by Lukens, Mark
“They are not alive anymore,” Billy said.
“I agree,” Esmerelda added. “I don’t think anyone out there is alive anymore. I can’t . . . I can’t feel anything from them except . . .” She hesitated.
“Except what?” Jed asked her.
“Nothing except darkness from them. A void. Nothingness. But there’s something else out there, an evil like I’ve never felt before.”
“Like the devil,” Sanchez said, still rubbing his crucifix with two fingers.
“They’re just empty bodies now,” Esmerelda said. “Empty shells to be filled with that thing’s evil. They are puppets in every sense of the word. That thing controls all of them, bits of itself inside each one of them. It wants us to believe they are still alive and suffering. It wants us terrified of being trapped between life and death, but it’s all a lie. Billy’s right, everyone out there is already dead.”
“We don’t save a bullet for ourselves,” Sanchez said. “We all fight to the death.”
Jed felt a twinge of anger at Sanchez’s words, feeling slighted in some way like Sanchez was calling him a coward for suggesting that they take themselves out. Saving a bullet for oneself had been a common practice for some time now instead of being captured alive by a tribe like the Apache or Comanche. A bullet in the brain was much preferable to a torturous death that could last for days or even weeks.
But Jed let his anger slip away. He held Sanchez’s stare for a moment and then nodded. “Then we fight. We use every last bullet.”
“I want to see my family again,” Sanchez said. “I want to go back home to Mexico and see my mother and father again, and my brothers. But I came here on this adventure knowing that I may not make it back, knowing that I could die at any time.” He shrugged. “I’m ready to die if it comes to that.”
Sanchez had already been facing a certain death swinging from the hangman’s noose in Smith Junction, Jed thought. Even if none of this would have happened here in this town and Jed had turned Sanchez in, he could see that Sanchez would not have gone to his death kicking and screaming, crying and begging. He pictured Sanchez on his walk to the gallows through an angry crowd of townspeople, Sanchez stoic and calm as people shouted and spat at him. He could imagine Sanchez climbing the gallows steps with his back straight and head held high above the hatred, not willing to make a fool of himself in front of the crowd, not willing to give them that satisfaction.
Billy went back to his lantern near the front door and the bowl of herbs that was still smoking and sending a slightly pungent odor their way. He crouched down with his eagle feather again, chanting softly.
“I guess you found your adventure,” Esmerelda told Sanchez, drawing Jed’s attention back to them.
Sanchez smiled at her. “My father is a very wealthy man, as was his father before him. My family owns ranches, farms, and mines. We employ hundreds of people. I am to inherit that fortune, along with my brothers. But first, I wanted to travel and find adventure before I found a woman to marry and settle down in that life.”
“Where’d you learn to shoot like that?” Jed asked.
Sanchez took a sip of coffee, taking his time before he answered. “When I was seventeen years old, my father hired a gringo to help protect him. The man was tall and thin. He looked like he was maybe forty years old. He didn’t look . . . what’s the word I’m looking for?”
“Intimidating?” Esmerelda offered.
Sanchez snapped his fingers and smiled. “That’s the word. He didn’t look intimidating, but there was this darkness about the man, something that made men shrink back without knowing what it really was. It was like everyone could tell that this gringo was dangerous, and that he had seen death. Not only seen death, but dealt it out many times during his life. I saw him practicing with his pistol one day and I approached him. I had heard rumors that the gringo used to be a lawman and a gunslinger before, and the way he was shooting, I could believe it. Some of my father’s men even said there was a bounty on the gringo’s head. But of course none of my father’s workers would dare cross my father by turning the gringo in, so he knew he was safe. He was an important man to my father, traveling with my father to protect him like a . . .” Again, Sanchez searched for the right word.
“Like a bodyguard,” Esmerelda said.
Sanchez smiled, bowing his head slightly. “That’s it exactly. Like a bodyguard. I was around the gringo often, and I asked him to teach me to shoot like he did. Of course he said no, but eventually my father allowed the gringo to teach me to shoot. But the gringo told me that he would only teach me if I agreed to one condition—I had to promise that I would only use my skill for good and self-defense. I made the promise and the gringo taught me and my brothers. My brothers grew bored quickly, but I was . . . fascinated. Obsessed. I listened to the gringo’s stories about his adventures in many places, from Texas to Montana. He told me stories about the famous lawmen he had worked with. And he told other stories of robberies and gunfights. Those stories seemed like fairy tales to me, beyond belief, but I told myself that I would one day travel north to see those lands and have those kinds of adventures.”
Jed was getting an idea of who the old man might be, but it couldn’t be possible, could it? “What was the gringo’s name?” he asked Sanchez. “Was his name Dave Mather? Mysterious Dave Mather?”
Sanchez smiled and shrugged. “It doesn’t really matter now, does it? The name he used in Mexico wasn’t his real name.”
“Who’s Mysterious Dave Mather?” Esmerelda asked.
“He was a lawman in Montana and Kansas,” Jed said. “He even worked with Wyatt Earp for a short time. But he was also a gunslinger and a criminal. Many claimed he got away with a lot of crimes through the years. He jumped bail around ’85 and was never heard from again.” Jed looked right at Sanchez.
Sanchez just smiled. “I kept my promise to the gringo,” he said like he was trying to change the subject. “I only used my skills for self-defense.”
Jed stared at him. He knew Sanchez wasn’t going to admit to who the gringo really was down in Mexico. Maybe the man was still there under the employ of his father. “What really happened in that shootout in Smith Junction?”
Sanchez sighed. He gave a wave of his hand. “What does it matter now?”
“Tell us,” Esmerelda implored.
Jed waited.
“A man was going to kill me,” Sanchez said.
“Why?” Jed asked him.
“For just being Mexican,” Sanchez answered. “He wanted my pistols. My boots. My silver coins. He wanted anything of value I had. He said a filthy Mexican didn’t deserve to have the things I had. He insulted me, and I challenged him on it.” Sanchez paused for a moment. “The man was drunk, but he took my challenge. We stepped out into the street. It was over in a few seconds. But the townspeople rushed at me, many of them already yelling that I had killed the man in cold blood. Others were running to get the sheriff and his deputies. My horse was nearby. I had no choice but to ride away. I rode east for a few days, staying in some small towns, and then camping out in the desert. I waited a few weeks until I was sure I had thrown them off my trail, and then I started heading south. And that’s when that sandstorm came. I saw this town on the horizon and here I am now.”
Jed nodded. “Yes, here we are now.”
CHAPTER 35
A few hours later Sanchez was asleep on his blanket. Jed wasn’t sure how the man could sleep when they might only have a few more hours of life left, but he was breathing deeply, curled up on his side, facing away from the table. David was still asleep. Even Billy looked like he had fallen asleep even though he was still sitting up on the floor. His head was slumped forward and he had stopped chanting. His bowl of herbs had burned out hours ago, but his lantern was still lit.
Jed took another sip of his coffee. It was cold, but it still tasted good and strong. The other lantern they had was sitting on top of the bar, lighting up that side of the saloon just a little, the lantern’s g
low reflecting back at him from the mirror behind the bar. Esmerelda had stoked the wood stove before lying down on her blanket to try to get some sleep. The stove was still burning, but it didn’t seem to put out much heat. The rest of the saloon was swallowed up in darkness, the stairs just a shadow, the back room shrouded in impenetrable blackness. Everything was quiet; the only sounds were the heavy breathing and the occasional popping and creaking of the wood floors and walls. But at least there were no rustling sounds of movement from upstairs or any sounds from outside.
For a moment Jed thought that he might actually be asleep and dreaming all of this. Maybe the Ancient Enemy had put another sleeping spell on all of them. Maybe he was dreaming of being awake and sitting at this table right now. The thought of it terrified him for a reason he couldn’t explain, like he was helpless against those gods waiting out there—the Ancient Enemy, or maybe it was Billy’s Great Spirit, or Sanchez’s Christian God, or Esmerelda’s spiritual beliefs.
Jed took another sip of coffee just to prove to himself that he was still awake and in full control of his actions.
A shifting of cloth from the blankets alerted Jed. A moment later Esmerelda walked towards the table from the darkness. She sat down across from him. She looked tired, but still beautiful.
“Can’t sleep?” he asked her in a low voice.
She shook her head. “I guess you can’t, either.”
Jed shrugged. “I felt like I was close to nodding off a few times.”
They were quiet for a few minutes.
“You want some coffee?” Jed asked her.
She shook her head no.
Jed wanted to ask Esmerelda a question, and he could feel the urge building up inside of him. She had been looking towards the bar, deep in thought, but then she looked right at him like she was waiting patiently for him to speak.
“Was it true what Moody said?” he asked.
Esmerelda stared at him without answering.
“Moody said you didn’t read our futures because you already knew we didn’t have a future.”
“I . . . I don’t know. I haven’t read the cards.”
“You—”
“I don’t want to read them,” she said, cutting off his words.
Jed remained quiet.
Esmerelda’s face softened a little. “I’m sorry.”
“But you don’t have any feelings about what’s going to happen?” he asked, pressing. He needed to know. “You haven’t had any dreams or anything like that?”
Esmerelda didn’t answer for a long moment. She finally inhaled a deep breath and then let it out slowly. “I don’t see anything,” she finally said and shrugged. “I don’t feel anything.”
“So that means—”
“I didn’t say that,” she interrupted. “It just means that I feel like my . . . my senses are blocked somehow. I don’t know if that thing out there is interfering with my sense or not. Or maybe David might be interfering. Although he wouldn’t know it, just like he doesn’t know how he’s doing so many other things. Or maybe it’s both of them.” She let out a frustrated sigh.
Jed didn’t push any further. He took another sip of his coffee. His eyes burned like sand had been rubbed into them.
“I was just dreaming before I woke up,” Esmerelda said.
Jed stared at her, waiting for her to continue.
She glanced back at Sanchez and David like she was making sure they were still asleep, then she looked over at Billy who was still seated cross-legged on the floor, his head slumped forward, his hands in his lap. “I can’t explain the dreams,” she said when she looked back at Jed. “I saw strange things. I think they might have been from the future.”
“Our future?”
She shook her head no. “The far future. I saw what looked like these metal carriages that drove by themselves.”
Jed had heard rumors of inventors trying to put engines onto carriages and on bicycles, but he felt that kind of technology wouldn’t happen in his lifetime, maybe not even for another hundred years.
“And I saw flying machines,” Esmerelda said. “Metal machines. Like big metal pie plates in the sky.”
Jed just nodded, not knowing what to say.
“The dream was just bits and pieces,” she said. “None of it really made any sense. It moved from image to image. I saw a woman and a man. I think the man may have been some kind of outlaw. He had a gun, but his gun looked different.”
Jed didn’t interrupt her—she seemed like she was leading up to something.
“David was there.”
“In your dream?”
“Yes. He was with the man and the woman.”
“What were they doing?”
“They were scared. They were in a log cabin. And then the man and woman were in a small house in the jungle without David. The house was near the ocean. But even though David wasn’t there anymore, it wasn’t like he was dead.” She paused for just a second, staring at Jed. “You remember those names we saw written in blood in the dining hall?”
Jed nodded. He remembered.
“Cole and Stella,” Esmerelda said. “I think the man and woman I saw in the dream were Cole and Stella. I don’t know how that’s possible, but it felt so real in the dream. It still feels so real.”
“So you think those names on the wall are two people from the future?” Jed asked.
Esmerelda shook her head slightly, growing frustrated. “I’m sorry. I know it doesn’t make any sense. There were these feelings I had in the dream, feelings of darkness. I can’t remember exactly, but I think I saw a glimpse into a different world, a world so strange that if I stared at it too long I would go mad. That’s when I woke up.”
Esmerelda was trembling now.
Jed moved closer to her. He put his arm around her and it seemed to calm her down a little. “It was just a dream,” he told her, not knowing what else to say.
She nodded.
“How about that cup of coffee now?” he asked her.
Again, she nodded.
Jed got up and walked to the stove. He grabbed a ceramic cup and poured some coffee for her. He brought it back and set it down in front of her.
“Thank you,” she whispered and took a sip.
Jed sat back down in his chair, the wood creaking a little from his weight. “Who’s Purvis?”
Esmerelda smiled. “Oh, that was a few years ago.”
Jed waited—all they had right now was time.
“I grew up in Philadelphia,” she told him.
“I figured you were from back east.”
She nodded. “My mother died when I was very young. I barely remember her. According to my father, my mother was a medium and she could contact the spirits. He saw that same ability in me when I was a child, and he decided to profit off of it like he had done with my mother. We went from town to town, up and down the east coast. My father charged a pretty hefty fee for my services.”
Esmerelda paused for a moment like the rest of her story was difficult to tell. “I couldn’t always just summon my powers at will. After a few embarrassing séances, my father beat me. He never touched my face or hands, only places where the ‘rubes,’ as he liked to call them, couldn’t see my bruises. He told me that if I couldn’t see the rubes’ dead relatives, then I needed to learn how to make things up. Over the next few years I became adept at questioning the rubes and deciphering the clues they unknowingly gave me. Most times, if the questions were just right, the rubes would tell me everything I needed to know. I would ask a leading question and they would give me the answers that I needed.”
“But sometimes you could really contact the dead,” Jed said.
Esmerelda shrugged. “Sometimes. Not as often as my father would’ve liked or as much as he professed to people.”
“When you do contact the dead,” Jed started, and then his throat closed up a little. “What do they say to you?”
Esmerelda stared at him. “Clara.”
He nodded. “My wife. She di
ed five years ago. She got sick for a few weeks. It got harder and harder for her to breathe. I . . . I tried everything I could think of. The doc tried everything. I was ready to haul her in the wagon up to Denver or down to Santa Fe if I needed to, anywhere where someone might know how to save her.”
“I’m sorry,” Esmerelda whispered.
“We never had any children. We always wanted children, especially Clara, but we just never did.” He took another sip of his coffee. “I used to be a god-fearing man. Used to believe. After Clara died . . .” He let his words hang in the cold air. “But now. After the things I’ve seen these last few days, there must be something.”
“There is,” she told him. She touched his hand, laying her small hand over his big one, her smooth skin touching his rough skin, her pale flesh contrasting his tanned flesh.
The touch from her felt good, and Jed was quiet again. He found it difficult to articulate what he wanted to say, that he had turned his back on God, on any supernatural things in the world. He realized now that he had been traveling through the world blind these last five years, blinded from reality by his grief and anger.
“The dead come to me from the light,” Esmerelda said as she pulled her hand away from his.
Jed stared at her.
“They’re in a good place,” she told him with a smile. There were unshed tears forming in her eyes. “There’s this feeling around them of warmth and safety. Of happiness. They want to see their families again, their loved ones, but they know that they will be with them soon enough.”
Jed was tempted to ask Esmerelda to contact Clara, but she just said that her powers were blocked right now. It made him feel good that the spirits she contacted were in a happy and safe place; it gave him an odd sense of hope that he might see Clara again in that place.
“Was Purvis your father?” Jed asked.
“No. I left my father when I was eighteen years old. He was getting more and more abusive. Drinking more—among his many other bad habits. He threatened to kill me if I ever left him, but I went far enough away so that he could never find me. My father controlled all of the money we made, but I managed to save up some over the years, hiding my stash until I had enough to leave. I’m sure it angered him that his source of income had abandoned him. I’m sure it also scared him, and I relished that fact. I could imagine him riding from place to place, asking everyone about me, his mind frantic as he wondered where the money was going to come from now, the money that he’d never bothered to save, the money that he had squandered on card games and prostitutes and drinking. Nothing left to show for it.”