Dead in the West

  Horses, most likely.

  Rhine trudged toward home, a house at the end of the street just behind the barber shop.

  He was hungry as a fresh-woke bear. He hoped that woman had something on the table.

  He was too tired to slap her around tonight.

  Shortly after Rhine made his way into his house full of the smell of beans and cornbread, the livery doors trembled ever so slightly. The padlock fell off the door without unlocking, thumped in the dust. The doors blew open with a gust of ice-cold wind, and the wind tumbled down the street.

  The livery doors closed. The padlock jumped into place, and all was as it had been.

  Almost.

  II

  The dog was a night hunter. Belonged to no one. Padded its way through the darkness, down the streets of the town, ever watching, ever alert.

  Sometimes people shot at it, because the dog was known to be vicious, its one purpose in life was to scavenge, to dig in garbage, and attack small livestock.

  One year it had wiped out the entire population of old man Mather's rabbit hutches and killed his prize boar hog—no easy feat.

  It had bitten a young boy who had tried to hit it with a stick, and chased every dog in town away with their tails between their legs. For a year now, it had dodged bullets, rocks, and oaths. It was smart. It was a survivor.

  During the day, the dog laid low. Hit town about sundown, when most people were about their suppers, and the saloons hadn't had time to crank up good. It was a good time to scavenge. And tonight, the dog was working its favorite place. The alley behind Molly McGuire's Cafe. There was generally plenty of tasty garbage there, except on Fridays when Uncle Bains brought his wagon around and hauled it all off.

  But tonight was a good night. He could smell chili and hard biscuits and soggy flapjacks.

  The dog climbed up on a wooden trash box and pushed it over. It made a loud thud and its contents puked into the alley. The dog did not rush to eat, though its mouth was watering. It watched the back of the cafe, turned to look down both ends of the alley. No one was coming.

  The dog ducked its head into the box, used its teeth and forepaws to move paper and tins aside so it could get to the good stuff. First off, the dog found a flapjack with syrup and a spot of chili on it, and wolfed that down. Soon the dog was lost in his appreciation of what had been left for him, and by the time the dog knew something was amiss—it was too late.

  Wasn't just the smell that alerted the him. Something else, a sixth sense. The dog pulled its head out of the box for a look.

  He raised his hackles and his loose mouth folded back to reveal long, yellow, foam-flecked fangs. A low growl came from his throat.

  A shape moved in the shadows.

  The dog didn't like this at all. He had not felt what he was feeling now since he was a pup.

  Fear.

  But fear was a thing to overcome. The dog was a survivor. He was big and he was strong.

  Teeth snapping, the dog leaped for the shape.

  The dog yelped once before dying.

  III

  Nate Foster was Mud Creek's town drunk, and he was the neatest drunk in creation. He wore a black Prince Albert coat (hundred degree weather or not), striped, stovepipe trousers, and a crisp derby hat to perfection.

  He was already six bottles of beer and two bottles of whisky ahead of every other drunk in town. That was because he had a two-hour start on most of them, and he could easily afford it. Unlike the other drunks, Nate Foster—king of Mud Creek's drunks—was also the town banker, and he made a rather good salary at it.

  Tonight, Nate was particularly rolled up and pulled tight, feeling no pain. He had gotten started earlier than usual, and the whisky had been potent.

  Now that he was well lubricated, he was about his nightly stroll (the school mistress, Bessie Jackson, called it his nightly wobble) toward Molly McGuire's where he would order a steak and hash browns, hold the gravy but plenty of biscuits. Then he'd be ready to tie on a real drunk.

  He was nearly to the cafe when he felt the urge to urinate.

  Piss first. Eat later.

  Moving at a slightly faster wobble, Nate slid down a narrow alley that led to the larger one behind Molly's. No sooner had he made the alley, unbuttoning his pants as he went, than he tripped over something and went down hard, pissing all over himself.

  "Goddamn," he muttered, and pushed up on his elbows. A gorge of beer and whisky almost forced its way up.

  Nate rolled over on his right side to see what he had tripped over. There was a dark shape at his feet.

  He reached into his pocket, produced a match, and with great deliberation, and after many tries, struck it on his thumbnail.

  He bent to place the match closer to the heap. It was a dog. That big dog that had troubled the town so much. And God almighty, its throat was ripped out.

  Nate didn't feel so drunk anymore. He stood quickly, and as he did, he had the terrible sensation that someone, or something, was watching him.

  He licked his lips and turned, slowly.

  Nothing.

  Just the alley wearing its shadows and a thin light like a straight razor's edge sliding out from beneath the back door of Molly McGuire's.

  But the sensation did not go away.

  Nate wasn't so curious he wanted to stay in the alley and find out what it was. He turned to head out the way he had entered.

  And ran right smack dab into a big man's chest. Nate looked up. The face of the man was shielded by a great, flat-brimmed, black hat. It looked like... but it couldn't be....

  The man bent closer, and now Nate could see the Indian's face, not clearly, but enough to know who it was.

  "You," Nate said.

  "Howdy," said the big man.

  Nate tried to scream, but instead of a scream, he got a spout of beer and whisky puke that splattered on the chest of the big Indian.

  "Not nice," the Indian said. "Not nice at all."

  The Indian's hands shot out and clutched Nate's Prince Albert. He pulled Nate to him, and bent his face down close to Nate's and smiled.

  IV

  Ten miles outside of Mud Creek, in the forest at the edge of the stage-line trail, a long, slender white hand pushed up through the soft forest soil.

  Nearby, other hands pushed up through the dirt.

  After a moment, Millie Johnson had the soil worked away from her face—what was left of it. She had both hands free and was scraping the thin layer of dirt from her body.

  Bill Nolan had already managed.

  He sat bolt upright like a jackknife springing open. A wad of dirt slipped out of his empty eye socket. Nolan reached up absently and pulled his eye patch back into place over the hole.

  Next to him the dirt quivered like a ground hog working, and up popped the gambler.

  Nolan, with his broken right hand, slapped out at the gambler, striking him in the face.

  The gambler, whose neck hung at an awkward angle because there was a plug out of it big as a fist, growled.

  Nearby, Lulu came out of the ground. Her dress was ripped from bodice to groin. One of her breasts was missing. It looked to have been ripped, or gnawed off. She didn't mind.

  She stood up.

  Jake popped up, dirt raining off of him. And clinging to his chest was the little girl, Mignon. She slipped off and fell to the ground like a bloated tick. She lay there on her stomach for a moment. The back of her dress was ripped open and so was her back. Her spine was visible.

  All of them stumbled out to the edge of the trail and began to walk.

  Toward Mud Creek.

  V

  Sheriff Matt Cage sat at his desk drinking coffee.

  The door opened and Caleb came in.

  "Sit down, you old fart face," Matt said.

  "Don't mind if I do.... If you got something besides that cat piss to drink."

  Matt smiled, opened a desk drawer, and produced two shot glasses with one hand, and with the other he pulled out a bottle of redeye.
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  Caleb sat down on the opposite side of the desk. "Now you're talking," he said.

  Matt started to pour the whisky. He filled one shot glass, and as the first splash went into the second, he hesitated. There was a fly in the bottom.

  "I see it, and don't let it stop you," Caleb said.

  Caleb reached out, put his hand over Mart's, and poured the shot glass full. He took the glass and sipped. Matt frowned.

  "When I lived with the Indians," Caleb said, "may they all die off terribly and may God's people take their places— when a fly lit in the stew that was just extry meat. You just stirred that rascal in. Ain't lost the habit yet. What makes me healthy."

  "God almighty, Caleb. Why do I stay around you?" "I reckon it's my natural charm."

  Caleb took a big gulp of the whisky, wiping it and the fly out.

  "Do her again " Caleb said. Matt poured.

  When the glass was full, Caleb raised it in toast. "Here's to women with legs just like I like 'em. Feet on one end, pussy on the other" They drank.

  "You know," Caleb said, wiping his mouth with a filthy sleeve, "tonight reminds me of the night we hung that Injun. It's great hanging weather out there. Crisp and cool." "Don't start it, Caleb."

  Caleb reached into his shirt and pulled out a pair of female ears on a strand of leather around his neck. "Put it away," Matt said. "Getting squeamish in your old age?" "Sick of seeing it, that's all." Matt stood. "I'm going to make my rounds." Matt took his hat from a wall peg.

  "You do that," Caleb said. "Me, I'm going to sit right here and keep this bottle company."

  "Good place for you. You might even catch a fresh fly or two. And Caleb, do me a favor.

  Don't drink out of the bottle."

  Matt went out.

  Caleb picked up the bottle and took a long, deep swig.

  VI

  Standing in front of his office, Matt looked down the street. Caleb was right. For some odd reason this night did remind him of the night the Indian was hung. He should have killed Caleb that night. He couldn't understand what it was about the man that had him buffaloed. Why he even treated him like a friend. He was scum. Ate flies, had no manners—and what he had done to the Indian's woman.... He was glad he hadn't been there to see it. In fact, he had tried to stop it.

  Matt squinted his eyes and looked down the street. That night came back to him clearly.

  He was standing right there where he was standing now when they came for the Indian and his woman.

  Caleb was in front of the pack, holding a bowie knife. "Let us by, Matt," he said. "This ain't none of your affair. We want that Indian and his nigger, and we aim to have them."

  "I can't do that" he had said.

  And that was when David Webb stepped forward. He looked a total wreck. He had been crying. "He killed my little girl," Webb screamed. "He's a murderer. You're supposed to be sheriff. Mud Creek's sheriff. If you know what justice is, let us have him."

  And Matt had stood firm for a while, his hand on the butt of his revolver.

  But then he had looked at Caleb and Caleb had said, '"You're protecting a murdering Indian and a nigger. Where's your guts, Matt? Step aside!" And he had.

  They had entered the jail, taken the keys from the wall, and pulled the Indian and his mulatto wife from the cell.

  And when the crowd came out of the jail, they were practically carrying the Indian and the woman, and the Indian, held tight as he was, turned his head toward Matt and said almost casually, "You'll not be forgotten."

  The crowd pushed into the street, tossed the man and woman into a wagon, bound them hand and foot. The driver clucked to the horses, and the wagon was off, the crowd running behind it.

  Except for Caleb. He walked over to Matt and tossed the keys at the lawman's feet. "You did the right thing, boy."

  Then Caleb was off at a trot behind them.

  …

  The night of the hanging faded before him, and Matt stepped off the boardwalk and began his rounds.

  VI

  Matt liked the night rounds. It was his favorite part of the job. It made him feel as if he owned the town. He nodded at people he passed, though as usual, there were few out.

  Most were home or at Molly McGuire's or The Dead Dog Saloon.

  He came to the saloon and looked in over the bat wings. It was a small crowd. They all looked hot and tired.

  Zack, the bartender, looked bored and crabby at the same time. There was a drunk asleep under the table at the back, and the Dead Dog's only saloon girl was leaning against another drunk at the bar. The bar drunk had his head on the counter and was asleep. The girl looked sleepy and downright sick of the whole mess. At a table, four men played a lackluster game of cards.

  Zack saw Matt at the doorway, cupped his hands in a come-hither wave.

  Matt smiled, shook his head, and went on.

  Matt went down the street, checking locked doors, making sure everything was sound.

  When he came to the alley that led back to Molly McGuire's, he hesitated. He heard a sound, like something meddling in the trash boxes out back.

  Probably that damned dog again.

  Matt pulled his revolver. This time, he'd get that bastard. He started to creep down the alley. A moon shadow became visible. It was the slanting shadow of a huge man wearing a broad-brimmed hat. It looked uncomfortably familiar.

  Matt froze.

  He cocked the revolver and stared at the shadow.

  "Who's there?" he said. "This is the sheriff—Who's back there?"

  Silence. But the shadow did not move.

  Matt inched forward.

  "You are not forgotten " came a voice. Or was it a voice? It had almost sounded like the wind.

  But there was no wind.

  "Who's there, I said?"

  And then the shadow quivered and melted and reformed. It was no longer the silhouette of a big man with a broad-brimmed hat. It was the shadow of a wolf.

  Matt blinked, started backing up the alley, holding the revolver before him. The shadow moved and swelled in size.

  Matt broke and ran out of the alley, turning too quick to dart into Molly McGuire's, but going up the street as fast as his legs would carry him.

  And then he felt stupid.

  He stopped. He didn't look back. He just stood in the street. He had not heard a voice.

  That had been the wind and his imagination. There was no man-shape becoming a wolf-shape. He had seen the shadow of the dog all along, the dog that had troubled the town for a year now. He was getting jumpy. Maybe Caleb was right. He was getting squeamish.

  But then he heard something behind him like the padding of feet.

  All I have to do, he told himself, is turn, and there will be that big yellow dog, and I will shoot his brains out, and it will be over.

  But he found he could not turn. He was afraid of what he would see—and deep down, he knew it would not be the big yellow dog, or for that matter a true wolf. It would be something else.

  He started walking briskly up the street toward the church.

  The padding behind him had stopped momentarily, as if examining him, but now it had picked up again. Whatever it was, it was big. And he could hear the sound of breathing.

  Matt broke into a run.

  The street was empty, not a soul in sight. There was only the church at the end of the street, calling to him as if it were a beacon, its white cross standing high on its roof peak, throwing a black-shadow cross into the street.

  Matt's breath was coming in bursts now, and so was that of whatever was behind him, and he could sense that it was almost on him, ready to leap and take him down, and he found a second wind and ran harder, and then his side felt as if it were about to burst, but he still ran, and he thought he could feel the hot, damp breath of his pursuer on the back of his neck.

  His hat came off. His breath was coming in gasps now. He was almost to the church.

  The buildings on either side of him seemed to lean out and push—hang at strange
angles over his head. And there didn't seem to be as much light as usual, and no sounds, other than his own breathing, and the breathing of whatever was at his heels.

  And then he was in the shadow of the cross, and it was as if he had been struck by a warm wind. He ran up the church steps, and when he was at the church door, he wheeled—the revolver held before him—and he saw—

  —nothing.

  Just the empty street with his hat in its center. There was nothing wrong with the buildings. They grew at proper angles and did not hang over the street, and there were just as many lights as usual, and in the distance he could hear the buzz of voices at Molly McGuire's, and someone had finally decided to play the piano at The Dead Dog Saloon.

  Matt leaned against the church door and got his breath. His face became less tense and finally turned humorous. He collapsed on the top church stoop and laughed at himself. He slipped the revolver back into its holster.

  "Nothing," he said. "Not a goddamned thing."

  But at that moment there came a long, haunted howl that filled the street, and the howl gradually began to sound like a hoarse and hateful laugh.

  VII

  After a little while, the sheriff cautiously walked away from the church and picked up his hat. When he was about to put it on his head, an involuntary cry escaped his lips.

  The crown was bitten neatly out of it.

  Hat in hand, the sheriff ran back to the jail.

  VIII

  The dead gambler was the best walker, but Millie was no slouch—even though she had lost a shoe.

  The others were doing their best, and Millie was doing better, but the gambler had long legs and a good stiff stride.

  He was moving way out ahead, as if he were trying to win a race.

  As the night moved on and the sky lightened, the others slowed down, but not the gambler.

  He walked faster.

  Millie veered off into the woods and out into a field until she saw the shape of a house.

  She no longer truly recognized that it was the house where she lived with her sister, Buela, nor did she guess that Buela was worried sick about her, wondering what had happened to her and the stage. In Millie's mind there was only a reptilian pattern, and she followed it.

  No lamps burned in the house. It was silent. The sun was easing up over the horizon like a sneaky, blond baby raising its head.