R. Trembly - Madigan

“What do you want?” Madigan asked while keeping an eye on the other man.

“Nothing special. I’m just gonna kill you and leave your bones to rot. I always wanted a Sharps and now it seems as if I have found one for my own.” The man opened the breech and found the rifle unloaded.

“Where do you keep the bullets for this cannon?” he asked irritably. There was something familiar about the intruder’s voice. Then it hit Madigan like a bomb! It was Harry O’Neill! It took all Madigan had to control his anger.

“Over in the pack, in a little tin box, but you’ll never get to use them,” he said. “It takes a man to shoot a Sharps. All I see is a big-mouthed rat!” Madigan was hoping for more time to figure his plan of action. O’Neill stared at him for a moment, then turned to his companion and smiled.

“You keep an eye on him while I get the bullets for this here gun.” He raised the rifle for emphasis. “I want to find out how big a hole it will make in this bastard’s head!”

Madigan needed to act fast. He waited for O’Neill to go over to where his pack lay, then when O’Neill was busy digging around for the ammunition, Madigan made his play. In one motion he kicked the blanket off and levered a round into the Winchester he had hidden beside him. At the same instant, the guard, realizing what Madigan was up to, went for his side arm. Madigan was a split second faster, and his bullet hit home while the man’s gun had barely cleared leather.

Even as the man fell backward Madigan was off and running, firing a shot in the direction of O’Neill. Madigan expected O’Neill to fire back, but to his surprise O’Neill dropped the Sharps and bolted for the shadows. Madigan fired a couple more rounds after O’Neill as he ran through the trees. But not being able to see in the dark of the forest, Madigan stumbled headlong into a tree, giving his rifle a good whack in the process. It jammed before he could get off another shot. He apparently had missed O’Neill anyway, and was not surprised to hear him ride out on a dead run. Madigan quickly gathered up his Colt and then checked to see that the Sharps was all right. It had fallen on the pack and wasn’t hurt.

The man he had shot lay on the ground where he had fallen, groaning softly. Madigan kicked the man’s gun away, then put the barrel of his Colt to the man’s head. The man’s eyes opened slowly and Madigan could see the man was no threat, as it was plain to see that he would soon die.

“Who are you?” Madigan asked. The man looked up with a hatred in his eye that Madigan had seen in but few men.

“My name is Rodino and you have killed me.”

“You could have kept on riding. Nobody said you had to come into my camp,” Madigan said. “I was defending my life, so I have no remorse in killing you,” he added.

The man lay quiet for a moment as though thinking something over, then half-smiled, and coughed up a little blood. “You are the man called Madigan, the hunter of men, aren’t you?”

“That’s what they call me,” Madigan affirmed. “Why were you wanting to attack me? Have I done anything to you or your kin to cause you to want to kill me?”

The dying man tried to sit up but did not have the strength, so Madigan helped him, pulling his saddle behind the man’s back for support while they talked.

“Thanks,” the dying man said and Madigan noticed the hatred had left the man’s eyes, replaced with sadness. “You have done nothing to me or my kin.”

The young cowboy then said, “I am dying. Before I go, I will try to tell you some things that might save you from the same fate.”

“Why would you want to do that? I have shot you, so why help me now?” Madigan asked. The man held out his hand motioning Madigan to take it.

“Because you are everything that I wanted to be and am not. I give you my hand and my word so that you will know that which I tell you is true.”

Madigan took the cowboy’s hand in his, and at that moment wished that he had known this man under different circumstances. “What is it you want to tell me?” he asked. The cowboy drew in a deep breath, then began his story.

“The man you just ran off is no friend of mine. I was only tagging along for what I hoped would be enough money to buy a small ranch somewhere.” He coughed and a little blood ran down his chin. Madigan took his kerchief and wiped it off.

“Thanks,” the cowboy said with a look of sorrow. “I guess I came into it about three days ago down in Maysville. I’d been doing some prospecting and had come to the end of my grub, had no money to buy any more.”

“I’ve been there myself a few times,” Madigan admitted.

The cowboy managed a knowing little laugh, then began again, his voice sometimes barely a whisper. “Like I said, I was out of money and I was hungry, so I went to Maysville to try to get a grub stake when I ran into this hombre named O’Neill. He offered me a drink, so I took him up on it. One drink led to another, and before you know it, he was tellin’ me a story about saddlebags full of little gold statues and how if I helped him we’d both be rich.” Another cough, more blood. Madigan gave him a little water from the canteen and adjusted the cowboy’s head so he could be more comfortable.

“Sounds funny, don’t it? A full-grown man like me, fallin’ for a fool story like that. But I did-hook, line, and sinker.”

“Doesn’t sound so silly to me,” Madigan said, thinking of the saddlebags of gold, his curiosity suddenly aroused.

“Anyway, this O’Neill says that he and five others were runnin’ from the law and headed into the mountains northeast of Durango when they chanced to come upon some Indians having themselves a ceremony of some kind.”

“Did he say what kind of Indians they were?” Madigan asked.

“Didn’t know what they were. Just said they were different from any redskins he ever saw before.”

“What were they doing?”

“O’Neill said they were about seventy-five in number, maybe fifty of them were what he took to be warriors. The rest, and this is the funny part, were women, all dancing around this huge fire, and none of them had any clothes on. Kind of stupid to believe such a story, wasn’t it?” the cowboy said, emotion filling his voice. “I guess it was more stupid to die for something like that, but that’s what I’m doing.”

“Maybe there was more truth to the story than you think.”

“Well, if you’re Sam Madigan, I guess you’d know better than me about that.”

“What do you mean?”

“O’Neill said that these women were a dancing all around, beautiful women too, or so he said. Then one of his men spotted a small mound to the side of the fire. Do you know what was on the mound?”

“Let me guess. Piles of gold?”

“Close. On the mound was a large statue in gold and all around its base was thousands of smaller ones also in gold. O’Neill told me that he and his men decided right then and there to take the gold for themselves. Their plan was a simple one. Ride in with their guns a blazin’, grab the gold, and run for it.

“By the time they got set to attack, all the warriors were so busy watchin’ the women that O’Neill and his men were able to walk their horses right up to them before they were even seen.”

“Didn’t the Indians try to stop them?” Madigan asked.

“They tried, but against six-guns and with surprise on O’Neill’s side, it was all over in a minute. While the Indians were trying to take cover, a couple of the men had enough time to fill some saddlebags with the small gold statues and ride out again. The Indians, after regrouping, killed a couple of men that got greedy and tried for some more gold. Anyway, that’s the story O’Neill told me. One other thing, he also said they grabbed two of the women and planned to make them tell where the gold had come from,” the cowboy said in a failing voice.