The Treasure of Eerie, Arizona
by Christopher Leeson and Ellie Dauber

This new story of Eerie, Arizona concerns one of its untold tales. It carries us back to December, 1871, to a month that has been already visited in the second novel, “Eerie Saloon: Seasons of Change – Autumn” and in the short story “Eerie Saloon -- Toy Soldier.” Let's assume that, behind the scenes, something else was happening that we did not at that time choose to reveal, something that will now be the subject of this novella.

Here begins our adventure, featuring some old characters, some new characters, and some bits of rip-roaring action. It's about outlaws, and robbery, and lost treasure. It's about anew pretty girl, and...oh, that would be telling. Read on and see!
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Prologue

Wednesday, December 13, 1871

A bullet ricocheted off the canyon wall as the stage slowly climbed the upgrade. The company guard grabbed for his rifle, but fumbled the weapon and it fell down across his feet. The driver beside him cringed, glancing about for robbers.

Someone's shout echoed between the canyon walls: “Throw down that smoke pole, codger, or you won't like what happens next.”

The flustered guard took the rifle by the barrel, but then looked hesitant about what to do next. “Throw it down,” the highwayman repeated. “I won't be asking three times.” The rifleman resignedly took the barrel of the Henry rifle between two fingers and tossed it away. He had deliberately aimed for a roadside bush, to keep it from breaking on the rocky grade.

“That's better,” the bandit said, stepping into the open. Three others emerged from different hiding places. They were masked with colored bandanas, but had the build of young men. “Driver, toss away your hog leg, too," the first robber told the guard, "and if any of you passengers are toting, dump what y'got out the windows.”

“Don't try anything fancy, folks,” another of the desperadoes grumbled. His bandanna was read and his voice came across as even younger than the other outlaw's. “Hand over the strongbox and the key.”

“The key!” scoffed the guard. “Sonny, that key'll be waiting fer this shipment at the bank in Phoenix. Company policy.”

The red-masked holdup man pointed a Remington at him. “Don't call me Sonny!” he warned. Just then, the wind swept his hat back, so that it hung over his back by its stampede strap. His hair was fair and looked like it needed a good washing.

“All right, old man,” the guard answered back. “Don't get yourself in a lather. We've been authorized to hand over any payload, if a highwayman asks fer it politely. The box is in the boot. Don't shoot me if I go back and get it out fer ye.”

“You do that,” the grumbling bandit responded.

“Wait a minute,” said a woman through the coach window. “You sound just like Thorn Caldwell. You even got his hair. That's your farm a couple miles down the hill, boy. What would your aunt think?”

The stickup man glared at her old face, his pistol raised, but not aimed. “Damn you!”

“Settle down, gentlemen," the guard interjected. "No reason to get your lather up. Ye'r about to get rich, so yah got to be mad about? He climbed down to the natural pavement and went to the rear-end boot. It looked to be strongly reinforced for carrying the weight of gold shipments. The company man inserted the key and turned it, unlatching the boot's protective plates. Once they were pushed aside, the robbers could see the coveted strongbox.

"Now step away," the lead badman ordered. When the guard gave back, two of the holdup men, the pair who had not said a word so far, went to take the loot. The bigger one tried to lift the chest and exclaimed, “Shoot! The damned thing must weigh a lot more than a hundred pounds!”

There was silence for a moment, then the lead badman yelled, “Anybody bring a crowbar?”

The canyon fell silent, and then the smaller of the two quiet bandit said, “Hell, no.” The remaining outlaws just stood where they were, looking out of sorts.

“We can't carry anything so heavy on a horse's back,” said the apparent leader.

“Let me have a crack at it,” said Myron Thornton Caldwell -- “Thorn” Caldwell. The other highwaymen backed aside, allowing Thorn to square off with the box. He cocked his shooting iron.

“Easy there, lads,” the guard said. “It ain't a cinch to blow off a strongbox lock. That case is solid iron. Bullets bounce.”

“Don't call us lads, either!” snarled the gang leader.

Caldwell aimed his barrel about a foot from the padlock. Before anyone could yell, “No!” he pulled the trigger. The blast rocked the canyon and made pebbles fall.

“Hey!” yelled the biggest bandit as the shell whistled past his ear.

“You're an idiot!” growled the leader, pacing forward. “Stand back and let me try.”

The young shooter bridled, but grudgingly gave back a step.

The bandit chief took a careful bead and pulled his trigger. The cliffs, for a third, time echoed.

“Yahhh!” Thorn Caldwell howled.

For a few seconds, everyone stared at the boy curled up on the ground, groaning.

“Keeee-rist!” an outlaw exclaimed.

Blood was flowing between Caldwell's fingers where he clutched the wound. Everyone -- outlaws, company men, and passengers -- continued to look on mutely. Most knew that belly wounds soon turn poisonous. During the war, gut-shot soldiers had commonly been left to die behind the surgeons' tent while the doctors worked to save men with less fatal wounds.

“Ike!” one of the gang shouted. “We have to...”

“Shad-up!” Ike snapped. He pointed at the ground with his gunbarrel. “Pick up those pistols.” Turning, he bared his teeth at the people inside the coach. “You men, get out and clear away the barricade. When the road is open, you can all get on your way. Move it! We don't have all day.”

Everyone, except the lady, exited the stage. Watched by three outlaws, the company men and passengers took apart the obstruction of wood and stone. The work took only about fifteen minutes to complete. Then one bandit held a gun on the onlookers while the other quiet bandits dragged the box out of the boot and set it down on the stony grade.

“Now jump back into your seats and get the hell out of here!” Ike ordered.

“Maybe we should send Thorn with them,” put in the scrawniest of the outlaws. “They can take him to a doc.”

“Just let me do the thinking!” Ike told him bluntly.

Five minutes later, the stagecoach was bouncing down on the roadbed, in a hurry to be away.

The bandit Ike stood in place, pondering what to do. He looked over his shoulder, at a small canyon that branched off the defile. Holstering his revolver, he told the unwounded men, “Carry the box up into that gorge. We'll hide it and come back later, when the excitement's died down. Next time, we'll bring proper tools.”

“What about Thorn?” the scrawny bandit asked.

Ike scowled. “Leave him to me.”

The big robber and the skinny one took up the load together, one at each handle, and carried it into the offshoot canyon. Ike brought the gang's four horses out of hiding and tied them to a sickly mesquite tree that was growing out of a crack in the rock wall. Then he regarded the wounded boy, still thinking hard.

“Damn you, Thorn, you've made yourself into a problem that we didn't need. We can't take you with us and move out with the kind of speed we need. If a posse takes you, you'll get talkative. You owe it to your friends to die quick-like and be done with it.”

“Go to blazes,” the wounded robber moaned.

Ike rested his hand on his gun-grip, frowning. “That's a selfish attitude. If you're still alive by the time we've gotten the gold hidden, you'll be a problem that'll need fixing.”

That said, he followed after the other two.

Thorn cringed, toughing out what were the tortures of Hell. By the time the scuffling of the robber's boots died away, he had grasped the situation. As soon as Ike came back, he was going to put him down, like a nag with a broken leg. Seething mad, the young outlaw struggled, despite his searing pain, to get up.

Somewhat to his own surprise, Thorn found he could walk some. He shuffled toward his tethered horse and managed to clamber up into its saddle. The youth was under no illusion that his new “friends” didn't give a hot damn whether he lived or died, and they'd be money ahead if it were the latter. Thorn couldn't let his plans and dreams end like this, all because of some stupid mistake that wasn't even his own. If this were any place else other than the familiar canyon that lay only a couple miles from his own home, he wouldn't have stood a chance. As it was, if he could reach the farm, he could get some help. Luckily, the youth didn't feel half so close to dying as Ike seemed to be hoping.

Riding down out of the hills, each bump inflicting shots of pain, he felt like he was living some awful dream. If he hadn't been only half-unconscious, the agony would have been unbearable.

The first darkness was closing in on Riley Canyon Road by the time he reached the plain below. He kept on following the trace toward Eerie, Arizona, barely lucid. Somehow, his bay was staying with the road, carrying him in the direction that he wanted to go. He didn't try urging it to speed, afraid that he couldn't hold on if the ride got any rougher.

At last, he spied the uneven shingles of his family's farmhouse. Thorn suddenly felt younger than his years. He didn't want to face his aunt in so sorry a condition, and he wanted even less to have a one-on-one with the town sheriff. Dan Talbot would remember the horse that he'd stolen from his neighbor, Tally Singer. That was a hanging offense under the law, even if stage robbery was not.

By this point, though, the young bandit would have gladly accepted a jail-house bunk if it meant getting off his horse's back. The mid-December wind was chilling him to the bone. His teeth chattered; his breathing came in shivery snatches. By the time the rider heard a shout from the farmhouse, he didn't have breath enough for an answering hail. Pain was draining away his strength like water from a leaky canteen. Was someone running his way? He couldn't focus.

The hard ground slammed into his shoulder. The wounded youth never felt it.

***

TO BE CONTINUED IN CHAPTER 1