A Fistful of Horror - Tales Of Terror From The Old West (20 page)

“Let’s ride, man!” He rammed both spurs into his horse’s flank. “Go!”

***

Juanita Gomez was in her second floor room. Her mouth was bloody; her hands more so. The tail-like protuberance, rattles silent, still lay between her legs. There was a deep, satisfied hissing emanating from deep in the woman’s throat.

Under her bed, the snakes in the basket slithered happily over and around fresh meat and sinew. Juanita had come back from the Sheriff’s office bringing their morning meal with her. The heart of William Duffy sat in the basket. It had been removed from his body so quickly that it was still beating, in her hands, until she had walked out of his office.

Outside, behind the saloon, Albert was hurriedly shovelling fresh dirt into the back of a coffin wagon. He had muslin cloth ready to tie onto the sides. It would be necessary to keep his cargo hidden from view of those on the road west. Ten feet from his labour, he could clearly hear the ominous rattles of the babies in the shack. They could sense his anxieties. He imagined them writhing, in fear and anger, over the decomposed corpses inside. It would be a trying chore to get most of them inside the bodies after they were in the wagon.

***

United States Marshall Jasper Holton had dismounted and ran into Sheriff Duffy’s office before Two Willows had a chance to get his steed stopped. By the time the Indian stepped inside, Holton was standing next to the body of his friend. It was obvious that Duffy had met a very violent end.

Two Willows’ mind flashed red and then black. He grabbed the door frame to prevent himself from falling. His mind’s eye saw a woman and a snake; or a woman who was a snake. His inner eye watched as, a short time ago, this woman and her serpent decimated an unsuspecting lawman.

“Two Willows, did you know this had happened?” Holton was trying to remain calm, not wanting to cry or scream in front of his guide. “Is this what you were talking about?”

“Not know, Marshall.” Two Willows knew the white man would not understand spiritual insight. “Felt something bad happen. Felt danger for Sheriff.”

“Bad? Bad?” Holton was losing the battle against rage. “Look at him Two Willows! Look at him! They ripped his god damned heart out! Who the hell does that?”

Mental flashes; woman, snake.

“Marshall, she-devil come here.”

“What the fu…”

“Injun’s right, Mr. Marshall. She carried his heart away in her hand.”

The men turned to see a dirty man with an eye patch standing, unsteadily, just outside the door. The man steadied himself on the railing and spat a string of tobacco, leaving half of it on his grey beard.

“She came in here. I heard her rattlin’,” James spat again. “And then, she carried the man’s heart right out of here.”

“Who are you?” Marshall Holton walked out to the porch. “Who is this woman you keep squealin’ about?”

“I’m James Murphy, sir.” He extended a grimy hand toward the lawman. “And, she, sir is Juanita something or other. She is a whore from Albert’s place right up the road.”

“So, James Murphy, you are telling me that a woman did this to Sheriff Duffy? Just ripped his heart out and took it away?”

“Yes, sir…”

“Brown-skinned woman.” Two Willows was repeating what his inner eye was telling him. “Dance with snakes.”

James Murphy showed a gap-toothed smile and spat happily.

“Injun’s right again, sir. Like he knows the whore.”

“I know legend.” Two Willows stared in the direction of Albert’s dance hall. “One way to stop she-devil.”

***

The night was hotter than usual in Hell. The crowd in Albert’s was larger than usual. The piano was loud, the crowd was louder. The ladies from the second floor had been working the floor. They brought beer, they flirted and they flashed skin. Each one of them looked for that first man, with too much beer and whiskey, who was ready to go upstairs to spend a dollar. So far, only a few had fallen for the game.

Most of the men were waiting to watch the lovely Juanita dance before they settled for one of the other women. She would whet their appetites for a woman. They would wait for her to come, barefooted, down the stairs. They would watch as she danced and kissed her snakes. If they were lucky, she would raise her skirt and show almost everything she had.

Sitting at a table just inside the door was a sunburned man with cracked lips and a heavy heart. Seated to his left was a drunkard with an eye patch. Jasper Holton had left his badge on the desk in Sheriff Duffy’s office. Sheriff Duffy was left, covered with a burlap sheet, in the cell. Holton had locked the cell behind him so that no one could disturb the body. Tektomah Two Willows had gone to speak to his spirits.

James Murphy was more sober than he had been in years. He walked, with purpose, to the bar and had gotten a bottle of rye whiskey from Mackey, a young Irish barkeep, who was filling in this evening for Albert.

“Sir,” he filled a shot glass for both of them. “What is that Injun gonna say to his spirits?”

“He needs to tell them,” Jasper gulped the glass empty and slid it back to James. “That they are gonna rot in hell.”

“If this damned plan doesn’t work,” James emptied his glass and quickly poured another and shot it straight back. “We are all gonna rot in hell.”

***

The crowd was mesmerized by Juanita’s last dance. She had never bothered to tie her blouse before coming downstairs. Her breasts, clearly visible to start, had moved freely throughout the performance. The snake around her neck danced its own way back and forth under her shirt. She seemed to have more rattlers than usual in her hands and around her arms.

Her teasing lifts of her skirt showed four or five brown snakes on each leg. She lifted the hem higher than anyone could remember. At times, the drunken men near the small stage yelled about seeing her private parts. She did not seem to care. In fact, throughout both of her dances, Juanita seemed to be in a trance. Her eyes rolled back and forth and she seemed to be repeating a phrase over and over while she danced.

“What is it that thou hast done? What is it that thou hast done?

Now finished, she was walking slowly around the tables, touching many of the men. These lucky customers revelled in her attention while, at the same time, they tried to stay away from her wriggling companions. She seemed to find the stranger in the crowd and, smiling, walked in a straight line toward Jasper Holton.

***

Two hundred yards away from Albert’s, Tektomah Two Willows sat cross-legged on the ground. He sat facing the full moon. He looked inward to his mind’s eye. There, he watched Juanita dance. He watched her enjoy the attention of the men and her serpents. He heard her chant.

“What is it that thou hast done? What is it that thou hast done?”

Under the full moon and silent winds, Two Willows answered aloud.

“And the woman said the serpent beguiled me. And the woman said the serpent beguiled me.”

He sat rigid, pulse quickening around short gasps, as he watched, with his mind, Juanita walk toward the table where Jasper Holton and James Murphy sat waiting.

***

Jasper Holton’s plan had worked so far. When James Murphy introduced him to Juanita as a friend travelling to California, she smiled and asked if he had a dollar. A quick smile and a toss of three gold pieces on the table earned him a direct escort to the second floor.

Here, inside her room, Juanita quietly prepared a bath for him. As she cleansed his body, Jasper sensed another being in the room with them. He knew the snakes were in a box in the corner but, he thought, there was another creature much closer. If Two Willows’ wild legend was correct, there was, in fact, a much larger serpent waiting.

She helped him out of the tub and onto her bed. Jasper was unable to tell if his sudden chill was from wet skin or fear. Juanita pulled her blouse over her head. She crawled onto the bed and knelt between his legs.

“What the hell,” Jasper thought, “is that god damned noise?”

***

Two Willows stood in the moonlight. His brow glistened, his breathing had slowed. In his right hand, a large knife shone bright in the night.

“And his angels were cast out with him.”

***

Juanita rubbed her body slowly against Jasper. She hummed in his ear, biting and nipping in turn. He placed his hands on her breasts, trying not to shy away from the movement that seemed to come from within them. She kissed him and licked his lips. Her tongue felt strange. Jasper’s body almost revolted when he realized the tongue was forked. He kept his hands on her breasts and tried to slow his breathing.

Juanita’s arms and legs seemed to go limp. Her mouth opened wide and Jasper felt something cold against his lips. In an instant, his mouth was full of slimy scales. Something was filling his mouth and sliding toward his throat.

“Now, Marshall!”

Tektomah Two Willows slammed through the door. He slashed his knife at the black tail showing from under Juanita’s skirt. Blood, thick and black as oil, flowed freely from the large gash. Holton felt the serpent react violently at the pain. He grabbed its body, with both hands, where it entered his mouth.

Two Willows grabbed the serpent’s tail. He pulled, futilely, as the serpent’s heavily muscled body fought to move forward into his friend’s mouth. Holton held on as best he could. The scales were slippery and its girth, in his mouth, was making it hard to breathe. The listless body of Juanita Gomez hung between the two men in this deadly tug of war.

Holton’s eyes pleaded with Two Willows to do more. The serpent’s body was struggling against his hands to delve deeper into his throat. It was, now, almost impossible to breathe. Two Willows, out of options, grabbed Juanita’s hair and pulled her head up and back exposing her neck. He raised the knife high above his head striking down and across her neck. The woman, and her serpent, let out terrifying shrieks of pain. Both men were splashed with blood, human red and serpent black. Two Willows raised the knife and slammed it into both bodies time and time again.

“Die! Die!”

Juanita screamed no more. The serpent still squealed in agony. With it nearly cut in two, Jasper Holton was able to pull and push its head from his mouth. Its tongue made a last ditch effort at his throat but, finally, gave way and retracted into its dying head. Two Willows grabbed the upper half of the snake and threw it across the floor. The normal sized snakes in the box rattled and hissed at their father’s demise.

Jasper Holton curled against the iron headboard and retched violently. Two Willows knelt and stuck his knife into the space between the reptilian eyes of the serpent.

“Die!”

“Two Willows,” Holton rasped and retched, “It’s done, my friend. It’s done.”

“Jeeeesus Christ!” James Murphy stood in the doorway taking in the blood, the snake and Juanita’s decimated body. “Jeeeesus Christ, save our souls.”

***

Six days later, United States Marshall Jasper Holton and Tektomah Two Willows stood beside James Murphy and other townsfolk, alongside the burned out shell of what used to be Albert’s Saloon. The entire town decided, after James’ retelling of the fateful night and the discovery of two decomposed bodies in a shack out back, that the entire place needed to be cleansed.

“Will you stay, Marshall?” A middle-aged woman with two children at her side smiled hopefully. “Will you stay with us?”

“No, ma’am,” Holton tipped his hat. “We have to get back to Las Cruces. But, maybe, we will get back one day to see you all again.”

***

Six days after leaving Hell, a small, bespectacled man stood behind the bar in a dance hall just north of the Mexican border. It was almost sunset. The crowd was growing and murmuring about the new dancer they had heard about.

“Gentlemen,” the small man pushed his round glasses high on his nose. “My name is Albert. Please clap your hands for a lovely lady, from south of the border and her slippery friends…”

MARSHAL

Jay Wilburn

The narrow trail was packed with wagons. Some were families, but most were not. John coaxed the calico horse along the side of the line of wagon wheels and clutter. Some of the ones waiting gave him a threatening look, but they let their eyes slide away when they saw the star of his badge. Some of them wanted trouble, but not this kind and not here.

There were cooking tripods hanging pots over kindling fires in the middle of the road as John trotted past. This did not speak well of the process going on below the ridge.

Others huddled inside the canopy covers of the wagon beds with mining tools or family heirlooms. John could hear the flies and smell the filth off of some of them. They might as well have not bothered coming all this way to join this stagnant line just to be rejected if they ever reached the base of the ridge alive.