The Black Widow (10 page)

Minutes trickled past while Coburn sat
still, his emotionless face reflecting nothing of the seething
anger. Anger that was directed more at himself than at Tarrant. In
the boy’s place he might have tried the same sort of thing. But
there was no admiration in him. No sense of reluctantly
congratulating his younger adversary. If he had been given the way
of shooting Tarrant in the back, Coburn would gladly have taken it.
But he was well caught, and could do nothing but sit there and wait
to see how Herne played the hand he was going to find waiting for
him when he and the girl returned to the shelter.

Barely a quarter of an hour later they
both heard the crunching of feet in the snow, and the boy made a
warning gesture with the gun. ‘One noise, that’s all, and I’ll
fuckin’ blast you.’

‘
I should watch your tongue when
Herne gets back here, otherwise he’ll break that gun over your head
for using foul language in front of Rebecca.’

‘
Here comes the fire service!’
called out Herne, stooping to enter under the low roof. ‘We went a
ways along the trail by the lake and it’s still clear and the...
Ah!’

The unnatural silence at last
penetrated to him and he dropped the pile of branches on the floor,
standing quite still. Becky bumped into him from behind, laughing
and pushing a strand of hair back from her face.

‘
Why are we all ... Oh,
no!’

Nobody moved, like a tableau vivant at the
vaudeville halls, frozen. Tarrant sneered at the way the gun in his
bound hands had tipped the balance in his favor. Herne glanced at
Coburn, who shrugged his shoulders apologetically.

‘
Grabbed it when I was givin’
him a smoke. Never thought he’d do something that stupid when he
was that close to makin’ it away.’

‘
M
el! Why?’

The boy grinned at the girl, his eyes
never leaving Whitey. ‘Guess I was tired of waitin’,
Becky.’

‘
What happens next, son?’ asked
Herne, looking at Tarrant, his hand hanging loose and easy by his
side.

‘
She cuts me loose and
then I get on a horse and ride away.’

‘
No.’ The word was quietly
spoken, yet it dominated the silence in the little shelter. ‘No,
son. If’n we let you do that, then maybe you’ll ride away to Mount
Abora, and that’ll shoot all our chances of gettin’ in, and you’re
able to lead them right to us. I don’t favor that idea, son. Not at
all.’

‘
Don’t call me “son” you
stinkin’ old bastard! I’ll fuckin’ kill you all!’

Herne
shook his head gently. ‘You got the
ace there. You just play it the way you want, and we’ll think about
it.’

‘
What? What do you mean?’ There
was a dear note of uncertainty in Tarrant’s voice.

You got a
gun
, there.
Now what do you aim to do with it,’ said Herne
patiently.

‘
Oh. Yeah. You give that knife
of yourn to the girl and she’ll cut the ropes round my hands and
feet.’

‘
Suppose I say
not?’

‘
I kill him. Sure, I know
that’ll give you time to draw and kill me, but that ain’t the way
you’d act. You fuckin’ old-timers with your ideas of being loyal to
a friend. You’d not risk his life.’

‘
If’n it was me, son,’
interrupted Coburn, ‘I want you to know I’d gun you down like a
dog, even if you had a gun to my mother’s breast.’

The boy’s nostrils flared with anger and
they all saw, in the ruddy firelight, his knuckles whiten on the
butt of the Colt Herne’s own hand trembled and he tensed ready for
the quick draw to save his own life, but the girl saved the moment
for them all.

‘
Give me the knife, Jed,’ she
said, stepping forward to come between Herne and the
boy.

‘
Take it,’ he said, not
wanting to risk reaching down with his gun-hand.

‘
D
on’t get in the way of the gun,’ said
Tarrant, as she sliced through the ropes round his ankles. Becky
went to cut the ropes on his wrists, but he stopped her. ‘No. Take
their guns and throw them out in the snow. Then we’ll go out there
and you can cut them.’

‘
You don’t get my gun, boy.’
Herne shook his head. ‘Right now we can talk a deal, but if’n our
guns both go out there, then there’s no deal to talk. You let her
cut the ropes and we’ll give you a head start.’

Finally Tarrant nodded, arranging his
hands so that she could free him with the bayonet without coming
between him and Coburn. The moment the ropes dropped away Tarrant
made his play, grabbing Becky round the neck with his left arm and
digging the barrel of the cocked Colt into the back of her
skull.

‘
Right Now that does it, boy,’
said Herne. You try and take her with you and you’re deader than a
beaver hat.’

‘
You try and stop me, old man,
and she’s dead. Now she and me’s goin’ out there to the horses and
we’re goin’ for a ride. I’m takin’ your horses too, and I’ll be
watchin’ this shelter. Any sign of either of you tryin’ anything,
and I squeeze the trigger, and this pretty little lady gets her
head spread all over the fuckin’ Sierras. Come on!’

Coburn sat silent, with Jed at his side,
while the boy inched his way from the shelter, keeping the gun
rammed into Becky’s neck, always keeping her body between himself
and them.

They could hear their feet scuffling
through the packed snow, heading towards where the horses snickered
uncertainly. By bending down, Herne could see them as they moved
away, Tarrant carefully holding Becky tight so that he himself
presented no target.

‘
Clever young bastard,
ain’t he?’ said Coburn.

‘
Maybe,’ said Herne, keeping his
eyes on the couple outside. ‘Maybe.’

‘
You goin’ to let him get away
with it?’ asked Coburn, stretching out his right hand for the
Winchester, quietly thumbing back the hammer.

‘
Let’s sit this one out,
Whitey.’

‘
You reckon the girl’s in it?
Maybe playin’ along with him, on account of she feels sorry for the
son of a stinkin’ bitch? Maybe?’

‘
Maybe.’

They were at the horses, Tarrant
standing close to Becky while she adjusted the straps on the
saddle-bags and the girths. He took little notice of her, still
raking the opening of the shelter.

‘
Should have unsaddled them when
you came in,’ said Coburn quietly.

‘
I was figurin’ on tryin’
to get up through the woods with her. See if we could get close to
the house on horseback. Make the way out that much
easier.’

‘
I could hit him easy from
here, Jed. Is it worth a try?’

‘
You kill him, and he still
squeezes the trigger on the way down and kills Becky. I guess that
little girl’s about all I got left in the world, Whitey. If I’m
going to try and pick up some of the broken pieces, I can use her
help.’

‘
Kickin’ yourself in there, old
men?’ called Tarrant, from the other side of the clearing. ‘I’m
takin’ the girl with me.’

‘
No!’ That was Becky. Sounding
more angry than frightened. ‘I’m not goin’ with you, Mel
Tarrant!’

‘
Then I might as well kill you
now. Mount up or else I’ll put a... Oh.’

The last syllable was a quiet, polite
exclamation, following on the muffled noise of a small caliber
pistol shot. Jed and Whitey exploded from the shelter, both holding
guns, to be met with a strange scene.

Tarrant was hanging on the bridle of Jed’s
stallion, one boot already in the stirrup, his blanket poncho
flapping in the wind. The gun was still gripped in his right hand,
but it pointed down at the earth. His mouth hung open, and he was
staring, not at Herne and Coburn, but at Rebecca.

She stood three paces away from him, her
left hand to her mouth, the right holding the small derringer that
Herne had insisted she carry in the saddle-bags of her mare.
Largely, he thought, as a useful back-up weapon for him. But he’d
taught her to use it.

Taught her well.

Smoke trickled from the one barrel,
being whipped away by the cold breeze.

The horse skittered sideways, putting
Tarrant directly behind her, in line of a clear shot from either of
the men, making the boy hop awkwardly on one leg. Herne saw the
muzzle of the Colt swinging up again, towards the girl.

‘
Again, Becky.
Again!’

This time the crack of the gun was louder,
as the second bullet found its mark, sending Tarrant tumbling to
the snow, his gun dropping from his nerveless fingers. He shook his
head like he couldn’t believe what had happened to him, struggling
to his knees, fumbling for the fallen weapon. After his gasp of
shock as the first bullet hit him, Tarrant never said another
word.

There was the heavy snap of the Winchester
at Herne’s side as Whitey fired. The bullet hit Tarrant through the
chest, pitching him on his face, right at Becky’s feet, his hand
reaching vainly up to her, as though he sought her help. His
fingers closed on the dark material of her skirt, and she stood
quite still, looking down at the dying boy.

Even as his life-blood pumped
sluggishly across the rutted ice, his fingers didn’t relax their
grip, nor did she make any effort to move away.

Finally, it was Coburn who stepped
forward and kicked the body on its side, tearing the hand from its
death-grip. Whitey bent down and picked up his own gun, holstering
it again.

Becky didn’t speak, simply placing the
little hand-gun, its over-and-under barrels still warm, into
Herne’s pocket as she walked unsteadily past him into the
shelter.

As the two men dragged the stiffening
corpse out of sight among the trees, burying it under several feet
of snow to try and keep the animals from it, Coburn grunted to Jed:
‘Don’t worry about her. Like I said. She’s got grit, that
one.’

‘
Maybe,’ was all Herne
replied.

During that night, Becky woke three
times, finally crying herself to sleep.

Four days later they were ready to
make their move.

Ruth Stanwyck stood naked in front of
the long mirror in her bedroom. The chubby figures of grinning
cherubs carved round the dark oak frame flickered as the light from
the three brass oil lamps played over them. The yellow light also
threw shadows across her body. Highlighting the firm breasts, and
the peaking nipples, erect in the cold air.

She half-closed her hooded eyes,
admiring herself, appraising what little damage time had done to
her. Smoothing her fingers over the flat stomach, stroking the
silken mat of hair in the pit of shadow at the junction of her
thighs. Half-turning, tightening her gluteal muscles, watching her
buttocks in the mirror. Deciding that she would still be considered
a desirable and attractive woman.

It had been a long time, she remembered,
letting her fingers roam absently, pretending that they did it
without her agreement. Licking her lips, and tossing the light
blonde curls. Perhaps it might be time, after this winter was
finished, to move back out of the hills to the coast. Re-enter
society in San Francisco and perhaps even marry again.

But that would mean having a man touch her
again. And do ‘that’ to her. She shuddered at the memory. Far
better to stay with her beautiful, unspoilt sons. Even though they
were sometimes rather high-spirited, they were still her boys. Far
better to stay with them. It was so good to have them with her.
Gentle Mark, who she loved so much. Loved to have him spend the
night with her in the padded bed, secure in the certainty that he
would never try to do ‘that’ to her. Not Mark.

Nor Luke. She had made sure that his love
was as safe as that of his twin. Ruth smiled to herself, her hand
moving faster at the happy thought of what she’d managed to make of
her two lovely boys. And in six days time they’d be twenty-one.
Grown men.

Her eyes glazing with pleasure; her
panting breath making her breasts rise and fall, faster and faster,
Ruth Stanwyck locked herself deeper into her own private world of
dreams.

Or nightmares.