Man with No Name- Dragging Pinky

The bounty hunter walked his horse toward the swaying hammock. He had no difficulty in recognizing Pinky. There was plenty of him to see—and there could not be two albinos in these mountains. A pile of clothes had been thrown to the hard-packed ground beside the door, a dozen feet from the hammock. A brace of murderous guns in their holsters had been laid carefully atop the pile.

The Man With No Name loosened the rope coiled on his saddle horn, took his time building a loop. He nudged the horse to a halt beside the hammock and looked down on the round white buttocks. His voice came low and flat.

“Sorry to interrupt, Pinky.”

Roebeck rolled, squirmed, sat up so fast that he knocked the girl out of the hammock. He struggled against the yielding rope webbing, trying to scramble out, to dive for his guns.

The hunter dropped his loop over the weaving head, jerked it tight around the stretching neck. The big horse had been trained to cut cattle. It knew how to keep the rope taut, keep the noose from slipping out of place. It backed with a sure, steady step.

Pinky Roebeck was pulled forward. The hammock jerked back as its center of gravity changed. Pinky sprawled on the ground. He gathered his bare legs to spring to his feet.

The Man With No Name touched spurs to his horse. The animal made a graceful swing, jumped ahead, and the killer was dragged, the grit of the street scraping his white skin. They passed the church. Men and women ran at Pinky, spitting on him. He flailed at them, helplessly, raging. At the single tree in the little plaza the hunter stopped, dismounted, lifted Pinky by his hair and roped him against the trunk. He seemed not even to hear Roebeck’s raging curses. No killer likes to be caught.

The hunter stepped back from his victim, put his long, narrow eyes on the people closing in.

- A Dollar to Die For, chapter 3