Arkansas Assault

Daisy.

The gunny who had come through the door was picking himself up and cursing. He’d just been humiliated and physically hurt in the process.

He staggered to the table and turned up the lamp.

“Name’s Ekert,” said the man with the shotgun. “Guess I didn’t have a chance to introduce myself yesterday.”

“Let’s get going,” said his partner. He was still nervous from the humiliation. A man like him preferred to think of himself as tough. That was the only thing he could claim to be. Smart, no. Cunning, no. Successful, no. But tough—damned tough. Except he wasn’t damned tough, was he? Not anymore, not in the eyes of Ekert, anyway.

“We’re taking a trip, Mr. Fargo.” Ekert glanced around the room suspiciously, as if expecting a leprechaun with a six-gun to be hiding somewhere.

“Same kind of trip you took Daisy on?”

“Believe it or not, nobody told the Mex to kill her,” Ekert said. “He was just supposed to keep her hidden ’till the boat came.”

The boat. Fargo thought about the island Aaron Tillman had alluded to. Maybe this was the fastest way to find out what was going on. Let himself become a captive of these two gunnies—given the fact that they had the drop on him didn’t leave him much choice, anyway—and see if that led him to the boat and the island.

“Get your clothes on,” Ekert said.

“You’re gonna be sorry you hit me,” said the other gunny.

Fargo dressed.

“I take it Noah sent you,” he said as he pulled on his boots.

“Who sent us is none of your business,” Ekert said.

“It’s gonna be a pleasure to pay you back,” the other gunny said.

“We don’t hurt him,” Ekert said. “The island, remember?”

“The Mexican was a lot tougher than this one,” Fargo said, smiling at the other gunny. “This one isn’t tough and he isn’t smart.”

Fargo saw an easy chance for escape. He could smash the lamp. He was close enough to the open window to dive through. In the darkness, Ekert wouldn’t be able to figure out what was going on until it was too late.

But as salty—not to mention crazy—Cap’n Bill had told him, the easiest way to get on the island was to have somebody kidnap him and take him there.

Well, here was his chance.

He buttoned his shirt, hefted his manhood to a more comfortable angle inside his breeches, and then said, “Let’s go, gentlemen.”

“What the hell’re you so happy about?” the other gunny asked.

“Well, hell, friend,” Fargo said. “It’s the Fourth of July. Why wouldn’t I be happy?”

“He sounds like he’s got somethin’ funny planned,” the other gunny said to Ekert.

“Shut up,” Ekert said.

They left the room by way of the fire escape.

15

Fargo was thrown into the back of a buckboard, marked by slivers in the wood of the wagon bed. He lay beneath a horse blanket that smelled of animal urine and hay. Ekert and the other gunny sat up front.

It was hot as hell, and his sweat added to the urine scent and the bouncing ride to make the trip miserable. Plus it made him need to piss. But he’d play hell getting them to stop and let him empty his bladder.

He was hoping they’d talk to each other, fill in a few details about where they were going and what their plans were. But they said nothing.

Fargo stared into the darkness.

Somehow, despite everything working against it, Fargo managed to drift into a light sleep.

He woke to find that the buckboard had pulled off to the side of the stage road.

“Where are we?” he said.

“Don’t worry about it, Fargo,” Ekert said.

“Yeah, don’t worry about it, Fargo,” the other gunny said, sounding like a dumb little kid imitating his old man.

The silence returned.

After awhile the other gunny said, “They’re late.”

“Yeah, I noticed that, McGarth,” Ekert said sarcastically. “I’m sittin’ here with you, remember?”

“Who they bringin’ us?”

“I don’t know. All Manuel said was that we were to meet ’em here and they’d have somebody else for the boat.”

“Well, they’re late,” McGarth said.

Ekert sighed. “You say that one more time, McGarth, and I’m makin’ you walk.”

The silence again. Fargo had a few second thoughts about putting his fate in the hands of two idiots like these. What was to say McGarth wouldn’t say “screw it” and shoot him, anyway? Fargo had humiliated him, or that was how McGarth saw it, and it was obvious the man was eager to pay Fargo back.

After a long time, the clatter of an approaching wagon could be heard.

“About time,” McGarth said.

Fargo tried to sit up but the way they had lashed his wrists and ankles made it impossible to raise his head more than a few inches. But at least when he sat up this way, the blanket fell away and the air, hot as it was, smelled clean.

The buckboard pulled up alongside the wagon.

“How come you’re so late, Manuel?” McGarth said, sounding angry.

“I don’t answer to you,” Manuel sneered.

“Never mind him, Manuel. I thought maybe something went wrong.”

“Something did go wrong. My friend here managed to escape when we were loading him on the buckboard. He faked being unconscious. You’ll have to watch him carefully. He’s a wily one.”

“He ain’t gonna escape while I’m around,” McGarth said.

Manuel laughed. “You have a brave one with you, I see, Mr. Ekert.”

“If he was as good with his gun as he is with his mouth, he’d be a dangerous man,” Ekert laughed.

“You two think you’re pretty funny, don’t you?”

“Go help him load up the other one,” Ekert said to McGarth.

In the moon shadow night, a second man bound identically to Fargo was carried from Manuel’s buckboard to the wagon holding Fargo. He was loaded next to Fargo with all the tender care of two-by-fours being crammed into a wagon bed.

“We meet again, Mr. Fargo.”

The voice surprised Fargo. He rolled slightly so he could get a look at the man who’d just spoken in such familiar tones.

Aaron Tillman.

“I guess tonight we’ll both find out what the island is all about,” Aaron said. “The big secret, I mean.”

“Shut up back there,” McGarth said.

“Right now all I care about,” Fargo said, loudly enough to be heard by all, “is to give McGarth a nice big funeral.”

Manuel, obviously trusting neither Ekert nor McGarth, came back to the wagon bed and jumped up to check