The Curse of Iron Eyes by Rory Black

big. Far bigger than he had ever imagined it would or
could be. So big that Harve Calhoon had seen it when he and the
rest of Big Jack Brady’s team of handpicked outlaws were more than
a mile away from Honcho Wells.
    Even
the moonlight could not lessen its sheer awesome
splendor.
    Spanning the entire valley, Calhoon had quickly calculated
that it had to be nearly three hundred yards across and at least
fifty foot high at the center. The outlaw had seen bridges before
but never one like this.
    It was made up of
thousands of large wooden trestles, bolted together and supporting
the single-span tracks at its top, spanning the width of the
valley.
    Harve Calhoon started
to get worried.
    His
mind tried to work out how much dynamite it would take to bring
down such a magnificent structure. This was way beyond anything he
had experience of. In the past, Calhoon had used explosives to
blast a dozen or more bank vaults open with remarkable success but
he had never once thought of demolishing a bridge.
    Where did you start
with something like this?
    He focused on the
trestles at the very base of the bridge. Was it possible to blow
them apart and bring the rest down like a house of cards?
    Calhoon had no idea how
the bridge was constructed. He knew that he would have to get up
close to see if he could find a weak point.
    His mind wrestled with
the problem as they continued to advance towards the bridge.
    The river flowed
swiftly between the wooden trestles at the base of the bridge. The
high moon above made it appear that a thousand fireflies were
dancing on the wide river.
    The dozen horsemen and
heavily laden wagon rode down on to the level ground next to the
fast-flowing water.
    Calhoon was riding next
to the wide-shouldered giant Big Jack and could hear the man
getting more and more excited the closer the long line of horses
got to it.
    ‘ Looks mighty
fine, huh?’ Brady asked.
    Calhoon grunted. ‘Yep. Mighty fine, Big Jack.’
    Every
few paces of their horses, Calhoon glanced over his shoulder and
watched as Black Roy Hart steered the wagon’s four-horse team along
the rugged route towards the place known as Honcho
Wells.
    He had
inspected the explosives before they had ridden out of Calico a few
hours earlier. There were thousands of sticks of top-grade
nine-inch dynamite and boxes full of fuses on the flat bed of the
wagon.
    Calhoon began to think
that he might require every one of them to bring down a bridge so
well constructed as the one before them.
    The
outlaw watched as Brady’s huge right hand plucked a pocket-watch
out of his coat and opened its golden cover.
    ‘ What’s the
time, Big Jack?’ he asked.
    ‘ Four fifteen,
Harve.’ Brady smiled, patting him on the back for the umpteenth
time. ‘I can tell ya eager to start work on that bridge. Don’t you
fret none. We’ll be there in less than half an hour.’
    Calhoon cleared his dry
throat.
    ‘ I can hardly
wait.’
    ‘ We have between
seven to eight hours for you to bring down that bridge and get all
the boys in place ready to strike in the confusion,’ Brady
announced.
    ‘ What if the
train is early, Big Jack?’ Calhoon posed the question that most of
the other men had thought of but none been brave enough to
ask.
    For the first time
since he had met Brady, he saw the venom for which the big man was
famed. The eyes widened and looked across the distance between the
two lead horses. There was a madness in them.
    ‘ Ya better pray
that the train is on schedule and you’ve blown the bridge apart
before it reaches Honcho Wells, Harve,’ Brady warned. ‘’Cause if it
is early and ya ain’t done your job, I’ll surely kill
ya.’
    Harve Calhoon felt his
throat tighten. He looked away from the angry face and stared again
at the bridge. The closer they got to it, the bigger it looked.
    ‘ Understood, Big
Jack,’ Calhoon said as every bone in his body began to wish that he
had stayed with the rest of his gang and headed on to Waco instead
of riding to