Chastain and I did as Virgil instructed. We posted at the back of the tent on the right side.
We could see Virgil and Eddie. They were at the rear of the tent on the left side.
Chastain and I watched Virgil. We waited on a signal, and after a moment, Eddie nodded. Virgil looked to me and nodded.
Here we go, I thought.
Virgil and I walked deliberately past the tent and directly over to the two men and the goat they were turning on the spit.
“Evening, fellas,” Virgil said.
They looked up.
“Who are you?” the man with the beard said.
“My name is Virgil Cole. The fella here next to me with the eight-gauge is Everett Hitch.”
I nodded politely.
“Everett and me are lawmen,” Virgil said.
I looked around to see if we were drawing any attention from anyone yet, and so far there was no one looking or coming in our direction.
“I’m a territorial marshal,” Virgil said. “And Everett here is my deputy marshal.”
The man with the beard shifted his eyes back and forth.
In an instant, his body shot up and across the campfire in an attempt to run, but I swung my heavy eight-gauge the way the baseball fellas go after the ball and caught him just under his chin. His feet flipped out from under him and he hit the ground so hard on his back it knocked the wind right out of him.
He grasped his throat, trying to get a breath.
The second man was much slower, and Virgil just put his Colt between his eyes.
“Just stay seated,” Virgil said.
I got the bearded man by his hair and propped him up near the fire. I put my boot to his chest with the eight-gauge barrels pointed at his head and pushed him back toward the flames lapping up from the spit.
“I think the combination of my eight-gauge hitting your throat and you hitting the ground hard like you did is making it difficult for you to breathe,” I said. “Regardless, I know some shit about you.”
I dug my boot hard into him, pushing him toward the fire.
“I’m gonna ask you a few simple questions. If you don’t answer, or if you lie to me, I’m gonna burn your face off in this fire. You try to move for some stupid reason, I’ll blow your head off with both barrels of this eight-gauge.”
The bearded man just looked at me as he tried to get his breath.
“First question is,” I said, “what is your name, but before you answer, just know, I know what your name is, so if for some reason it comes out wrong, I start burning your face.”
63
“Fuck you,” he said.
I crammed my boot fast and hard under his neck and pushed him back to the fire. His hair started to burn.
“Ahha,” he rasped as he squirmed trying to worm out of the fire, “Ohhh... stop! Stop... Dee! Fuck. Dee. Name is Dee.”
“You murdered the sheriff and his deputies of Appaloosa?” I said. “Yes or no?”
“I don’t know what you are talking about,” Dee said.
I shoved him back into the fire and he fought me, but I held him to it.
“Ahhh,” he cried.
I wanted to pull both triggers on my side-by-side and watch his face explode, but I took another tactic and let up on him.
“Oh, fuck,” Dee said, as I let him out of the fire.
“Oh, fuck...” he continued. “Oh, fuck...”
“This fella here with you and this goat?” I said. “He part of your rotten gang?”
Dee’s eyes were just wide with pain and madness.
“What’s your name, your real name?” I said to the man Virgil had his Colt leveled at. “You lie to me and I will burn you, too.”
“Dmitry,” he said.
Dee squirmed and I dug my boot into his neck.
“I ain’t done nothing,” Dmitry blurted out. “I didn’t kill nobody. Honest.”
Dmitry was a little man with a wool head cap. He had thin lips and slits for eyes.
“There’s gonna be a few options for you, Dmitry,” Virgil said. “One is you will die, the other is you will go to jail.”
“I didn’t do nothing to no one,” Dmitry said.
“How many are you, Dmitry?” I said.
“Fuck him,” Dee said.
Virgil looked around. I glanced around, too, and for the moment there was no one moving about except for the men fifty yards down the way in the darkness. The men were still chopping wood and they were unaware we were even in camp.
“How many are you, Dmitry?” I said.
Dmitry’s eyes worked back and forth.
“Talk,” Virgil said, as he pressed his Colt on Dmitry’s forehead.
“Seven,” Dmitry said, “There’s seven of us...”
Dee squirmed some more. He was clearly not liking the idea that Dmitry was forthcoming.
A hefty man wearing long johns walked out of the tent that was flanked by Chastain and Eddie. He saw Virgil and me, and Dee on the ground, and guns out. This sight was obviously a confusing and unexpected one.
“Wha... what’s going on out here?” he said.
“We’re just having a visit,” Virgil said.
“What?” the hefty fella said.
In an instant, Chastain was at his side with his rifle crammed into his ear.
“Down,” Chastain said quietly.
The man just looked to Chastain, and Chastain slapped him hard on the side of the head with the barrel of the rifle.
“Now,” Chastain said with a harsh hush.
The hefty guy did as he was told and got down on his knees. Chastain peeked quick into the tent, then looked to Virgil and me and shook his head, letting us know there was no one else inside. He put his boot in the middle of the hefty man’s back and shoved him hard face-first into the dirt.
“Don’t move a muscle,” Chastain said.
“Fat fella one of your clan?” Virgil said to Dmitry.
Dmitry glanced to Dee, then nodded.
“Eddie,” Virgil said.
Eddie was standing in the dark beside the tent and looked out a little.
Virgil nodded for him to step out.
“Here,” Virgil said.
Eddie moved out into the open road area, looking both to his left and to his right as he made his way over to us.
Dee cocked his head, looking at Eddie. He recognized him.
“I’ll be goddamned,” Dee snarled. “You fuck.”
Without saying a word, Eddie took one bounding step and kicked Dee so hard between the legs his head jerked forward and he busted his mouth on the barrels of my eight-gauge.
“Goddamn,” Dee cried, as he crunched his legs up and spit out pieces of his bloody teeth. “Goddamn...”
64
“Eddie,” Virgil said, tossing Eddie his knife, “cut some lines off that tent. Tie up that big boy under Chastain’s boot first. Tie him up good.”
Eddie nodded and did as he was told. He cut the tent ropes, then moved to the man under Chastain’s boot.
“Hands behind your back,” Chastain said.
The man did as he was ordered.
“Snug ’em tight to his feet, Eddie,” Chastain said.
Eddie did just that. He tied the fella’s hands behind his back, then looped the rope around his feet, and with a half-hitch jerk he pulled the man into an uncomfortable backward arch.
“Gag him,” Chastain said.
Eddied nodded and crammed his handkerchief into the man’s gaping mouth.
From a ways down the dirt path of shacks and tents that lined the creek we heard some music start up, a fiddle and a guitar. They were working on some dancing tune.
“Dmitry,” Virgil said. “The more you tell me, the better off things will be for you when we take you in, that is if we take you in. If things go a way we might not appreciate, there’s a good chance you will burn and die here tonight.”