“Rein ’em in,” Thorpe said beside him.
Thorpe hadn’t said anything for what seemed like miles. The abrupt command took Ike by surprise and made him jump a little. He recovered quickly, hauled back on the lines, and asked, “Something wrong, Marshal?”
“No, we just need to give the mules and the horses a little rest,” Thorpe explained. He called to the outriders to halt as well, and then climbed down from the wagon seat, still holding the shotgun. “Better stretch your legs while you’ve got the chance, Winslow.”
Ike had given the marshal his real name when he asked to join the group of volunteers going along with the wagon. He didn’t see that it mattered if they knew who he was. He didn’t know what he would have done if Thorpe had refused to bring him along, so he emphasized his experience at handling a wagon team. And of course, it was true that he had driven a team of mules hundreds of miles already. He’d had no trouble so far with this team.
Luck had been with him…if you could call it lucky to be captured by a gang of desperadoes and forced to help them murder nine innocent men so they could free a monster in human form.
Thorpe went to the back of the wagon, which had a door set into it. A heavy padlock held the door closed. The marshal reached into his pocket and pulled out the key to the padlock, and as Ike dropped to the ground beside the wagon, Thorpe tossed the key to him. Instinctively, Ike caught it.
“Unlock the door,” Thorpe said as he stepped back and leveled the shotgun. “We’ll give Shade a little air.”
Swallowing nervously, Ike went to the door and stuck the key in the lock. He stood well to the side and stretched his arm out to reach the key as he turned it. If Shade tried anything, Ike didn’t want to be in the line of fire when that scattergun went off.
He hoped desperately that Shade wouldn’t try to escape just yet, though. If Thorpe was forced to kill the outlaw, then the rest of the gang would call off their rescue attempt…and Maggie and Caleb would be lost.
Nothing happened, though, except the door swung open. Training the shotgun on it, Thorpe said, “Come on out of there for a minute if you want, Shade.” Without taking his eyes off the door, he added, “Draw your gun, Winslow.”
Ike pulled the Colt revolver the outlaws had given him. He let the weapon dangle at his side as he watched the door. The walnut grips felt odd in his hand. He had used a rifle and a shotgun in the past, but he’d never handled a six-gun all that much. He wasn’t sure he could hit anything with it except at close range.
Like the width of a wagon seat…
Ike caught his breath as Shade appeared in the doorway at the rear of the wagon. His confinement over the past week had caused a pallor to set in on the outlaw’s face. His hair was matted and tangled, his eyes sunken and haunted by unknowable demons. His suit was dirty and disheveled. He looked like a lunatic, Ike thought, and from everything he had heard about Joshua Shade, that was an apt description. The man was crazy as a bedbug.
But still dangerous. Ike felt a chill go through him as those haunted eyes swept over him.
Something about the man inspired great loyalty in his followers, too. Ike had heard the way the outlaws had talked about “the reverend.” Sure, they respected Shade because the raids he planned were successful and had netted them plenty of loot, and no doubt they feared him as well.
But it was more than that. The fire that blazed in Shade’s eyes got into a man and burned right through him when Shade looked at him. Ike felt it now. He didn’t think that he ever would have succumbed to it…but at least he could understand why some men did.
“You can walk around a little if you want,” Thorpe told the prisoner. “We’ll give you some water and something to eat. Just don’t try anything funny.”
Shade didn’t say anything. He just stared at Thorpe with those baleful eyes for a long moment, then turned to look at Ike. Ike had to look away. A dry chuckle came from Shade.
“That’s right, boy,” he rasped. “Avert your eyes from the avenging angel of the Lord.”
Shade had no idea that Ike was working with the gang, and Ike couldn’t tell him. He just said, “I’ll get the canteen.”
“And a little jerky, too,” Thorpe said.
Awkwardly because of the shackles and leg irons, Shade climbed down from the wagon bed. There was nothing inside the enclosure but the bare planks, nothing Shade could use to free himself or turn into a weapon. He shuffled along for a few steps, then turned and went back to lean against the wagon. Evidently, that was all the exercise he wanted.
Ike holstered his gun and got the canteen and a strip of jerky from the bag of supplies stashed under the wagon seat. Being careful not to get between Shade and the marshal, he handed them to Shade.
“The blessings of the Lord be upon you, my son,” Shade said. Ike thought he detected a hint of irony in the outlaw’s voice, but he couldn’t be sure.
Shade took a long drink from the canteen, his prominent Adam’s apple bobbing in his thin neck as he swallowed. He smiled as he handed it back to Ike.
“I’ll take particular delight in flaying every inch of skin from your body, you foul, fornicating sinner, so that you take days to die screaming in agony.”
Ike shuddered as he stepped back. Shade’s voice had been as soft and friendly as he uttered that threat as it had been a moment earlier when he asked for the Lord’s blessing on Ike. The man was loco, all right. No doubt about it.
“You won’t be torturing anybody else, Shade,” Thorpe said. “Now take that jerky and get back in there. Lock up after him, Winslow.”
Shade did what the marshal told him. Ike was glad when he swung the door closed and couldn’t see that evil, smiling face anymore.
But he knew he would have trouble shaking the image from his mind, maybe for the rest of his life…however long
