Read Online Magnificent Guns of Seneca 6 by Bernard Schaffer - Free Book Online Page A

the mask and said, “If they had been true to the old ways you would be a dead man right now.”  
     
    “So how do I know it wasn’t you that sent them?”
     
    “Because I would not send Akashame for a task such as this.”
     
    “No?   Who would you send?”
     
    “I would do it myself.”
     
    The masked man chuckled and said, “I bet.   So what brings you out here, friend?   Just good conversation, or were you fixing to do some trading?”
     
    Keewassee looked back at the caged wagon and said, “Tonight I have brought you something different than before.”
     
    “Different how?” he said.   “Our deal was squaws.   Not too young, not too old, and not too ugly.   You bring me some raggedy bag full of deformities and left overs and we ain’t trading.”
     
    “Before I tell you anything else, I want you to know they were not harmed.   They were not touched.   They were fed.”
     
    Gentleman Jim smiled sharply at him, “How about we cut the foreplay and bump uglies, Tookie?   What did you bring me?”
     
    Keewassee cocked his head and one of his Beothuk threw the caged wagon’s rear door open.   The women inside screamed as he reached in and grabbed the first limb he could find.   Ruth kicked at him violently but he grabbed her by the ankles and yanked her out of the wagon so fast that she fell on the dirty ground with a thud.   He snatched her by the hair and lifted her head, showing her face to the wasichu.  
     
    The masked man yanked his pistol free and shoved it against Keewassee’s belly.   “You got five seconds to tell me what the hell you’re doing with a cart full of white women, itjin.”
     
    “They came to us.   They wanted to come live among The People and learn our ways.”
     
    He headed for Ruth and said, “Is that true?   You came here to join the itjins?”
     
    “Our church did,” Ruth hissed.   “But he killed Willard!”  
     
    “Who’s Willard?”
     
    “Our teacher.   The one who brought us here.”
     
    The masked man looked her up and down and nodded approvingly.   “Teacher, huh?   I just bet he was.   Get the rest of the women out of that damn cage before I lose my temper.”  
     
    “Please save us,” Ruth begged.   “Please, in the name of the Great Spirit, I beg you to save us from these monsters.”
     
    “First things first, buttercup,” he said.   He waited for the rest of the women to get ripped out of the wagon, laughing as they spat and cursed in fury at the Beothuk who touched them.   He knelt down to inspect Elizabeth Hall but recoiled in revulsion at the vomit staining her chest.   The masked man bent down and washed his hand in the dirt and said, “I reckon if we clean ‘em up a bit they’ll do just fine.   Especially this young ‘un.   Not that our buyer is real particular.   Long as a girl’s got the right amount of holes, he’ll pay.   I mean, they been takin’ squaws, so a few white women should be like Christmas come all over again.”   He snapped his fingers at his men and said, “Round ‘em up, boys.”
     
    Keewassee watched the filthy wasichu grab hold of the women and thought, Good.   Better to be rid of them.   “There may be others.   Ones like these.   I do not know yet.”
     
    The masked man mounted his destrier and stayed silent for a moment, thinking it over.   “The deal we had was for redskin slots only.   We start taking real people and the law will come down on us harder than divine judgment.   Plus, taking squaws is one thing, but taking white girls seems, I dunno.   Uncivilized.”
     
    Keewassee looked at his riders who had the wasichu from the group bound and gagged across the backs of their destriers.   “What do you want me to do with the men who came with them?”
     
    “Well, they wanted to be with the Beothuk, right?”   He looked up at the dead native bodies hanging from the tree and said, “There you go.   Itjin and whiteman, together at