The lord nodded, reached into his waistcoat and withdrew a velvet bag which he gave to Hamuta. The gunsmith opened it and emptied the contents into his palm. There were three large rubies and a modest diamond, all perfect gems. Hamuta, it was known, would only take perfect gems. He returned one ruby.
"That is a perfect ruby," said the lord.
"Yes, it is," Hamuta agreed. "But it is too much."
"That's downright decent of you," the lord said.
"Your gun, your bullets. Now you should test it," Hamuta said and the lord nodded.
Hamuta clapped his hands again and a door at the other end of the long hall opened. And there was a poor wretch tied to a stake.
"Kill," said Hamuta.
"I'm not going to kill someone tied to a stake," the lord said. "I'm not an executioner."
"As you wish," said Hamuta. He smiled and took the rifle with a simple motion of one hand and loaded one shot and fired. So fine was the tooling that even without a silencer, the shot sounded like a minor hiss coming out of the barrel. A knot exploded on one of the ropes that held the man. The man squirmed and the ropes fell away. The man let out a shout and Hamuta handed the gun back to the nobleman.
"Oh, gracious," said the lord. The man who had just been set free was large and unshaven and his eyes were flecked with a red madness.
"He has killed before," Hamuta said. "And I think he wants your jewels as well as your life, old chap. Is that how you Englishmen say it? 'Old chap'?" Hamuta laughed. The lord fumbled a bullet into the rifle and fired and a little pop appeared in the enraged killer's belly. But all it made was a little red mark. From his hunting, the lord knew what was wrong. A platinum bullet was so hard it would cut through someone like a fine pick. The shot had to go into the brain or hit a vital organ, or it would not stop the man.
But the rifle wasn't in his hands anymore. That vicious beast, Hamuta, had it, and he was laughing. Loading and firing and laughing. And at this point, the nobleman saw what he might need a strong stomach for. With one shot, Hamuta crumpled the man's left ankle, and with another, his right. The poor creature was on his back, screaming in pain, when Hamuta put a shot into his spine and the legs stopped moving. It was then that the lord saw the pain and fear in the victim's eyes.
And there were no more bullets.
The lord turned away his hand and glared angrily at his friend.
"How could you have brought me to this?"
"You said you wanted a Hamuta."
"I did, but not like this."
"You said you had a strong stomach."
"I did. But I didn't expect this."
The victim's groans mingled with Hamuta's laughter. The gunmaker was laughing as much at the Englishman as he was at the bleeding figure on the floor.
"You won't say anything," the friend said.
"How long does this go on?" the nobleman asked.
"Until Mr. Hamuta has had his fill of pleasure."
The lord shook his head. They listened to the screams for more than fifteen minutes and then Hamuta was brought a box of platinum bullets and stunned admiration replaced the disgust.
Hamuta worked the bullets like scalpels. First he ended the screaming by faintly grazing the victim's skull, just enough to knock him out.
"I wanted you to hear me," he explained to the lord. "First the skull. Then we take off the Adam's apple. Then the lower lobe off the left ear and then the right ear, and then we move down the body until we are at the kneecaps. Good-bye, kneecaps."
He put two more grazing shots against the skull, then told the lord to finish the kill.
The rifle almost slipped from the nobleman's hands because they were so wet with sweat. He knew his heart was pumping wildly.
Sorry, wretch, he thought, and put a single shot into the heart and ended the whole sorry mess, even while Hamuta continued to giggle.
He did not bother to tell the nobleman that he had actually rushed this sale. He wanted to get to California. A most wonderful target was being arranged for him, but he had been told he must hurry.
"It is a challenge for you, Hamuta," the provider of the target had said.
"I have no challenges," said Hamuta. "Only entertainment."
"Then we will both have fun," said the provider, Abner Buell of the United States, a man who certainly knew how to give people what they wanted.
sChapter Nine
They had all gotten used to the fancy life-style, to the fancy cars and fancy homes and fancy women and fancy vacations, and the fanciest thing of all-- being able to buy anything without bothering to ask what it cost.
And then the money had dried up, and Bernie Bondini, checkout clerk who had bought the grocery, and Stash Franko, bank teller who had become a stock manipulator, and Elton Hubble, auto mechanic who now owned two auto dealerships, had spent a month scraping and scrapping to meet their overextended obligations. So when they each received a card that read: "What won't you do to have the money turned back on?" and gave an address and a time in Malibu, they all showed up.
The oceanfront house, jutting out over stone columns, shadowing the sandy beach lapped by the warm Pacific, was a cool three-million-dollar number and just the thing to put them in the right frame of mind to remind them of what they were in danger of losing forever.
They were let into the house wordlessly by a beautiful redhead who silently ushered them to a balcony overlooking the ocean. When she turned to leave, Bondini said, "Miss, what are we supposed to do?"
And the woman replied: "Think about what was on the note you all received."
They thought about it and talked about it. There were things they wouldn't do, not even for money. No. There were certain inflexible rules of morality that they would observe, the things that separated man from beast.
They saw the parade of beautiful beach bunnies walking by on the sand below, looking up at the house hopefully, and finally Hubble forced himself to look away and said sluggishly, "I don't care. There are some things I won't do for money."
"Me neither," said Bondini.
"Such as?" said Franko.
"I wouldn't kill my mother with a stick," Bondini said. "No way. I just wouldn't do that. I don't care about money that much."
Hubble nodded agreement. "That would be terrible, I guess. Unless your mother is real old and sick like mine. I mean, sometimes death is a better solution to life's problems than continuing to live."
"But with a stick?" Bondini said. "No way. I won't kill my mother with a stick."
"Maybe a big stick so it'd be fast," Hubble suggested, but Bondini was adamant. "No way," he said.
"Well, I would," said Franko. He was a small man with sandy wiry hair and thirteen months of secret money going into his secret Insta-Charge account had encouraged him to leave his dullard of a wife and disown his two sluggard daughters. "I remember my wife," he said. "I'd kill my mother. I'd kill your mother too. Anything is better than going back to my wife."
"I don't believe it," Bondini said stubbornly. "There's something you wouldn't do. Both of you. There's something you wouldn't do."