The Gunfighter Read online

  “You ain’t in no mood for whiskey just yet?” I asked him.

  “No,” he said. “I’m not.”

  “You go up and get yourself some rest?” Bonnie said.

  “Yes,” he said. “In a sense.”

  “Hell,” I said, “you don’t need to rest up just from what you done a while ago. Do you?”

  “I needed to relax my mind,” Sly said. “I don’t like what happened out here with that boy. It bothers me. It happens too often. No one will believe me when I say that I’m not after them.”

  “Why is that?” Bonnie said.

  “They’ve all got enemies,” said Sly. “They’ve all done something to someone, and when they see me, they think that their victims have sent me to even the score. It’s the guilty conscience in all men. I bring it out. It’s my curse.”

  “You’re wrong about that,” I said. “There ain’t no guilty conscience in all men. I oughta know, ’cause I ain’t got one.”

  “There’s nothing you’ve done in your entire life that you feel guilty over?” Sly asked me.

  “Not a damn thing,” I said. “There’s some stupid things I done that I feel stupid about, but that ain’t guilty. No, sir.”

  “You’re a fortunate man, Baijack,” he said. “I’ll modify my statement. Most men have guilty consciences. Some of us are even haunted by them.”

  Chapter Four

  It weren’t long after that when ole Peester come into the Hooch House. His face was red, and his chest was a-heaving. “Baijack,” he said, real huffy-like, “I want to talk to you.”

  “If you want to talk to me about that there widowmaking Herman Sly,” I said, “he’s a-setting right here at this table right with me right now, and you’re a-looking at him. Is that what you was wanting to talk about, Peester?”

  He started in to blustering and puffing and spitting all over his own fat belly. I ain’t never seen a man back up so fast as what that shyster lawyer done just right at that time. So while he was a-trying to regain some control of his spit glands and his wagging tongue, I looked over at ole Sly.

  “Mister Sly,” I said, “this here is His Honor our mayor of this here town. His name is Peester, and besides being the mayor he’s a pettifogging lawyer.” I leaned over real close to him then and lowered my voice some. “He’s also a worthless son of a bitch,” I added.

  Ole Sly, he stood right up and offered out his hand to our mayor. “Mayor Peester,” he said, “it’s an honor, sir. My name is Herman Sly. I’m here in your peaceful town for a short visit. If you’re concerned about the little episode that occurred in here recently, I regret it very much, and I assure you that I did everything I could to prevent it.”

  Peester allowed his hand to be shuck, but he never did find no more voice, not just then, and it come to me that I had witnessed a pure-dee miracle right there in the ole Hooch House, and what it was, it was a lawyer without no words. I wanted to hooraw out loud, but I never. Instead, I just set there and watched ole Peester turn around and walk outa the place still a-blustering and wheezing and kinda shaking his head.

  Well, the day had gone by before I hardly knowed it. Sly got up to go over to the White Owl for his steak supper, and he asked me if I wanted to join him, but I declined. I poured me another glass of good whiskey and watched him walk out the door. I was thinking how it’s funny the way one man can shake up a town just by being there and setting quiet and minding his own business, which is all ole Sly was a-doing. ’Course, he had chose his way of living, and them was the results he got from it.

  Anyhow, just as ole Sly had done had enough time to get over there where he was a-going, here come Peester back in. He musta been watching and a-waiting for a chance to get at me without Sly being there. He come a-stomping over to me where I was a-setting, and he set down right across from me and planted his elbows on the table and give me his hardest look. Well, it never made me shake and tremble, the silly little ass. I just looked him back in the eyes and said, “Peester, what the hell do you want now?”

  “I want that man out of town,” he said. “I want him out now.”

  “Is that you the little ass a-talking,” I asked him, “or is it the mayor?”

  “Baijack,” he said, “I’m serious.”

  “So am I,” I said. “‘Cause if you’re a-talking at me as a individual citizen of this here town, my answer to you is that there ain’t nothing I can do about it. This here is a free country last I heard, and if a man ain’t wanted by the law, and he stops by in your town and don’t break no laws, then you got to put up with him a-being there. This here is the U.S.A. of America. It ain’t Poland or some damn place. So shut your yap about it.”

  “Baijack,” he said.

  “On the other hand,” I said, “if you’re a-yapping at me as the mayor, I got even more to say. As the mayor, you got to be be aware of the laws of this here town, and you had ought to be a-setting here by my side and telling all the folks just the same thing as what I just told you. You’re the most important man, even more than me, to be talking about the law. So if you personal want Sly outa town, then that’s a thing between you and Sly — personal, and you had your chance to tell him about it, and you never took it. You went outa here like a kicked dog with your tail tooked between your legs and a-whimpering all the way out. Now I’m a-going to tell you something. I don’t want to hear no more about it. Shut up. Either have a drink or get out.”

  “I’ll have a drink,” he said.

  I waved at ole Aubrey, and he brung a drink over to Peester. He knowed already what Peester liked to drink. He set it down on the table and went on back to the bar. Peester gulped it down right quick and poured hisself another. I could tell that the presence of Sly in Asininity had ole Peester somewhat discombobulated, and a thought come into my head. Prob’ly I should ought to of kept it to myself, but I couldn’t hardly resist the chance to job ole Peester a little bit more.

  “You got someone out there what might be a-wanting to get you killed?” I asked him. “Is that how come Sly being here got you so shaky? You thinking that maybe someone paid him to blow your ass away?” He stammered a bit, and so I just went on. “You ain’t got nothing to worry about, Mister Mayor, on account of ole Sly, he never does commit no murder. He prods a man into going for a gun so that he can claim self-defense whenever he final kills him. So if it is you he come after, just don’t make no sudden moves whenever he gets to picking on you, calling you names and such. If he calls you a yellow-bellied, slime-sucking, goat-faced chicken, why, hell, you just smile and stay calm. That’s all.”

  “Baijack, you son of a bitch,” he said, and he was trembling mad.

  “Better yet,” I said, “you could just tell him that he’s absolute right about all that, and that there ain’t nothing you can do about it since you was bom that way. Thataway you’d not only keep him from killing you, you’d be a-telling the whole truth.”

  Peester turned down his second drink and shoved his chair back real fast. He stood up and turned and headed for the door, and as he was a-going through it, he like to of run over ole Happy Bonapart, who was just a-coming in. Happy stepped aside and looked after the mayor for a bit. Then he come strolling on over to where I was a-setting and he plopped hisself down.

  “What’s wrong with the mayor?” he asked me. “Something wrong with him?” I said. “I never noticed nothing outa the ordinary.”

  “Where’s Sly?” Happy said.

  “Likely that ain’t none of your business,” I said. “You got some kinda complaint against him or something?” “Naw,” he said. “I was just asking. That’s all. Where’s Bonnie?”

  “You got anything to say that ain’t a damn worthless question?” I said. “Get yourself a drink and don’t say nothing more till you can think of something to say that ain’t a stupid question.”

  Ole Happy got a pout set on his face, and he got up and walked over to the bar. He ordered hisself a drink, and whenever he got it, he brung it back to the table with him and set d
own. He didn’t say nothing, though. He just set there a-sipping his drink. I emptied my own glass and poured me another.

  “Baijack,” he said of a sudden, “has you noticed? Bonnie ain’t here in the room.”

  The little son of a bitch was smarter than what I’d been a-giving him credit for. It weren’t no question. “I hadn’t been a-paying no attention,” I said. “You wanting Bonnie? You wanting to take her upstairs for a little romp, are you? ‘Cause if that’s what it is, why, hell, I reckon we could chase her down.”

  “No,” he said, and he said it real quick-like, like he was a-trying to shut me up. “That ain’t it. I just didn’t see her is all, and I was a-wondering.”

  “Well, I don’t know where she’s at,” I said, “and I don’t know where Sly is at, and what’s more, I don’t give a damn about neither one of them. It’s a-getting late, and I’m headed for the house. You keep a eye on things.”

  “Yes sir,” he said, and I got up and headed for the door. I was a little pissed off, and I couldn’t figger out just exactly why, but I kinda smashed my way through the doors and stalked on over toward the White Owl. It was near time for Lillian to be closing up the place, and I meant to walk her home like I done the night before, but I figgered this night I’d go on and stay home for the night. I figgered that for a change I might even do a little romping with my sweet wife. I had just stepped offa the walkway into the street when I looked up, and I seen ole Sly step outa the White Owl along with Lillian. I stepped back into the shadders.

  Lillian locked the door, and then she turned and kinda looked up at Sly. He offered his arm, and they commenced to walking down the street together. They was headed for the house. I walked along for a spell a-watching, and then I slunk along keeping a eye on them. Sure enough, ole Sly walked Lillian all the way to the house, and he stood there while she opened the door and went inside. Whenever she was safe inside and shut the door, he turned around and headed back towards down town. I hid myself out real good, and whenever he walked right by me, I thought to myself, I could slip out my trusty ole Merwin and Hulbert Company revolver and put one lead slug right in his back and kill him dead.

  Hell, no one would ever know who it was what done it, and even if they was to find out, no one wouldn’t press no charges on me. Likely they’d give me a goddamn medal. Make me a big hero or something. Then I got to thinking, if I was to kill ole Sly and the word was to get out, I’d have ever’ gunnie in the country a-looking for me a-trying to build up his own reputation. I sure didn’t want that, and besides that, I was really getting to where I kinda liked the son of a bitch. And he hadn’t gone on into the house with Lillian. He’d only walked her home was all. I let him get well on past me, and then I went on up to the house and went inside. Horace’s wife Myrtle, the woman what watched our kid during the day, was done gone by then, so it was just only my little happy family there in the house. The kid come a-running at me and hollering, “Daddy.”

  “Ain’t it your bedtime?” I said.

  Lillian took him and went into another room with him. I found myself a bottle and a tumbler and poured myself a drink. Then I plopped down on the divan and stuck my feet up on the table there in front of it and took me a good swaller of the good stuff. By the time I had finished that drink, Lillian come back out. She had put the kid to bed.

  “At least you could say hello to him,” she said. “He’s just a little boy, and he’s your son.”

  “He’s more yours than mine,” I said. “You’ve spoiled him rotten, and I can’t stand him.”

  “That’s an awful thing for you to say, Baijack,” she said. “Why did you even bother coming home? Why didn’t you just stay with your whore again?” Well, there, she had done went and said it.

  “Bonnie Boodle’s my business partner,” I said. “Me and her —”

  “Don’t tell me any lies, Baijack,” she said. “I know what goes on. If you think you’re fooling me, you’re even more stupid than I thought.”

  “Well, I seen what you done tonight,” I said. “I seen you walking home a-snuggling with that killer.”

  “Mr. Sly is a perfect gentleman,” she said. “You weren’t there, so he walked me home, and if you were spying on us, you know that’s all there was to it.”

  “I bet it weren’t all you were thinking about,” I said. “Nor him, neither.”

  “If anyone was thinking thoughts like that,” she said, “no one gave voice to them.”

  “Well, la dee da,” I said, and I poured myself another drink. Lillian turned and headed for our bedroom. She slammed the door behind her. I drunk myself another tumbler full, and then I got to thinking about her in there in that big bed, and I got to recalling all her female charms and curves what had trapped me into this situation in the first place, as well as the reason I had told myself I was a-coming on home that night. I pulled off my boots and throwed them on the floor. Then I stood up and took off my coat and vest and my gun belt. I throwed them all on the divan, and then I throwed my shirt and my trousers on there with them. I puffed myself up and walked into the bedroom a-grinning. Lillian set up straight, a-pulling the sheet up under her chin.

  “Baijack,” she said.

  “Hell,” I said, “let’s make up.”

  “You get out of here,” she said.

  “It’s my goddamned bed,” I said.

  “Well, you’re not sleeping in it,” she said. “Not with me.”

  “Aw, come on, Lillian,” I said, and I took another couple steps toward her. She reached over to the little table there beside the bed, and I be damned straight to hell if she didn’t come out with a little snub-nosed revolver of some kind, and she thumbed back the hammer and aimed that little squirty son of a bitch right at me.

  “Get out,” she said.

  “Now, Lillian,” I said.

  “Get out of here, Baijack,” she said, “or I’ll kill you.”

  I turned to run just as she pulled the trigger, and the damned bullet nicked my left ear. I yelped like a kicked dog and run for the front door. I run hard into it ’cause I fumbled with the door handle, but then I got it open and took out. Lillian had got outa bed and follered me. She stood in the doorway and fired another round as I was a-running across the way there a-headed back for the main street of the town. Just then I learnt how tender my feet was on accounta stepping on sharp rocks and stickers and things, and I was a-running and a-hopping and yowling all the way back to the Hooch House.

  Whenever I run in through the front door, ever’one in there set up straight and stared with their eyes opened real wide. I just straightened myself up real proud-like and walked through that big room over to the stairs and on up, and I went into Bonnie’s room. Happy was in there a-humping her. I set down in a chair. “Don’t mind me,” I said. Bonnie pulled the sheet up clean over then-heads, and I just set there a-waiting for them to get the job done. In another minute or two, ole Happy come out from under that sheet, and his face was bright red. He tried to keep hisself covered up with the sheet while he pulled his britches back on, and he never looked at me, not straight. He got hisself dressed and hurried out the door.

  Bonnie set up and give me a hard look. Her great big titties was hanging down full exposed.

  “How was he?” I said.

  “He was just fine till you come in,” she said.

  “Whyn’t you lock the damn door?” I said.

  “I will from now on,” she said. “What’s wrong with you?”

  “Aw, hell,” I said, “I’m all right. Lillian took a shot at me is all. I had to run for my life just the way you see me here.”

  “It looks like she hit you,” Bonnie said.

  “She just only nicked my ear is all,” I said. “Ears bleed like hell. It ain’t nothing.”

  “It’s a good thing she ain’t much of a shot,” said Bonnie.

  “It’d be tough for me to hit a moving target with that little snub-nosed son of a bitch she was a-using,” I said.

  Just then Bonnie throwed the
sheet clean off and come stark nekkid outa the bed. She flounced her big floppy body over to the door and jerked it open. “Aubrey,” she yelled out. God, she had a awful voice whenever she yelled like that. Then she looked over her shoulder at me. “Take the rest of them clothes off,” she said.

  Well, before long she had me a bath fixed up there and had me a-setting in it. I was puffing me a good cigar and had me a tumbler of whiskey in my hand, and ole Bonnie, she was a-washing me all over. That was after she had already washed up my bloody ear and put some kinda salve on it. She had scrubbed me in ever’ place imaginable, and I was still a-smoking and a-drinking, but I was getting some aroused from all that activity, and then, damned if she didn’t step over the edge and drop her fat ass down in that sudsy water with me. A bunch of water sloshed over the edge of the tub when she settled herself down, and I scooted back as much as I could, ‘cause the two of us more than filled up that little tub.

  “Damn, Bonnie,” I said, “you’re going to flood the Hooch House.”

  “Let them swim,” she said, and she wriggled around and commenced to fondling on me, so I put my cigar down and my tumbler, and I reached my arms around her as far as I could and give her a big wet smooch. We fooled around like that for a bit, and then she washed her own self up some, and we got out and she dried us off. Then she took a hold of me by the handle and pulled me towards the bed. “Come on, Baijack,” she said. I didn’t have no choice. I had to foller her or lose it, so pretty quick we was in that bed a-getting after it.

  When we was all done and laid back and relaxing, ole Bonnie throwed a arm over my chest and kinda nuzzled me. “She really try to kill you?” she asked me.

  “She said she would,” I told her. “Then she shot my ear, and when I was a-running away from the house, she took one more shot at me. That’s all I know.”

  “You and me’re real good together,” she said. “Ain’t we?”