California Killing (4 page)

"Somebody do somethin' about my damn arm," the injured man cried from the rear of the lusting crowd. "I'm bleedin' to death."

Not a single eye was turned in his direction as the men drank in the sight of the woman, her submissive despair heightening their anticipation as Jose's fumbling fingers hooked over the neckline of the gown. The material ripped with a rasping sound and several thin giggles rippled through the watchers as the torn dress was pushed forward off the woman's shoulders and released to sink to the bed of the wagon around her feet. She was completely naked, her flesh firm and white and tremulous,

"Travels light, don't she?" Dayton muttered as his wide eyes moved up from her ankles to the top of her blonde head before returning to the center of her body.

"Is it true what they say about women who don't wear nothin' underneath?" a man asked.

"We're about to find out," Hood answered flatly, reaching up a cupped hand.

Jose grasped one of Magda’s limp arms and folded it across her back in a vicious hammerlock that tore a cry from her mouth and forced her to lean forward.

"No!" she exclaimed as Hood gripped one of her large breasts and allowed the money satchel to slip from her other hand. "That's what they all say," the bald-headed man said, his fingernails clawing deep into her flesh. "Don't never mean it, though. Jose?"

The Mexican released his hold and Hood jerked cruelly at her breast. Magda was dragged off the wagon and her cry of despair was cut off as her mouth sank into the slime. The men crowded in around her, hands fumbling at their belt buckles. A boot hooked under her stomach and flipped her over on to her back. She vomited up the dirt from her throat as the teeming rain washed the mud from her body.

She looked up into the circle of evilly excited faces and tried to rise, opening her mouth to plead. A boot stamped upon her long hair, wrenching her head back into the mud. Other boots stamped on her wrists, pinning them to the ground. A man crouched at each side of her and splayed her legs, their fingers clawing into her ankles.

She moaned and prayed for unconsciousness. But the heaven of which she asked deliverance was as much her enemy as the ravishers. It continued to empty its reviving water upon the land, forcing her to stay aware.

"Now don't all rush," Hood told the men. "The little lady looks like she's got enough for all of us."

Her eyes still tightly screwed shut, Magda felt the man's weight sink on to her, his hands and mouth defiling her body before he accomplished a clumsy, searing entry. He finished quickly, the manner of the act drawing him close to the edge of fulfillment before he even touched her. And it was the same with the others as they drove their lust into her soft, unresponsive body, demanding nothing from her except her presence beneath their laboring lust. They took their pleasure in silence except for an impassioned moan at each climax. And as she lost count of the number of times she was assaulted, there was no longer any need to hold her prisoner to the mud. For she gave in to the inevitable: lost her will to struggle.

She waited in patient revulsion for it to end, wanting it to be over only because then she could find the gun and accomplish what Jose had prevented.

She became so detached from reality that it took her several seconds to become aware what they had done with her and when she opened her eyes many of the men were mounted and the driver was back on the stage. The ugly little man who had ordered her degradation was crouched close to the rear of the wagon, picking up the satchel he had dropped. His bulbous eyes raked across her nudity, starkly white against the black mud, as he halted beside her on the way back to the stage.

He studied her for long moments, then delved a hand into the satchel and brought out a ten dollar bill. He rolled it into a cylinder and showed his misshapen teeth in a leer as he bent down and left it with her. "Rate for a lousy job, lady," he said. "Ten bucks for ten bucks."

She met his gaze for a moment, then snapped her eyes closed and listened to the sounds of their departure. Not until the last hoofbeat and the final creak of the stage had diminished into the rain-washed distance did she struggle into a sitting position and snatch the ten-spot from her. She hurled it away and the action seemed to drain her of the last remnants of strength. For each time she struggled to get up, she pitched down into the mud again. Finally, she had to crawl on all fours to where John lay, his head half submerged in mud.

His shallow breathing expanded tiny bubbles in the thick moisture and she cradled his cheek to her naked breast as tears of joy coursed with the raindrops down her face.

Chapter Four

B
Y
four o'clock it was as if the San Fernando Valley had never seen rain. Above, the sky was a polished cobalt blue with a fiery sun shedding a parching heat that sucked thirstily at every droplet of moisture, cracking the earth below. The three men moved through the shimmering heat at a weary, measured pace, Edge slightly ahead of Dexter and Wood. All sweated freely, the perspiration caking into salt amongst their stubble. Dexter carried his coat over his arm. Wood swung his valise from one hand to the other after every ten steps. Edge ambled along unburdened.

The rain had let up
two hours previously and they had not had a drink since then. Unused to the Western climate, unwilling to shed any of his clothes and having to take two strides to every one of the bigger men, Wood was suffering the most. But he did not complain. He had fallen in with every suggestion Edge made - about heading for the waystation after they buried the dead at the scene of the hold-up and then continuing to move south when they discovered the buildings vandalized and deserted. It was Dexter, once hardened by the struggle to become the richest cattle rancher in northern California and now softened by the luxury of money, who constantly raised objections. But, in the end, he complied. For he realized that the tall, cold-eyed half-breed was adept in the art of self-preservation while caring nothing for either the wish or the fate of any other. So he limped along grimly through the blazing heat.

"I think we should rest, Edge," he said after a long period of silence as they rounded a turn in the trail and entered a patch of shade thrown by a steep-sided rise. Wood looks on the brink of collapse."

Edge did not break his stride and held back from a response while he swilled spittle around in his mouth, swallowed it and licked his lips. "So carry him," he said at length without turning his head.

"I'm perfectly all right:" Wood protested between grasps for breath, readjusting his derby in an effort to get a greater degree of shade from its narrow brim. "Really I am."

Dexter stared malevolently at Edge's back, unaware that the elongated bulge which began at the nape of his neck and extended several inches down the line of his spine was formed by a cut-throat razor in a pouch. "You weren't such a man of iron at the hold-up," he taunted, dragging his forearm across his sheened brow as they moved out into sunlight again.

"You and me both," Edge snarled.

"I don't keep a dog and bark myself," Dexter shot back.

"He didn't have a lot of bite."

"At least he tried."

Edge halted' and spun to face the limping rancher. The move was so unexpected that the tall man and Wood almost cannoned into Edge. But they backed off under the force of his scowl.

"Why?"

Dexter licked his lips, but it was discomfort rather than apprehension which showed in his eyes. "It was his job to guard my money."

"He lost it the hard way," Edge growled.

"Desperate men take desperate measures," Dexter replied, holding Edge's level stare, unwilling to offer further explanation.

"Hey!" Wood yelled excitedly, his shrill voice cutting through the tension as he pointed a wavering finger along the trail. "That looks like a wagon over there"

Edge whirled and shaded his eyes to peer in the direction the photographer was indicating. The trail ran in an arrow straight line across the pan-flat country before curving slightly to the left to take a low rise with a rock strewn bowl on one side. As the heat mist swirled like lazily moving water he caught sight of the wagon, canted at an angle on the lip of the bowl.

"One day can't be all bad," he muttered and set off down the trail at a quickened pace.

Wood scampered after him and following a moment of hesitation, Dexter limped along at the rear.

Magda Stricklyn had been unable to lift John up on to the wagon, so had made him comfortable beneath it, sheltered at first from the rain and then from the sun. Her torn dress formed a pillow and she had donned another, less ornate gown from the chest. Neither of the rifle blows had drawn blood from the contusions and her nursing was confined to dousing pads of cloth in the water barrel and resting them against the discolored skin at his neck and across his stomach. Often he groaned and his breathing became stronger, but he did not regain consciousness.

He was still in the depths of his concussion when Magda sensed the approach of strangers and looked up to see the three men drawing near. The agony which had somehow seemed detached from her during the mass assaults now closed in around her, raising a burning pain within her stomach and causing her flesh to turn cold against the heat as she watched the trio through haunted eyes.

A moan ripped from her lips, which curled back to show her teeth in a snarl. She dragged her gaze away from the men and raked the surrounding area, seeking a means of defense. She saw the Symmes, its muzzle still caked with hardened mud, lying where Hood had dropped it. Trembling with ice cold fear, she scrambled out from under the wagon and staggered across the open ground. She snatched up the rifle, ramming the stock into her shoulder, aiming the weapon, forcing her hands into rock stillness.

Dexter and Wood faltered, seeing the hate-filled menace in the woman's eyes. Edge, his lean face expressionless, moved on to within ten feet of the woman. Then he halted, hooding his eyes to pale blue slits which missed nothing - the broken wheel, the distress of the horse still in the shafts, the unmoving man beneath the wagon, the tense stance of the woman, the condition of her rifle.

He kept his
voice low and toneless. "They had a stagecoach. Top man was a little guy named Hood with no hair and eyes like they were trying to get out of his head."

The aim of the Symmes did not waver from Edge's chest. "I don't need reminding," Magda said dully and there was a hint of hysteria in her eyes. "Move around and on."

"We do and you'll stay here and your man will die. We can fix the wheel and be in The Town With No Name before sundown."

"I'll take my chances," Magda said. "One step that isn't around the wagon and I'll fire."

Edge looked away from her, down at the ground to where the indentations made by her splayed body had been baked into a rock-hard mold. "Some men have hurt you, ma'am," he said softly. "Don't mean all men mean you harm."

"Move on."

"We need the wagon."

John Stricklyn groaned. Magda's eyes flicked to the side, filling with new expression. But she did not move.

"Move on."

"Squeeze that trigger and you'll get hurt worse than me," Edge warned.

"Please, ma'am, we want to help," Dexter pleaded.

Edge began to stretch out his arm and took a step forward. "He's right."

Magda saw the action as the gesture of a man seeking to touch her. All the revulsion of the rape welled up inside her and she gave a choked cry and squeezed the trigger.

The muzzle jerked skywards as the paper cartridge exploded. The rifle clattered to the ground, trailing black smoke. Magda staggered back, screaming and clawing at the bloodied mask which moments before had been a beautiful face. Her body hit the ground and writhed as her head rolled from side to side, spraying scarlet droplets.

"Oh, my," Wood gasped as he squatted and began to retch dryly.

Dexter rushed forward and crouched beside the woman as death rattled in her throat and she became still, her hands falling away, the fingers inscribing red trails down the front of her white dress.

"What in the hell happened?" the rancher croaked as he straightened up, his crinkled skin looking pale beneath its tan.

Edge stooped and picked up the rifle, holding it out to show the rancher how the breech mechanism had been ripped apart to shower the woman with twisted fragments of metal. Then he showed him the muzzle. "Mud in there dried as hard as the barrel, he said evenly."Blast had to come out someplace."

He hurled the smashed rifle down among the rocks in the bowl and moved across to the side of the wagon. There was a dipper hung over the rim of the water barrel and he used it twice, one to drink and then to pour refreshing coolness over his neck. "Warned her she'd get hurt," he said, bending to examine the broken wheel.

Wood heard the splash of water and scuttled across to the wagon.

"Can you begin to imagine what those animals put her through?" Dexter demanded. "She was in no state of mind to listen to anything a man said."

Edge moved to the log lever. "I ain't much for drawing pictures," he muttered and tested his strength against the log. The wagon inched up.