free, due
to the most unusual disappearance of his step-son, Sheriff Adrian, whose
presumed dead body had never turned up, Hyatt, as sole, and, now, uncontested
heir to the vast fortune and estate, had let control of the expansive empire go
to his head. Byrne heard rumor that within several generations following the
demise of the “genius” shakers and movers of greatness who succeeded in amassing
vast fortunes over decades of hard work, luck, ambition, thievery and
skullduggery, very often lost the entire legacy, ending in total ruin, if they,
somehow, managed to survive, at all. Hmm!
She
had dismissed such gossip as wishful thinking on the part of her envious
“lady”-friends of the smallish town concluding that the jealous old crows only
wanted her fortune to be destroyed since they could find no means to garner it
for themselves. Little by little, Byrne’s intelligence and her husband,
Hyatt’s, obvious inability to run such a huge conglomeration as the enormous
ranch, the town bearing the name of his birthright which included all the going
business concerns and vast riches comprised of land, money, silver, gold,
artwork, properties and homes began to become painfully aware to the
heiress-by-circumstance of fortuitous marriage. Clearly, as the days slowly
passed, she began to develop a picture of where the inherited wealth was taking
them and Byrne did not intend to be discarded on the desolate vastness of the
grass prairie as a pile of bleached bones which the local rodent-varmints would
chew on for needed calcium in their diets. The problem: How to come out on top,
once more, this time around---without Hyatt.
The
pompous heir, the very day after his father’s funeral, had left for St. Louis
on yet another of his infamous, well-established “business” trips; six weeks
later he had dutifully returned with a dozen brand new suits of the latest cut
and, also, in tow, the tailor from the prestigious city whom Hyatt set up in
the General Store with a wagon load of fine fabric choices. Nobody in the burg
could afford such opulence, save the banker, Hyatt, himself. Still, he managed
to keep the clothier fully occupied designing, cutting and sewing one outfit
after another; each new dawn saw the “Joke” of the community sporting a new
masquerade as the treatments became more and more ridiculous and grotesque as
the tailor’s creative limitations had been approached, and, surpassed. Hyatt
refused to accept the man’s excuses, demanding ever more “exquisite” attire.
Such
behavior caused myriad arguments between Hyatt and Byrne as she caught the
brunt of his faux extravagances from the busy-body witches of the town who
desperately envied her honored position of status and wealth. Finally, as the
tailor’s creative designs began to obviously repeat themselves in appearance,
Hyatt unceremoniously threw the concierge, of a sort, onto the weekly afternoon
eastbound stage for St. Louis; Byrne feared that he might just do the same to
her, one day, when she no longer suited his needs. The next day, Hyatt left for
New Orleans.
Byrne
both desired and demanded constant attention; since her brother-in-law, Sheriff
Adrian Van Gangen, had mysteriously disappeared from the face of the earth and
with her husband, Hyatt’s, numerous vacancies, not to mention his
philandering’s at the Albino Prairie Dog Saloon where he practiced his
reputation with the bar girls on a regular basis in the opulent upstairs
private room he maintained for his personal entertainment with frequent
dalliances, she searched high and low for a replacement for the errant law man.
All, to no avail.
Any
potential conquest she might even grudgingly consider was already married, not
that such would have impeded Miss Byrne Van Gangen’s successful attempt, her
looks and charm easily triumphed over the simple competition, but, these
country boys were henpecked as any barnyard rooster by the old crows whom they
had married, some by trickery, others by fear of losing the opportunity to ever
garner a wife in such a god-forsaken atmosphere as this depressing prairieland.
Besides that, each owed his financial happenstance, poor as that may, in reality,
prove to be, to their benefactor, her husband, and the possible field feared
his wrath. At that conclusion, Byrne laughed, thinking that Hyatt wouldn’t care
what she did, or with whom.
There
were a fair number of rugged, good looking cowhands who frequented the Albino
Prairie Dog once a month on payday where they quickly spent their coins on
cheap whiskey and cheaper saloon-girl company for a quick roll. Then, back to
the range for another thirty days sunrise-to-sunset toil in the desperate hope
of surviving so as to enjoy the sorry monotony once more at the end of the
month. She had already been to, and through, the bottom of the heap in her life
in New York with the dock workers and laborers of the city scum; the local
cowboys seemed a bit cleaner and, perhaps, a little more gentlemanly, at least
they took a bath once a week, Saturday, before coming to town. Yet, all men
managed to smell and act the same, like wild dogs pawing greasy hands and grimy
fingers at a girl. She had, at last, done a lot better for herself.
All
her prospects were pretty bleak; any plan Byrne attempted to concoct seemed
destined to failure. Still, while she craved the attentions of a real man, her
plight gave her status and money. Not bad for a working girl from the wrong side
of the proverbial tracks. Thank you! Very much!
Two
months after Hyatt’s “necessary” business trip to New Orleans, Byrne’s husband
returned home, again with a “guest” in tow. Byrne scowled and her dark
complexion clouded with angry emotion tinged with acute jealousy; she did not
even attempt to disguise her disgust.
Hyatt’s
proclivity for debauchery and the embarrassment Byrne suffered because of it
made the woman nauseous, but, prior to this display, he had kept his
perversions mostly private although the entire town knew of his numerous
“associations” with younger women; now, he showed total disrespect for Byrne by
bringing the tramp into his wife’s very home, to live.
Jasmine
stood barely five feet tall, but, nobody seeing the Creole beauty would mind, nor
barely notice her diminutive stature. Large, dark brown eyes seemed to shadow
an olive shading adding charm and beauty to an oblong face replete with full
red lips, generous, yet not overly ostentatious, more attractive in a manner
begging to be crushed emotionally with passionate kisses. Thick, dark,
raven-black hair adorned her head as an achieving crown of a queen contestant
in a beauty pageant. A French-English accent turned heads bringing adoring
attention to the girl. The Creole beauty might have been sixteen or seventeen,
but the allure deepened with that innocent childlike appearance of a twelve
year old just at the very blush of womanhood.
Byrne
wanted to cut the girl’s throat, right there on the spot, but, Hyatt read the
signs and kept his “guest” away from the Femme fatale as best he could. The
Creole child spent nights in Hyatt’s room, under his guard. This blatant
affront to Byrne’s position as mistress of the newly acquired empire set her
emotions on raw edge prompting her vivid imagination to run wild. She
immediately began to behave as a demented woman-possessed. Danger lurked as she
flirted with depression through raging anger, demeaning disgust and vile
jealousy, becoming despondent.
One
bright spot developed almost immediately, quickly negated by the reason, itself.
In the month since husband-Hyatt had sprung his surprise on Byrne and upon the
population of the town of his namesake, he had discontinued his nightly forays
to the Albino Prairie Dog Saloon and his thinly veiled rendezvous with the
cheap saloon girls there, preferring to retire early each evening, as soon as
dining had been completed and spending the time in his room entertaining
Jasmine in the finer private delicacies of behavior as the beautiful “Princess
of the Prairie!”
That
was the exact term Hyatt used when Byrne had confronted her husband with
objections.
