Of Kith and Kin

 

 

This is an original work of historical short fiction by The Tactical Hermit. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in this short story are entirely fictional and are of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or organizations of persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

 

(Author’s Note: This story is a homage to the famous Texas pistoleer John Wesley Hardin. Hardin is a near mythical figure here in Texas, and is considered by some, including myself, to be one of the finest, if not the best Pistoleer of the 19th Century).

 

“Man never has really loved humanity all of a piece— all its races, its peoples, its religions—but only those creatures he feels are his kin, a part of his clan, no matter how vast.”

-Camp of the Saints by Jean Raspail

 

 

Fannin County Texas, 1867

 

I had just turned sixteen years old the day I buried a hatchet into the head of a red headed yankee soldier who was trying to have his way with my widowed mother. I will never forget how calm mama was afterward as she told me me to strip off all my clothes which were covered in the bastards blood. She promptly did the same with her house dress and the yankee’s uniform and burned it all in a pit in the back forty. She then gave me his rifle and pistol belt and told me to wait until nightfall and then go and throw them all into the Sulphur river. I tossed that Springfield but could not bring myself to get rid of that .44 caliber Remington Army! Damn she was a beauty! When I returned home mama had already chopped up the yankee’s body and fed it to our hogs. I must have sat there for over an hour watching our big sow devour that yankee bastard piece by piece. Did you know a hog can crack a man’s head open like a pecan? They must really love the brains because they all fought over them something fierce!

The next day a squad of yanks came around the house asking questions about a missing soldier. Mama said one of them walked over to the pig pen and nosed around, staring at our big sow for a while. She said it made her kind of nervous until she realized that the red headed bastard was nothing but a pile of pig turds. Mama told the Lieutenant she had heard rumors of a red headed soldier going around town telling folks he was going to go down to Galveston to catch a steamer ship to South America or was it Australia? Mama had a real knack for bullshiting folks, especially lawmen or yankees. It was a skill I always admired about her.

Life was tough in Texas during this time which that bastard Andrew Johnson in Washington D.C. had the nerve to call ‘Reconstruction’. Just to be clear: I never saw any kind of construction while the yankees were here. In fact, If a yankee wasn’t trying to steal it, he was damn sure trying to fuck it, you can bet on that. After daddy was killed at Gettysburg three years ago proudly fighting with General Hood’s Texas Brigade, I quit school to go to work for Mr. Clyde Hopson’s Lumber outfit. Daddy had worked for Mr. Hopson before joining up and when it was announced that Daddy had been killed in the Dallas newspaper, Mr. Hopson rode out to the house personally to offer me a job and also give mama twenty dollars to help out with expenses which was a small fortune in those days I don’t mind telling you. I never forgot Mr. Hopson’s kindness to my family for as long as I lived.

Every morning I took my younger brother Jefferson Davis to school on the way to work, not trusting him to walk by himself past the yankee’s garrisoned in the hotel in town. There had been reports of soldier’s “interfering” with young boys all over the county. Pete Sanders youngest boy, Tom said a group of drunk yankees tried to snatch him up while he was night fishing out on the Red but he was too damn fast for them and escaped into the woods. He said they were all yelling about how they would have “first dibbs on that pretty little pink asshole.” Poor Tom said he never ran so fast in all his life after hearing that.

One of the biggest issues Texans had with this “Reconstruction” business was how the Federal Army allowed nigger units to march around town like they owned the place. This caused several altercations to include a shooting last month when one uppity yankee nigger decided he would just go in the General Store and buy himself some candy. Well, this did not sit well with the owner, Mr. Jacob Landry, who promptly pulled a Navy Colt from beneath the register and told him to get his black ass out of his store. Federal soldier or not, niggers were not allowed. When the nigger soldier mouthed back about having Federal “jurisdiction” Mr. Landry promptly shot him in the arm. Later at the military hearing, Landry said he was only sorry his aim was not better, he intended to kill the black son of a bitch, not just wing him. After a long discussion amongst Mr. Landry’s lawyer and the three officers overseeing the hearing, all charges were dropped and Mr. Landry was sent home. It seemed the Blue Belly brass was not ready to back nigger soldiers as so-called “equals” just yet. We all knew why the niggers were down here: to satisfy the wealthy abolitionist up north that “progress” was being introduced into the “backward” Southern states. It was all window dressing horseshit, and just another prime example of the kind of condescending moral indecency these Federal bastards were good at.

But anybody familiar with Texas history knows Texans don’t take shit like this lying down. Contrary to them lying yankee newspapers, the war of Northern Aggression did not end at Appomattox. Because of the Federal Government’s insistence on waging economic and cultural war on the southern civilian populace, guerilla outlaw gangs like the James Gang in Missouri, The White Man’s League in Louisiana and several other outfits in Texas continued to fight their federal oppressors with vigor and matched barbarity. Of course being young and full of piss and vinegar, I took an interest in these gangs despite mama telling me to steer clear.

“I already lost a husband to this God awful war, I am not losing a son too! You keep your nose clean John Wesley, you hear me!”

“Yes ma’am” I replied with respect even though I was itching to join them as soon as I could. As fate would have it, I would not have to wait long.

One evening at dusk I was coming back from fishing with a nice stringer of channel cat hanging from my horn when I saw five men with their faces covered with mask sneaking off into the woods with rifles. Being half curious and half stupid, I tied my mare to a tree off the road a ways and snuck over to investigate. The sun had just went down and in the low amber light I saw fourteen year old Billy McGuiness in a stand of thick pin oaks holding the reins of five horses. I let out a low fox whistle and when Billy turned his head my direction I whispered to him:

“Billy! It’s me Wes Hardin!”

Billy jerked his head in my direction with his eyes bulging like a scared deer.

“God-dammitt Wesley! You scared the shit out of me! What the hell you doing out here! You tryin’ to get yourself killed!” he replied in a high tenor voice.

I had to stifle a laugh as Billy was literally shaking in his boots.

“No, just wondering what the hell’s going on, that’s all.” I replied as I walked up out of the brush, smiling like a jackass.

“What’s going on ain’t none of your damn business! You need to haul ass out of here!” Billy replied, his eyes darting left and right with sweat beading on his forehead.

“Oh Bullshit Billy! I saw the men creeping in the woods earlier, what the hell is…”

Before I could finish my question the whole country side exploded in gunfire and I almost shit myself as I hit the ground with a dull thud with Billy following right on top of me. He strained and grunted as the horses began blowing and pulling away in fear.

“Oh to hell with this!” Billy shreiked as he stuffed the reins in my hand and then got up and ran off into the brush like a jackrabbit with it’s ass on fire.

Before I could think about it I was up on my feet calming the horses and whispering to them to be quiet. As soon as they had settled down several masked men exploded out of the brush with rifles in their hands and their faces covered with burlap mask.

“Who the hell are you!” One of the men asked covering me with his rifle barrel.

“Where’s Billy?” another man asked jerking the reins out of my hand.

“He got scared and ran off yonder” I pointed to the dark woods like a soft brain.

“Why don’t that just beat all!” The man replied laughing as he mounted up.

Before I knew it all five riders were gone in a cloud of dust with only the sound of galloping hooves echoing in the distance. I squatted down in the brush for a few more minutes, catching my breath and trying to piece together what in the hell just happened. The smell of gun smoke floated thick in the air and somewhere on the road up ahead I could hear horses snorting. I finally got up the nerve to sneak back to my horse and I raced back home so damn fast I lost my stringer of catfish and my buckskin mare Sally-Jean had a lather of sweat on her thick as shaving soap.

Walking in the house I was tackled by a hundred pounds of worried mama.

“Oh Thank God you’re alive!” Mama’s voice was trembling as she grabbed me and squeezed me tight. I could feel her body trembling and could see that she had been crying.

I hugged her tightly in return and told her I was fine.

“I heard the gunshots and I thought those damn yankees were on a killing spree in town!” she choked out, finally letting me go.

I considered telling her the whole story but I was so damn tired I just decided to stay quiet. Better not to worry her until there was a real need for it. Mama decided to keep Jefferson Davis home for the next few days until things calmed down and I am glad she did.

I could not believe the amount of activity as I rode into town the next morning. Armed union soldiers and cavalry were everywhere you looked, questioning people, searching wagons and shops and nailing up posters:

$500 Reward for any information that leads to the arrest of the individual(s) responsible for the cowardly ambush and murder of four union soldiers last night outside of town. Please report directly to Major William H. Standrich, U.S. Army.

I’ll be honest, I was scared when I saw that four yankee’s had been killed and I had been so close to it, but at the same time I was excited, I hated the bastards and wanted in on this fight.

As I made the turn off main street to go to the mill, a short and squat yankee sergeant with a blondish-red handlebar mustache stepped off the sidewalk and in front of my horse like he owned the damn street.

“And just where in the hell are you going this morning laddy?” he asked in a thick irish brogue.

“I work at Hopson’s mill” I replied staring at him like he was something I found on the bottom of my boot.

He walked up to Sally-Jean and attempted to pet her on the nose but she jerked away and blew at him. I smiled and patted her.

“Your horse needs some manners!” the yankee said giving me his best go-to-hell stare.

“She don’t take to strangers. Can you move aside please, I need to get to work.”

Not waiting, I gently spurred Sally-Jean to go around him and the soldier quickly side-stepped and grabbed her by the halter. By this time three other haggard looking yankee soldiers had crawled out of the saloon and formed up on the sidewalk. Even though they were a good ten feet away I could smell the liquor on them like they were standing next to me.

“You ungrateful piece of trash! You’re gonna learn who gives the orders around here!” He stared up at me with bloodshot eyes as his right hand went to the top of his holster.

I remained calm, keeping my gaze on his right arm. I had that big .44 tucked into my belt under my jacket but I had already decided if he opened that flap on me I was going to spur Sally-Jean right over the top of the cocky son-of-a-bitch and not look back. Thankfully, one of the half-drunk soldiers broke the tension and called out from the sidewalk.

“Come on Sergeant, we’re late for muster!”

The drunk irishman shot a glance over at his cronies and then back up at me and then after thinking about it, let go of the bridle. As soon as he did I spurred Sally-Jean knocking him off-balance and onto his fat ass into the muddy street.

“You little peckerhead bastard!” the soldier yelled out from behind me in a rage as I dissapeared around the corner in a cloud of dust with a big shit eating grin on my face.

After work that day I avoided town and went straight home to where to my surprise was Sheriff Pete Slidell waiting on the porch with mama and Jefferson Davis drinking lemonade. I knew right away from Pete’s grin he wasn’t there on business.

“Boy everybody in town was talking about you today! How you knocked a yankee flat on his ass and rode out like one of them dime novel outlaws!”

I smiled as I walked up to the porch and shook hands. I had known Pete since I was a boy. He was a big barrel of man, built stocky and low to the ground with dark hair and eyes and a pair of hands like meat hooks. He had done some boxing in his youth and I remember daddy telling me there was nobody better to have with you in a bar fight than Pete Slidell. Pete got wounded early on in the War at a place called Round Mountain and came back home and joined up with the home guard regulators and after the war was over became a law man.

Me, Pete and Mama talked for a while about the Yankees stirring up a fuss in town until Mama got the hint Pete needed me alone for man talk. When she took Jefferson Davis inside me and Pete walked out to the barn out of ear shot of the house.

“So a little birdie told me you helped Billy McGuiness tend some horses the other night?”

My heart began thumping and my palms got sweaty and for a quick minute I considered running for it but then I saw Pete crack a smile and begin to do an imitation of me being scared shitless in the woods that could only mean he had been one of the masked shooters that night!

“He got skeered and ran off yonder…”

Pete busted out laughing so hard he had tears in his eyes and after a while I started laughing with him and could not stop. After we both regained our composure Pete put his arm around me and drew me in close.

“Your pa would have been so damn proud of you son!”

My heart swelled in my chest and at that moment I felt like I could fight ten men.

“Shit, I almost forgot! I got something for you!”

Pete reached into his saddlebag and pulled out a brand new leather belt and open top holster along with a box of paper cartridges for my colt.

“Figured you needed a proper holster for that hogleg you keep stuck down your pants like some jackass road agent. Besides, I can’t have you blowing your damn pecker off before you ever get started!”

We both had a good laugh as I tried the holster on and Pete showed me how to wear it low on the hip so as to make it easier and quicker to draw. He then showed me how to cock it while it was still in the holster. I worked it a few times and boy did it feel smooth!

“Damn, thank you Pete, I really appreciate it.” I was smiling and feeling as giddy as a little kid and then suddenly it hit me. What would I tell mama about all this?

I guess Pete was reading my mind because as soon as he saw my face he already had an answer.

“If you’re worried about your mama, You let me take care of her.”

My eyes narrowed as I stared up at Pete like a pissed off rattler. I wanted him to know I meant business when it came to protecting my mother, even though there was not another man in the world I would rather have courting her.

Seeing how serious I was Pete gave me a playful wink.

“Don’t worry, your mama told me how handy you are with a hatchet! You can be sure I’ll walk the straight and narrow, John Wesley!”

 

The End.

 

 

 

The Last Good Chance

 

 

This is a work of short fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in this short story are entirely fictional and are of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or organizations or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

 

 

Tuesday

 

Detective First Grade Jimmy Boland took three steps into the Tipsy Gent saloon at a quarter past one in the afternoon and stopped dead in his tracks. The owner and Jimmy’s mentor, Tommy Donovan, seated on his elevated perch behind the bar, looked up from his sports page and with his bifocals on the end of his nose, studied Jimmy intently.

“What the hell you doin’ here this time of day?” Tommy asked with his mouth slightly ajar.

Tommy was a good twenty-five years older than Jimmy with a head of spare white hair. As he got closer to seventy, Jimmy could see all those years working the mean streets as a beat cop catching up with him. Two bullet wounds, one back surgery, a complete knee replacement, a fractured skull and numerous concussions had left him not as mobile and sharp as he used to be, but he could still make a mean Bull Shark if you asked him. Jimmy ignored Tommy’s question and just stood there, looking around the bar like he was dazed.

“What in the hell is wrong with you boy-o?” Tommy asked, taking off his glasses and straightening his posture.

“It just occurred to me that I have never been in this bar before five p.m, ever in my life.” Jimmy replied.

Tommy stared at him like he had a screw loose for a few seconds and then went back to his sports page shaking his head. Jimmy sauntered around behind the bar, grabbed a bottle of Glenfiddich single malt and a glass and took a seat.

Without looking up from his paper, Tommy said:

“You may not have answered my question about why you’re here at this hour but by your choice of drink, I think I can guess.” Jimmy poured himself a liberal two fingers and took a long swallow.

“So you gonna wait for me to ask like a schmuck or are you just gonna tell me?” Tommy said looking over.

Jimmy took a deep breath and looked at Tommy.

“Yeah the bastards canned all of us. A hundred years of combined service between us and they fired us for doing exactly what they trained us to do.” Tommy took off his glasses and gently placed them on the bar. He then got up and retrieved a whiskey glass and walked over in front of Jimmy and poured himself a snort.

“What does it state on your paperwork?” Tommy asked not looking up.

Jimmy pulled a sheaf of folded papers out of his inside jacket pocket and threw them on the bar.

“Discharged for non-cooperation in an ongoing IA (Internal Affairs) Investigation of abuse of office and gross professional misconduct of Police Detectives First Class Murphy, Duran, Kearns and Boland.” Jimmy replied shaking his head in disbelief. Tommy slipped his glasses back on, picked up the papers and skimmed over them.

“Since you were not fired for misconduct you kept your severance and your pension.” Tommy stated, pursing his lips together and nodding in amazement.

Jimmy looked at him with tired eyes.

“What the hell is that look for?” Tommy laughed and then downed his drink in one go.

“Whatta you mean what’s that look for? You fuckin’ kiddin’ me?” Tommy replied pouring himself another snort. Jimmy reached in his coat pocket and pulled out a pack of Camels and his USMC zippo.

“What Tommy? Explain yourself please.” Jimmy asked, lighting a cigarette and then grabbing one of the silver tin ashtrays that sat stacked at the end of the bar.

“You all were fired, yeah, but you kept everything you worked for, including your reputation, intact, so who gives a shit about this IA dog and pony show bullshit?” Tommy replied, a huge grin on his face.

Jimmy exhaled the pale grey smoke and shook his head.

“I don’t see it that way Tommy, I see it as a kick in the nuts from a group of backstabbers I busted my hump for. Hell, most of the people in that room made rank off my collars.” Jimmy exhaled loudly, crushed out his cigarette and ran his hand through his thick brown hair. His pale blue eyes were dim and puffy from lack of sleep.

Tommy replaced the cap on the bottle of scotch and put it back behind the bar. He then turned around, took a deep breath, placed both hands flat on the bar, leaned down and looked Jimmy square in the eye.

“Pride is a son-of-a-bitch boy-o. It can cloud you perception of things, so let your old friend Tommy Donovan. break it down for ya’. The case IA had on you four was paper thin to begin with. A bunch of fucking hearsay with no evidence. No CCTV, no phone video, no recordings, no wire-taps. Nada. Nothing. The only card those bastards in internal affairs had left to play was to threaten you four with termination if you didn’t rat on each other. You all kept your mouth shut, so they fired you, but union rules still apply. No proven misconduct means you keep your pension and benefits. You just got an ace of diamonds for your river card for a fuckin’ royal flush boy-o!”

Tommy laughed again and slapped Jimmy on the back hard. Tommy fished a cigarette from Jimmy’s pack and lit it.

“I thought you quit?” Jimmy asked with a smirk.

“Yeah I did but sometimes certain situations call for a celebration relapse.” Tommy replied smiling. Jimmy laughed. Tommy was a fucking hoot.

“Let me tell you something Jimmy. I gave twenty-five years of my life to this city as a cop. It cost me everything I hold dear. My health, my marriage and my relationship with my only son, Logan, who chose the streets and drugs to his mother and me. But that’s the sacrifice. That’s the price you pay for doing this damn job, you understand what I’m saying to you?” Tommy looked at Jimmy with tired eyes filled with tears.

“Shit Tommy that’s the first time you have mentioned Logan in over a year.” Jimmy took a long drag on his cigarette and exhaled the pale grey smoke into the air.

“Some things you keep locked away deep inside, hoping they will fade away like the tide, but of course they never do.” Tommy replied, looking out the window toward the street with a blank expression.

Jimmy got up and hugged Tommy’s neck. He loved him like a father and hated to see him in pain.

“OK Jim, enough of this hugging bullshit!” Tommy said, crushing out his butt and gently pushing him away.

“Guys come in here gonna think the place has turned into a damn gay bar!” Tommy said smiling. Jimmy laughed and patted him on the back.

“We still on for poker Sunday night?” Jimmy asked as he headed for the door.

“Hell yeah, I still gotta win back that twenty bucks I lost to you last week!” Tommy answered as he re-opened his newspaper to the sports section. Jimmy just smiled as he put on his Ray-ban’s and walked out the door.

Jimmy got home a couple hours later to find fellow ex-Detectives Mike Murphy and Patrick Kearns sitting on his back deck drinking his expensive german lager.

“Been calling you non-stop” Mike said agitated.

“My phone died” Jimmy replied, lying his ass off.

“Why the house call? What’s the emergency?” Jimmy asked cocking an eyebrow.

“Patrick has a problem he wants to discuss with you.” Mike replied cutting his eyes over. There was a lengthy pause and Jimmy noticed his grass in the backyard was looking a little brown. He made a mental note to turn the sprinklers on that evening.

“OK, let’s go in the house if you don’t mind. This neighborhood has ears.” Jimmy replied while he collected the empty beer bottles on the table. Walking through the patio door to the kitchen he tossed the empties into the trash while Mike and Kearns followed him in. Before Patrick had a chance to speak Jimmy spun around to face him.

“So how much you owe and to whom?” the bluntness of Jimmy’s question froze Kearns in his tracks.

“What the hell you talking about Jimbo?” Kearns replied, trying to look dignified.

“Come on Patty, don’t pull that shit, I know that look.” Kearns was quiet for a long moment, looking like a kid who had been busted stealing bubble gum.

“Super Bowl was supposed to get me square.” Kearns replied, keeping his head down.

“Unfucking believable!” Jimmy threw up his hands and walked into the living room over to his corner bar and poured himself three fingers of irish whiskey and took a long swallow. A bright green neon sign above the bottles of rum, tequila and vodka flashed ‘Jim’s Place’. Mike and Kearns followed him in and sat down on the couch. With his back to them at the bar Jimmy asked again in a calm voice.

“One more time Patrick. Who do you owe and how much?” Kearns cleared his throat as if the answer was going to come out sideways.

“A hundred K to Nikolai By Saturday” he replied.

Jimmy spun around with his eyes wide as saucers.

“You owe a hundred thousand dollars to the Russian Mob and you come to me?” Jimmy’s mouth was so dry he could hardly talk. Sensing Patrick needed help, Mike stood up and walked over to the bar.

“Jimmy, Patrick really needs our help man.” Jimmy downed his drink in one go.

“No Mike. What Patrick needs is a fucking undertaker.” Jimmy replied looking at him with an icy stare. Kearns got up and walked over to Jimmy, his head bowed in reverence.

“Jimmy I know I fucked up, I do, but if you could just talk to Nikolai and see what could be worked out? I just need some more time to put it all together.” Jimmy took a long, deep breath and rubbed his temples.

“There is no ‘working out’ things with these people Patrick but I’ll see what I can do. No promises though.” Jimmy filled his glass again and stared into space. Kearns nodded his head, breathed a deep sigh of relief and in a low voice whispered “Thanks Jimmy.”

That night Jimmy didn’t sleep. This thing with Kearns was a big problem. Paddy boy was as loyal as they come but he was never that smart and he just could not understand that with the Russian’s you did not work out “payment plans” or “deals”. You paid what you owed or body parts got broke or severed, both on you and the people you cared about. Jimmy considered squaring the debt out of his own money, but taking a hundred thousand out of his ‘retirement fund’ he had vacuum sealed in his garage wall put a serious dent in his long term plan. The money would have to be replaced if he did it, and being a realist, he knew Patrick was not good for it. That mean’t another job and with IA still up their ass, it was risky. So what to do? Jimmy had been on the street long enough to know that he could not walk into a meeting with the Head of the Russian Mob in Boston asking for leniency on a friend’s hundred thousand dollar debt without offering something in return.

Just before dawn broke Jimmy made his decision on what he had to do.

 

Wednesday

 

Nikolai Petrov had been sitting in his darkened office staring at a picture of his late mother for over an hour now. From a very young age he had accepted that death was as much a part of life as breathing. It was the Russian way of things. As he traced his mothers picture with his finger a tear escaped which he quickly wiped away. Watching his mother die a slow and painful death from ovarian cancer in a filthy, understaffed Soviet hospital outside Moscow had left a scar, a raw, nasty scar on his soul. Nikolai remembered watching her writhe in agony on the yellowed sheets as a picture of Premier Brezhnev stared down uncaring from the wall.

“Those fucking Politburo cocksuckers with their fancy new hospital in Kiev and all the modern western drugs and here we are in this rat infested hovel treating cancer with aspirin!” His father said as they drove home after their evening visit.

Nikolai remembered with clarity watching his father talk and smoke at the same time. It was a Russian art form. The staccato rhythm of his words were like venomous barbs that when combined with the pale grey cigarette smoke resembled a dragon breathing fire at his enemies. Two weeks later they buried his mother in the same cemetery his grandfather who had fought in the Great Patriotic War was buried. He did not cry at the service. He emulated his father in that respect and ate the pain, digested it down deep inside of him to give him fuel for the struggle that lay ahead. Before the memory could stab any deeper, there was a knock on his door.

When Jimmy pulled up at Nikolai’s club Trance, he was so damn jittery he had to take a xanax to calm down. After waiting fifteen minutes for it to kick in, he walked inside the club. Like all night clubs it looked unimpressive in the daytime. Amazing what you can do with lighting, Jimmy thought to himself. After asking to see Nikolai, he was searched and then escorted up to the office on the second floor.

“Jimmy Boland! As I live and breathe!” Nikolai said smiling as he came out from behind his desk and shook hands.

Dressed in an impeccable John Phillips grey suit, Nikolai had not changed one bit since Jimmy saw him a decade ago. He had retained his muscular physique and though pushing fifty, had the waistline of a twenty year old vegan meth head.

“Still a single malt man?” Nikolai asked as he walked over to a stocked bar cart.

“Your memory is as sharp as ever.” Jimmy replied smiling. Nikolai poured Jimmy and himself two liberal fingers each of top shelf scotch.

“My memory is sharp for things that matter Jimmy” Nikolai replied handing him the glass.

“Na Zdorovie” Nikolai toasted in Russian.

Jimmy raised his glass and took a long swallow.

Nikolai walked over and took a seat on a black leather couch and invited Jimmy to do the same.

“The club is amazing” Jimmy said smiling, trying to make small talk and flatter a bit.

“Yes. We just re-decorated and added a new sound system, You and a lady friend must come on a Saturday night as my guest. VIP lounge, dinner, drinks, everything my treat.” Nikolai replied, smiling.

“That’s very kind of you Nikolai” Jimmy said rubbing his hands together, thinking of a way to broach the delicate subject.

“Listen, Nikolai, we’ve known each other for quite a while so I am not going to disrespect you by wasting your time and blowing smoke up your ass.” Jimmy made a point to keep eye contact with Nikolai even though his coal black eyes were intimidating as hell.

“Patrick Kearns owes you a hundred grand. He asked me to come speak with you to ask for more time but I am not as naive or stupid as my friend so this is what I have to offer. Promise me nothing happens to him or his family and me and my crew will go to work for you re-cooping the money owed while at the same time ripping your competition apart just like the old days.” Jimmy kept eye contact for a long minute as absolute silence filled the room like grey vapor.

Jimmy could literally see the small cogs and wheels turning behind Nikolai’s cold dark eyes. Schemes within schemes, plans within plans. Angles intersecting with hidden agendas with one absolute final goal: self-interest and lucrative profit.

Nikolai kept the stare for a long moment and then smiled and leaned forward to retrieve a silver cigarette box from the coffee table. Opening it, he removed a russian cigarette and lit it with a gold zippo. After exhaling the pale, blue smoke his gaze fell upon Jimmy like a raptor about to devour a meal.

“It’s true we have known each other for a long time Jimmy, so in the interest of time, I will dispense with the bullshit. When you and your crew of corrupt pigs worked for me back in the day you were useful. You did things for me nobody else could do because of the singular reason that you had a badge. Now, I hear you and your crew have been fired from the department. Put out to pasture as it were by your internal affairs. So what makes you think you can still be of use to me?” Nikolai’s gaze had become icy laser beams now. No emotion. No sentimentality, all business. Jimmy swallowed hard but did not miss a beat in his response.

“Because even though we don’t have badges anymore we still have the two most important things: contacts and information, both within the department and out on the street. Twenty years working the gutter gives you a lot of angles if you know how to play them.”

Nikolai pursed his lips and laughed.

“As always Jimmy, you shine when under pressure.” Nikolai crushed out his cigarette in a black marble ashtray, got up and walked over and sat on the edge of his desk.

“Hundred grand is a lot of fucking money Jimbo. You think you can re-coop all that in one job?” Jimmy stood to his feet.

“Trust me when I say that we can. I have an account from the old days I am going to cash in.”

Nikolai  took a seat behind his desk and folded his hands together as if he was praying.

“Typically I would want details but since this is you I am gonna do this. Just like the old days I will provide you any logistical support you need for the job. Vehicles, weapons, etc. Also, you have my word Kearns nor any of his family will be touched but I am gonna need the entire principal amount by Sunday noon. If you can do that I will forgive the ten grand vig and me and Kearns will be square.” Before Jimmy could think about it, he stepped forward and shook Nikolai’s cold hand.

“You got a deal.”

As he was walking to his car Jimmy’s heart began thumping like two jack rabbits fucking. It had worked. He had bought some time. Now all he had to do was go rip off a bunch of armed to the teeth coked out gang bangers. No big deal, Jimmy thought to himself. We got this.

 

Thursday

 

The next morning Jimmy called a meeting at the storage unit over in Chelsea. As the crew filed in with sleepy eyes and grande cups of coffee, Jimmy was trying to play it cool even though he felt like at any moment he was going to shit himself.

“Alright, we don’t have a lot of time so I’m gonna cut to the chase. Saturday night we are gonna hit a Southie Point Dawgs stash house in Telegraph Hill. Estimated take is half-a-million plus.”

You could literally hear the oxygen being sucked out of the room as everybody’s sleepy eyes suddenly grew large as hen’s eggs. Before anybody could pick their jaws up off the floor, Jimmy continued.

“Before any of you start bitching that this is too quick of a notice to do a job this size, Nikolai has agreed to provide all logistics and front any expenses. If we do it right, we can be in and out of there in less than five minutes and if the take is good enough we can not only square Kearn’s debt, but also walk out of there with a nice payday for each of us to pad our retirement.”

A few moments passed and Kearns, looking like death defrosted, stood up with tears in his eyes.

“I don’t know what to say to everybody except thanks.”

Everybody nodded until Mike, in true Irish fashion stood up and said:

“I tell you what you can say Paddy Boy; promise everybody here that you will never make another fucking bet in your life!”

Raucous laughter could be heard all the way to the street from inside the storage locker.

 

Friday

 

Jimmy checked his watch and yelled “Lunch! check your weapons!”

He made his way out of the shoot house to a set of picnic tables where he removed the magazine from his HK-416, ejected the round in the chamber and placed the rifle gently in the standing gun rack. He then removed his Level IV vest and helmet, mopped his brow with his shirt sleeve and drained a cold bottle of water. He was completely knackered. The crew had been running breach and clear drills since seven this morning and overall Jimmy was impressed. None of the men had lost their edge. Other than being slightly out of shape, Jimmy felt confident that everybody would do their jobs.  After lunch they had another briefing to keep things fresh.

“First things first. I greased our old friend Captain Delaney for Saturday night, so we should not have any noisy patrols investigating gunfire if these assholes get any rounds off. Also, we got lucky with the location of this stash house. It is parallel to a commercial park with around ten businesses close together, so there will not be a lot of civilian traffic to get in the way and worry about. Estimated number of bad guys is going to be somewhere in the neighborhood of six to eight. Figure three to four out front and four inside.”

Jimmy pointed to a spot on the white board where the stash house had been meticulously drawn.

“If it was me I would post my outside security here, here and here with a possible over watch position here.” Mike laughed as he removed a sandwich from his cooler.

“Correct me if I am wrong, but these are coked out gang-bangers Jimbo, not the Taliban. These numb nuts would not know an over-watch position from the missionary position.” That drew a round of laughter from everybody.

“Point taken, but let’s keep this in mind on the approach, OK smart ass?” Jimmy replied smiling, shaking his head.

“What kind of hardware these boys typically carry?” Duran asked with a mouthful of pastrami.

“Best I can tell from recent UI (undercover informant) reports is AK’s and assorted small arms like Mac-10’s. Let’s not forget these guys move weight for the Sinaloa cartel, Nikolai’s biggest competition, so we have to go in there expecting they will be rolling heavy.”

Jimmy flipped the white board over to reveal an assignment list, timetable and another drawing of the AO.

“OK so to recap, Duran is gonna be on Overwatch with “Leroy” (Leroy was the nickname of a Remington 700 .308 Sniper rifle equipped with a IR Nightforce 4-25x Mil-Dot scope and an AAC Suppressor) to cover our ass and provide security. Number one is Mike as breacher with the shield and ram, me as second and Kearns as third. Timetable will be as follows: 12:45 Duran is dropped off two blocks from the location to setup here.”

Jimmy pointed to a red x on the white board drawing, an elevated spot roughly two-hundred yards diagonally opposite from the house.

“The great thing about this perch is it will allow coverage of almost the entire house in the event we have anybody wanting to squirt out the back.” Duran interjected.

“The Van will then post up here out of sight of their hawks until he is in position.” Jimmy pointed a blue x on the board.

“If he able to take the shots without raising alarm, Duran will take out as many sentries on the outside perimeter as possible. Either way, as soon as we get the all clear over the radio, we move in to execute. Remember: Stealth is the name of the game. All weapons will be suppressed so let’s not make any unnecessary noise. As an added precaution, everybody police up their brass if rounds are fired. The ammo is clean and from a random lot but we still don’t need some forensic nerd shaking our tree. Also, as we discussed. there is a good chance they will all be wearing vest, so put two in the dome and put your man down. OK, so if there are not any more questions, go home, get some rest and we meet at the storage locker ten p.m. sharp tomorrow night.”

 

Saturday

 

On the way over to the storage locker Jimmy’s hands were sweating so bad he had to wipe them on his pants twice. He went through his mental checklist for the tenth time in an hour. He felt confident but as always he had the pre-op jitters. Nikolai had called earlier that evening to make sure everything was still a go.

“I want to re-iterate our agreement Jimmy. You leave no witnesses” Jimmy was silent for a moment.

“Hello? Did you hear what I said?” Nikolai’s voice had an edge to it now.

“Yeah I copy.” Jimmy replied. The  line went dead and the tone hung in Jimmy’s ear for a long minute before he hung up the phone.

The dodge work van came to a stop at the drop-off point at precisely 12:45 on the nose. Jimmy took a glance around, The streets were bare, as expected. Duran’s sniper nest lay on the roof of a massive refrigerated warehouse.

“See you on tha’ flip” Duran said as he exited the van with leroy slung over his shoulder in a extra large Addidas racket bag.

To make it look official, Duran was dressed in work out clothes so to the casual observer, he was just another dude going or coming back from the twenty-four hour gym a few miles up the road.  Duran quickly made his way to the side of the building where the service ladder to the roof was located. As soon as he disappeared around the building, Mike drove the block then turned right into a narrow alley and killed the lights. Jimmy adjusted his wireless ear bud, checked the mic level and then pulled his black balaclava over his head where just his eyes were showing and then topped it off with his kevlar helmet. Everybody else followed suit. Twelve minutes passed and Jimmy’s ear bud crackled to life.

“In position, I got three tango’s on roving patrol all wearing vest at two-hundred yards. Clear shots on all of them. Give me the count and I will take them out.” Mike let out a whistle as he started the van.

“Damn. Duran has not lost his touch.” Jimmy smiled as he pressed his mike.

“Roger. We are rolling your way now, give us ninety seconds and let em’ fly.”

There was one squelch for a reply and a minute and a half later the first 168 grain HPBT round exited Leroy’s barrel at over twenty-five hundred feet per second with the sound of a delicate whisper.

As the van turned the corner for the final approach to the house Jimmy rolled down his window and turned on his situational awareness radar full blast. It was dark and quiet. No vehicle or pedestrian traffic. Hell, there wasn’t even a dog barking. Whoever had decided on the location for this stash house was smart. It was a ghost town. Must have been somebody from cartel accounting Jimmy thought to himself because no street gang banger was this damn smart. Before the van rolled to a stop the sliding door opened and in one seamless motion the entire stack took shape. Mike took point followed by Jimmy and then Kearns bringing up the rear. Each man covered their own sector as they moved heel to toe, like a deadly black anaconda going in for the kill. As they approached the front door of the house Jimmy spotted all three of the lookout’s bodies laying dead in the grass spread about twenty yards apart. Having to step over one of them to reach the front door, Jimmy noticed he was a young kid, early twenties, hispanic with half his face missing.  Kearns’ round had entered just below his right eye and blown out the entirety of the back of his skull.

Once they were in position at the door, Mike checked the exterior for wires and booby-traps and then tried the knob. Right away he gave the hand signal it was locked and barred from the inside. Jimmy whispered into his mike “Breaching now” as Mike swung the small battering ram like Conan. It only took two swings and the door and metal bar came away from the frame and crumpled like crepe paper.

Immediately Mike tossed the ram aside and retrieved the kevlar shield from his back and drew his suppressed Glock from his holster while Jimmy tossed in a flash-bang grenade which filled the room with ear splitting POP! and a brilliant bright light like an arc welder. After a count of three Mike charged in with shield held high and Jimmy and Kearns in tight formation behind him. The front room was empty save a card table with empty beer bottles, ashtrays full of half-smoked blunts and a couple of folding metal chairs. To the right was an entryway into what looked like the main hallway and kitchen.

“Moving right” Mike announced.

“Covering left” Jimmy replied.

As soon as they rounded the corner into the kitchen earsplitting gunfire erupted. A tall, skinny white kid with a MAC-10 and a blue bandanna tied around his head fired wildly from the far corner. The .45ACP slugs slammed into the kevlar shield with a loud thump as all three men instinctively got low and returned fire. Mike, Jimmy and Kearns all fired simultaneously with their weapons. The kids’s head exploded like a melon and painted the beige walls behind him with a pink spray and brain matter as his limp body collapsed to the floor with a thud.

“Son-of-a-bitch!” Kearns yelled from the rear.

“Anybody hit?” Mike asked.

“I’m Good” Jimmy replied.

“I just shit my pants but I’m not hit, thanks.” Kearns replied smiling.

“Brass! Everybody police it now” Jimmy reminded the crew.

When they were done finding all their spent rounds Mike cleared the rest of the room and then turned around to go down the hall.

“Watch these doors” Mike called out as they started down the hall, waling heel to toe in unison. As soon as they came to the first bedroom on the right a commotion could be heard inside the room.

“Looks like we got a squirter trying to crawl through the side window” Duran called over the radio. A few seconds passed and the earpiece crackled to life again.

“Tango down.” Duran called out. Jimmy smiled and shook his head.

“Duran has not lost a step.” Mike reached down and tried the doorknob. Locked.

“You wanna do the honors” Miked asked, looking at Jimmy with a smirk.

“Gladly” Jimmy replied.

Jimmy took two steps back and delivered a front kick right behind the doorknob. The door was flimsy particleboard and the doorknob lock a joke. Jimmy’s foot went clean through the door while the lock flew into two different pieces. Mike quickly took his position in front and entered the room quickly. Nothing. Empty. Not a stick of furniture. “Clear” Mike yelled out as he turned around to continue down the hall.

As they came to the next bedroom door Jimmy could hear voices speaking in staccato Spanish inside. This was it. The target. The epicenter. The Holy of Holies. The count room. All hell was about to break loose Jimmy thought to himself. These fucking cartel soldiers are going to fight to the death to protect this money because if they lose it there bosses are gonna kill them anyways.

As Mike lined up on the door and Jimmy got ready to kick it in suddenly a voice called out in heavily accented English from the other side.

“Hello? amigos! There is no need for any more people to die here today. You want the money, yes? We will gladly give it to you. Our only request is that let me and my compadre walk out of here alive.”

There was silence as Mike gave Jimmy a quizzical look. Kearn’s was shaking his head violently mouthing he words “It’s a fucking trap!” Jimmy thought about it a minute.

“OK, here is the deal. You lay down your weapons and lay face down on the floor. We come in, clear the place and once we have the cash we let you go.” Another long period of silence as the two cartel members discussed things in spanish. Finally the same voice replied.

“Amigo how can we know you will do what you say?” Mike laughed to himself and Jimmy smiled.

“You don’t but I don’t think you really appreciate how badly you are really fucked right now. I Have a sniper outside your bedroom window ready to blow your asses back to Sinaloa and a team of guys out here itching to paint that room you are in with your brains so what say we cut through the bullshit and get this over with!”

Hushed voices could be heard talking.

“OK, we are laying down our guns and getting on the floor.” The man replied.

Two minutes passed and Mike pointed to his eyes with two fingers and then pointed to the frame of the door. He was going to look for tripwires to make sure these fuckers were not inviting us into a booby trap. Mike slowly turned the knob and cracked the door and peered up, to the side and down. After giving the thumbs up he stood aside as Jimmy delivered a front kick which sent the door flying back on it’s hinges.

Inside two hispanic men were lying flat on their stomachs with their arms spread. One fat, one thin. Two AK-47’s with folding stocks lay on the floor beside them. A Large desk with two digital money counters, rubber bands and a notebook lay on the desk. Some loose bills, no more than a few thousand dollars was scattered on the desk as well.

“Keep your head down and do not look up!” Jimmy ordered. Kearns quickly walked over to the desk and started rifling through it, frantic.

“Where’s the money! Where the fuckin’ deniro?” Kearns asked excited, his eyes big as saucers. When neither of the men answered, Kearns quickly walked over to the fat one and put the tip of the suppressor in his ear.

“Last chance El Gordo, where the fucking money?” The fat man began whimpering and cried out

“The closet behind the desk!” Kearns smiled and walking over to the desk, unstrapped his carbine and then opened the closet.

Inside were a dozen brown cardboard boxes stacked on top of each other to the ceiling. Kearns quickly grabbed one and put it on the desk, removing the lid with the numbers “125K” wrote on the top, a huge smile spread across his face as he reached in and pulled out three bundles of cash wrapped gangster style with rubber bands. “Fucking jackpot!” Kearn’s yelled as both Mike and Jimmy let out a whoop.

It took under five minutes to load all the boxes and guns in the van with Kearns and Duran having to sit on top of some of them to ride. Before they pulled away Jimmy ran back into the house. Walking back to the count room the two cartel soldiers were sitting up talking when Jimmy walked in.

“OK, so you let us go now, yes?” The skinny one asked in broken English looking up at Jimmy.

“I’m sorry amigo, but I had to promise a very dangerous guy that I would leave no witnesses and send a message to your organization.” As Jimmy pulled out his suppressed Glock the Fat man began crying out “But!, But! We did not see your face! Please! Plea…”

El Gordo’s sentence was cut short as the first round hit him an inch to the left of his nose, blowing out the back of his sinus cavity and brainpan with a swoosh. The skinny one fell sideways trying to escape but it was of little use as Jimmy pumped two into the side of his head, pinning him to the carpet and staining it a deep crimson. The fat one was still squirming as Jimmy began to leave so for safe measure he pumped one more into his head. Reaching down he collected all his brass and slipped it in his pocket and then walked out of the house as quietly as he had came.

The crew drove parallels for an hour to make sure they were not being followed and finally arrived at Duran’s bungalow near Winthrop for the count. Jimmy and Kearns finished the count at a quarter past two in the morning. Mike and Duran both passed out thirty minutes after sitting down. They both had earned it. As the final stack of bills ran through the counter, Jimmy plugged the amount in the calculator for the final tally. His mouth got dry and his throat tried to close up a little when he started to read out the number:

“Nine Hundred and sixty three thousand dollars.” There was silence in the room. Silence like in a church. Nobody spoke. Nobody moved. Nobody breathed for what seemed like minutes.

“Christ Jesus and the Saints” Mike whispered to himself. Kearns laughed so loud he woke Duran and Mike up.

“After we pay Nikolai that is two-hundred and forty grand each” Jimmy said hoarsely, barely able to talk. He quickly took a drink of beer to wet his throat then let out a “Holy Shit!” that could be heard for two blocks. Duran went over to the cabinet and pulled down a bottle of Irish whiskey he had been saving.

“This calls for a toast gentleman” Duran said sitting down four shot glasses and filling them liberally.

“To the Four Horseman of the apocalypse” Jimmy said holding up his glass with a huge smile.

“May they forever ride!”

Sunday

 

Jimmy awoke to this cell phone ringing the next morning.

“Just dropped off the cash to Nickolai” Kearns said in an exhausted voice and hung up.

Jimmy in turn hung up the phone and mumbled “Thank God” as he fell back to sleep. By six p.m. that evening he was sufficiently rested and after a shower and some  dinner felt like a new man. After watching the evening news where the top story was a “Gangland massacre” in Telegraph Hill he decided to begin work on stashing his new loot. The garage wall was stuffed with somewhere around $3,5 million, so he considered hiding it in an old standby: Inside the Refrigerator. Jimmy had lost count how many times they had searched drug dealers house and found the guts of a refrigerator stuffed to the brim with cash. The trick was replacing the rubber gasket sealant around the door you bad to break to get the cash inside. He chose the refrigerator in his man cave versus the one in the kitchen mainly because it was older and he did not want to rip apart his brand new stainless steel Maytag. As he was diving into the project his cell rang. It was Mike.

“So what time we doing this? Same as usual?” Immediately Jimmy remembered it was his turn to host poker night.

“Oh Shit” was all Jimmy could say.

“What? You forgot?” Mike asked laughing.

“Yeah, I guess so, hell it’s not like I have not been busy!” Jimmy replied, heading downstairs to his man cave.

“No worries Jimbo, I’ll bring everything, just have the table ready! See you in an hour.” Before Jimmy could answer Mike hung up.

In short order over the next two hours Duran, Kearns and Mike showed up, all with their arms full of beer, whiskey and munchies.

An hour into the game and Jimmy realized Tommy had not called or shown up.

“Since when was Tommy Donovan late for poker night?” he asked out loud. Everybody shrugged.

“Tommy is getting old Jimbo, he may have just forgot who knows.” Miked replied, counting his chips. Jimmy called Tommy’s cell. Straight to voicemail.

“Shit I hope the old fart did not have a stroke or something.” Jimmy thought to himself.

“I’ll try him again in half an hour” Jim said in passing as he began to deal the cards. An Hour and a half later Jimmy’s doorbell rang.

“My God Tommy, I have been calling! What happened?” Jimmy asked as Tommy Donovan slowly walked into the front hallway. Right away Jimmy could tell something was off. It looked like he had been crying.

“Come on down to the basement and let me get you a drink, all the boys are here.” Jimmy said, leading him down the stairs. When they got down to the man cave everybody was immediately concerned about Tommy.

“What the fuck happened to you Tommy?” Mike asked, standing up. Tommy remained silent and stoic. Jimmy sat him down at the table and poured him three fingers of Jameson’s. Tommy turned up the glass and downed it in one go. He then wiped his mouth and ran his hand through his white hair.

“I just got back from the Coroners office” Tommy said, his voice cracking. The entire room went deathly quiet.

“To identify my son’s body.” Huge tears rolled down Tommy’s red cheeks as he reached over and poured himself another snort.

Jimmy swallowed hard, put a hand on Tommy’s shoulder and in a gentle voice asked “What happened Tommy?” Duran asked leaning in at the table.

Tommy downed the drink and then looked up and stared into Jimmy’s eyes.

“He was killed during that shootout in Telegraph Hill last night.”

Jimmy’s heart shot up into his throat and all the color drained from his face. Mike tried not to react and turned and walked over to the bar. Duran and Kearst just sat there, wide-eyed and dumb founded.

“I didn’t know you had a son Tommy!” Kearst replied, his mouth still agape.

Tommy just kept his stare on Jimmy, his bloodshot pale blue eyes as chilly as a January morning.

“Yeah, he would have been twenty-two next Thursday.” Tommy replied.

Jimmy just shook his head, patted Tommy on the shoulder and walked over to the bar with Mike.  As Mike and Jimmy’s eyes met, one thought kept jabbing itself into their mind like a splinter: Does he know?

Jimmy walked behind the bar to grab another bottle when a thundering gunshot rang out.

Instinctively Jimmy ducked down behind the bar.

“Jesus Tommy! What the hell!” Kearst could be heard screaming.

 Jimmy moved to the end of the bar and peered around the corner. Tommy was sitting casually at the poker table with his Colt 1911 in his hand. Kearst was standing with his hands high in the air and seated across from them was Duran, slumped backwards in his chair staring at the ceiling with the back of his head blown out. Jimmy craned his neck around the bar and saw Mike on the floor in the corner, his eyes wide.

“Sit down Paddy boy” Tommy said in a calm voice, directing him with the barrel of the pistol.

“Mike and Jimmy! You two assholes come over here and sit down!” Tommy yelled out. Instinctively Jimmy reached for his cell but realized he had left it in the kitchen. He then quickly began to grab the small .380 he had stashed behind the bar when Tommy yelled “And I know about the hideout piece behind the bar Jimbo, so don’t even think about it.”

Jimmy’s heart sank as he placed the gun back on the shelf and then walked over to sit down with Mike.

“Listen, Tommy, whatever is going on we can help you man, just put the gun down…” Jimmy was quickly interrupted as Tommy pointed the pistol at his face,

“You got some balls Jimmy, some real huge balls. Still trying to con me even now! After all this!” Tommy’s gun hand began to tremble.

“Whoa! What the fuck Tommy! Con you? What are you talking about?”Jimmy replied in his best, surprised bullshit voice.

Tommy shook his head in disgust.

“Let’s begin with this: Kearst, the degenerate gambling piece of monkey shit that he is, owed Nikolai a hundred grand and you decided to get the four horseman back together and go rip off a gang of drug dealers for the money. Sound right so far?” Tommy replied, his eyes laser beams of ice.

The room was church house quiet.

“See the problem is that gang of scumbag drug dealers you massacred in that house included my son Logan. He was the kid you popped in the kitchen with the MAC-10, remember?” Tommy held out his phone with a crime scene picture of Logan dead on the kitchen floor.

“So you want to keep lying to me now Jimmy?” Tommy asked, keeping the pistol trained on him.

“OK, Tommy, you’re right, we killed your son. But not on purpose! We had no ideal he was part of that crew, no ideal whatsoever.” Jimmy pleaded. Tommy shook his head in disgust and leaned back in his chair, keeping the pistol level on Jimmy.

“Why did you have to kill Duran Tommy?” Jimmy asked looking over at Duran’s corpse.

“Self-Defense. Don’t you see the gun in his hand?” Tommy replied. Jimmy shook his head.

“You’re losing it brother. He’s not fucking armed!” Jimmy replied.

  “No problem, I have a throw-away in my truck, we’ll just plant it on him.” Tommy replied with a smirk.  Jimmy’s mouth fell open.

“What? Does that offend you Jimmy? I thought that was Corruption 101 shit for the Four Horseman!” Tommy spat, his eyes wide with anger. Jimmy stared at Tommy for a long moment.

“I would be real careful throwing that word ‘corruption’ around Tommy. It’s not exactly like you were snow white when you had a badge.” Jimmy replied. Tommy leaned forward and slammed his fist down on the table with a thud.

“Yeah I may have shook down the occasional dealer so my family could go on vacation or my son could have braces,  but I wasn’t a greedy criminal with a badge, murdering and stealing at will like you and your crew!”

While Tommy was distracted talking, Kearns had gradually positioned himself behind him. Thinking he had the drop, Kearns moved to snatch the gun but Tommy was one step ahead of him and turned and fired, hitting Kearns high in the chest, right under his throat. The blast sent Kearns reeling backwards, with the bullet exiting out the back of his neck painting the walls behind him with a wet splash of crimson mist. Kearn’s was dead before he hit the ground.

“Shit! Why did you have to shoot him Tommy!” Mike yelled, jumping out of his chair to check for a pulse on Kearn’s.

Tommy stood up and glanced over at Kearn’s body and then walked over to the bar as if nothing had happened.

“Because the son-of-a-bitch would have killed me if he got my gun! Another clear cut case of self-defense.” Tommy replied self-righteously.

“You have lost your fucking mind Tommy.” Jimmy spat in disgust. In the silence they could all hear a loud pounding upstairs as SWAT made entry into the house.

As Tommy was busy at the bar, pouring himself a drink and mumbling to himself incoherently, Jimmy got Mike’s attention. He mouthed the words it was now or never. With Tommy’s back to them, Jimmy and Mike rushed him like two linebackers, Tommy tried to spin around with the gun but Jimmy controlled his arm while Mike grabbed the half-full bottle of Jameson’s off the bar and knocked the gun out Tommy’s hand with a wallop. Once disarmed Tommy began to buck wildly. Jimmy was surprised at how strong Tommy was for his age. Even though he had a good 20 plus years on him, the old man was still a street fighter at heart. As Jimmy was positioning an arm bar and a take down, Mike picked up the gun and placed it against Tommy’s temple.

“You going to settle down or am I going to have to fucking kill you Tommy?” Mike asked out of breath.

“You morons don’t get it do you? I don’t give two shits about dying. In fact I welcome it. But I was hoping to kill all of you bastards before I went.”

About that time the door to the man cave busted open with a loud crack and in rushed several armed men clad in black with balaclavas covering their faces. Instinctively both Jimmy and Mike raised their hands and before MIke could drop the gun three rounds hit him high in the chest, spinning him off to the right like a pinwheel.

Jimmy could hear himself yelling “Don’t Shoot! Don’t Shoot!” in the chaos as Mike’s body crashed to the floor with a loud thump beside him. Jimmy’s mind went into freeze frame and as he was studying the expression on MIke’s face as he died, a question pierced his mind like a high beam through a fog bank. Why had they not announced themselves as Law Enforcement? Why had they not given commands to drop the gun?  Why were SWAT using Suppressors? The chaos and stress had made his mind like molasses in the winter time. As he was raising his head to look around, somebody hit him hard over the head and things went dark. The last thought Jimmy had as the blackness swallowed him up was that those guys did not have helmets or SWAT ID on their vest.

Jimmy woke up with a splitting headache handcuffed to a metal chair. He could taste the familiar metallic flavor of dried blood in his mouth along with nauseating bile. He tried to gather up enough saliva to spit but was unsuccessful. As he rotated his head around to see where he was he realized his left eye was swollen shut. What he could see out of his right eye was definitely not home, maybe a warehouse or garage? The smell of rust and old motor oil permeated the place.

“Hello? Where the hell am I?” Jimmy yelled.

Suddenly, a door opened off to his left and light from what looked like an office illuminated the warehouse. Immediately Jimmy knew where he was. He was at the docks at one of the dozens of shipping container facilities. As Jimmy squinted his eye to try and see the figure walking toward him, lights came on in the warehouse with a loud thump, revealing several armed men dressed in black surrounding him. The next voice Jimmy heard made his heart sink into his stomach.

“Jimmy Boland, as I live and breathe!” Nikolai said smiling as he walked over and pulled up a chair.

Jimmy smiled back like a fiend, revealing bloody, chipped teeth.

“Why am I not surprised to see your ugly face here Nikolai?” Jimmy replied shaking his head.

Nikolai chuckled. “Why are you not surprised? I will tell you Jimbo, because like you I am an opportunist and when I see an opportunity, I pounce!” Nikolai reached into his jacket pocket and retrieved a cigarette case and took out two, without asking Jimmy, he lit them and put one of them into Jimmy’s mouth. Jimmy inhaled and exhaled the smoke like a pro, his eyes like icy laser beams on Nikolai the whole time.

“So when you discovered Tommy was out on the street asking questions about who murdered his boy, you made sure he found out it was us who pulled the trigger and then encouraged him to come get revenge because it was a really convenient way to kill off all your loose ends and get ALL the money from the heist, not just what was owed to you, right?” Jimmy exhaled more smoke and then spit the cigarette toward Nikolai like an out of control rocket.

Nikolai watched the cigarette land harmlessly well short of his feet, politely stamped it out and then looked up at Jimmy and smiled.

“Once again Jimmy, you have proven why you are such a great Detective. You see all the angles!”  Nikolai stood up and crushed out his own cigarette and nodded to the goons behind Jimmy.

“Wait, before you go, you have to tell me. No way you were alone in all of this, there were way too many moving parts. Who was your inside man at the Department?” Jimmy asked, looking intently at Nikolai with his his one good eye bloodshot and swollen.

Nikolai smiled and motioned toward the office from which he had entered. The door opened and out stepped Captain William C. Delaney, Boston Police Dept.

“Me and the Captain here have been partners since the good ole ‘days Jimmy. In fact, he was the one that suggested I approach you twenty-five year ago!” Nikolai smiled like the cat that ate the canary as Delaney walked up.

“Son-of-a-bitch” Jimmy muttered to himself. One of the goons undid his leg shackles and stood Jimmy up.

“Thanks to Captain Delaney here we found all the money you had stashed in the walls of your garage and house. We also found the stashes at Kearns, Durans and Murphy’s place.” Nikolai replied.

“Oh how nice of him.” Jimmy spat.

“Delaney you always were a backstabbing cocksucker.” Jimmy shot daggers with his one good eye.

The Two goons turned Jimmy around to face an open shipping container of which to Jimmy’s horror were the bodies of Tommy, Duran, Kearns and Mike, all covered in white lime and wrapped in thick sheet plastic. Jimmy tried not show any fear when he saw the large piece of plastic on the ground obviously meant for him, but fear boiled out of him none the less.

“So you’re shipping us all off to Russia huh Nikolai?” Jimmy asked as the goons moved him inside the container.

“Yes. It’s for the best.” Nikolai replied.

“You know I only did this job to help a friend. I figured it was my Last Good Chance to do something good in my life.” Jimmy said, looking at the bodies.

“In the end we are all punished for our kindnesses my friend.” Nikolai replied as he motioned to the goon with his hand.

The gunshot was loud as it echoed off the inside of the container. Jimmy’s body slumped to the deck like a sack of bricks and the goons began covering him with lime and wrapping him in plastic.

Container #BE-4567 was loaded onto a transport ship bound for Murmansk, Russia later that day.

The End.

 

 

 

 

The Final Letter

 

 

This is a work of Original Short Fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in this short story are entirely fictional and of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or organizations or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.

 

 

I first met Percy Ingovoll at a saloon called the ‘Devil’s Watering Hole’ outside of Cisco, Texas in the fall of Eighteen Hundred and Ninety. I had just been discharged from the U.S. Army Cavalry after spending five miserable damn years in Mexico hunting renegade indians and mexican bandits.

I had six months worth of Army wages in my pocket and was well on my way to an epic drunk and maybe a poke or two with some of the sportin’ girls when a gunshot rang out behind me at one of the poker tables.

 Looking over my shoulder I saw Percy Ingovoll holding a smoking Remington Single Action with a local gambler and lowlife name of Wally Steven’s sitting across from him with his face and head damn near missing. Before anybody could begin to ask questions, Percy walked over to Wally’s corpse and held up his right arm. Rolling back Wally’s shirt sleeve he removed an ace of diamonds.

“I want everybody to see why this bastard got killed. He’s a cheat!” There was a low murmuring among the crowd as Percy held up the card for all to see.

Percy then removed his hat and began raking the large pot of cash in the middle of the table into it. About this time, the bartender, a barrel chested Irishman with a thick brogue and even thicker mustache produced a coach ten gauge from behind the bar and cocked both hammers. To this day I don’t know why I decided to intervene. Maybe it was the fact I did not like seeing a man shot in the back or maybe I just did not like Irish bartenders, but before you could say boo I skinned my Model 3 and walloped that bartender upside the head with its heavy barrel, knocking him out cold.

Upon hearing the commotion, Percy instinctively spun around and drew down on me.

“Whoa partner!” I said, laying my Model 3 down on the bar next to a collection of the bartender’s bloody teeth.

“This fat Irishman was about to shoot you in the back, I just helped him change his mind.”

A wide grin came across Percy’s face as he eased the hammer down and holstered his gun.

Taking a look behind him to check for any more would-be bushwhackers, he approached me at the bar.

“Appreciate what you did.” he said, extending his hand and introducing himself. I shook it and returned the courtesy.

“Logan Chandler. Originally from Lampasas.” I replied.

After talking for a while, four men, all half-drunk and armed approached and began asking questions about the toothless, unconscious bartender. Percy quickly grabbed my arm and led me outside.

“Listen, both Wally and that bartender are locals and I am just some stranger from out of town.These peckerwoods are all drunk as hell and it won’t take long before they decide to lynch both of us for fun and split up the money I got on me. Whatta’ you say we haul ass out of here before that happens?”

Hearing the men getting more riled up and drunk in the saloon it did not take long for me to agree with Percy’s wise suggestion.

The night was clear and cold, with a three-quarter moon and a breeze from the east carrying the smell of rain. We decided to ride south for a few miles and then checked up off the trail into a small stand of cedar trees and waited to see if we were being followed.

“So why did you do it?” Percy asked as we watched the dark trail behind us.

“Do what?” I replied.

“Whack that big Irish bastard across the head that was gonna shoot me.” Percy spat tobacco juice and glanced over at me.

“Hell I don’t know, I guess I just don’t like seeing men get shot in the back.” My answer must have amused the hell out of Percy because he laughed like I had just told the funniest damn joke you had ever heard.

We rode a few more miles up the trail and finding a small creek, decided to make a cold camp for the rest of the night. The next morning I was awoken to the smell of bacon and Percy feeding our horses with a bag of oats. As I wiped the sleep out of my eyes Percy came over and poured me a cup of coffee.

“Did you hear them coyotes yippin’ it up last night?” he asked smiling as he squatted down by the fire like an indian to tend the bacon.

“I would not have heard a damn buffalo crash through the woods last night I was so tired.” I replied. Percy smiled.

“You think them boys at the saloon are still looking for us?” I asked, sipping my cup.

“Hell, I bet them boys are more worried about nursing their hangovers right about now.” Percy replied, turning the bacon over with a fork.

“I don’t know, you did kill a man.” I replied looking at him sideways.

“Shit! The day it is a crime in this country to kill a card cheat or whack a surly bartender will be the day I move to Mexico permanently!” I could tell Percy was still half drunk as he stood up to stretch his back and wobbled some.

In the daylight I realized he was taller than I thought, with long, lean, muscled arms that resembled thick braided ropes. His hair was sandy brown with hints of red and the week’s worth of stubble on his face was burnt amber like the midday sun. He had eyes that were a strange deep shade of green, almost the color of fresh cedar with small specks of brown.

After finishing our bacon and coffee we broke camp. As I was rolling up my bed roll, Percy walked over and handed me a hundred dollars.

“What is this for?” I asked looking at the money.

“For saving my ass last night.” Percy replied smiling.

“Shit Percy this is too much!” I said, shaking my head and handing it back to him.

“The hell it is!” he replied pushing my hand back.

“Besides, I got plenty more where that came from.” Percy replied with a wink.

He then cinched up his saddle straps and got on his horse. I did the same and we both rode out of the woods to the main trail.

“Well Percy, what do you plan on doing?” I asked looking both ways up and down the trail.

“Oh, I don’t know, maybe head over to Abilene for a friendly game or two and then catch a train to New Mexico. A friend of mine just opened a saloon near Four Corners and invited me to help run it. How about you?” Percy asked as he placed a chaw of tobacco into his mouth.

“I was thinking of riding south to my old home place in Lampasas, see who I can find.” I replied.

“Well hell, why don’t you ride with me over to Abilene and at least let me treat you to a nice meal and a bath? I sure could use the company.” Percy replied smiling.

I thought about it for a second, looking up the empty trail and watching the trees sway in the gentle breeze. Hell, I knew there was nobody in Lampasas waiting for me. Both my folks died from scarlet fever five years back and my younger sister, Clara, had gotten married and moved to California with some tin pan chasing his dreams of riches.

“Sure, why the hell not!” I replied, reigning my horse west toward Abilene.

After going a few miles, and listening to our horses fart in rhythmic time and watching some buzzards circle high above us, Percy spoke up.

“So if we are going to be traveling companions, we best know a little about each other in case one of us is killed. That way we can say something meaningful at the funeral.” I smiled at the odd comment without looking at Percy.

“Okay, where do you want to start?” I asked.

“Were you ever married? Have any children?”

“Came damn close to getting married once to a gal in Durango. She was mexcan’ of course and did not speak a word of English, but damn that gal could…”

My story was interrupted by several gunshots up ahead of us. We both spurred our horses and as we came around a wide right bend in the trail we spied a covered wagon about a hundred yards ahead of us under attack by three men with masks on horseback. 

The wagon had come to rest near the side of the road after both of its horses had been killed. Near as I could tell there was one person inside the wagon returning fire with a rifle at the bandits as they circled.

“Whatta you say we even up the odds?” Percy said pulling out his repeater from its scabbard.

Before I could reply that maybe we should find cover before engaging three armed men in the open, Percy let off three quick shots, none of them finding its intended target, but all of them letting the bandit’s know our location.

“Dammit Percy!” I said spurring my horse into the brush off the trail. By the time I had dismounted and pulled my Winchester, the bandits had decided not to fight it out and hauled ass, leaving a plume of brown dust in their wake.

“What are you doing down there in the brush?” Percy asked me, sitting tall and smiling from his horse.

“You crazy sumbitch” I spat, mad as a wet hornet.

We both were cautious approaching the wagon, as nobody had shown themselves yet.

“Hello! In the wagon there! Don’t shoot! We both come in peace!” Percy called out.

Nothing was heard in return. We stopped ten yards shy of the flap and Percy dismounted while I held his reins .

“Hello in the wagon!” Percy called out again.

This time we could both hear somebody inside breathing hard. Percy drew his pistol and pulled back the flap. There laying down inside was a man of around thirty with dark blonde hair. His face was pallid and his sky blue eyes were bloodshot and haggard. He had one hand on his stomach with blood leaking out around it and in the other hand a cocked Double-Action Colt Army.

“Help me, I have been shot…” the man whispered weakly.

Percy turned and gave me a concerned look and I quickly dismounted and jumped up into the wagon.

“Whoa there partner” I said trying to soothe him.

Before looking at the wound, I carefully took the Colt out of his hand and let down the hammer, placing it back in the man’s holster. I then moved his bloody hand aside and examined the wound. The Bullet had entered three inches right of his naval. Rolling him over slightly on his side, I could not see or feel an exit wound.

  “I’m so damn cold.” the man said looking at me with scared eyes as sweat poured from his forehead and his teeth began to chatter.

Percy climbed up beside me and gave him a drink of water from the canteen while I looked around for something to make a dressing out of. Rummaging around inside the wagon, I could tell right away the man was a tin pan. Picks, pans, shovels, spades and other digging implements littered the back of the wagon. Finally finding an old shirt, I began ripping it up into strips for the dressing. The blood was almost black and I knew right away he had been shot in the lower bowels, which was never a good sign. I dressed the wound best I could, trying to staunch the bleeding.

“You keep your hand here as tight as you can.” I told him plainly. He nodded while his teeth chattered so violently I was scared he would chip a tooth. I covered him up with my wool blanket from my bed roll and then me and Percy went outside to talk.

“We gotta get him to a Doctor Percy. He’s burning up with fever.” The man was loudly mumbling incoherently about something while we talked.

“Since when are we responsible for bushwhacked travelers?” Percy asked with a confused look on his face.

As I was thinking up a keen response the man yelled out with a concerning tone so much that me and Percy both immediately jumped back up in the wagon. The man’s eyes were large and he was pointing to the back of the wagon as if his life depended on it. Through chattering teeth he mumbled:

“In the trunk, please hand me the small leather satchel in there.”

Not thinking anything of it I went over to the trunk and opened it and retrieved a small, well-worn brown leather bag. As I was about to hand it to him Percy intercepted me.

“Let’s see what he is so anxious to get at.” Opening the bag Percy found ten soup can tins with a piece of cloth stuffed down into them.

“Whatcha got in here partner?” Percy asked smiling , looking over at the man, who by now had a look of extreme anxiety on his face.

As Percy removed one of the cloths covering the can, both his eyes and mine almost popped out of our heads. Inside the can were dozens of chunks of gold as big as a man’s thumb.

“Holy shit on a shingle!” Percy said laughing.

As a huge grin began to spread over my face I will never forget how loud the sound of that Colt’s hammer was when it was cocked. Me and Percy turned around at the same time to see the wounded man had drawn down on us and that anxious look had turned into one of pure anger. The smile disappeared from Percy’s face as he looked at me and said

“Well Damn Logan! Don’t you wish now you had disarmed the sum-a-bitch!”

After me and Percy had stared down the barrel of that cocked Colt for a long few seconds with our hands in the air, the man motioned for us to hand over the bag, which we did. Once the man had the bag he motioned with the gun barrel for us to get out of the wagon. Standing there with our hands up, Percy had the presence of mind to state the obvious.

“Looks like to me you are in quite the pickle feller. Yeah, you have your gold, but you are also gut shot and dying. Without someone helping you to a Doctor, you are certainly going to lie there and bleed to death.”

Percy’s words hung in the air for a long few seconds while the wounded man surmised his terrible situation with a look of agony and anxiety I have yet to see duplicated on another man’s face since. The miner took a deep breath and spoke.

“You get me a Doctor and I will give you one can.”

Immediately me and Percy did the math. There were at least a dozen chunks of gold in that can, each chunk weighing around 6 ounces, maybe more. With gold currently at around twenty dollars an ounce, one can was worth around fourteen hundred dollars minimum. With around ten cans in the bag, this gut shot miner had around fourteen thousand dollars in his possession.  No damn wonder those bandits were after him so hard!

With his arms still raised in the air, Percy, to my absolute horror, began to haggle with the miner.

“I think the going rate for saving a gut shot tin pan is two cans.” Percy replied with a straight face.

“The fact that you would argue with a dying man holding a gun on you shows your character sir.” The miner replied, glaring at Percy.

Un-phased by the insult, Percy continued in the horse trade.

“Still, being things as they may, you need us more than we need you.”

Seeing my chance I gently moved over next to Percy and whispered.

“Percy, let’s take the one can and get him to a Doctor.”

The look Percy gave me reminded me of the look my mother used to give me when she found me in my fathers tobacco. Pure scorn and anger. Before he could reply I continued.

“The man’s dying Percy! Now let’s stop farting around and get going!”

Percy finally relented.

“OK tin pan. One can paid right now and we will get going.” Percy switched his gaze from me to the miner. The miner shook his head in disgust and took out one can and handed it over.

“By the way” the miner said through gritted teeth.

“In case I die on the way to town my name is Arthur Wingate and I have relatives in St. Louis. I would be much obliged if you contact them.” Percy shot me a confused look as if the information had confounded him.

We rode into the town of Abilene an hour later with Arthur Wingate barely clinging to life but damn sure clinging to his Fourteen Thousand dollars worth of gold and that Colt revolver.

Not seeing a sign for a Doctor’s office, Percy asked a man crossing the street where we might find one. We were directed to a fine-looking home not far out-of-town.

“Charles A. Kirkpatrick, MD.” a sign read outside a ranch style affair with a white picket fence and gate. The yard was well manicured with several rose trellis’ by the front steps. With me on one side and Percy on the other, we walked the wounded man up the steps and Percy banged on the door with a bloody hand. The curtain on the front window parted and the door was quickly opened. A balding man in his fifties with wire rim spectacles and bushy black eyebrows that resembled two caterpillars crawling across his head answered. Taking one look at the miner he motioned us inside. We dragged the miner through the entryway and parlor into some type of exam room.

“Get him on the table over there.” the Doctor instructed us brusquely.

The room smelled of antiseptic and mint. As we laid him on the table the Doctor felt the miner’s pulse on his neck and then went over to a cabinet and started preparing some kind of injection.

“Anna!” the Doctor called out loudly.

Immediately a large, round-faced woman with auburn hair who looked to be around forty or so entered the room. She was tying a large white apron around her ample waist as she approached us.

“You gentleman may wait in the parlor”  she said as she herded us out the door and shut it behind us.

The parlor, which sat just off the entrance hall, was decorated with fine china, a Persian rug and a large love seat upholstered in a pattern of dainty yellow roses.

“Damn! The Doctoring business must pay well!” Percy remarked looking around at the room. As we both sat down on the love seat I took notice of a large painting hanging on the wall opposite. It was a duel between two large man-of-war sailing ships.

“Battle of Baltimore – 1814” read the gold-plated inscription below it. As I stared at the painting I felt Percy’s heavy head collapse against my shoulder. It did not take long for my head to collapse the other way as both of our bodies surrendered to exhaustion.

Two hours later the Doctor was shaking us both awake.

“Your friend is alive. I got the bullet out but he lost an awful lot of blood. If he doesn’t get an infection in his colon, he should survive. He should stay here for the next few days so I can keep an eye on him.”

Me and Percy both got to our feet and followed the Doctor into the exam room where Wingate lay asleep.

“I just gave him a large dose of opium tincture so he will be asleep for the rest of the evening. Please feel free to come back in the morning.” With that the Doctor began to escort us to the front door. Before we walked out of the room. Percy stopped.

“Say, that leather bag he had, where is it? He would want us to take it with us.” The Doctor eyed Percy suspiciously.

“Well Mr. Wingate informed me and my wife that the bag was to stay here under our supervision until he was ready to travel, and when I give my word to a patient, I keep it.” Percy smiled back at the Doctor and just nodded his head. Before leaving I extended my hand to the Doctor.

“We appreciate all you have done Doc, what do we owe you?” The doctor smiled wearily.

“We can settle the bill when the patient is discharged.” I nodded understandingly and me and Percy turned around and walked out of the door.

Riding into town it did not take Percy long to say what I knew was on his mind.

“So when do you want to rob the good doctor and his plump wife?” I did not even look at him when he said it. I let a few moments pass just to aggravate him.

“Hey, shit for brains! Did you hear what I asked? When do you want to go get that fourteen thousand dollars just sitting in that sawbones house waiting on us?” We were just coming into town and I stopped my horse.

“Percy you really expect me to go along with you robbing an honest miner of his find? Hell, the man already gave us over a thousand dollars just to bring him to the Doctor! You remember that?” Percy stopped and swung his horse around to face me.

“Logan if you honestly think I am gonna give up an opportunity like this you are crazy! There is enough gold sitting in that house to set you and me up for life!”

It felt like I was talking to a brick wall.

“I will have no part of it and I will not stand by and watch you rob him either, so I am just letting you know.” Percy stared at me for a long minute as I returned the stare.

“You’re serious!” Percy asked, his mouth open.

“Damn right I am serious. We already got Seven hundred dollars worth of gold each! Shit man, be happy with that!” I spurred my horse and headed for town, leaving Percy sitting on the side of the road confused and angry.

Being alone that afternoon, I felt good about things for the first time in a long time. Instead of killing and maiming I had helped to save a decent man’s life, and had been rewarded handsomely for it. Perhaps this is something I could do on a more regular basis I thought to myself. Riding this strange wave of euphoria I decided to get a haircut, shave and a bath and then went next door to the tailor’s and bought me a brand-spanking new outfit. I had to laugh at the tailor when he asked me what I wanted to do with my old clothes.

I  told him to promptly “burn them” and without missing a beat he replied “My thoughts exactly sir.”

Suited up in my new duds I went to the hotel and had a steak dinner complete with peach cobbler for dessert and then got me a room with a big soft bed where I slept like the dead. At breakfast the next morning however, Percy was nowhere to be found. My first thoughts of where Percy might be scared the living shit out of me I don’t mind telling you. I imagined in my mind’s eye the miner and the good doctor and his wife laying dead in pools of their own blood with Percy riding hard for Old Mexico with that brown leather satchel in tow.

It did not take long however for the reality of Percy’s plight to be revealed.

Walking down main street, I spotted his chestnut mare tied outside the city jail. Shaking my head with disgust, I walked over, took a deep breath, and entered the jailhouse. 

A man in his fifties with a head of white hair and a matching waxed handlebar mustache sat behind a desk with a name placard that read “Arthur T. Roberts, City Marshal”. The marshal did not get up when I entered and made sure I saw the double barrel ten gauge in his lap.

“Yes sir can I help ya?” he asked, eyeing me suspiciously.

“Yes, I have come to fetch my friend, Percy Ingovoll, I believe you have him locked up in your jail.” The lawman grinned and took his boots off the desk.

“If you are referring to the gentleman who was trying to fight the entire saloon last night, yes we have him.” There was a long pause as the lawman continued to size me up.

“OK, so let’s have him.” I said impatiently.

The lawman gave a smirk and reached over on his desk and picked up a piece of paper. Taking time to remove his spectacles from his front shirt pocket, he then studied the paper.

“He is scheduled to go before Judge Tillford at 10 o’clock this morning.” The lawman answered.

“For fighting in a saloon?” I asked.

The lawman stood up. He was a tall, gangly man with long slender arms and almost no waist to speak of. I also noticed as he stood he wore a tie-down rig, which told me he fancied himself a gunfighter.

“Disturbing the Peace, Drunk and Disorderly and Destruction of Private Property are charges we take very seriously here in Abilene, Mr.? I did not catch your name.”

The atmosphere was getting tense so I decided to cut through the bullshit and talk a language all  corrupt lawmen know. Money.

“I did not give my name. How much are the fines for those three charges?” I asked. The lawman’s expression turned smug as he walked over to the gun rack and stowed the ten gauge.

“Well let’s see for those three charges plus court costs, and the cost of stabling the man’s horse, let’s call it what we took off him in gold last night as payment in full.” He reached into his shirt pocket and laid out four thumb sized gold nuggets wrapped in cloth. My temper flared at that moment and I felt like the top of my head was gonna blow off.

“That seems a bit excessive since that gold is worth well over seven hundred dollars.” I replied, my face feeling hot and most likely the color of crimson from anger.  The lawman walked over and sat on the edge of his desk. He removed makings for a cigarette and began rolling one up.

“Well sir, it very well may seem excessive, but that is the price if you want to walk out of here with your friend this morning. Of course you are more than welcome to let him have his day in court but let me caution you, Judge Tillford is not as lenient as I am.” The marshal smiled a shit eating grin as he lit his cigarette with a match.

“And by not as lenient you mean more expensive?” I replied looking at him coldly. The marshal shot me a look of pure cruelty through the haze of smoke. I thought for a brief moment before I spoke again since my anger was at the fine point of boiling over.

“Very well, let’s have him then.” I said. The marshal hesitated as if he had not heard me and then stood up, making a big show to pocket the gold. He then slowly reached over and retrieved a set of keys.

A few minutes later he returned with what was left of Percy. My mouth fell open when I saw him. Percy literally looked like death warmed over. Both eyes were black and swollen and his lip had been split in several places. A deep gash on his scalp was leaking blood down the side of his head and to top it all off he could barely walk.

“My God! What the hell happened to him?” I asked taking hold of Percy’s arm.

“Like I said he tried to fight the entire saloon.” The Marshal responded nonchalant. Percy gave me an incredulous look that confirmed that statement was pure bullshit. As we left the marshal handed me Percy’s gun belt.

“If you or your friend make trouble around these parts again, I am going to do more than fine you next time, is that understood?” I was so mad at that point I did not even turn around to acknowledge the smug bastard. Once we were out the door and to our horses I asked Percy if he was alright to ride. He nodded that he could and I followed along as he swayed back and forth in the saddle like a drunkard.

“What the hell happened!” Dr. Kirkpatrick exclaimed as me and Percy came through the door.

“Your town marshal’s handiwork” I replied angrily.

“Oh my God! Bring him into the exam room” The doctor’s wife came running from the parlor and took Percy’s other arm as we both helped him up on the exam table. Wingate sat up in his bed as we came in.

“Bandits?” Wingate asked with a weak voice.

“No, worse, the town law.” I replied sarcastically.

“Ain’t nothing worse than crooked law.” Wingate fumed, his face turning three shades of scarlet.

“Looks like they broke two ribs and fractured his arm. He has a slight concussion and this cut on his scalp is gonna need a couple of stitches too.” I walked back over and gripped Percy’s hand.

“Hang on pard, Doc is gonna put you back together.”

The next day Percy was awake, but only for a little while. As I was sitting there next to Percy Anna came in to check on him. I suppose she could see the concern on my face.

“His body is repairing itself, we just need to let him rest.” She told me checking his pulse. I walked out on the porch where Wingate was sitting in a rocking chair smoking his pipe.

“How is he?” he asked through the blue-grey smoke. I shrugged and leaned up against the porch post.

“Don’t you worry yourself Logan. I once saw a man get the living shit kicked out of him by three other miners for poaching a claim. They worked him over good with shovels. He did not get out of bed for a damn week. He could take only broth and water. But you know what? After a week and a half he got right up and went back to work. Of course he did not learn his lesson too well and a week later he was shot dead for poaching another man’s claim. Some men are just dumb beast.”

I had to laugh at Wingate. The man always had an entertaining story to tell, even if it was depressing as hell.

Early the next morning before sun-up somebody shook me awake. Looking up through bleary eyes I saw Percy standing there.

“We need to talk.” he whispered.

I pulled on my pants and followed him quietly through the dark house and out to the front porch. The early morning was cool and damp and the smell of honeysuckle floated on the air while a Whip-poor-will cooed from a tree out in the yard. Percy sat down in a rocking chair and lit a coal oil lantern on the table beside him. I could tell he had something serious on his mind.

“We need to get Wingate and get the hell out of here come first light.” Percy said matter of factly, sitting back in the chair. I gave Percy a puzzled look.

“What are you talking about? Why? I thought you might want to get back at the son-of-a-bitch marshal for what he did to you!” Percy shook his head.

“You don’t understand Logan. That marshal knows everything about Wingate and his gold.” I stared at Percy for a long moment, my mouth agape.

“Wait a minute, so is that the reason they questioned and beat you like they did? They think we are all in cahoots or something?” I asked amazed.

Percy nodded.

“Yep they think we know something. And the reason they think that is what happened out on the trail when Wingate got shot. Us accidentally finding him being ambushed out on the road and driving those deputies away that were trying to kill him was proof to the marshal that we are indeed in cahoots! Can you believe it!” Percy leaned over and lit the cigarette with the flame from the lantern.

I put my head in my hands. This was just too much for my foggy brain this early in the morning.

“So why not just me and you cut and run and leave Wingate to deal with this Marshal by himself? I mean you said the other day we are not responsible for helping every poor pilgrim we come across, right?” Percy sat forward in the rocking chair and looked at me.

“Normally I might agree with you, but now, like it or not we are involved in this thing up to our necks and we owe it to Wingate to get him somewhere safe. It may not be the smartest move, but it is definitely the right one.”

A half-hour passed and the soft light of dawn began to break. I went into the kitchen to put some coffee on and then went and woke up Wingate. After Percy had explained everything to him and we agreed the best thing to do was leave town as soon as we could, Percy asked Wingate a question that made me do a double-take.

“That marshal knew an awful lot about you Wingate. How is that, being you are not from around here?” Wingate let out a long breath and shook his head.

“I sure am sorry you boys got mixed up in this thing.” Wingate said looking at us.

“Enough of the bullshit Wingate. Answer the question!” Percy said flatly.

“The claim in which I found the gold belonged to the Marshal’s brother. He was killed in a saloon brawl in Austin almost a year ago. When his claim came up for sale at the land office I snatched it up and began mining it. 

Of course this was before anybody knew the man had a will and had left the claim to his brother, the Marshal of Abilene, Arthur T. Roberts.” Wingate said lighting his pipe.

“Well I’ll be damned!” Percy said getting up out of his chair.

“It all makes sense now. He thinks you cheated him!” Percy exclaimed.

“Yeah what caused the confusion was Roberts had not filed the will with an attorney or any next of kin, he had left it with a whore in Austin he frequented. Once he died and the whore came forward to a judge, the land and mine had already been sold to me, so the marshal had no legal recourse, so he resorted to trying to rob and kill me out on the road when you boys found me the other day.” Wingate replied.

“Why the hell didn’t you tell us this earlier?” I asked.

“I did not want to get you boys anymore involved than you already were, I guess.” Wingate said looking at the floor sheepishly.

“Well there’s one thing we know for sure. That marshal intends to kill you to get that claim.” Percy said matter-of-factly.

“Yeah and the only reason he has not done so by now is because you are here, at the Doctors house. I reckon at any moment he is going to ride out here to arrest you for something and then take you back to that jailhouse and kill you for any number of reasons” I replied.

Wingate leaned back in his chair and took a deep breath.

“Hell, there ain’t no way the three of us can hold off that marshal and all the deputies he has! What should we do?” I asked, my eyes wide.

“Only thing to do is to take the fight to the marshal before he brings it to us. We kill the head of the snake, the rest will die.” Percy replied, his eyes bright and focused.

A smoky silver haze floated just above the ground while two whitetail deer, a doe and a spike buck, grazed on the lush green grass. Uncertainty and fear coursed through my body at that moment like no other time in my life. Glancing over at Wingate I could tell the same was true for him.

“So we go in there and kill him? That is our plan?” Wingate asked looking at both of us. There was a long pause.

“That or we wait and let him come out here and kill you, which sounds better Wingate?” Percy asked, still looking at the deer grazing peacefully.

After breakfast and a long discussion with the Doctor, it was decided all three of us would go into town that evening and murder the Marshal. I could tell the Doctor was troubled by our plan.

“Doctor if I am killed, I am signing off ownership of the claim and the gold I currently have in my possession totaling fourteen thousand dollars worth to be equally split three ways between You, Percy and Logan.” Wingate said as he signed a piece of paper and slid it over to the Doctor.

“Would you please witness this Doctor?” Wingate asked.

The Doctor put on his spectacles and read over the document. After reading it he paused for a long moment and took off his spectacles.

“Mr. Wingate are you sure this is what you want to do sir?”

Wingate paused for a moment, thinking.

“I am sure.” he replied.

“I would like to ask one more thing.” Wingate said as he stood up from the table.

“If I shall be killed in this mis-adventure, I would like my body to be shipped back to Missouri and be buried next to my mother and father in our family cemetery outside of House Springs. Here is a hundred dollars to see to the cost.” Percy, me and the doctor all looked at one another with a sense of sincere sadness.

Then Percy did something shocking and totally out of character.

“You can count on me Wingate!” the two men shook hands and smiled as if they were long lost brothers.

That evening as we were preparing to leave, the doctor and his wife asked us into the parlor.

“I called all of you here to make a suggestion that I think can solve your problem much simpler than your current plan.”

As the doctor said this his wife entered with a freshly baked apple pie. A smile spread across Wingate’s face as he realized what he was about to say.

“You intend to poison him!” Wingate said jumping up from his seat like a man who had been touched in the head.

“Indeed we do. Anna has dosed this pie with enough hemlock to kill five men easily.” The doctor replied with a sly grin.

I sat back and admired the simplicity of the plan while Percy just shook his head in amazement and poured himself a brandy.

“Anna will deliver the pie first thing tomorrow before lunch and I expect you shall have the desired result shortly thereafter, depending of course if he eats it right then or later that evening.” The doctor’s tone was both proud and strangely enthusiastic.

After the meeting, we all moved into the dining room where Anna had prepared a lovely fried chicken dinner with all the trimmings. Everybody ate and drank until they were full as ticks. It was an overall jovial occasion. When we were finished, Wingate, now fully drunk, stood to make a speech.

“This day has truly turned out to be a surprise. I thought for sure it would end with me either being wounded or killed.” Wingate grew more unsteady on his feet as he kept talking, slurring his words so badly it drew nervous laughter from everybody in the room.

Suddenly I began feeling light-headed and dizzy myself, even though I had not touched a drop of alcohol. As my heart began to pound in my chest at the thought that was forming in my mind, I remember seeing Wingate collapse on the floor in a heap and hearing the loud thud his head made when it hit the oak planks. Looking over at Percy I noticed he had collapsed sideways in his chair, his tongue rolling out of his head like a sick dog.

“What the hell?” was all I got out before the world turned upside down and then went black as midnight.

When I awoke I was lying in the exam room with my head busting wide open from the most terrible headache I had ever known. Looking over to my left I saw both Percy and Wingate lying in a bed together like they were asleep. Suddenly two men’s voices could be heard.

“So why is this one still alive?” I heard one of the men ask.

“Not sure, he ate the same as the rest.” I suddenly felt nauseous like I was going to throw up.

“Oh Jesus Anna! Come help us with this one!” One of the men called out.

“Turn over on your side Logan.” a woman’s voice instructed me curtly.

After I had retched, Anna wiped my mouth with a moist washcloth and then patted my head with it. As my eyes adjusted, I saw that we were not alone in the room. Standing there at the end of the bed was Dr. Kirkpatrick and Marshal Roberts. As I tried to raise my arm to draw my gun, I realized my arms were bound with leather straps and I was not even wearing any pants, much less a gun belt.

“Now now Logan, you need to take it easy.” Anna whispered. My blood was literally boiling in my head I was so mad.

“What the hell have you done!” I yelled out with a hoarse voice. Anna looked at me with abject pity and then turned around to her husband.

“Can’t we spare him?” she asked.

“Afraid not darling, he knows too much.” Dr. Kirkpatrick replied coldly. Anna gave a pouty look.

“Now Marshal our deal stands, we get all the gold and you get the deed to the claim, correct?” The Marshal gave her a look of disgust.

“Yes Anna, that was the deal.” The Marshal walked over to the bed where Wingate and Percy’s bodies lay.

“As for Mr. Chandler there, I figure a good story to tell the judge is these three had a falling out about the gold and Logan murdered them over it. Of course you two can be key witnesses as you saw the whole thing happen in your dining room, correct?”

As those words hit my ears a lightning bolt went through my entire body. Pure, seething anger emanated from every pore. As I jerked at the restraints the doctor and his wife backed up from the bed.

“Logan! You need to settle down!” The marshal yelled, taking out his pistol to whack me.

“You murdering, corrupt bastards!” I yelled out, spittle flying from my mouth in a rant. After a minute of my temper flaring I was spent, the poison in my body completely zapping me of all energy and willpower.

“So he will hang then?” The Doctor asked, setting the brown satchel containing Wingate’s gold on a table to inspect the contents.

“Oh yeah, the judge won’t hesitate on this one.” The marshal proudly replied looking at me.

“A double murder over gold? That is about open and shut as you can get in these parts.”

Hot tears rolled down my cheeks as I turned to look at my best friend’s dead faces as one of the marshal’s deputies lifted me from the bed and handcuffed me. A flood of memories washed over me. Percy’s infectious laugh. Wingate’s wild mining camp stories. I remembered them all. 

As Anna watched from the window as I was loaded onto a horse, I was reminded when me and her helped carry Wingate into the house after he had been shot. I remember the Doctor taking such care sewing up Percy’s head after the Marshal had beat him. Now both Anna and the Doctor had murdered the same men they had cared for all these weeks in their own home!

Greed truly infects men’s and women’s souls and turns them into heartless beasts.

Arriving at the jail I was told it would most likely be tomorrow when I would be hung because they had to build a gallows and those things took time. I asked for some paper and a pencil to write a letter to my next of kin, trying to explain things.

I hope whoever reads this letter will seek out justice for me and my friends, Percy Ingovoll and Arthur Wingate. These men were murdered in cold blood by City Marshal John Roberts, Doctor Charles A. Kirkpatrick and his wife Anna Kirkpatrick.

Please let truth and justice avenge us!

Sincerely,

Logan Chandler 

 

The End.

 

 

A Rebel Stand

 

 

 

This is a work of Short Fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in this short story are entirely fictional and are of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or organizations or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

 

“Like my father before me
I will work the land
And like my brother above me
Who took a rebel stand…”

(From The Night they Drove ole’ Dixie Down)

 

 

Bethel, Georgia – 1866

 

It was just past eight in the morning and Reverend Henry Callahan Sr. sat on his front porch with his nine year old grandson, Nathaniel (or ‘Natty’) taking his breakfast and Henry his morning coffee. As was the usual routine this time of day, Union troops garrisoned just outside of town could be heard marching up and down the main road, the sound of their boots stomping in cadence a daily reminder that so-called “Reconstruction” was just another euphemism for more federal tyranny. As Henry sipped his coffee he glanced over at his grandson, who was a spitting image of his only son, the late Captain Henry Callahan Jr., 5th Georgia Cavalry, CSA, who fell at Gettysburg three years prior.

“Pa-paw when will the Yankees leave?” Nathaniel asked with a furrowed brow looking out at the main road.

Reverend Callahan smiled at the look on his grandson’s face.

“God willing it will be soon, Natty.” The Reverend replied with a wink.

“That would be nice!” Nathaniel replied smiling, taking a bite of bacon.

“Well then let’s both ask the Good Lord for that to happen, shall we?” Henry Sr. replied as he closed his eyes and reverently folded his hands together in prayer

Immediately Nathaniel followed suit and without missing a beat begin to petition God as only a child could:

“Dear Jesus, me and my pa-paw are thankful for all your many blessings but we have been asking for you to get these Yankees out of Georgia for a while now and nothing has happened. Please Lord! Take these Yankees back to where they came from so they will leave us all in peace! In Jesus’ Mighty Name we Pray, Amen.”

“How was that prayer pa-paw?” Nathaniel asked, smiling.

“One of your best yet!” Henry Sr. replied with another wink and smile, his heart bursting in his chest.

When Nathaniel’s mother had died of scarlet fever two years ago most everybody in the family urged the Reverend, who had lost his own wife to illness over a decade ago, to send the boy off to the mother’s relatives in Tennessee but the Reverend would not hear of it. No, family needed to stick together. Besides, Henry knew his son would much rather have him raise the boy than some in-laws whom he had only met once at the wedding over seven years ago.

“Hurry up and finish your breakfast Natty or you’ll be late for school!” Henry Sr. gently chided his grandson.

Nathaniel nodded and shoved the last of his scrambled eggs down his gullet.

The buggy ride to school typically took less than ten minutes with the Reverend always taking care to avoid Yankee patrols. But today was different, for some reason the Yankees were really making a show of themselves. As they rounded the corner into town four yankee soldiers stood in the road with rifles crossed.

“What’s your business in town?” A big Yankee Sergeant with a walrus mustache asked, almost knocking Henry Sr. down with the smell of corn mash liquor on his breath.

“Taking my grandson to school like I do every day at this time.” The Reverend replied with obvious agitation in his voice.

The Yankee stared at Henry for a long moment, his bloodshot eyes itching for a fight.

“Sergeant! What’s going on here? Why are these people being detained?” A young Yankee Captain asked riding up on a well groomed white gelding.

The half-drunk Sergeant and his three underlings all quickly popped to attention.

“Routine inspection for contraband sir!” The sergeant replied.

The Yankee Captain quickly dismounted and approached the buggy.

“Routine inspection for contraband of a buggy with a Reverend and a school age child?” The Captain asked, looking at the Sergeant like he had mush for brains.

The sergeant’s face turned beet red with embarrassment.

“I apologize for this inconvenience Reverend Callahan, you are free to go.” The Captain said waving the buggy forward.

The Reverend tipped his hat and gave the horse a gentle reign. After they had went a fair piece down the road Henry Sr. glanced at Nathaniel out of the corner of his eye and could see his grandson thinking intently about what had just happened and ever so quietly Reverend Callahan said another prayer for the yankee plague to be swept away by the mighty hand of God.

 

Near Bertram, Texas – 2026

 

From his elevated perch on top of a Burnet county water tower, Captain Logan Callahan of the Texas Brigade Militia carefully watched a high resolution tablet screen as he controlled a small “Mosquito” drone equipped with two 1080p video cameras as it hovered three-hundred feet above as a UNF supply convoy consisting of six, five-ton 6×6 military transport trucks as they rumbled down a small blacktop county road half-a-mile away.

“Two minute’s from the T-junction.” Logan announced over the radio.

A quarter of a mile away at the T-junction three squads of heavily armed Texas Brigade militia men patiently waited, one of them with a cheap cell phone with a saved number in the contacts under the not so subtle title of “BOOM.”

Meanwhile, four miles away three Texas Brigade requisitioned U-Haul panel trucks were already making their way to the ambush site to make the pickup of men and supplies.

As the lead 6×6 UNF truck slowed to make a left hand turn at the T junction the militia man with the cell phone began counting.

“One mississippi, two mississippi, three mississippi…”

When he got to five he mashed the green call button on the cell phone to dial the “BOOM” contact which sent the signal to the detonating device on the homemade IED which had been placed in the drainage tunnel underneath the road at the T junction. The timing was perfect. Just as the lead vehicle was in the middle of his left turn the road underneath the truck exploded in a massive fountain of asphalt, dirt and metal sending the truck airborne like a plastic toy. When the truck finally landed on it’s side, it created a massive five ton roadblock, just as it had been planned. Immediately the rear squad of riflemen went to work on the last truck, pelting it with rifle fire, killing the driver and three man security detachment dead and creating yet another five ton roadblock. The remaining trucks in the middle were trapped and had nowhere to go and nothing to do except die as their cabs were pelted with unrelenting rifle fire. It was all over in under two and a half minutes.

Logan watched all the action unfold on his display as he slowly circled the drone at one hundred and fifty feet above terra firma. Right on time the Texas Brigade trucks pulled up and the men began loading up the supplies. Ammunition, small arms, grenades, rocket launchers, explosives, rations, fresh water and medical supplies. It was the mother lode for a guerilla army and it was sorely needed. As Logan landed the drone and prepared to hike down to the ambush site he quickly sent the captured video of the ambush to his team of online trolls. Thirty years ago, before the internet and social media, large armies would never admit small bands of guerilla fighters would be capable of ambushing a supply convoy. Instead they would lie and say there had been a terrible traffic accident and only a “few trucks” had been lost. Now in the digital age of 4GW they could not hide behind that lie. The truth was being beamed out on millions of cell phone and laptop screens in full 1080p resolution. Of course from now on UNF supply convoys would have better beefed up security, most likely some kind of armed air support, but that was the price you paid when fighting a guerilla war. One thing was for certain though: Slowly but surely the UNF facade of invincibility was being worn down. A savage war of attrition was being fought and for the first time since the conflict began over a year ago, public opinion and empathy was leaning toward the Texas Brigade. Texas and its Confederacy of Southern state allies would be successful in seceding from what was left of the Former United States of America and its United Nation Globalist taskmasters.

That night as Logan returned to the barracks he fell into his bunk like a dead man and tried to close his eyes, but as was always the case after an operation, he couldn’t sleep. He reached down underneath his bunk and came up with a novel, an old western written over thirty years ago by John Carlos Blake called In the Rogue Blood. Inside the book were two laminated pictures of his distant Confederate relatives. One was of Henry Callahan Jr., 5th Georgia Cavalry, taken in 1862. He was pictured on a stunning white horse in his dress gray uniform. The other taken in 1876 was of his son and on the back was written “Nathaniel Callahan, 19 years old, Georgia State Militia.” As Logan studied the photograph intently he remembered his late Grandpa’s stories about “Natty”, who was a kind of folk hero within the family.

“Daddy always said that Natty was a true Southern Loyalist and although some folks called him an “outlaw” daddy never saw it that way. Natty only stole from Yankee banks and railroads, never from good southern white folk and I have it on good authority he took a lion’s share of the stolen loot and gave it to struggling Southern businessmen so they could get on their feet without having to rely on the thieving Yankee usury. That my friend is why Nathaniel Callahan died of old age and not with a noose around his neck.”

 

 

Twelve miles Outside Macon, Georgia – 1876

 

While his three other partners got control of the locomotive and the passenger car, Natty climbed up on the caboose and began searching for the conductor. It didn’t take long. He found him cowering behind three sacks of mail whimpering like a child. Natty shook his head in disbelief at the man and then motioned with the barrel of his Colt for him to lead the way to the strong boxes in the mail car. Once they were inside Natty handed the conductor a feed sack.

“Fill it up and don’t stall on the combinations. You don’t wanna test me Mr. Hamilton, I assure you.”

The conductor shot a worried glance up at the masked bandit that he knew his name and immediately got to work. Within thirty-seconds he was filling the sack up with stacks of thousand dollar bundles. Natty counted thirty bundles before the conductor moved on to the next safe. It took just under four minutes to empty the two remaining safes. When he was done Natty casually rared back and whacked the conductor upside the head with the barrel of his Colt, splitting his scalp at the hairline and bringing a large trickle of blood from his head.

“Shit fire! Why in the hell did you do that! You got the damn money!” The conductor yelled angrily, grabbing his head.

“No hard feelings Mr. Hamilton but now you got an alibi that you did not cooperate with us!” Natty winked and stuffed a hundred dollar bill in the conductor’s front shirt pocket before jumping down from the mail car. Confounded as to what to do next, the conductor stood there with his head bleeding and his mouth wide open in amazement as the four masked outlaws rode off into the dark Georgia woods hooping and hollering like wild indians with just over sixty-thousand dollars in cash in their poke.

 

Texas Brigade Militia Forward Operating Base Near La Porte, Texas – 2027

 

 Captain Logan Callahan sat in the Command Post sipping twice brewed black coffee giving his After Action Report (AAR) to his CO and his staff. Earlier that morning, while leading a dawn patrol with an under strength platoon Logan had ran into an element of UNF infantry supported by a LAV-26, a six wheeled light armored recon vehicle with a 25mm Bushmaster Chain Gun.

“Looked to me like they were probing along our right flank here.” Logan pointed at a position on the map.

Out of sixty-seven men he had lost five before they could get a SMAW (A Shoulder Fired Rocket Launcher) into the fight to take out the LAV.  It was a costly lesson that all units needed to have Anti-Tank capabilities from here on out. The UNF were throwing everything but their toenails into this push, including mechanized units and armor. After almost two years of brutal fighting the Brigade along with their nine Confederate State allies had taken back all of the major Texas cities except Houston. Houston was the crown jewel that the UNF did not want to let go of, mainly because of the oil refineries and the strategic importance of a naval port.

“Tomorrow morning I want you to take the entire reinforced second battalion: Able, Bravo and Charlie Companies, seven hundred men total and push up the right side of this canal. I will have First Battalion on your left flank with what is left of Third in reserve. We need to hit their forces hard before they get organized. Do not let them breathe Callahan! Constant pressure is key! Make sure and utilize your explosive drones and mortars on the attack. I have gathered all the anti-tank weapons we have and given them to the Second Battalion. Any questions?” Lt. Colonel Brian Potterfield asked Logan.

Logan stared at the map for a long moment.

“Not at the moment sir.” Logan replied.

“Good. Oh there’s one more thing I almost forgot.”

“Sir?” Logan replied

“You might be needing these from here on out.”

With that the Lt. Colonel pulled out a pair of Gold Oak Leaves.

“Congratulations Major Callahan.” Potterfield said with a smile.

As the Colonel removed the silver bars and replaced them with the gold oak leaves in a bright flash, as if some hidden sound proof door had been opened and a flash bang grenade thrown in, Logan’s senses were assaulted all at once. A cavalry trumpet blasted in his ears, the smell of burnt cordite and gun smoke floated heavy up into his nostrils. He saw a dozen Confederate soldiers with rifles run by followed by cavalrymen, the horses thundering by in unison. As Logan was trying to interpret all of this, suddenly a man appeared on a lean white stallion. A man Logan recognized immediately as his relative, Captain Henry Callahan Jr., 5th Georgia Cavalry, CSA. The sound of yankee cannon fire echoed around him but yet he and his mount remained calm.

“I ain’t gonna lie to you, this is gonna be a rough one cousin, but you’ll see your way through it.” Captain Callahan said in his strong Gerogia drawl as he spat tobacco juice, his horse gently shaking its head at the sound of the distant cannons.

Logan wanted to speak but he couldn’t, it was like he was in a dream and couldn’t move or talk.

“You won’t believe this but you will be talked and wrote about for the next twenty years by the same children you just fought to save, ain’t that somethin’!” Captain Callahan smiled, shaking his head.

After a few moments the smile faded from his face and a look of serious consternation replaced it.

“So go on and get to it Major…them Yankee’s ain’t gonna kill themselves you know.”

And with that the soundproofed door closed and Major Logan Callahan found himself seated in a Forward Command Post surrounded by monitors and computer equipment with dozens of support personnel buzzing like busy wasp around him.

“Major Callahan Sir? Are you O.K.?” a young Captain named Jackson asked standing behind him.

It took a few seconds for Logan to get his bearings.

“Yes, I’m fine. What’s happening?” Logan replied looking up at the screens in front of him.

“The entire assault force is waiting on your GO WORD sir.” Captain Jackson replied.

Logan took a deep breath and glanced up at the status screen showing the position of the Second and First Battalions in relation to the canal. Logan stared at the enemy positions marked with a red X across from the canal. Damn, there were so many of them! Then suddenly his cousin’s words echoed again in his ear and Logan smiled as he shouted into his headset.

“All Unit’s GO!”

 

The End.

 

 

 

 

“Thank You for Your Service”

 

 

 

This is a work of Short Fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in this short story are entirely fictional and are of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or organizations or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

 

The old man stood in front of the full length mirror admiring his military uniform. Though it has been over sixty years since he had last worn it, surprisingly it still fit him fairly well. That was most likely because he was now at the same weight he was at twenty years old, a buck fifty! The old man smiled at the thought as his liver spotted wrinkled hand carefully checked the three rows of ribbons and medals that adorned his left breast. Satisfied all was in order, he then put on his cover (his hat) and carefully centered it low over his brow. Taking a deep breath, he glanced at the picture of his late wife and his two married sons he kept on the dresser and then turned and walked out his front door.

A small black SUV waited at the curb with the back door open.

The old man gingerly crawled into the vehicle and after buckling his seatbelt, the door automatically closed.

“Please place your thumb on the green keypad in front of you” a stern female AI voice commanded over the vehicles speakers.

The old man grudgingly complied and after a series of beeps the doors locked and the vehicle pulled away from the curb with a mild electric hum.

“Good Morning 310654, this trip to the Hunger Mandate Processing Center will take precisely five minutes and thirty four seconds. Enjoy the ride and Thank you for your Service.”

The old man stared out the window at the passing city scenery but in his mind he was a million miles away. Full color mental images of his late wife and two grown sons filled his thoughts as did holding his new infant grand-daughter at the hospital three months ago. The old man wiped a tear from his eye. These were the things he wanted to remember today, not this sad, despicable place.

“We have arrived at your destination. Please watch your step when exiting the vehicle.”

The old man waited for the door to open and then carefully got out. As the vehicle hummed away the old man looked up at the industrial grey skyscraper in front of him, The Hunger Mandate Processing Center.

“You there! Do you have business inside the center?” a Sentry in full grey battle rattle approached him, his attack robot dog by his side.

Before the old man could answer the cop produced a retinal scanner and in seconds had every piece of information he needed.

“310654 you have a priority tasking inside the center, come with me!”

Before the old man knew what was happening he was being forcefully escorted inside the building by the sentry, the robotic dog emanating a low growl the whole time as they walked. When they entered the building the cop pointed to a bank of red elevators on the far wall.

“Priority tasking is Elevator 32, it’s straight ahead, you can’t miss it. Thank you for your service.”

As the cop walked away the old man considered making a run for it. He could walk right back out that door, turn a corner, jump into a cab and be gone. Of course they would track him down in due course, a dozen cops in full battle rattle armed with stun batons ready to “tag and bag” him back to the Hunger Mandate Processing Center.

No, he had made up his mind. He was going through with it. Besides, the survival of his family depended on it.

The old man made his way over to Elevator 32 and pushed the green button. A few seconds passed and the doors to the elevator parted open. As soon as the old man was inside the doors closed and a woman’s stern voice asked for him to stand still for a full body scan. The elevator lights dimmed and a series of green lasers began scanning the old man’s body in a grid fashion, going up and down from his head to his feet several times. When it was done the lights came back up to full power and the woman’s voice came over the speaker:

“Scan confirmed. Thank you for you cooperation and Service.”

It took another full minute before the elevator doors finally opened at their destination.

“Priority Tasking 310654, Please follow the green arrows on the floor.”  A female voice announced out of a loudspeaker on the wall.

The room was dark and cold and the only thing visible was the flashing green arrows. The old man gingerly stepped out of the elevator and followed the flashing arrows around to the right, down a large ramp and onto a large metal platform with the word STOP HERE! in flashing red lights.

The old man peered into the vast darkness around him as mechanical whirling noises filled the cavernous room. And then, suddenly, without warning, a large spotlight from above blinded him and a woman’s voice boomed out of a series of loudspeakers around him.

“310654 according to the body scan you have Stage 3 Pancreatic Cancer, inoperable. Life Expectancy, 124 days, are you aware of this?”

“Yes I am” the old man said with confidence.

“And is this council to understand that you wish to take advantage of our Legacy Waiver Benefit today?”

“Yes, that is correct” the old man replied, staring straight ahead.

“Just to clarify, your Combat Veteran status gives you the Legacy Waiver option which provides the opportunity for you to Sacrifice your Body for the Greater Good and in doing so exempt both of your sons from having to sacrifice themselves when they reach the current Terminus Age of 81, do you understand this?”

“Yes, I understand.” the old man’s voice cracked.

There was a long moment of pause.

“310654 This council accepts your great Sacrifice to the New People’s Marxist Republic and Thanks You for your Great Courage and Service! Please know that every part of your body will be processed and used for nutrient rich food to feed the multitude of starving foreign workers across our great land! This Council Thanks you for your Service!”

The old man closed his eyes. “God please forgive me.” he whispered.

The spotlight went dark and the platform was lowered into a small, sealed concrete basement room where an odorless nerve agent was pumped in.

In just under 70 seconds the old man was dead and his body removed by a large mechanical robot arm and dumped into a waiting semi-trailer with hundreds of other “Sacrifices” which were then taken to a processing plant where the bodies were skinned, gutted, boiled and refined by chemical reverse osmosis into a vanilla flavored protein powder with the trade name “YUM”.

Yum could be mixed with water or taken alone by the Tablespoonful.

One serving provided 2,000 calories and 20 grams of protein.

 

The End.

 

 

 

Forever and a Day

 

 

In memory of the 77th Anniversary of D-Day

 

The flak was ungodly and the pilots had no choice.

They green lit the stick going way too low and way too fast.

When Hank left the plane he was upside down looking up at his deployed canopy as fountains of orange and red tracer rounds zipped by him like brilliant ropes of light. The ground looked like it was on fire. Hank’s heart raced as he saw nowhere to land there wasn’t a German gun flash. Suddenly there was a loud explosion above him as a C-47 was cut in half by a flak burst. As the nose of the plane sheered away, the fuselage tumbled to the earth and Hank watched in horror as the stick of paratroopers inside were engulfed in flames and came tumbling out like burning embers being carried away on a stiff breeze. Hank turned his head away and prayed harder than he had ever prayed in his life.

Hank hit the ground so hard it knocked him out cold.

Later he awoke to the sound of a German twenty-millimeter flak gun popping off like a typewriter not more than fifty-yards away. He wasn’t sure how long he had been unconscious, it could not have been more than a few minutes. Instinctively he reached for his rifle but it was gone, along with all his ammo, his sidearm and even his damn jump knife. All he had in his pockets to invade fortress Europe was a cricket clicker and three melted Hershey bars.

Moving away from the flak gun, Hank shimmied and bounded through the bocage toward what looked like a farmhouse in the distance. Arriving on the outskirts of the farm Hank was met with the challenge word of “Flash!” Without thinking he responded “Thunder!” and two other troopers appeared out of the thick brush, Privates Thomas and Perry, both from Hank’s stick.

“Well if you ain’t a sight for sore eyes!” Pvt. Randall Thomas exclaimed slapping Hank on the back. Hank smiled and shook hands with both men.

“Please tell me you know where in the hell we are” Hank whispered looking at Thomas and Perry intently.

“N damn clue!” Thomas replied, taking a drink from his canteen and then offering it to Hank.

“Well at least you both got your rifles!” Hank replied, eyeing the two M1 Garands.

Perry laughed and handed Hank his .45.

“So what’s this farm?” Hank asked.

“It’s crawling thick with krauts, I counted at least a platoon in there.” Perry answered, adjusting his helmet.

“Most likely using it as a resupply for AA ammo. No way we can take that on. I heard trucks just beyond those trees, I say we find that road and follow it until we hit a road sign so we can get our bearings on where the hell we are.”

Without waiting for an answer, Thomas and Perry took point and bounded over to a drainage ditch which ran beside the farm and almost all the way up to the road. Perry nodded for Hank to follow and bring up the rear since all he had was a pistol. They maintained tactical spacing and moved as quietly as they could through the knee deep water. Reaching the road, Thomas gave the hand signal for everybody to find cover while he scouted if it was clear. Hank took a position behind a tree that gave him good visibility of the road in both directions while Perry went prone in the brush. Just as Thomas was about to reach the other side of the road and give the signal to cross, the sound of a truck engine could be heard rumbling their direction. Thomas gave the signal to find cover. When the truck was about ten yards away suddenly the night lit up like the fourth of July and all hell broke loose. Perry came running up beside Hank.

“What the hell is going on?”

Hank heard the familiar sound of Garand’s and a .30 Caliber Browning and smiled.

“Sounds like some of our boys decided to get into the war!”

The firefight was over in under half a minute and soon Hank saw a total of six men step out of the bocage onto the road to investigate the truck.

“Flash!” Hank yelled at the top of his lungs down the road.

Suddenly the squad got low and trained their muzzles in Hank’s direction.

“Thunder! Show yourself!” a voice replied from the squad

“Hundred and First, we’re coming out” Hank yelled

Hank, Perry and Thomas emerged from the thick brush and double-timed toward the lead man in the squad.

Hank immediately saw the subdued bar on the helmet and saluted and sounded off.

“Private Parker, Able Company 502nd, Lieutenant.”

As Perry and Thomas sounded off Hank recognized two of the men from Charlie Company 502nd, Roselli and Davis. As Hank went over to shake hands he heard the Lt. identify himself.

“Lt. Winters. Easy Company, 506th. You men sure are a long way from your drop zone!”

“I think we all are sir.” Thomas replied with a laugh.

As Hank walked past the truck shot all to hell, he saw the dead German driver shot through the temple. Walking around to the back were six more dead soldiers, all of them killed before they could exit the truck.

“Not a bad piece of shooting if I do say so myself.” A trooper with a Browning .30 caliber over his shoulder said smiling.

“Yeah well I nailed the driver!” another trooper replied with a smirk.

Everybody got quiet as Lt. Winters approached.

“OK, this road is busy tonight so police up weapons and ammo and let’s move in two tactical columns to the farmhouse. Thomas, Parker and Perry, welcome aboard. You’ll be attached to me until we find your unit. Parker, be sure and grab a Kraut rifle and some ammo until we can find you a proper replacement.”

“Yes sir” Hank replied.

Hank walked over and picked up a K-98 and a leather ammo pouch from the back of the truck and slung it over his shoulder.

As the squad bounded toward the farmhouse in two tactical columns Pvt. Hank Parker quietly thanked God for getting him through D-Day+1.

He knew he had a long way to go yet, but this was a good start in the big scheme of things.

 

The End.

 

 

 

Medicine Gun

 

This is a work of short fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in this short story are entirely fictional and are of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or organizations or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

 

This story is dedicated to my friend, John Gregory Herring, aka “Spotflare”

(1947-2020)

 

“Keep your nose in the wind and your eyes along the skyline”

(From the film Jeremiah Johnson)

 

It was the waning days of late summer in the year of our Lord eighteen hundred and forty-eight when ‘Red-Tail’ Jack Patterson came down from the Little Belt mountains for his annual visit to the Medicine Gun trading post near the mouth of the Judith river. Coming down into the low country on his three year old roan mare, the mountain man was a spectacle to behold. Everything he wore was self-made (except his tanned buckskins, which he had traded for with the Cheyenne) from his knee length Grizz coat to his red fox and muskrat hat, to his knee high Elk boots trimmed in the finest beaver fur. Resting in a tanned leather scabbard was his trusty fifty caliber hawken rifle while two fifty-caliber pistols were mounted on either side of his saddle horn. Tucked into his belt cross draw was another pistol, this one with a custom short barrel for a wider spread at close-range, along with his fourteen inch drop point knife with a antler horn handle rightly named “Annabelle.” He also on occasion tucked a razor-edged pipe hawk in his belt he had taken off a Crow brave last year after the bastard tried to steal his horse.

The owners of the trading post, Otis and Prudence McSween, were overjoyed to see Jack return since in the thirteen months he had been gone there had been countless rumors of his death from any number of french trappers, wagon train masters and Army scouts alike. As was the custom when Red-Tail visited, before he was ever allowed to put his feet underneath her supper table, Prudence handed Jack a large piece of homemade lye and mint soap, scissors, a small hand mirror and a towel and pointed him toward the creek to bathe.

“I love ya’ like a brother Jack, but My God! Me and Otis smelled you long before we saw you!” Prudence exclaimed, smiling.

Jack slapped Otis on the back and let out a hearty laugh as he took the necessaries from Prudence and headed to the creek whistling an old church hymn.

When he showed up an hour later, the couple did not even recognize him.

“My God, you look like a new man Jack Patterson!” Prudence exclaimed, smiling as she grabbed him by the arm and pulled him inside to the dinner table. Typically Jack would take offense at somebody calling him by his Christian name but Prudence McSween was the closest thing to family Jack had, so she could rightly call him whatever she pleased as long as it was not late for supper!

“So how many this time Prudence?” Jack asked, smiling as he sat down at their large maple dinner table as she poured him a steaming cup of coffee.

“Well, let me see.” Prudence replied, holding the coffee pot with a dish towel and looking up at the ceiling as if she were reading off an invisible tally sheet.

“Three at last count: cree war party, grizz attack and drowned in the Powder river.” Prudence replied with a wise smirk.

Prudence was a tall, handsome wisp of a woman, not yet thirty with dark, raven hair past her shoulders and soft, sad brown eyes. She and Otis had lost their twin daughters to the pox three years prior and the sorrow still clung heavily to her soul. Jack shook his head and laughed heartily as he enjoyed the regal comforts of having good honest white folks for company, a roof over his head and real coffee to drink.

“The Powder this time, huh? Last time it was the Milk, wasn’t it? And Cree? Hell, last Cree indian I saw was Rutting Pony. He tried to marry me off to his humpback sister for two horses and a pistol, can you believe it!”

The comment caught Prudence and Otis totally off-guard and they looked at one another in total shock and then busted out laughing so hard they both had tears in their eyes.

After finishing their coffee, Otis helped Jack unload the few black bear, mule deer and elk pelts from his mule as Prudence cooked up a dinner of venison backstrap, mashed potatoes and fresh squash from her garden. As they ate and talked about local news, Prudence took stock of Jack, whose full Christian name was Johnathan Obadiah Patterson. He was somewhere in his thirties and had deep set blue-grey eyes that often twinkled when he laughed. He had got the name “Red-Tail” not from the hawk as many thought but from his temper. Three years prior at a gathering near the Musselshell, ‘Coon-Eyes’ Jim Grady, a man of fearsome low-reputation and character, accused Jack of poaching beaver on his patch and a fight ensued. After the fight ole’ Coon-eyes actually in fact resembled a coon with both of his eyes blackened courtesy of Jack. After that day Johnathan became known as “Red-Ass” Jack, which later was changed to “Red-Tail” so as not to offend Prudence McSween, the only white woman in the territory Jack cared about not insulting with foul language and bad manners.

To their delight, Jack stayed on and helped Otis and Prudence with several jobs around the place including patching the roof, building a smokehouse and planting a fall garden. On the afternoon of the fourth day however things took an unexpected turn. While working in the garden Jack noticed one of the flea bitten dogs Otis had kept looking up the trail as if annoyed by something. Never one to ignore an animal’s instincts, Jack walked up past the barn to take a look. There, about fifty yards up the path was a skinny and winded grey mare with a man slumped over in the saddle. As Jack looked closer he could see a small pair of arms wrapped around the man from behind. A child! With his protective instincts telling him to run to the horse and help the man and child, his hard taught experience told him to stay put. This could easily be a trap. Besides the riled up injuns, there were bad outlaw elements around these parts since the wagon trains began coming through regular. Slowly backing up off the trail, Jack pulled his pistol and took a knee behind a tree. He sat there for a long minute listening and looking. After deciding they were indeed alone, Jack slowly walked up to the horse with his pistol cocked and trained on the slumped rider.

“Hello there on the horse! I say Hello!” Jack yelled out several times.

The horse was so exhausted it did not so much as flinch at Jack’s approach.

“Easy there girl, easy…” Jack cooed as he gently walked up and put his hand on the reins.

Immediately Jack could see the saddle covered in fresh blood with the slumped man in the saddle unconscious but alive, if not barely. Peering around the side, Jack could now see the child was a little girl around the age of eight, her wheat colored hair and little round face burrowed into the back of the man, whimpering softly like a wounded animal. Jack double checked that the child was not wounded and once satisfied started leading the horse toward the barn. By this time Otis had heard the commotion and came out running with rifle in hand to help.

“We got us a badly wounded man and a scared child here” Jack yelled as Prudence came out the door of the trading post wiping her hands on her apron.

“My God! Bring them both inside now!” Prudence demanded as she quickly went inside and began clearing the table.

Jack gently tried to pry the child’s arms away from the wounded man but the child was not having any of it, letting out a shriek of pure terror.

“Child, you are gonna have to let go so we can help him” Jack pleaded.

After a brief tug of war and the child finally relenting out of exhaustion, Jack gingerly lifted her off the horse and carried her inside to an anxiously awaiting Mrs. McSween who then took the child into their bedroom. After that Jack and Otis went to work lifting the man out of the saddle and into the house.

“Damn this feller’s lost a lot of blood!” Otis remarked as they laid him down.

“We need to find these holes and start pluggin’ em’. Otis, help me turn him over and get these clothes off of him.” Jack commanded, taking out his knife and cutting the bloodied shirt and pants off the man.

As Jack began to examine the man right away he counted two bullet holes high in his chest and one in his stomach. He could not find one exit wound. After a couple more minutes of searching the man let out a soft whimper,  took a wet gurgling breath, whispered the name “Celia-Anne” and then died right there on the table.

Otis and Jack both stared at the man for a long moment and then removed their hats out of respect.

“Not much we could have done. He had been shot in the lung twice and had lost too much blood.” Jack said softly.

As Prudence walked in from the back bedroom holding the child to her shoulder, her eyes met Jack’s and he gently shook his head that the man had passed. Quickly Prudence turned back around and shut the bedroom door behind her while softly singing a hymn:

 

My hope is built on nothing less

Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness;

I dare not trust the sweetest frame,

But wholly lean on Jesus’ name.

On Christ, the solid Rock, I stand;

All other ground is sinking sand,

All other ground is sinking sand.

 

Jack went through the man’s pocket’s respectfully looking for any clues as to his identity. All Jack could find was a worn brown leather wallet with three U.S. dollars which he promptly handed over to Otis.

“Who do you think he is Jack?” Otis asked, looking concerned as he pocketed the money.

 “Well, he’s not a trapper and he’s not a scout. Judging from his haircut and clothes I’m guessing he’s a pilgrim that got lost or separated from the wagon train, maybe.”

“But why would somebody shoot a pilgrim with a child? You think injuns done this?”

Jack shook his head. “I doubt it. And since he still has his wallet, I don’t think bandits did this either. It’s peculiar.”

Otis and Jack then proceeded to wrap the body in a blanket and bury the man behind the trading post in a little makeshift cemetery Otis had created for folks who had died while passing through, either from sickness or being murdered by injuns.

“We don’t even know this feller’s name for a marker.” Otis said, wiping his brow after shoveling the last of the dirt on the grave.

“The Good Lord knows him and I guess in the end that’s all that really matters.” Jack replied, his gaze fixed on the mountains in the distance.

A week passed and although the girl still had not spoken, Otis and Prudence slipped right back into their roles as loving parents. They had taken to calling the little girl “Celia-Ann” and she seemed to cotton to it just fine. Prudence sewed her some right handsome dresses and in the evenings after supper all three of them would go for a walk down by the creek while Jack watched from a distance on the porch smoking down his pipe. One evening Celia decided to pick a small bunch of yellow and blue wildflowers for Jack.

“Well that is right nice of you young lady! Thank You!” Jack said, smiling as he kneeled down and took the flowers.

Celia looked at him for a long moment, her little blue eyes twinkling with delight. Jack could see she wanted to say something but just couldn’t bring herself to do it. Instead, she cracked a smile that could break your heart and ran off into the house with a giggle, her sun kissed hair bouncing with every step.

“Someday that girl is gonna start talking and when she does the world better watch out!” Jack said out loud laughing to himself as the sun disappeared behind the little belt mountains and somewhere out in the valley the soft purr of a whip-poor-will floated on the evening breeze.

The next day Jack headed out early to go hunting. With fall quickly approaching the Mule deer and Elk would be active in the valley timber below the snowline and he intended to take advantage of it.

As he was heading out Prudence came out the front door in a rush.

“Wait! You can’t go without taking a lunch!” she exclaimed smiling, handing Jack a small red handkerchief tied up with a hunk of jerky, a sliced onion and some homemade goat cheese.

“Much obliged Mrs. McSween.” Jack replied, tipping his hat.

As Jack rode off he smiled to himself. If any of his old mountain buddies could see him now he would be the laughing stock of the territory. Packing a lunch in a handkerchief to go hunting for the day? Whoever heard of such foolishness! But that’s what living indoors does to a man. Still, Jack may not have wanted to admit it to his buddies or even to himself, but he was fast growing accustomed to these small little pleasantries of life.

Prudence watched Jack until he disappeared around the bend and under her breath uttered a small, earnest prayer for his protection and return.

After about an hour of riding, Jack got off the main trail and headed south. Although he intended to do some hunting, that was not all he intended to do on this outing. He had decided to satisfy a curiosity he had about the man who died bringing Celia to safety. Where had he come from? Jack knew he had most likely been part of a wagon train going west to Oregon. It was the only logical explanation of why an eight year old white child would be out here in this wilderness with a man who was obviously not a trapper. The only problem was the trail the wagons took was over a hundred miles to the south. So the most likely explanation was the pilgrims had gotten lost or separated and went looking for help. The question was why had the man been shot? and by whom?

Although Jack knew the trail would be cold and almost impossible to track, he followed his gut instincts and backtracked south-east. It did not take him long to find something. Stopping at a small spring to fill his flask and let his horse drink and graze, he spotted smoke on a ridgeline to the southwest. Jack ruled out injuns. Injuns did not make big fires for all to see like white men did, they were smarter than that. No, this was most likely eastern tenderfoot pilgrims. Being cautious, Jack decided to make a big circle and approach them from down wind. As he got closer he began to smell their clothes and their cooking. These men had been on the trail for some time judging from how loud they were stinking up the countryside.

Coming within a hundred yards of the camp Jack left his horse in a small stand of ash and maple trees and crept up within earshot of the camp. Taking a knee in the high grass he sat there with his Hawken rifle and watched and listened.

There were three of them, all of them with decent, well-fed mounts.

“How long is that rabbit gonna take to cook? I’m so damn hungry I’m ready to eat it raw!” One of the men complained.

“You watch your mouth young’un! Yeah, you eat this meat raw and you’ll wish you were dead!” An older man replied sitting by the fire, turning the meat in a pan with a fork.

After a few minutes the man cooking by the fire divided up the meat between each of the men.

They all ate like they were starving except the older man who had done the cooking. He restrained himself and ate like a civilized man, savoring the taste.

“How much longer do we gotta stay out here Boss? Pearson and his daughter have either been scalped or are bear turds by now!”

“We stay out here until we find them or find proof they are both dead, it’s that simple.” Boss replied

“That Jake Pearson was stupid to argue with the prophet like he did. He should have just given up his daughter to marry when she turned twelve like all the other families in the wagon train agreed.”

The man called Boss stood up to stretch and looked over in Jack’s general direction. Jack could see clearly he was heeled with a pistol and a large knife.

“We’ll rest up a few more hours and then ride North. An Army scout told me there is a trading post near the mouth of the Judith. It’s possible he could have made it there.”

As the three men settled down for a rest Jack shook his head and cursed under his breath. This beat all he had ever seen or heard. A grown man marrying several twelve year old girls? What the hell was going on? And why did they call that man a prophet? Were they some kind of church? Jack had more questions than answers about who exactly these people were but he knew one thing for certain: These were the men responsible for that man’s death and they were about to ride to the trading post and find Celia. Jack simply could not allow that to happen. Jack crept back to his horse and thought about a plan. Judging from listening to these three talk, only the older one, “Boss” , had much experience with killing. The other two, were just hired pups. The simplest plan would be to just to ride in there with his three pistols and kill all of them in one fail swoop. But it was also damn risky. Better to divide and conquer and pick em’ off quietly, one at a time, using fear as his primary weapon, just like the injuns did. He pulled his Crow pipe hawk from his saddle bag and stuck it in his belt.

Jack waited an hour to let the three men get good and relaxed and then crawled into the high grass not fifteen yards from the camp. He quietly unsheathed his knife, reversed his grip and made several short, quick calls with his mouth that sounded like prairie dogs humping. At first the men paid no attention and then Jack increased the volume and then two heads popped up in unison. Jack smiled to himself. This was going to be fun.

“What in the hell is that?” one of the young pups exclaimed.

“Sounds like a horny prairie dog” Boss replied lazily, uninterested.

“Well they need to shut the hell up!” the kid replied, laying back down on his bedroll.

A few minutes passed and then Jack started up again, increasing the volume.

“Sonofabitch!” The kid yelled out as he got up and stormed toward Jack in the high grass with his pistol drawn.

“I’ll shut you up you little squeaking bastard!”

The kid came bounding through the grass like a pissed off bull elk and stopped within three feet of where Jack was crouched. Jack could now see the kid’s face clearly. He was no older than seventeen, tall and lanky with a baby face and large, scared eyes. Jack doubted he had ever killed a man in his life. Jack let him walk right by him and then in one swift motion came up behind him like a mountain lion springing a trap. With his left hand Jack covered the boy’s mouth and with his right brought his fourteen inch blade down in a plunging motion into his heart. The boy died with a soft gurgle and his eyes wide with horror as Jack gently set his body down in the tall grass. It had all taken less than ten seconds.

Wiping the blade on his pant leg, Jack then made a semi-circle around the camp and waited. When neither of the two men moved, Jack quickly walked over to the other young boy who was lying down on his bed roll with his back to him.

“Did you kill that noisy bastard Seth?” the boy asked with his back turned

“No, but something killed Seth” Jack whispered back, smiling like the devil himself.

As the boy jumped up in fear Jack closed the distance with a razor edged pipe hawk in one hand and a .50 caliber pistol in the other.

“Oh Christ” was all the boy could choke out as Jack brought the pipe hawk down into the boy’s skull with a wet splitting sound, the boy’s blood and brains spilling out into the dirt like thick, black oil.

In all the commotion Boss sprung to his feet and while he was cussing trying to cock his pistol Jack shot him clean through the right knee, sending him crashing down to the ground screaming like a banshee.

Jack casually strolled over and kicked the man’s pistol out of his grasp.

“You sorry bastard!” Boss yelled out in pain.

“Bushwhacking three innocent Christian men! You will burn in hell for this!” Boss spit in anger, his eyes like two red coals.

Jack stood there watching him squirm in agony for a long moment and then drew Annabelle from her sheath and walked over.

“Go ahead! slaughter me like you did those two innocent boys!” Boss spit through yellow, cracked teeth.

Jack kneeled down in front of Boss and in one quick jerk grabbed the man’s hair with his left hand, turning his face so it was inches from his.

“Innocent? You want to claim you and these boys were innocent Christian men? What kind of Christian men hunts and kills a father trying to protect his eight year old daughter from some sick bastard wanting to marry and bed her?” Jack stared at the man with pure hatred.

“The great prophet will deliver this world!” Boss cried out as he writhed on the ground laughing hysterically.

“This is for Celia and Jake Pearson.”

Jack then scalped the man in one quick motion with his knife, the scalp peeling off the man’s skull like ripe melon. Smiling, Jack then proceeded to stuff the bloody pulp of hair into the man’s mouth until he began to choke on it.

“Maybe that will shut you up for a few minutes.”

After gagging and retching for what seemed like forever, the man finally spit out his own scalp and began yelling in pain at the top of his lungs once again.

“Keep yelling like that and you’re gonna attract injuns, most likely Blackfeet, who will take pleasure in roasting you alive for sport.”

Jack shook his head in disgust as he turned and leashed the three horses to his and then gathered all the men’s weapons and stowed them on the trailing horses.

“Oh God! Please shoot me, please mister!” Boss pleaded and cried like a child as Jack mounted his horse and turned North.

Jack refused to look at the man as he rode out of the camp at a slow walk.

When Jack arrived back at the trading post that afternoon, Otis, Prudence and Celia were all waiting on the porch.

“My, my, where did you get those three fine horses?” Prudence asked, walking up with her eyes wide.

“Oh, The Good Lord just dropped them in my lap,” Jack replied with a smile.

Otis walked over and unsheathed one of the captured rifles and then glanced up at Jack with a smirk.

“The Good Lord is mysterious like that I reckon.” Otis replied as he began removing the saddles and feeding the horses fresh hay.

Jack walked over to Celia and kneeled down and gently touched her on the nose, making a funny face.

As Celia let out a long belly laugh at his silliness Jack smiled and a deep sense of satisfaction washed over him like he had never known in his life.

Home had finally found him.

 

The End.

 

 

 

 

“The Purebloods”

 

 

This is a work of Short Fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in this short story are entirely fictional and are of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or organizations or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

 

Somewhere in the mid-west in the not too distant Future.

I was chopping wood behind the barn when one of the dogs began barking and looking out toward the main road. Taking a step around the barn I spotted a Black SUV idling in the road. I wiped the sweat from my brow with my forearm as I shaded my eyes with my hand in time to see the vehicle slowly turn into my long driveway. Letting out a breath and shaking my head with disgust I walked into the barn and told my brother who was tinkering with the tractor to go inside the house and get ready for company. I then walked over to a pail of cold water and washed my face and the back of my neck and after drying off walked to the front of the house. As the SUV was pulling up I took a seat in a lawn chair by the blooming blue hydrangea bush and began packing my pipe for a smoke.

As soon as the two men exited the vehicle I made both of them for federal stooges. Cheap haricuts and suits with the standard issue oakley sunglasses and the useless and faulty N95 masks. They both did a cursory scan of the property and then took interview stances about ten feet away from me.

“Good Afternoon sir. I am special agent Giddings and this is my partner special agent Marks. We are both with the Department of Domestic Security and Well-Being. We are looking for Mason Hightower.”

I puffed my pipe to life and exhaled the first batch of bluish-grey smoke into the humid afternoon air.

“You found him fella” I said flatly.

Agent Giddings nodded and following his interview training by the numbers, attempted some levity to further gain my trust and break the ice.

“Excellent! Our navigation assistant was right for once Agent Marks, can you believe it!”

As Giddings and Marks giggled together like mentally deficient children, I remained stoic, puffing my pipe and giving the impression this entire encounter was about as thrilling as me trimming my toenails. Seeing my impatience, Gidding’s smile and laughter dissipated and he got down to business.

“Mr. Hightower we are following up on a tip we received via our new app “Neighbor Nanny” which allows law-abiding comrades of the State to include local health care providers to report serious covid mandate violations of their fellow neighbors and co-workers.”

I stared at the man like he was lower than a monkey turd.

“Yes sir, well your local health clinic has reported that you are in violation of Covid Mandate 617.85 which clearly states all Children under the age of twelve must report for vaccination within seventy-two hours of notification. You currently have three children that are all under the age of twelve that have not reported to the clinic for vaccination, are you aware of that Mr. Hightower?”

I noticed both agents stances were now fully bladed and their hands at their waist line.

“Yes I am aware of that.” I answered, as I finished my pipe and tapped the spent bowl on the bottom of my boot.

Giddings curled an eyebrow at my response and for the first time a look of insolence came across his face. Before he could speak however I hit him with a zinger.

“Which is why I would like to ask you kind gentleman if you could help me round up the little rascals? They are such a handful at this age and me being a single parent, well, I don’t mind telling you they can stretch my limitations at times!”

Giddings and Marks looked at each other with a confounding smile.

“While yes sir! We would be glad to help you!” Agent Marks answered gleefully.

“Thank you so much! They are just inside the house here…” I replied as I led the way up the steps to the front door.

Opening the front door I led them down the hallway to the living room.

“Come on in, make yourself at home gentleman, let me see if I can locate the little hooligans…”

I gave them both a reassuring smile and then walked out of the living room into the kitchen where I flipped a red switch which automatically locked all doors and windows in the house and began distribution of an odorless, colorless sleeping gas through the main ventilation system in the house. After waiting around a minute I walked back into the living room to find Agent Marks and Giddings collapsed on the floor and out cold.

“It’s a good thing this gas only works on humans” My brother commented as he walked into the living room from upstairs with two aero-pods floating behind him.

“Yes, another ingenius invention by our Bio-Weapons department, but I do wish they could make these mask where they don’t itch so badly…” I replied as I tore the human face off myself with wet sucking sound and discarded it to allow my delicate translucent blue skin underneath to breathe and my eye tentacles to extend and rotate.

My brother followed suit, tearing off his face as well.

“Oh by the Hand of Neftu of Orion that is so much better!” he replied as his eye tentacles and proboscis extended to their full height.

We loaded up both of the humans on the aero-pods and moved them upstairs to the cryo chamber.

“When is the next pickup” I asked opening the cryo chute

“In two days” my brother replied.

I entered the proper code and the aero pod slipped into the cryo chamber with a quick hiss of air.

“The Research Department are very anxious to start dissection on these two. They want to discover why it is a species would knowingly spread lies and propaganda to murder their own offspring with poison under the guise of so called vaccinations and boosters? It is a biological conundrum they hope to solve.” I replied watching the cryo chamber process the pods.

“There is no conundrum to solve. From their inception this species has always invented new reasons to kill themselves off. If you ask me we should just bide our time. In another century we will be able to take over this planet without ever lifting a finger.”

I pondered my brother’s words for a moment then turned around and headed back downstairs.

“Come on let’s go get suited up. Who knows what kind of people they will send around next to arrest us for not wanting to willingly murder our own offspring.”

My brother laughed so hard at the joke he had to reach up and wipe bio-slime from his eye tentacle.

The End.

 

 

 

A Border Reckoning

 

 

This is a work of Original Short Fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in this short story are entirely fictional and are of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or organizations or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.

 

 

I.

 

Northern Mexico, 1901

 

This land is desperation and hardship.

Everywhere the cracked red earth springs forth thorny reflections of violent resilience, as if creation itself is nodding its weary head to the inevitable conclusion of the despair that surrounds it.

In a canyon named resortes rojo, a large black seep in a red rock wall drained slowly down into a watery pool creating an oasis in multiple stands of juniper, cottonwood and pinyon trees. Shaded from the tortuous sun, this place is a momentary reprieve for both the sparse resident and weary traveler alike, including four Texas cowboys and forty-three head of stolen mexican mustangs. As the horses watered behind a well-made thorny picket line and the men set up a small overnight camp, a pair of young dark eyes hidden in a small cave far above them watched their movements intently.

The eyes belonged to a fourteen-year-old lipan apache boy, wiry and tall for his age, his muscles stretched over his long frame like taut steel cables while his clay colored skin was already rough-hewn, his pores blasted by relentless sand and wind, the moisture of youth crucified long ago. 

His coal-black hair was shoulder length and unkempt, his bangs long enough to partially cover the crimson-purplish scar on the left side of his face that began dangerously close to his eye and ended at his chin. As the boy traced the long scar with his finger, in his mind flashed the image of the man who had put the scar there two years ago. 

The man had whispered into the boy’s ear like some deranged drunk lover that this was going to be a“forget me not” scar, a warning never to steal from him again. The boy remembered the bastards holding him down as the red-hot blade seared deep into his face, the smell of his own burnt flesh still fresh in his nostrils and nauseating him to this day.

 The boy waited until well after sundown until the men were fast asleep and snoring like a pack of hogs, save a sentry armed with a repeater perched on a high shale ledge overlooking the camp.

 With a three-quarter moon overhead, a broad carpet of soft white light enveloped the red canyon walls and created luminous shadows that danced in the firelight like mischievous children. The boy moved quietly, always in a deliberate fashion until he was out of the canyon and atop his bay mare, Cricket. 

He then raced back to the band of lunatics he called family who were camped several miles away on the western side of Montana del lobo.

Upon entering camp the boy reported what he had witnessed to the leader of the group, a mexican army deserter named Diaz. It was Diaz who had found the boy wandering the western tablelands weeks after the Texans had murdered the boy’s family.

 Often at night the boy considered how the smallest choices can often make the biggest impact in one’s life. If his father would not have insisted he go hunting that morning, the boy would have joined his ancestors that day as well. When he returned from the hunt late that evening with a doe and sow pig hung over the back of his horse, he found the entire camp had been rode through and burned.  

His father and uncle had both been shot through the head and strung up upside down on a tall cottonwood with their arms hacked off and their eyes gouged out. 

Their dick and balls had been cut off and stuffed in their mouths. His poor grandmother had been stretched over a wagon wheel and then set on fire with coal oil.

It took the boy a while to find his mother, the bastards had drug her away from camp with a rope around her neck. She had been gutted like a pig, the six-month old  fetus inside of her that had been the boy’s sister had been ripped from her womb and impaled on a sharpened paloverde pole made into a roasting spit. 

The charred remains of the fetus and the bloody black umbilicus hanging from it were a grim reminder that human life was cheap here, and regardless of age or innocence, it held no sentimental place of reservation.

Diaz quickly called a haphazard council and an ambush was planned for just before dawn, only a few hours away. The group’s number currently stood at ten fighting men, with one man injured. The boy was not counted and considered a half-ass scout at best. Their real scout, a Comanche named Parsons, had taken the boy under his wing and when out on the trail, showed him how to cut and read sign.

Tick, a black French creole from the swamps of Louisiana had been wounded in the leg during a mail-coach robbery a few days prior and was laid up and useless for fighting. 

The rest of the men were petty thieves save two white men. Grissom, a former US Army cavalry Sergeant and Spoon, a cow puncher from New Mexico. After the meeting had broken up, the boy walked over to Diaz’ shanty where he found him sitting outside cleaning a German mauser by the light of a lantern.

“You reckon these cowboys are the ones that killed my folks?” The boy asked.

“That was over two years ago kid, I seriously doubt it.” Diaz replied without looking at him.

The boy studied Diaz by the light of the lantern. He had a large flat face with a squashed nose and large black eyes. His hair was long and greasy.

“If you want to shoot one of the bastards, I will let you, makes no difference to me, so long as I get thirty horses out of the deal!” 

Diaz smiled widely, proud of the good fortune that had seemingly fallen into his lap. The boy tried smiling back, but just looked down at his feet awkwardly, unsure of how to feel, but feeling anger and loneliness all the same.

After a small supper of beans and tortillas, the boy laid down by the fire and drifted off to sleep. He dreamed he was at a river, him on one side and his family on the other.

 His father was motioning for him to cross but he was scared. The current was too swift. His father kept calling out to him but he could not hear his words for the roar of the rushing water. A hawk called above him and when he looked up, the sun blinded him. He tried to see his father once more and then suddenly, he was awakened with a swift kick to his side.

The boy rose suddenly from his blanket, his fist raised to fight to find Spoon laughing. He was a tall thin white man with a shaved bald head and a black handlebar mustache flecked with grey. He said he had hired on to work for a rancher near Roswell but got into a fight in a saloon and during the scuffle, shot and killed a whore and a local banker named Peterson.

“I Did not mean to kill that whore.” he said in a mournful tone.

“But the banker? Well hell! Who gives two shits about a banker!”

He often bragged there was a five hundred dollar bounty on his head in New Mexico and Texas, but nobody believed him.

“Diaz says you can come along to help us drive them horses back, we leave in an hour, so be ready.”

Spoon handed the boy a New Service Colt revolver and gun belt. The boy took the rig gingerly as if he was handling a basket of eggs.

“Took that off one of those teamsters on that mail run. Damn fine Weapon.” Spoon smiled at the boy and spat in the dirt and clamored off toward his tent with a gourd of tizwin in his hand.

The group rode out well before dawn. The weather had grown colder, so the boy imitated Grissom, who had tied a handkerchief around his face to block the cutting wind.

 As they neared the mouth of the canyon they found a shallow wash with waist high banks where some sparse cholla and whitethorn were growing to park the horses out of the wind. 

As Diaz quietly hobbled the stock, Grissom unholstered a Winchester carbine from his saddle rig and handed it to the boy.

“It’s loaded and here are some spare shells.”

The boy tucked the shells away and slung the carbine across his back. Grissom held a finger up to his lips and then nodded his head toward the top of the cliff for the boy to lead the way.

 The pair crawled on all fours almost the entire way until they found the entrance to the small cave, both of them praying to themselves that no rattlesnakes or mountain lions had moved in during the night. 

The boy carefully peered down into the dark abyss of the canyon. The warm orange light from the campfire had died down but still bathed the red rock walls enough to reveal the three sleeping cowboys. The sentry, now fast asleep like his friends, sat on top of a large rock promontory that overlooked the horse corral, his hat tipped down over his eyes and a carbine laid across his lap. 

Grissom pointed where he wanted the boy positioned to cover the cowboys while he moved to a place where he could cover the sentry. Removing one of his boots to use as a rifle rest, Grissom smiled as the boy followed suit. Scanning with his carbine the boy noticed movement down below. 

It was Parsons. He wore no shoes or hat and had his face and body completely smeared black with axle grease. His bow was slung low across his back with a quiver full of arrows, and a large bowie-knife strapped to his leg. Both men watched the indian slip through the mouth of the canyon, using the shadows of the tall rocks along the flanks.  

Parsons closed the distance between him and the lookout and stopped, kneeling behind a set of large rocks and pinion scrub. He took the bow from his back and notched an arrow. As the boy’s eyes were trying to focus in the low light, the small cane arrow had already flown, its flight short and straight with the only sound being a sickly wet slap as the arrow found its mark right above the sentry’s adam’s apple.

 The man dropped the carbine and put both hands to his throat as if he were choking at supper, his eyes wide and frantic, searching for some kind of reprieve from the pain. Blood sprayed from the wound like a fountain, covering the brown earth and rock like some ancient mayan sacrifice.

The indian quickly closed in from behind on the man’s position, taking control of his convulsing body and bringing him down to the ground behind the large rock. 

A few moments later Parson’s appeared like a ghoulish specter, slowly lurking toward the campsite. His knife, covered in blood, looked black against the backdrop of the eggshell moonlight. 

“Cock your rifle boy.” Grissom whispered as the pair both drew a bead on the three men below. 

Parsons stopped behind a boulder and whistled, stirring one of the cowboys awake. Before the poor soul could get the sleep out of his eyes an arrow pierced his right eyeball with a swoosh. The boy jumped as Grissom shot the second cowboy through the chest as he was bringing his pistol from underneath the blanket. With that Parsons let out a war yelp and charged the remaining cowboy with knife in hand. The young cowboy panicked as he tried to get the gun out of the holster laying beside him, but it was too late. Parsons was already on top of him. 

The cowboy managed to let out one blood curdling scream, before Parsons delivered the death-blow, sinking the knife deep into the boy’s heart. Parsons then stood and raised his bloody knife to the night sky, his profile illuminated by the campfire, he let out a guttural yelp that originated from a place deep within his soul, a place of pain and loneliness. 

This was revenge. A deep seeded hate that boiled out like a wildfire consuming the countryside. It was a familiar sound the boy had heard many times from war parties of neighboring clans. The boy had to restrain himself from joining in, but this was not his hunt. This was not his kill. That day still awaited him.

Parsons went around and collected scalps from each of his victims, the four bloody pieces of matted hair and skin the only reminder of these cowboys’ short and meager existence in this brutal place. Grissom and the boy made their way back down to the arroyo where Spoon sat asleep in his saddle, half drunk, and Diaz sat smoking a cigar, watching the Dawn begin to break and the purplish light spread over the canyon like a familiar blanket. 

“We heard Parsons hoop and holler so I guess he got his scalps?” Diaz asked the boy. 

The boy nodded and Diaz grinned.

“Alright then, let’s go get them horses!” Diaz remarked with his toothless grin. 

When they arrived Parsons had already looted all the bodies, and took one of the dead cowboys’ mounts, a fine, tall black stud for his own. 

Spoon noticed the new carbine Parsons was now cradling like a newborn babe in his arms. 

“What’s that you got there, Parsons? A new repeater? What’s that writing’ on the side of it there?”

 Parsons held up the gun with bloody hands, not really sure what Spoon was talking about. 

“Looks like an inscription of some sort. ‘J.T.’, must have been the poor bastards initials.”

 Parsons nodded indifferently and slid the carbine back in the saddle scabbard. By the time they drove the herd to the far side of montana del lobo the boy and his mount were exhausted. Tick had made some much-needed repairs to the horse corral and was waiting for them when they arrived, waving his hat and yelling at them through the gate. 

That night everybody got drunk and celebrated. Parsons rode over to Valle Azul and traded a horse for food and a case of mescal. Diaz, always in fine form when loaded, hooped and hollered, firing off his revolver wildly.

Grissom broke out a fiddle and started sawing a lively tune while Tick, full of mescal, hopped on one leg like some kind of carnival act, flailing around to the music in such a wild display of tomfoolery that he finally collapsed on the ground face first in a drunken heap. 

Spoon and the boy sat by the fire, watching Parsons clean and examine the new carbine he had taken off the murdered cowboy.

“Well Parsons you feel better now you killed them boys that killed your family?” Spoon asked. Parsons stopped polishing the rifle and looked at Spoon through the crackling embers of the fire. 

There was complete silence between them. After a while Parsons went back to polishing the rifle. 

“Damn indians, you can never figure em’.” Spoon commented as he spit into the fire.

 After a moment he got up and stumbled to his tent where almost immediately the lantern went dark and snoring could be heard.

 

 

II.

 

The next morning the boy awoke to a gunmetal grey dawn and the smell of frying bacon and coffee. 

Grissom’s coarse voice soon broke the morning peace.

“Come on and get yourself some of this boy, we got a long day ahead of us.” 

As the boy slowly made his way to the fire Spoon appeared out of his tent, looking as if he had been bushwhacked by bandits and squinting as if the morning light were a pack of unwelcome solicitors banging on the front door of his brain. 

He stumbled out to the jakes and disappeared there for a considerable amount of time. Soon Diaz appeared, looking disheveled but somewhat jolly. 

“Change of plans. Me, Spoon and Tick will take thirty head to the trader. I want the boy, Parsons and Grissom to take the remaining head up to that bastard Colonel Parker to trade for guns and ammunition.”

 Grissom cursed under his breath and headed for the corral saying something about being a wet-nurse to savages. 

By the time the boy was saddled up and ready to ride, Parsons and Grissom were already leading the string of ponies out of camp. The boy trailed two mules to haul their return load of guns.

The triplet of riders and beast rode due east with a sketch of pale blue mountains floating ahead of them and a set of small scribbled valleys in between twisting like a snake with no pattern or design. 

They camped in a small stand of cottonwoods near a trickling creek at sundown. Early the next morning they started off on the final leg where narrow winding valleys and red stone cliffs gave way to long stretches of white soda flats. 

The boy thought they might never see water again but Parsons managed to find a small spring where they all drank like fishes and the horses drank so much they laid down in a small stand of pinon and napped for a while. 

They rode the rest of the day across the flats until sunset when they finally pulled into a silver mining camp that set at the base of some low pockmarked foothills covered with cholla and palo verde called El lugar de las águilas (The Place of the Eagles).

Grissom led the horses down a crowded street of miners and drovers to a corral that sat at the back of a two-story clapboard building marked ‘oficina and cantina.’ Parsons dismounted and nodded for the boy to do the same. The boy felt eyes from all directions studying them. 

As they entered through the saloon doors, the sweet stench of whiskey and sweat hit them like a sharp slap while the din of drunken men’s voices drowned out all reason. 

Grissom made his way to the bar, navigating around crowded tables of miners playing poker while consumptive whores loitered like buzzards. Above the bar a stuffed mountain lion sat watching the pitiful proceedings, indifferent to the carnival scene below him. 

“Whatta you have?” The bartender asked. 

He was a large white man, at least six feet, with an oxblood-colored boulder hat and arms like pine knots. 

“Three rye” Grissom responded. 

The bartender wiped his brow with a rag and poured out one drink. 

“You can stay but the two savages have to go, Colonels orders.” Grissom paused, taking stock of the command.

Grissom looked at the bartender with contempt and then drained his whiskey in one go. Turning to Parsons he nodded for the door. Parsons grabbed the boy by the arm and led him outside.

Grissom then nodded for another drink. 

“Need to see the Boss, got horses to trade.” The bartender again wiped his face and brow as he poured the drink. 

“Upstairs, last door on right.” Grissom downed his drink and laid a crisp five dollar bill on the bar and set the glass on top of it. 

As Grissom topped the stairs, a thin sickly and scantily clad mexican whore was leaning on the railing.

“Ola cowboy.” Grissom ignored the woman and kept walking. 

The small corridor reeked of cigar smoke, kerosene and sex. At the end of the hall a bald squat man with a long black handlebar mustache named Timmons sat cradling a double barrel ten gauge. Grissom nodded to the man.

“Here to see the Colonel?” Timmons asked plainly. 

“Yeah, got horses to trade.” Grissom replied. 

“Surrender your weapons.” 

 Grissom handed him his Colt. The man stuck the pistol in his waistband and rapped on the door. 

“Enter!” a deep voice called out from the other side.

Timmons opened the door and nodded for Grissom to enter. 

Colonel William Frances Parker, United States Army retired, sat behind a large custom rosewood desk with his left leg feet propped up smoking a large cuban torpedo cigar. Parker was in his late-forties, with reddish blonde hair cut short and combed over and a neatly trimmed mustache. His steel blue-grey eyes seemed to look beyond the measure of men, seeking their unspoken agendas.

 It was said he had fought with Crook in the Apache wars and actually shook Geronimo’s hand at his surrender. The room was freshly painted and smelled of cedar and sandalwood. A large bookcase containing several thick volumes on the History of the Roman Empire and Roman military tactics sat in a corner with several framed military commendations and awards populating the wall around it. 

Grissom’s eyes were drawn to a custom-made cedar gun cabinet with an etched glass door that took up one wall entirely. It contained a Krag ’92, a ’95 Winchester and a ’97 Winchester Pump twelve-gauge.  

A large painting of a four masted Man-of-War engaged in close quarter cannon battle with a brass name plate “The Great Nile Victory, 1798” hung behind his desk.  

Grissom also noticed the Colt 1900 Pistol which lay underneath a two week old newspaper from St. Louis.

“Sgt. Grissom! Well I’ll be damned!” Parker’s feet quickly came down on the floor with a thud as he stood, limping on his left leg as he came around the desk.

“I heard you were killed in a skirmish near Juarez last year!” Parker extended his hand and Grissom shook it with a soldier’s firmness. 

“Yes sir, I heard that one too, but here I am, alive and well!” The Colonel let out a hearty laugh and slapped Grissom on the back. 

“So you are Sergeant! So you are! Remind me again, when did you get out of the Army?” The Colonel asked, limping his way back around to his chair behind the desk. 

“Around two years ago sir. Was at Fort Duncan the majority of my tour.” Parker struck two matches and re-stoked his cigar while studying Grissom closely through the blue smoke. 

“Fort Duncan, nothing short of the devil’s asshole!” Parker shook his head and closed his eyes, as if trying to dissuade the memories from lodging in his brain.

“Have a seat Grissom.” Parker motioned his hand toward a chair.

 He then opened a desk drawer and removed two glasses and a bottle of single malt scotch whiskey. He poured a finger in each glass.

 “To your health sir!” Parker said as he downed the drink. Grissom did the same and smiled. 

“That’s fine whiskey Colonel!” The Colonel poured each man another. 

“So Colonel is it true what I heard about you? That you killed ten Comanche in a skirmish in ’96 up at Fort Stockton before being wounded in the leg?” 

The Colonel’s face grew dim. 

“Yes Grissom it’s true. But the part of the tale they leave out is how we lost eight good soldiers that day. Those damn Comanches were buzzing around like flies on a carcass.”

 The Colonels voice drifted off, his grey eyes staring off into a place beyond the horizon.

“So Grissom, what brings you to my fine camp?”

“Horses, Colonel. I have ten good ponies I would like to trade for rifles and ammunition.”

“Horses? How many head?” 

The colonel’s eyes studied Grissom now as he took a long drink. 

“Ten Head, all good stock.”

“I see. I don’t suppose you have a bill of sale for them do you?” The Colonel gave a sly smile and Grissom shook his head to the implied notion.

He knew the Colonel had set up shop here three years ago, at first trying to buy out some very lucrative mining claims and then when that failed, burning out the miners and their families and hijacking their claims with his hired army of ex-saddle tramps and mercenaries. 

He had also used his shady connections in the Army Ordnance Supply chain to find out railway delivery schedules so he could conveniently rob Federal weapon supply and payroll trains and blame it on Mexican bandits or Apache’s.

“Who are you running with now Grissom? Are you still with Diaz and his band of cut-throats? Why you have not taken my offer to hire on with me is beyond everything! I will be running all the rackets in this province soon Grissom, and before long, all of Northern Mexico!”

 The Colonel looked at Grissom solemnly, waiting for a response. Grissom just smiled. 

“I kinda like my freedom Colonel, after a decade of Army life, not having to answer to somebody is nice for a change.”

The Colonel laughed. 

“Answer!? Hell boy, we all gotta answer one way or another! Now Let’s go take a look at that stock and see what we can work out.”

 The Colonel finished his drink, stuck the Colt in the army issue flap holster and made his way to the door. The guard went before him downstairs and cleared out the drunks and dregs lying in the way.

The saloon quieted as the Colonel made his way through, each man eyeing him with a sense of both fear and reverence.

Parsons and the Boy were sitting outside the saloon on a bench sharing a piece of venison jerky when the group came out. 

As they passed, the boy’s eyes met the Colonels and his blood ran cold. Those same eyes belonged to the man who had cut his face two years ago! 

The boy felt heat from the top of his head down into the soles of his feet. It was like liquid fire, burning and cauterizing his insides. The boy feared he would burst from the hate growing inside of him! 

So many thoughts raced through his young mind. He could kill the son of a bitch right here. No, there were too many guards around, too many witnesses. But hell, maybe he wanted a lot of witnesses so these folks would know what a bastard he was!

 Best to stay calm. The boy steadied himself and took a breath. As the Colonel passed the two indians, he eyed Parsons wearily.

“These two indians are with me Colonel.” Grissom motioned for Parsons and the boy to stand up. 

The Colonel stopped and inspected the two indians with a face of scorn. 

“How old is this kid?” The Colonel asked Grissom. 

“Not sure Colonel, I think around thirteen. We found him wandering in the desert a year or so back. Said his family got killed by Texas bandits.”

The Colonel turned his head to the street and spat and then turned and stared at the boy’s face. 

“Murdered huh? How awful! Lot of bandits and cut-throats here about doing all kinds of evil”

As he was about to walk off, the gleam of the Winchester Parsons cradled in the crook of his arm caught the Colonels eye. 

“Nice Winchester you got there indian, may I?”

 Parsons looked at Grissom who quickly nodded his head for him to comply with the Colonels request. 

As the Colonel turned the rifle over in his hands, the inscription showed in the bright sunlight.

 “J.T. is that your initials indian?” the Colonel asked, those grey eyes burning a hole through Parsons now.

 Parsons looked away and shook his head no. 

“Nonetheless, it’s a very nice rifle, can I buy it from you? say fifty dollars American?”

 Grissom’s mouth dropped open about the same time as Parsons. Before he could think about it, Parsons accepted the offer.

“Excellent!” the Colonel replied, grinning from ear to ear, his eyes quickly shooting Timmons a secretive glance. 

“Timmons, pay the man!” Timmons promptly reached into his pocket and counted out five ten-dollar bills to Parsons and took the rifle. 

“OK Gentleman now show me these horses!” the Colonel’s voice boomed as he started toward the corral.

Parsons, Grissom and the boy started toward the corral with Parsons examining his new fistful of greenbacks and the Colonel following close behind. Timmons then without missing a beat, promptly rapped the boy upside the head with the butt of the Winchester, sending him to the ground with a thud.

 In the same moment as Grissom was turning to see about the commotion, the Colonel presented his Colt Automatic from his holster, and shot Parsons in the back of the head, the explosion of the gunshot piercing the evening stillness.

The bullet exited right above Parson’s right eye, sending a mottled combination of white and grey matter mingled with blood spewing out into a wide luminous cone, most of it ending up in Grissom’s face and eyes.

Parsons went limp and dropped like his backbone had been snatched out. 

Grissom went for his revolver like a man groping in the dark for a life line but remembered in a hurried flash that he had been disarmed earlier by Timmons.

“God-dammit Colonel! What have you done!” Grissom yelled. 

As Grissom wiped the last of what remained of Parson’s head from his eyes, he realized at least five rifles were drawn down on him. 

The boy lay knocked out cold on the ground, the back of his head bleeding with Timmons standing over him gloating. 

“Colonel! What the hell is this about!” Grissoms face was red now, spittle flying with every word. 

“What this is about Sgt. Grissom is a cold-blooded bushwhack! This carbine belonged to one of my best men, James Tobin or “J.T.” as it is inscribed right here on his gun!”

 The Colonel snatched the rifle from Timmons hands and held it up like evidence in a courtroom. With that the Colonel walked over to Parsons body as it lay crumpled on the ground, reached down and removed the fifty dollars from his pocket. 

“That black stud right there that the indian rode in on was also J.T.’s. Now I don’t have anything against stealing horses, hell I steal horses everyday, but this was more than stealing horses Grissom. You and your band of cut throats murdered and scalped four of my men for forty-three head of stolen mexican mustangs! I should just shoot you like I did this damn indian, but you served your country Grissom and deserve to be hung like a white man I suppose. Go fetch that lazy drunk-ass sheriff and tell him to come put these two in the jail for the night.”

 The Colonel spit in the road and stuck the Colt back into its holster.

“What about the boy?” Grissom asked. 

“He did not take part in it, let him go!”

 The Colonel looked down at the boy on the ground and spat.

“No I can’t do that Grissom. This boy belongs to a clan we tried to kill off a while back. You see that scar on that little bastard’s face?”

The Colonel pointed to the boy’s face.

 I gave that little red bastard that scar and warned him and his family not to stick around this country! 

“But did they listen? Hell no! The bastards were sitting on some of the best prime mining dirt in this territory and would not move! We tried everything but the savages refused. The next morning we went back and killed everybody there but I guess this little son of a bitch got lucky. No, the boy hangs with you tomorrow at Noon. I will send a priest over in the morning if you want to get square with the Almighty, although with the scum you’ve been runnin’ with, I doubt it will help.”

The Colonel shook his head in disgust and then walked off toward the saloon.

Directly a drunk mexican wearing a sweat stained floppy brimmed hat and a thin hammered piece of tin fashioned to resemble a lawman’s badge came and collected Grissom and the boy. The boy was still groggy from being knocked over the head and had a deep gash in his scalp which was still bleeding. 

The mexican prodded the pair with a double barrel ten gauge across the street to a makeshift jail in an old run down clapboard  building that had once been a freight house. The “cell”  was nothing more than an oversized freight cage that smelled of stale piss and rat turds.

Grissom laid the boy down on the small bed and covered him with a threadbare blanket. 

“That bastard Colonel killed my family.” The boy’s words were groggy but still filled with anger. 

“Yeah kid I know, he has killed a lot of families around here.” Grissom took off the boy’s boots, then removed his own and jumped up to the top bunk and laid down.

“We gonna hang tomorrow?” The boy’s question hung like heavy grey smoke in the room. 

“Yeah kid, we are.” Grissom answered, trying to find better words that might comfort him but giving up.

“I will try to talk to the Colonel again tomorrow, see if he will see reason and let you walk.” Grissom closed his eyes and the last thing he heard before drifting off was the boy quietly chanting an apache death song.

 

III.

 

The next morning the sunlight spilled through the small narrow window in the cell and Grissom was awoken by the clanging of  keys as the hungover sheriff struggled to open the cell door. 

The boy swung his feet down to the floor and started putting on his boots. 

“The Colonel wants to talk to the boy.”

 The mexican swung the ten-gauge around on Grissom as he waited on the boy to get to his feet. 

“You stay put pendejo.” The sheriff eyed Grissom as the boy limped out of the cell. 

The sheriff placed a pair of handcuffs  on the boy and led him outside, prodding him with the ten-gauge all the while. The boy noticed a wagon load of lumber and several men building a gallows in an empty lot across from the jail. The sound of hammers and hand saws contributed to the usual morning din of a mining camp waking up. 

As The boy shuffled across the street toward the saloon, several miners loitered outside, waiting on the mine wagon. Some were still drunk from the night before, having never gone to bed, their eyes looking like bloodshot piss holes. 

The group quieted as the boy approached, some of them quickly looking down while others stared intently as the mexican prodded the boy forward through the doors and up the stairs to the Colonel. Timmons stood as the boy came to the top of the stairs.

 The sheriff grunted and handed Timmons the handcuff keys and retreated back downstairs to the bar and his waiting bottle. 

Timmons grabbed the boy by the shirt, knocked on the Colonels door and opened it. 

The Colonel was busy shaving in a gleaming white porcelain basin. As Timmons seated the boy, the Colonel watched in the mirror. 

“Leave the key with me Timmons.” Timmons walked over and placed the key on the desk. 

As Timmons left the room, the boy’s gaze shifted to the gun cabinet. Rifles with ammunition. No lock with a glass front door. How Silly these white men are! The boy thought to himself. 

The boy then noticed the Colt pistol laying on the desk, The same pistol that had killed Parsons and most likely the same one that had been used to kill his father and uncle too. 

“You are thinking If I could only get to those guns, I could kill that son of a bitch, aren’t you boy? I don’t blame you. Hell, I would be thinking the same thing!”

 The Colonel paused talking as he carefully trimmed below his lip with the straight razor while outside the large window on the street several teamsters could be heard loading a freight wagon.

The boy’s gaze stayed on the Colonel, the hatred pouring out of him in fluid waves of heat. He imagined breaking free of the chains and taking the straight razor from him and in a flash opening up his throat. The painting of the Nile receiving a fresh splash of crimson as the Colonel frantically died on the floor like the diseased pig that he was. 

The sound of splashing water brought the boy back to reality. The Colonel washed his face and as he dried off with a towel walked over to the window to gaze at the already bustling town below. 

“This place was a wide spot in the road when I got here. Nothing but a couple of run-down shacks and some whores. Now look at it! Because of me hundreds of men have jobs. Their families have food, clothing, housing; a future!”

The Colonel shifted his hard  gaze to the boy.

“I warned you and your family to stop stealing from me and move on, but they didn’t listen. So I cleared them out and made room for progress!”

The boy’s face grew red. His heartbeat racing like a rabbit. 

“You gave us no choice! For years my family hunted these lands and then you come along and in a day say it is all yours! You murdered my pregnant mother and put my unborn sister on a roasting spit you sick bastard!”

 The Colonel’s face changed expression as the boy’s comment seemed to truly shock him. Anger was replaced with melancholy. 

“I had no idea they did such a terrible heartless thing!” The boy sensed the Colonel was sincere in his sentiment.

The boy’s anger began to simmer down, his heartbeat slowed and his jaw muscles relaxed. The Colonel smiled and came in close as if to shake hands and offer an apology and then suddenly in a blur, he delivered a powerful right hook into the boy’s jaw.

The boy was knocked backwards out of his chair while several teeth scattered across the floor in a bloody mix of spittle. 

“You goddamn savage! I am gonna put you all on roasting spits before all of this is finished!” The Colonel yelled at the tops of his lungs.

 The boy lay dazed on the floor, the Colonel’s words a distant echo as if he was underwater. 

“Damn your soul to hell you worthless son of a whore!” The Colonel kicked the boy in the ribs, knocking the air out of him in a whoosh. 

The boy groaned and tried to roll away like a wounded animal, searching for a reprieve from the pain. Before the Colonel could kick him again suddenly Timmons bust through the door,  an expression of fear and excitement all across his face at once. 

“Colonel we got visitors!” Timmons was so excited he stuttered and stumbled over his words like a retarded child.

“Looks like half a dozen armed men led by a mexican bandit!” 

The Colonel regained his composure and calmly walked over to the window to inspect the street.

 “Well, the Lord is certainly being gracious to me today! Instead of hanging two pieces of thieving shit, I get to hang the whole damn gang! That’s Diaz and six of his cut-throats. Looks like they came looking for this boy and Grissom. Probably thought you two assholes stole the weapons and ammunition!”

The Colonel laughed heartily, his face turning red as he slapped his desk in exclamation. 

“No honor among thieves, aye boy? Timmons round-up the boys, I will try to get all these bastards in the saloon so we can take them all in one go!”

 Timmons nodded his head and spun around and headed out the door. 

“You just lay there and bleed you little bastard, I will be back to finish you off right and proper when I am done with Diaz.”

The Colonel eyed the boy on the ground as he stuck the Colt in his waistband and retrieved a Winchester shotgun from the gun cabinet, loading up the tube and sticking extra shells in his pockets.

 The saloon and the streets were already cleared by the time the Colonel walked outside with Timmons and four other men. Diaz and Spoon were waiting patiently still on their horses.

“Well, isn’t this a pleasant surprise!” The Colonels grinned as he came out of the saloon doors, the Colt stuck in his waistband and the Winchester Scattergun in his right hand.

Timmons stayed at the Colonels side as the four other men fanned out evenly to the left and right, each of them armed with a rifle. Diaz seemed to ignore the Colonel and the men. 

His gaze focused on an upright pine coffin sitting on the saloon’s porch. In it Parson’s decomposing body stared back, half of his head missing, one eye staring lazily upwards at the sky as his black matted hair lay plastered against his pallid skin caked with blood. 

Around his neck they had hung a wooden sign with the words “Murderer and Horse Thief” in big white letters.

 Seeing Diaz’ state of fury, Spoon spoke up. 

“We hear you got two of our people Colonel, we came to get em’ back.”

 The Colonel laughed as he brought the Scattergun around to bear on Diaz and Spoon. Reacting, Spoon drew the Schofield revolver that lay in his saddle holster and before he could cock the hammer the Colonel fired, the big shotgun roaring to life like a sleeping dragon, the buckshot tearing horse and rider apart like paper being ripped asunder by a strong breeze. 

Spoon was knocked clean out of his saddle, landing three feet behind where his horse had formerly stood, his chest opened like a bloody cavern, pieces of rib bone littered the dusty street. Spoon’s horse lay terribly wounded, crying in pain and trying to get it’s front feet under her The Colonel pulled his pistol and mercifully shot the mare through the head. 

During the melee Diaz had been bucked off his horse and had got to his feet, at least a dozen guns pulled down on him.

“Don’t twitch a fuckin’ finger you worthless piece of shit or you will end up exactly like your friend over there.”

 The Colonel’s voice was angry, but dead calm and focused. 

“Timmons, go on over there and get his gun belt and make sure he ain’t got no hideout guns or knives, you know how fuckin’ mexicans are.”

 Timmons walked over, holstering his gun and patting Diaz down. After finding a small knife in his boot, Timmons unbuckled his gun belt and threw it all on the saloon porch. Diaz stood there smiling. 

“You want my boots too Colonel? They are nice ones, belonged to one of your cowboys I believe!”

 The Colonel’s brow furrowed at the jibe.

“I am gonna hang you Diaz. You and your buddy Grissom down there in the jail are gonna hang together and twist in the wind momentarily.” 

The Colonel motioned for the surrounding men to take Diaz and tie his hands and feet. As the men were taking the rope to tie him, suddenly one of the men’s heads exploded like a ripe cantaloupe hitting rock, the rifle shot ringing out from above them. 

The boy had managed to free himself from his handcuffs and had now taken up a firing position in the Colonel office with a Krag Rifle. At this Diaz ran and dove into a small alleyway beside the saloon. Suddenly it sounded as if the whole town exploded in gunfire at once. Some men fired wildly at Diaz while others fired at the office windows above. 

About this time, more shots rang out from down the street at the jail. The Colonel and his men had not accounted for all of Diaz’s men before the shooting started. Half a dozen of them had taken up positions near the jail and had bushwhacked the drunk sheriff and freed Grissom, now Grissom along with six mexican bandits including the black creole Tick, all armed with Repeaters and bolt-action rifles, were moving on the saloon.

 The Colonel seeing this yelled for Timmons and retreated back into the saloon. 

“You go kill Diaz, he’s out back there somewhere unarmed!” The Colonel yelled at Timmons. 

“I’ll go kill this damn apache kid and then we can take care of Grissom and the rest of those cut throats!”

Timmons nodded and headed for the back door of the saloon. Suddenly it busted open and Diaz came through blasting with a revolver. The first shot caught Timmons in the neck, and the second caught him above the right eye, sending his brain pan all over the brand new pianola the Colonel had just had delivered from St. Louis.

“Fucking Bastard!” The Colonel screamed in fear as much as anger. He let loose with the shotgun on Diaz from ten feet away, the top half of Diaz virtually disappeared in a spray of pink mist and gore, with the bottom half of his body intact and neatly folded up on the floor like an accordion.

Breathing hard, the Colonel reloaded and began to climb the stairs to finish the kid. Suddenly two of his men busted through the saloon doors, one of them gut shot and the other shot in the arm. 

“Where the hell are the rest of the men?” The Colonel yelled. 

“Dead!” One of the men blurted out as he made his way to the window with his revolver and began firing wildly.

“God damn all you!” The Colonel yelled as he charged upstairs.

 As he was about to kick down the door suddenly several shots rang out through the cedar. Splinters flying wildly into his face. The first shot hit the Colonel low in the gut and the second hit him in the right arm, spinning him to the floor. 

“You little son of a bitch!” The Colonel cried out. Dropping the shotgun he tried to pull his Colt in his waistband, but his arm would not work. Downstairs shots rang out as the Mexicans closed in on the two defenders in the saloon. 

The Colonel watched as Grissom and a black creole man busted through the saloon doors and cut his men down at close range with revolvers. About that time the Colonel’s office door swung open and the Indian boy walked out, holding a Krag Rifle. 

The boy’s eyes burned like two hot coals. The Colonel lay there, blood pooling on the floor from his wounds. Grissom, Tick and three of the Mexicans had found the good whiskey and poured themselves a drink as they watched the show unfold upstairs.

“Go Ahead Boy, Here I am! Get your Revenge!” The Colonel yelled wildly, spit and blood flying from his mouth. 

The Boy calmly walked up to the Colonel, dropped the rifle and reached down and picked up the Colonel’s Colt. A look of disgust filled the Colonel’s face as he watched him.

 “You worthless Savage!” The Colonel yelled.

 “I Fuckin’ Despi—” before he could finish his sentence the boy fired three rapid shots into the Colonel’s head, sending brain and bone flying. The boy looked at the body a while before finally spitting on him.

 The boy then calmly stuck the Colt in his waistband and made his way downstairs and out the saloon doors. Directly Grissom came out. 

“The boys cleaned out the freight office.” Grissom said looking at the boy. The boy never blinked, just kept looking ahead like into a dream only he could see.

 “We got around a thousand dollars far as I can tell in cash money plus rifles, ammunition and fresh horses and mules.” Grissom continued looking at the boy, hoping for a response. 

Directly, the boy reached into his shirt and pulled out two small sacks. 

“You can add this to the total. Found it under the floorboards in his office.”

Grissom took the sack from the boy and looked inside. His eyes widened as he poured out chunks of pure silver into his hand, some of them as large as a baby’s fist.

“We are heading to Texas if you want to come along.” Grissom asked, his eyes still wide from the silver. The boy  walked out into the street and looked up into the blue sky, squinting at the bright sun. 

There in the sky, the boy saw a huge river, a river as large and swift as the Colorado.

Immediately the boy felt a familiarity about this place and then he realized it was the same river from his dream. As he watched the water roar past he quickly realized he was not alone, his entire family was there, including a small girl he had never met before.

“Who is this?” the boy asked his father, pointing to the small girl by his mother’s side. His father smiled and placed his hand on the child’s head.

“This is your sister, Princess Margarete.” His father replied, smiling.

The boy’s heart swelled and a happiness he had not felt in such a long time washed over him like a summer rainstorm. 

Before the boy could say anymore, his family turned and walked away into a sweet, glowing light that climbed upwards into the sky. As the boy dried the tears from his face, he realized something that made his heart glow even more; This time him and his family were not separated by the river, they were all together! The boy laughed to himself and shook his head, he had never felt so happy, alive and content as he did that day.

The Mexicans soon came out of the saloon, carrying with them whatever was not nailed down: crates of whiskey bottles, blankets, pictures, lamps and rifles.

 By now, some of the miners and teamsters were making their way back into town from their hiding places in the mines and hills, all of them treading carefully, surveying the dead in the street. 

“You coming along kid?” Grissom asked as he began walking toward the horses with the Mexicans.

The boy gave Grissom a long look, tears filling his eyes from the vision. Wiping the tears away, the boy smiled and said aloud:

“Let’s go to Texas!” 

 

The End.