The Curse of Iron Eyes by Rory Black Page A

his spurs gently and allowed his
horse to move forward slowly.
    Then he reined in again
and listened.
    He was scared.
    All he
required was a mere glimpse of Iron Eyes and he would unleash the
fury of the deadly rifle. He knew that not even the legendary
bounty hunter could survive being hit by one of the buffalo gun’s
bullets.
    He focused on the
boulder, which was now half in shadow.
    Was Iron Eyes hiding
behind it?
    Cautiously, the rider lifted his right leg over the neck of
his mount and slid to the ground. The sand was soft beneath his
high-heeled boots.
    He held the huge weapon
in both hands and walked beside his horse towards the boulder.
Every few steps, the man stopped and tried to see if his quarry was
hiding behind the big chunk of rock.
    The shimmering heat
haze that rose off the soft white sand, together with the
lengthening shadows, began to play tricks on his tired eyes.
    He held the buffalo gun
ahead of him and carefully edged his way closer and closer to the
boulder.
    Sweat
was now pouring down the hunter’s spine beneath his shirt. This was
a game that he had no experience of. This was not the way he had
planned it.
    This was getting
complicated.
    Was this a cunning
trick created by the devilish Iron Eyes, or was he allowing his own
vivid imagination to get the better of him?
    One mistake now could
prove fatal.
    He was determined not
to make that mistake. All he wanted to do was get one clean shot at
the infamous Iron Eyes and cut him in half with his lethal
weapon.
    For
revenge was the one thing that had driven the man onward for the
previous three years in his relentless search for the man who was
known as the living ghost. It was all the rider had thought about
since his outlaw brother had fallen victim to the bounty hunter’s
deadly Navy Colts.
    Vengeance meant an eye for an eye in this man’s mind, and he
had travelled a long way to claim this God-given right. Yet he
could not take his eyes off the towering boulder before him, for he
knew that death might be waiting just behind it.
    His death!
    This
was not the way he had thought it would be. With every step, he
began to feel that he had somehow stumbled into a web of Iron Eyes’
design.
    And he was the fly in
that web.
    He
knew that he was still way beyond the range of Iron Eyes’ Navy
Colts and he intended to keep that advantage if
possible.
    He moved to his right
and crouched against the canyon wall. He caught a glimpse of
something moving behind the boulder through a two-foot gap at its
base. Then he heard the distinctive sound of spurs softly echoing
off the canyon walls beyond the massive rock.
    ‘ Iron Eyes!’ the
man whispered excitedly to himself as he felt a sense of relief
filling him. The bounty hunter was lying in wait for him. He had
been right to be cautious.
    His right thumb pulled
back on the hammer of the hefty weapon until it locked fully into
position. He knew that he had to try and make the bounty hunter
show himself if he were going to be able to blast him into
Hell.
    Then
the unmistakable jangling of spurs rang out again around the
canyon, sending a chill up his spine. Every muscle in his body told
him that the elusive Iron Eyes was there OK. Just beyond that lump
of taunting rock.
    He had to outwit the
bounty hunter, even if it were only for a split second. All he
needed was the time it would take to aim and fire. The buffalo gun
would do the rest.
    The man looked at his
horse and then back at the boulder. An idea began to hatch in his
fevered brain.
    Could Iron Eyes be
distracted if he were to send his horse galloping down the canyon
past the boulder? Would the ruthless bounty hunter be drawn out
from the impenetrable cover of the large rock just long enough for
the gunman to get a target?
    There was only one way
to find out.
    He stood to his full
height and then kicked the rear of the animal as hard as he could.
The horse raced down the narrow canyon towards the boulder, making
an awful lot of noise as it did so.
    Without