Dawn in Damnation. Clark Casey

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СКАЧАТЬ shooting a man. On the way to the latrine, he ambled by the chubby newbie and knocked against his sipping arm. Some whiskey spilled over Buddy’s hand, but he didn’t make a big to-do of it, like most would. Barely pausing in his storytelling, he licked his knuckle so as not to waste any gut-warmer.

      “What’s he, yella?” Sal whispered. “Thought he was supposed to be some kinda big-shot gunfighter.”

      “Maybe gun fighting ain’t as important to him as telling tales and drinkin’ prairie dew,” Fat Wally said.

      On his way out of the latrine, Jack lingered by the faro table, though he wasn’t the gambling sort. He stood beside the banker, watching the cards come out of the shoe and glancing over a punter’s shoulder toward the bar. After a short while, Buddy stood, hiked up his pants, and staggered lazily to the latrine. Jack made a beeline for the bar to intercept him in his path. Buddy was nearly twice his size but Jack hardly gave him a foot to squeeze by. As they passed each other, Jack stiffened his elbow at the last moment and bumped hard against Buddy’s gut.

      “Watch where you’re going!” Jack hollered.

      “I was watching just fine,” Buddy replied. “Better learn some manners, son.”

      There were a few gasps of surprise around the room. Nobody would ever dare to address Jack that way. He still looked seventeen, because that’s how old he was when he died, but he’d sent hundreds of men to hell in the ten years since he’d arrived. It stuck in his craw to be called son, but he didn’t show it.

      “If you’re gonna address a man like that in Damnation, I expect you’re ready to draw,” Jack said calmly.

      Buddy was in his mid-forties—old by outlaw standards—and he showed his age, but he acted like a goofy kid and thought everything was a game. “Shit, boy!” He looked down at Jack. “I wanted to draw, I’d a got me some pencils instead of pistols.” He laughed good-naturedly, but Jack kept eyeballing him without so much as a blink.

      “Ah, you’ll understand when you’re older, sonny.”

      “Quit your jawing and pull!” Jack showed a rare flash of anger.

      “All right, if you’re set on getting yourself shot, how ’bout high noon tomorrow?” Buddy suggested.

      “Ain’t no such thing as noon here,” Jack said. “It’s always dusk.”

      “Oh yeah?” Buddy shrugged and took a gulp of his drink. “Guess we might as well settle it now then.” He seemed more put out by the interruption of his drinking than anything else.

      “How about you boys settle this outside.” Sal tried to sound stern, but he wasn’t. Jack must’ve been in the mood for some fresh air though, because he obliged him.

      Buddy staggered drunkenly toward the door, knocking over a spittoon on the way. He cursed at it for jumping in front of him, but then went back to give it a heartfelt apology.

      The whole saloon emptied into the road to watch, except Sneaky Jim. The greasy weasel liked to steal sips from other men’s drinks while they were in the commode. After a good gunfight, you could expect every glass in the room to be lessened by two sips, and for Jim to be lying in the corner with a bellyache.

      “We ain’t seen anyone semi-famous get shot in quite some time,” Red remarked.

      “I reckon the fat man won’t even clear leather.” Fat Wally waved a five-dollar bill to wager.

      “Ain’t that the pot calling the kettle black,” Red said.

      “All right, boys!” Sal interrupted, “I got two-to-one odds that the new man heads south without showing metal.”

      “I’ll take some of that action,” I said, having a suspicion Buddy might show some gumption. “He might not win, but I reckon he’ll get sent to hell with a gun in his hand.”

      The vampire was up on his balcony across the road, smoking a pipe with his feet propped up on the banister. He surely enjoyed himself a gunfight. Seemed the only time a smile crossed his pale face was when some loudmouth got a lead plumb in the gut. Looked on it like a type of vaudeville.

      As the two men lined up back to back in the center of the road, Buddy’s large round body shadowed Jack’s lean figure like a carnival tent beside a stake in the ground. The heft on his hips looked like it might hinder him from lifting a sidearm, whereas Jack’s trim waist gave no such obstruction, and his arms were coiled tight as a spring.

      At Sal’s signal, they each began walking in opposite directions. At the count of ten, they turned and stood for a moment. Jack locked Buddy in a cold glare. He could look at a fella like there wasn’t nothing else in the world, but at the same time he was aware of everything going on around him—always ready in case some upstart in the crowd decided to pull.

      Normally, Jack’d wait till his opponent made the first move. Then he’d gun him down so it looked like it was the other fella’s idea and he was just finishing it. Only this time it was taking too long. Buddy didn’t see any reason to pull, or maybe he’d forgotten why he came out into the road to begin with. He swayed drunkenly in the wind, covering one eye with his left hand to keep from seeing double.

      “Looks like your money’s as good as gone,” Sal whispered.

      Finally, Jack got fed up. His right shoulder popped forward in its socket as his wiry arm collected the pistol in one swift motion. Buddy must’ve woke from his stupor at that particular moment, because he had the good sense to draw as well. And he was surprisingly fast.

      They say steady is more important than fast, because then you only have to shoot once. But when you’re steady and fast, there’s no wasted motion and everything else seems to stand still. Jack’s gun slid out of its holster, and the shine of the metal brightened. He cleared leather with a whip of his wrist and leveled the barrel. Jack always looked as though he moved in slow motion because he was so calm, even though he was really moving quicker than runaway mustangs.

      This time though, Jack looked even slower on account of how quick Buddy really was moving. Drunk as he was, Buddy cleared leather and squeezed off three shots before Jack could pull the trigger once. One bullet hit the ground between them, another ricocheted off a rock into a horse. The third caught Jack Finney in the face, just below his left eye. A drape of blood spread across his smooth cheeks. There was a loud braying in the distance, then the horse and Jack both dropped at once.

      The crowd was stunned to silence. Then the vampire laughed from his balcony above.

      “Shit!” Sal cussed. “Guess you gotta be fast when you drink too much to aim properly.”

      The Chinaman came and lugged away both bodies. Jack was hardly a speck of man, all bone and muscle, and the Chinaman hauled him off by the ankles. Then he hitched the pony carcass to the back of a two-horse carriage and hauled it to the pigpen. Its heft, along with Jack’s bit of sinewy muscle, would later be appreciated as thick white stripes in the bacon. That evening, Buddy moved into Jack’s room in the hotel, just below the vampire, and Damnation had a new top gunman. The paper was a little longer than usual that week, but I suppose it was good practice so my hand wouldn’t cramp up later on when the bodies really started piling up.

      The Crapper

      Comings: Buddy Baker, originally of Louisville, Kentucky, was orphaned at the age of eight by a СКАЧАТЬ