The Headless Horseman: A Strange Tale of Texas

“Curse the damned thing!” cries Calhoun, with a gesture of chagrin. “It’s going to escape me again! Not so much matter, if there were nobody after it but myself. But there is this time. That old hell-hound’s coming on through the thicket. I saw him as I entered it – not three hundred yards behind me.

“Is there no chance of shaking him off? No. He’s too good a tracker for that.

“By God! but there is a chance!”

At the profane utterance, the speaker reins up; wrenches his horse half round; and scans the path over which he has just passed.

He examines it with the look of one who has conceived a scheme, and is reconnoitring the terrain, to see if it will suit.

At the same time, his fingers close nervously around his rifle, which he manipulates with a feverish impatience.

Still is there irresolution in his looks; and he hesitates about throwing himself into a fixed attitude.

On reflection the scheme is abandoned.

“It won’t do!” he mutters. “There’s too many of them fellows coming after – some that can track, too? They’d find his carcase, sure, – maybe hear the shot?

“No – no. It won’t do!”

He stays a while longer, listening. There is no sound heard either before or behind – only that overhead made by the soft waving of the vulturine wings. Strange, the birds should keep above him!

“Yes – he must be coming on? Damn the crooked luck, that the others should be so close after him! But for that, it would have been just the time to put an end to his spying on me! And so easy, too!”

Not so easy as you think, Cassius Calhoun; and the birds above – were they gifted with the power of speech – could tell you so.

They see Zeb Stump coming on; but in a fashion to frustrate any scheme for his assassination. It is this that hinders him from being heard.

“I’ll be in luck, if he should lose the trail!” reflects Calhoun, once more turning away. “In any case, I must keep on till it’s lost to me: else some of those fools may be more fortunate.

“What a fool I’ve been in wasting so much time. If I don’t look sharp, the old hound will be up with me; and then it would be no use if I did get the chance of a shot. Hell! that would be worse than all!”

Freshly spurring the grey mustang, he rides forward – fast as the circuitous track will allow him.

Two hundred paces further on, and he again comes to a halt – surprise and pleasure simultaneously lighting up his countenance.

The Headless Horseman is in sight, at less than twenty paces’ distance!

He is not advancing either; but standing among some low bushes that rise only to the flaps of the saddle.

His horse’s head is down. The animal appears to be browsing upon the bean-pods of the mezquites.

At first sight, so thinks Calhoun.

His rifle is carried quickly to his shoulder, and as quickly brought down again. The horse he intends firing at is no longer at rest, nor is he browsing upon the beans. He has become engaged in a sort of spasmodic struggle – with his head half buried among the bushes!

Calhoun sees that it is held there, and by the bridle-rein, – that, dragged over the pommel of the saddle, has become entangled around the stem of a mezquite!

“Caught at last! Thank God – thank God!”

He can scarce restrain himself from shout of triumph, as he spurs forward to the spot. He is only withheld by the fear of being heard from behind.

In another instant, he is by the side of the Headless Horseman – that spectral shape he has so long vainly pursued!

Chapter Ninety Two.

A Reluctant Return

Calhoun clutches at the trailing bridle.

The horse tries to avoid him, but cannot. His head is secured by the tangled rein; and he can only bound about in a circle, of which his nose is the centre.

The rider takes no heed, nor makes any attempt to elude the capture; but sits stiff and mute in the saddle, leaving the horse to continue his “cavortings.”

After a brief struggle the animal is secured.

The captor utters an exclamation of joy.

It is suddenly checked, and by a thought. He has not yet fully accomplished his purpose.

What is this purpose?

It is a secret known only to himself; and the stealthy glance cast around tells, that he has no wish to share it with another.

After scanning the selvedge of the thicket, and listening a second or two, he resumes action.

A singular action it might appear, to one ignorant of its object. He draws his knife from its sheath; clutches a corner of the serapé; raises it above the breast of the Headless rider; and then bends towards him, as if intending to plunge the blade into his heart!

The arm is uplifted. The blow is not likely to be warded off.

For all that it is not struck. It is stayed by a shout sent forth from the chapparal – by the edge of which a man has just made his appearance. The man is Zeb Stump.

“Stop that game!” cries the hunter, riding out from the underwood and advancing rapidly through the low bushes; “stop it, durn ye!”

“What game?” rejoins the ex-officer with a dismayed look, at the same time stealthily returning his knife to its sheath. “What the devil are you talking about? This brute’s got caught by the bridle. I was afraid he might get away again. I was going to cut his damned throat – so as to make sure of him.”

“Ah, thet’s what ye’re arter. Wal, I reck’n thur’s no need to cut the critter’s throat. We kin skewer it ’ithout thet sort o’ bloody bizness. It air the hoss’s throat ye mean, I s’pose?”

“Of course I mean the horse.”

“In coorse. As for the man, someb’y’s dud thet for him arready —if it be a man. What do you make o’ it, Mister Cash Calhoun?”

“Damned if I know what to make of it. I haven’t had time to get a good look at it. I’ve just this minute come up. By heaven!” he continues, feigning a grand surprise, “I believe it’s the body of a man; and dead!”

“Thet last air probibble enuf. ’Tain’t likely he’d be alive wi’ no head on his shoulders. Thar’s none under the blanket, is thar?”

“No; I think not. There cannot be?”

“Lift it a leetle, an see.”