Magnificent Guns of Seneca 6 (8 page)
“Get out of the way, you goddamn idiot!”
Bob leaned back as a destrier pulling a wagon charged past him, its hooves smashing the ground where Bob’s feet had been standing a second before.
People stared at him and shook their heads as Bob backed away from the road and headed for the town’s main square.
He passed rows of bakeries and medicine shoppes until he came to a large wooden building with swinging doors and windows in the shapes of tombstones.
Dalewood
Saloon was splashed in chipped red paint above the porch roof.
Bob walked in and waved to the bartender, “You have any rooms for rent?”
“Yes we do.
How long you staying?”
“Not sure, sir,” Bob said.
“Can I pay as I go?”
“Five dollars for the first night.
For two extra dollars I’ll send a woman up to your room after supper.”
“I’ll let you know, if that’s all right,” Bob said.
He dropped a coin into the bartenders hand and said, “Where’s the gunstore?”
***
The clerk looked up from his newspaper at Bob and nodded, taking stock of him in one glance.
Nervous eyes with grey skin and a sickly build.
Hollow, wet looking eyes when he said, “Good morning, sir.
I’d like to see some of your guns if you don’t mind.”
“Nobody gets to see guns unless they’re buying one.
You got money?”
Bob smiled nervously as he reached into his pocket, to pull out the sack of coins.
He set it on the counter and said, “My Pa just died and this is what I got from his estate.
You reckon that’s enough?”
The clerk squinted at the coins inside the bag and said, “It depends what you’re looking for.
I got a couple nice used pieces over here in the case.”
Bob followed the man and bent down to look behind the glass.
“The one on the left’s a Colt Defender.
Good, up-close weapon.
It’s an older model, but some people still swear by them.”
Bob looked at the gun next to it and jabbed his finger against the glass, “That one.”
The clerk reached in and grabbed the gun’s handle, “Course.
All you kids want the Defeater.
Considered by many to be the finest six-gun ever made.”
The clerk cocked the hammer back and laid the gun on the glass, “Used by outlaws and lawmen alike.”
Bob picked up the gun and held it in the air, aiming down the sights.
“I’ll take this one.”
“Sounds good to me,” the clerk said, “I need to make room anyway.”
The clerk’s voice dropped conspiratorially and he said, “Just got something
new
in.”
“New?” Bob said.
The clerk nodded.
“It’s all kind of hush-hush because we only got a few and the manufacturer wants us to use ‘em for displays.
When people see these things, shoot…they’re gonna go crazy.”
“What is it?”
“All right, come on back and I’ll show you,” the clerk said.
He opened the counter’s swing door and waved for Bob to follow him.
In the back room, he reached for a pine box on the counter that had the words
Colt Devastator
etched into the lid.
He opened the box and showed gun the sleek black weapon inside.
Bob looked down in silence for a long time until he said, “This is the gun I need.”
“I know, partner.
You and everybody else.
Like I said, there’s gonna be a stampede.
It’s gonna make all the people carrying those Defeaters around look like schoolchildren.”
“No, I mean, this is the gun I need right now.”
The clerk shook his head and closed the lid.
He went to put it back up on the shelf and Bob shook the bag of money at him, “You can have all of this.
I don’t care.”
“It’s not for sale.”
“Of course it is.
This is a gun store, you said you had more of them.
Sell me that one!”
“Listen, I made a mistake in showing you this.
Now let’s go back out front and you can get that Defeater and be on your way.
I shouldn’t have anyone back here like this anyway.”
“So why did you?” Bob said.
“Because you look like a nice young man who wouldn’t hurt a fly, and I figured you’d enjoy seeing it.
Now come on,” he said.
The clerk grabbed Bob by the arm to pull him toward the door.
For a skinny arm, it felt tight and wiry, like a coiled spring.
Not the limp, weak limb he’d expected.
Bob pulled his arm back from the man and whirled the heavy bag of coins at the man’s head, cracking him across the temple.
The man cried out as he fell, clutching the side of his face, and Bob grabbed him by the shirt collar.
“Wouldn’t hurt a fly?” he said.
He swung the bag onto the top of the man’s head again, driving him to the ground.
He looked around the storage room as the clerk lay there whimpering, and found a heavy metal crowbar.
“My name is Bob Ford, and people like you are going to stop underestimating me, mister.”
Betsy Clayton woke up to the sound of squalling.
She leapt out of her bed and raced into the baby’s room to see Claire sitting up in her crib, pulling on her hair.
She picked the child up and laid her on her shoulder, patting her back gently and rocking her side to side.
“Sam?” she said.
“Can you fetch me a bottle from the ice chest?”
There was no response.
She carried the baby through the dimly-lit house back to her bedroom and looked in.
The bed was empty.
Betsy carried her daughter into the kitchen and opened the ice chest with one hand, using her hip to prop the door open while she grabbed the bottle.
Claire saw the bottle and grabbed for it, clawing at her mother’s hand in the desperate way only a small child can manage.
“Here you go, sweetie pie,” Betsy whispered.
“Here you go.”
She felt Claire’s rump and realized her diaper cloth was full.
Both of Seneca’s moons were still overhead, casting everything in pale blue light, but the sun was coming.
One could tell from the way the valley around them began to shimmer with amber hues that reflected the red clay of the wasteland surrounding the settlement.
Claire laid her daughter down and unpinned her diaper, smiling down at the baby as she pressed the bottle to her lips and drank greedily.
Betsy found her husband sitting on the porch, staring at the meadow.
His rifle was laid across his lap and he had both his guns on.
Sam looked up at her and said, “What are you doing up?”
“I needed help with the baby and didn’t know where you were,” she said.
“I’m normally gone by this time anyway.”
“When you were working, you mean.”
“Everybody’s entitled to some time off now and again, Betsy.
Tom’s got things well in hand.”
Betsy patted Claire on the back and tried to coax a burp out of her.
“Most people take time off to do things besides sulk around the house, Samuel Clayton.
All you’ve done for two weeks is sit on my front porch collecting dust.
You ain’t shaved in so long you look like a grizzly bear.”
Sam scratched the length of hair on his neck and said, “I keep meaning to.
It itches like hell.”
“Why don’t you go wake Jem up and take him fishing?
Stop sitting around feeling sorry for yourself and go do something with your boy for once.”
He looked up at her in the early dawn light, the way the sun played with the loose curls of her hair and lit their tips aglow.
“All right, honey.
I will.
Just give me a little while.”
“Okay,” she said.
“I’m going to go lay her down and get a little more sleep if I can.
You two have fun.”
“We will,” he said.
Sam looked back to watch his wife go through the door and returned to the place in the meadow he’d been watching.
That would be the place Whiskey Pete would emerge, Sam reckoned.
That was the place he’d hunker down and try to spy on them, waiting for a second bite at the apple.
Wouldn’t be none this time, Sam thought.
He raised his rifle and looked down the sites, seeing nothing but swaying grass and yellow dirt.
I’ll wake Jem up in a little while, he thought.
But he never did.
***
He’d been sitting at the wheel for over an hour.
So long that the sparks looked like fiery rain spitting against his chest in the setting sun.
Sam took his foot off the pedal and inspected the blade in the dim light, then lightly bounced the edge of the blade across the surface of his thumbnail.
“Sum bitch!” he shouted, ripping his hand away and shaking it.
The knife bit him too deep, and Sam stuck his thumb in his mouth, tasting blood.
His little boy came up through the meadow and said, “You hurt yourself?”
“Only by being stupid,” Sam grimaced.
“Look at this.”
Jem peered down at the injury and said, “Guess the knife’s pretty sharp.”
“You ain’t kidding.”
“Can I see it?”
“Absolutely not.”
“All right.”
