The Curse of Iron Eyes (9 page)

What was the giant man
planning?

A bank robbery?

It had to be something
as big as the man himself.

He rubbed his weary
face, trying to wake himself up. Then his thoughts focused on Brady
again. What did he want? There seemed no reason why the large
outlaw would need to talk to him now, he thought. It had already
been agreed that Brady would not reveal his plans to his assembled
team until the following day.

Calhoon stood, lifted
his gunbelt off the brass bedpost, strapped it around his hips and
buckled it up. His skilled fingers instinctively confirmed that it
was loaded and ready for action.

Even
now he did not trust Brady. Some things just did not add up but he
could not think why. The Calhoon gang had always made sure that
they did not take on a job that was beyond their capabilities.
Harve Calhoon wondered if he was up to the task that Brady had
conceived in his fertile imagination.

The
outlaw walked slowly to the small dresser and poured cold water
from the large white jug into the basin. He splashed it over his
face and hair. He ran his fingers through his hair, then dried his
face with the tail of his bandanna. He was little more than
half-awake when he unlocked the door, walked along the dimly lit
passage and descended the flight of stairs into the large room
where men were still drinking and gambling and females were still
plying for trade.

He
walked to the back of the building and saw the dozen or more men
gathered in the rear room of the saloon. Big Jack Brady raised a
hand and signaled for him to join them. The outlaw obeyed. He felt
uneasy even though he recognized half the faces within the room
gathered around Big Jack Brady.

Something was just not
right.

He tried not to yawn as
Brady gestured to an empty chair next to him at the large circular
table.

‘
Now we can
start, boys,’ Brady announced to the gathered assembly of equally
stunned and confused outlaws.

Calhoon rubbed his face
with both his hands and glanced at the larger man.

‘
What are you
talking about, Big Jack?’

Brady grinned. It was
like the man himself. Big.

‘
I kinda
hoodwinked you earlier,’ he told Calhoon. ‘You see, I’ve been
hoping that you would turn up today because it makes the whole job
a lot easier. I had the other boys all stashed away in other hotels
and saloons around Calico for the last few days but without you,
Harve, we could not act.’

‘
I don’t
understand, Big Jack.’ Calhoon sighed. ‘If you were waiting for me
before you could get this job rolling, why didn’t you tell me
earlier?’

‘
Because you
were not the final piece in the jigsaw,’ Brady answered, ‘but you
are the most important.’

Harve
Calhoon was still no wiser. ‘What the hell are you talking
about?’

Brady pointed across
the table at a small man who resembled a lizard. Calhoon looked at
the skittish man but did not recognize him.

‘
This,
gentlemen, is Black Roy Hart. He’s the final piece of my jigsaw
puzzle. He only arrived in town an hour or so back and he brought
the ingredients to enable us to accomplish the job that I’ve been
planning for the last six months.’

Calhoon stared at the
unsmiling Hart.

‘
What did you
bring that’s so darn important, Black Roy?’

‘
Dynamite sticks
and all,’ Hart replied.

‘
We had the
dynamite man but not the dynamite itself, Harve.’ Brady pulled out
a scrap of paper from his vest pocket and laid it on the table. He
unfolded it and every eye around the room stared at the seemingly
meaningless hand-drawn map.

‘
But I got me
some dynamite in my saddlebags,’ Calhoon said. Big Jack laughed.
‘Not enough, Harve. This is a real big job and needs a real lot of
dynamite.’

‘
How
much?’

‘
A wagonload,
boy,’ came the reply.

Calhoon looked around
the table and began to recognize the faces of some of the other
outlaws. Each was an expert in his own field and slowly Calhoon
began to understand the enormity of what Brady had planned.
Anything that required such a prodigious amount of explosives had
to be beyond anything he had ever tackled before.

‘
What did you
mean when you said that you were glad that I turned up today and
not in a couple of days’ time, Big Jack?’ he asked.

Brady tilted his
enormous head.

‘
Now we can ride
tonight and get this job done. If you had been a tad slower
reaching Calico, we would have had to wait for another three
months.’

Harve Calhoon
frowned.

‘
What is this
job?’

Big
Jack Brady turned the scrap of paper around and pointed to the
crude drawings. He watched as Calhoon’s eyes looked down at the
place at which the finger was aimed. A picture of a train and a
long, sturdy wooden bridge spanning a wide valley seemed to jump
out at the still-tired outlaw.

Calhoon looked up at
the face of the man beside him.

‘
You want me to
blow up a train?’

Brady shook his
head.

‘
Not the train.
The bridge! You gotta blow up that bridge so the train has to stop
and when it stops, we attack it, kill every critter that stands in
our way and then take three months’ worth of gold coin headed for
Fort Dixon.’

‘
The army
payroll?’ Calhoon queried.

‘
Yep. The army
payroll. All three months of it. Do you have any idea how much that
is, Harve?’

‘
Nope.’

‘
Well there are
more than six hundred troopers at Fort Dixon.’ Brady grinned. ‘So
it’s one hell of a lot of money and no mistake. Equal shares. It
could run to thousands of dollars each.’

The price was right but
Calhoon wondered if he were good enough to accomplish what Brady
had planned. How big was this bridge in reality? The simple pencil
sketch gave no clue as to the true dimensions of the actual bridge
itself.

How
did you blow up an entire bridge? Sweat began to run down the side
of the outlaw’s face.

Harve Calhoon rubbed
his dry mouth and accepted the glass of rye that was offered to
him. He downed it in one swallow and exhaled loudly.

‘
So I’m to blow
up this bridge so that you and the rest of the boys can rob the
train?’

Big
Jack Brady slapped Calhoon’s back and roared with
laughter.

‘
Now you getting
your brain working, Harve. That’s exactly right, boy. See how
important you are?’

‘
How far away
from here is it?’

‘
A few hours’
ride north at a place called Honcho Wells,’ Brady replied. ‘The
rail tracks cut through the top of the Indian territory boundaries.
The bridge spans a river.’

‘
Ain’t that a
mite close to Calico, Big Jack?’ one of the other men asked. ‘The
army will track us back here looking for their gold.’

‘
Let them,’
Brady scoffed. ‘We’ll be long gone by the time they reach
Calico.’

‘
When’s the
train due?’ Black Roy asked.

‘
It ought to
reach the viaduct at Honcho Wells at noon tomorrow, give or take an
hour,’ Brady replied. ‘I’ve been keepin’ tabs on it for the past
year.’

‘
Is it heavily
guarded?’ another of the men enquired.

‘
Nope. Never has
more than a dozen troopers guardin’ it and they’re all in the car
ahead of the one with the gold.’

‘
Like takin’
candy from a baby,’ Black Roy muttered.

Harve Calhoon felt a
sudden chill overwhelm him as every one of the other outlaws began
to chuckle along with the big man.

‘
And when do we
do this?’ he asked.

‘
My personal
associates are getting the horses and dynamite wagon ready as we
speak, Harve.’ Big Jack Brady grinned. ‘We ride in about ten
minutes.’

Calhoon pushed his
empty glass towards the whiskey bottle. He needed another
drink.

There
were several smaller trails splitting off from the main canyon
which were collectively known as the merciless Devil’s Pass. Yet
Billy Bodine galloped on through the narrow moonlit canyon without
taking his eyes off what lay directly ahead of him. His instincts
told him that whatever he was looking for was somewhere ahead.
Somewhere on the soft sand that sparkled in the bluish light of the
large moon directly overhead.

Bodine leaned over the
neck of his charging mount as the horse continued to gather
pace.

The
only sound within Devil’s Pass was the noise of his own mount. It
echoed all around the young trooper. He had never known any place
so frightening or unholy. It troubled him as he urged the chestnut
on. Every hair on the nape of his neck felt as if it were standing
on end beneath his yellow bandanna.

His
hands gripped the reins tightly as he listened to the horse’s hoofs
pounding across the surface of the soft sand.

To Billy Bodine it
began to sound like the beating of war drums.

Were there any other
living creatures in this place, Bodine asked himself. If so, where
were they?

It would only take
another few seconds before he knew the answer.

The powerful horse
thundered around a bend. Suddenly its rider leant back on his
saddle and hauled the mount to an abrupt halt.

Bodine
wrestled with his reins and stood in his stirrups. His keen young
eyes spotted something a few dozen yards ahead and he hauled the
quarter horse around full circle while he tried to work out what it
was that was lying in the center of the sandy trail.

Whatever it was, he
thought, it was dead.

The skilful horseman
quickly dismounted and flicked the leather pistol flap up on his
belt. He withdrew his service pistol from the holster and cocked
its trigger.

Bodine held firmly on
to his reins and studied the sight carefully before he led the
nervous horse towards a large boulder. His mount could smell the
stench of death hanging in the hot canyon.

What
was left of the dead horse had already gone rigid in the intense
heat that still filled Devil’s Pass. As Bodine got closer, Bodine
could smell the flesh already beginning to rot as he walked his
horse past the carcass.

The moonlight did not
make the sight any less ugly.

Then
Bodine’s attention was drawn to the dark shadow beside the boulder.
For a moment he hesitated, then he aimed his pistol in the
direction of the shadow. It soon became apparent that he did not
need his weapon.

He stared down at the
dead man seated where Iron Eyes had left him. It was a chilling
sight.

The body was still
propped up against the canyon wall staring blindly into hell
itself.

Bodine looked all
around him for any sign of the victor in this battle. There was no
one else to be seen.

The corporal suddenly
felt very afraid.

The
two bullet holes were clearly visible when Bodine crouched down
beside the body. Two clean shots in the center of the dead man’s
chest.

Whoever had done this
was good, he thought. Darn good.

Bodine looked around
and then spotted the large buffalo gun lying in the soft sand. He
plucked it up and checked it carefully.

To his utter surprise,
he found that the lethal weapon was still loaded.

Billy Bodine holstered
his own pistol and then turned to his horse. He jumped up into the
air. His left boot entered the stirrup, he threw his right leg over
the army saddle and then laid the buffalo gun across his lap.

Billy
Bodine’s imagination began to race. He sat silently atop his horse
and held the reins in check. His eyes scoured the area around his
nervous mount. Even the eerie moonlight could not disguise the
horror that lay all around him. Bodine knew that he had to get back
to the rest of the platoon and inform them of his grisly discovery.
He dragged his reins hard to the right and spurred his
mount.

The
chestnut galloped back in the direction of the rest of Captain
Wallis’s men. Bodine knew that he would have to ride his mount as
he had never done before if he were to alert his comrades of what
he had found before sunrise. He was alone and scared.

Where was the man who
had created this bloodbath? Or was this the work of something less
than human?

The cavalryman
thundered along the pass knowing that he too might fall victim to
the same fate as the body behind him.

Then suddenly, as his
mount was almost at full flight, he spotted something ahead of him
on his left. He pulled back on the reins and slowed the chestnut to
a halt. The horse responded immediately and allowed its master to
stare into the eerie moonlight.

Bodine squinted into
the half-light at the trail, which led into a small canyon pass. It
was a narrow route, no more than eight feet wide; a trail that he
had not spotted when he had been riding in the opposite
direction.

He looked at the ground
and then saw two distinctive sets of hoof-tracks in the otherwise
undisturbed sand.

Bodine dismounted and
knelt.

He could tell that two
horses had ridden up this trail recently.

One was a shod horse
and the other unshod.

Could old Hanks have
been correct? Could it have been an Indian who had killed the man
back at the boulder? He had heard a thousand tales of the horrors
that the Apaches had inflicted on their enemies.