He turned and gave the dog a toothy, checkered grin. “You know what I’m gonna buy you with this gold, Plugger? I’m gonna buy you a big ol’ pile of fresh-cut steak.”
Plugger panted happily as the old man scratched his shaggy ears.
“And I’m gonna get you a whole mess of bones fulla marrow. You like that?”
Plugger licked the prospector’s liver-spotted hand.
The old man let loose a gravelly, bellowing laugh.
Plugger barked loudly in response.
The man patted the dog’s mangy back. “Okay, okay, that’s enough now,” he said with a smile.
But Plugger’s barking did not stop. Suddenly it became more intense.
“Hey, hey, settle down there, boy, whatsa matter?”
And then, as if in reply to the inquiry, the sound of approaching hoofbeats.
The prospector squinted against the bright sun. The road ahead looked empty, but the dust cloud ascending from beyond the next rise told a different story.
Riders. From the look of the dust, five or more.
His hands shaking due to both nerves and age, the old man hurriedly stuffed his glittering prize into his pocket. As he turned his attention back to the road ahead, a group of six men came galloping over the rise. The old gray shifted his weight with uneasiness, and Plugger continued his lengthy oration. As the riders approached and slowed to a stop, the old man could see that it was not six men after all. It was five men and a woman.
A rough-looking bunch too.
The lead rider was as hard-looking a man as the prospector had ever seen. The lines on his face betrayed a lifetime of anger, and the folds of his skin dove deep into those weathered grooves.
But his eyes.
Even from a moderate distance, it was evident. Those eyes were deadly. They spoke of a long-rotted soul, to which mercy and compassion had no value and never would. They were more reptilian than human, as cold-blooded as any creature that had ever lurked in the pocked depths of the Arizona desert. This was a man to be feared.
The girl was more of a puzzle. As the prospector slowed his wagon to a halt, he glanced in her direction.
She was quite beautiful. Probably mid-thirties, the old man guessed. She had a kind face, even though her stony expression was doing its best to deny the fact. Her soft-looking brown hair and graceful curves were out of place among the company she kept. She didn’t belong with this group—and yet somehow she did.
Plugger’s barking interrupted the old man’s thoughts. “Easy, Plugger,” he said. He tipped his battered hat toward the riders. “Howdy, there,” he offered, his tone bright with a cheerful nonchalance he did not feel.
The lead rider spoke with a voice as calm as still water. “We’d be obliged if you could point us toward the Sherman Creek Trail.”
The prospector exhaled a bit. Maybe he’d overreacted. These men were just passing through. A small band of honest cowboys heading out to Sherman Creek. Probably looking for work. Good for them. Decent work was hard to find, and if they were willing to ride that far out to make an honest day’s wages, well, then, he’d be happy to point them in the right direction.
“Well, sure, I can help you there,” he said.
He reached into the back of the wagon and retrieved a tattered map. He ignored the screaming protestations of his old bones as he pulled himself down off the seat and made his way over to the lead rider. With a crooked finger he indicated a snaky black line running through the center of the map. “You’re on the main road now, see? The main road goes all the way through Bullhead and then runs right into Sherman Creek Trail. But if you ask me, I’d say you’d probably get there quicker if you take Bilbee Pass. You’d be safer too. Less chance of bandits and such.”
“Bandits?” The rider looked curious. “Are there bandits in these parts?”
“Well, I only come upon ’em a few times in my years, but you never can rightly say. Bilbee Pass is your best bet. Get you there faster too.”
A smile spread across the rider’s face as he stared down at the old man. But there was no warmth in it at all. In fact, to the prospector it looked less like a smile and more like a wound sliced open by the blade of an invisible swordsman.
“Thank you,” the rider said, his gaze deadlocked with the milky, weary eyes of the prospector.
The old man stared back for a moment, then began backing away toward his wagon. “Oh, no trouble,” he said, with a quaver in his voice. “Happy to help out a friendly stranger.” The prospector prepared to pull himself up onto his wagon, when the rider spoke again.
“Oh, there’s one more thing you can do for us.”
The old man froze. It was a simple statement, presented calmly and courteously, nothing threatening in it at all. And yet the prospector was suddenly terrified for his life. He tried to keep the fear out of his voice as he answered. “What’s that?”
“You can hand over the gold.”
All pretense of civility had vanished from the rider’s demeanor. The outer skin had been shed, and the reptile was poised. But for what?
The prospector somehow managed to keep his wits about him and responded with deliberate conversational passivity. “Oh, I… I ain’t got no gold. I wish. Been prospectin’ all day, and that stream’s panned out. On my way back to town now.”
“You see, that’s just it,” said the rider. “You’re heading back to town in the middle of the day. Prospector only does that when he’s found gold to sell. Now give it to me.”
“I swear, I don’t have any gold. I’m headin’ into town early, cause—”
The rider drew his gun and pointed it directly at the old man’s head.
The prospector no longer troubled himself to hide his terror. He could feel a warm wetness spreading around his groin. He reached into his pocket for the nugget. “Oh, now, wait a minute. Y’know, I might have a little bit of gold—”
The rider shot him in the head.
The old prospector staggered back and slumped to the ground, dead.
Plugger barked wildly, then bounded over and sniffed at his master’s body with confusion.
The woman spoke for the first time, whirling angrily to face the lead rider.
“Clinch, goddammit, you didn’t have to do that!”
Clinch turned and flashed his open-wound smile. “I know I didn’t have to, sweetheart.”
“He would’ve given you the gold!”
“The point is, I had to ask him twice. I’m a busy man with a schedule.”
Her eyes narrowed with clear hatred. “You’re a son of a bitch is what you are.”
His smile vanished, and in the same instant his arm lashed out like a whip, striking her across the face with full force. She tumbled off her horse and landed hard in the dirt. Yet somehow, even as she wiped a trickle of blood from her lower lip, she managed to appear unscathed.
“Don’t you ever talk to me like that again,” Clinch commanded with a deadly tone. “A man’s wife will show him respect. Now, let me hear you try it again.”
The woman got to her feet and batted her lashes mockingly. “Oh, honey, you’re the best, I’m so happy to be with you, oh, my God, I love you, I’m, like, the luckiest girl ever in the history of girls.”
Before Clinch could strike her again, one of the other outlaws approached with the fallen prospector’s map. “Clinch, the old man was right. We’d lose half a day goin’ through Bullhead.”
Clinch briefly studied the routes. He then folded the map and addressed the group of outlaws. “All right. Ben, you, Enoch, and Jordy’ll ride with me. We’ll follow Bilbee Pass to Sherman Creek Trail. And make no mistake about the kinda heat we’re gonna draw after we take that stage. Every lawman in this territory’ll be out for us.” He turned to his wife, who had mounted her horse again. “And you—you’re staying outta harm’s way.” He indicated the weasel-faced, badly scarred man mounted next to him. “Lewis, you’ll ride east with Anna and hole up in this town right here.” He pointed to the map. “Old Stump. We’ll let things cool down, and we’ll come for you in three weeks.”