Redemption's Blood

by Chris G R Webb

  “What you planning on? Gunning down Harley like a dog?”

  Jensen prods the rank cloth in deep. He stands up and looks down on Tunstall. He draws his Bowie knife. It's finely honed nine-inch blade that whispers hush against its harness, as steel strokes leather.

  “No.” Jensen retorts.

  As Jensen leaves, he snatches a bottle of whiskey from the side and pries it open with the blade.

  A gaol cell is a place for reflection and respite from the hardship of life's toils. Winston knew he was soon to be released, that him being incarceration was just for show. He knew the people of Dunston needed to see someone held accountable for the bank raid. He also knew Tyler Devon, and the boys couldn't just ride back into town. On his return to Keystone mine, they’d sure as-you-like throw a hog-killing time, for their pal Winston. So right now, he did the only thing he could do, sleep.

  In his sleep Winston never heard the fumbling of iron against iron, or the clunk of an unlocking cell door. He didn’t feel a broad, long hand wrap around his ankle, not until its grip clenched like a blacksmith’s vice.

  The following seconds of disorientation as he’s dragged by his ankle to the floor, are accompanied by the sharp pain of what felt like knuckled hoof crashing into the kidneys. Gasping for air, yet betrayed by his lungs, Winston rolled over flailing his arms, as a means to stop any more harm coming his way. All he saw was that old man who came by earlier, clean shaven and armed to the hilt, bearing down on him. This old man, snatches Winston’s arms out the way, rolling him back to his side.

  “We gonna talk.”

  Harley’s last moment of consciousness is punctuated by a fleshy sledgehammered hand, ramming home against his cheek. CRACK - welcome to the black.

  Dunston town is a good few miles behind Jensen, as he slowly rode his Roan up through Sling Back Gorge. Knocking back the Sheriff’s cheap whiskey, he knows he’ll be found soon enough. He left the Sheriff in Harley’s cell. Dunston will be pissed. Daniels and the Pinkertons will no doubt want to take him in. As for Harley, he was draped over the mule in tow, behind his jogging horse.

  A screeching from upon high cuts through the fresh morning air. A Red Tail Hawk cuts its passage across a clear blue sky, its unfurled wings catch a waft of thermals as it waxes to the sun. Jensen watches, as his horse slows to a walk. He lifts his whiskey in salutation, in recognition of the Hawk’s freedom.

  Jensen glances back to the unconscious Harley, he speaks at Harley as a ways to pass the moment, or give it some significance.

  “It struck me that we’re just plum dumb, the further we civilise from nature, the mor's we lose our freedom." He has a single snort of an agreement, then hits the bottle again.

  “But what do I know’s about it anyway.”

  Harley’s eyes twitch and shuffle through his lids. It’s the stirrings of consciousness. It’s helped along by a hardy SLAP, from Jensen’s calloused palm.

  “Fuck.” Harley comes round.

  He glances down to see he's sat on Jensen's roan. Hands tied, and a noose around his neck, slung round a tree above him. He struggles. Jensen cuts a wad of his tobacco and offers some to Winston.

  “Easy there, easy. You don’t wan’ the only thing between you’se and the turf bolting off, now… or.” Jensen imitates a hanging by cricking his neck. “Krrriccckk.”

  “You crazy bastard, you can’t kill me. Do you know who the fuck I know?”

  Jensen looks around. "Whoever they are, they ain't here now."

  There’s a moment of silence cupped between them. Jensen jaws the wad he just cut, he adopts a more serious approach.

  “Did you charge down that boy on the edge of town?”

  “What? No… My ride got shot, as I was leaving the bank. They left me stranded.”

  Jensen carefully watches Harley for responses; he's telling the truth.

  “Right, kid, you’re ‘alf way home. Nearly free… …Who’d ya ride with?”

  Jensen takes out a note pad and pencil. He locks a granite stare with Harley, Harley feels the guttural punch of intent behind Jensen’s words.

  “I need to find who killed the boy.”

  “Was he your son or sumin’?” Jensen doesn’t answer. Winston continues “I ain’t saying shit.”

  Jensen spits brown juice down Harley’s leg.

  "You can spittoon me all day; I ain't saying shit." Jensen takes the horse and starts to lead her away. "What the fuck. If you kill me, they'll come after you. They'll hunt you down" Harley is in full on panic, as he starts to slide from the saddle. "Stop. Stop!" Jensen doesn't "Okay. Okay. Bedford Tannon."

  Jensen backs the horse up a touch. He starts to write down names.

  Beadfurd Tanone

  Jensen nods, go on.

  Harley responds, Jensen writes down each name, as he walks off.

  “Morgan Sandhill… …Graden White… …Two brothers Ben and Clyde, er, um, Jameson… …An’ Tyler Devon hisself.”

  Jensen in a distant focus, scribes down each name as he strides to a ridge, with a view of Sling Back Gorge. There are no dust-devils in the distance, no birds bursting out the brush. He figures they’re not onto him yet. He can let this Harley fella go and chase down these names on the list. Make someone pay, or get them to hand themselves in, or something. Jensen wasn’t exactly sure, what comes next, but the names were a good start.

  Jensen keeps his eyes on the horizon.

  "They ain't never gonna find out. I'll leave the mule; you can ride back to town. You can even make out like you escaped. They'll think you'se the big man."

  Jensen checks the names on the list, trying to ingrain them to his mind. The beautiful roan nudges his shoulder, then chomps at the grass by his feet. Jensen in secluded rumination gently strokes the roans blue speckled white coat. Jensen stops.

  “Oh shit.” Is his mumbled response.

  He turns to Harley. Blue lipped, bulging eyes, spazm kicks, and twists, a fish out of water, as he gently spins on the hanging rope. Jensen knows that Winston is too far into death, to be alive. Jensen repeats himself.

  “Sshhit.”

  Every Friday, Mrs. Ellie Jones, would bring an apple pie to the Sheriff. Okay, Gill Tunstall was no Jay McCoy, but he was sheriff none the less. When she arrived, Gill Tunstall called out from the cells. Terrified she went straight to one of the Pinkertons, who informed the Colonel. The Colonel and his men arrived, to free the Sheriff. Beau Dunston sent Daniels off to get help. A special kind of help.

  That’s why Daniels is on his own riding up to the Black Forest. Daniels had been a career soldier, never fought for what he believed, only what he was told to believe. Joining the Union on account they seemed better equipped and more professional. He made the right choice.

  Daniels dismounts and guides his paint horse through a forest. He draws his pistol, and he checks the other pistols in his saddle. This was out of habit; he'd fought many a Missouri guerrilla, who would come under cover and hit fast and strong, to leave devastation and confusion in their wake. Like the Quantrill Raiders, that bushwhacked many a Union patrol, or civilian wagon train. The Cheyenne would help scout for the Confederates, that’s one of the reasons he had troubles with their kind. Daniels didn’t like any kind, not even his own. He understood, rank and command. As the forest thickened, he braced the horse to a tree and carried on via foot.

  The forest painted out the sun and made the day feel like a winter's night. Daniels hears a crack, like a light footfall in the brush, he turns and snaps his pistol from its holster. He's on edge. His breath, locked into his lungs; as he waits…

  …it’s nothing.

  A few hundred meters is a long way in thick undergrowth and over-hanging branches.

  Daniel's reaches his destination, a pocket of a clearing, a hut, with furs and skins hanging from its roof. To the side, a tub, smelling of a sour, acrid stench; used for tanning hide.

  Daniels watches the hut, in expectation of movement. He settles.

  Daniels didn’t have time to reac
t as he feels the heated breath of another person pressed against his ear, while the cold iron of a blade pressed against his throat. In all his years he'd never been ambushed, now the person who was looking for had found him. Daniels started to believe the rumours, that this person had been born dead and therefore is part man, part ghost and walks through both realms.

  Daniels whispers, his voice cracked with fear.

  “The Colonel has a job for you.” Daniels holds up a small purse, laden with gold.

  The blade slowly slides away from flesh; Daniels can breathe again.

  “Jesus, the man must have become sick in the mind. Partaking with the yellow peril will do that.” Colonel Beau Dunston stood in Harley's cell.

  Next to Dunston is the nervy Sheriff Tunstall and Daniels. Outside the cell are a couple of Pinkertons, smartly dressed, button down collars, tight hipped leather pants, silk double panelled string ties, with flat bowler hats and suit Jacket. Pinkertons were hired muscle, under the guise of a detective agency, former soldiers, and even criminals. Starting out of Chicago, Allan Pinkerton had created the biggest security company in the world; gunned goons for hire.

  The men all stare ground ward.

  “Colonel, sir. The Ol’man came before and was ranting ‘bout some boy, who was killed in that robbery…” Colonel Dunston’s look extinguishes that train of thought. The Sheriff buttons up.

  Dunston looks ground ward again; he's expectant.

  “Marujo?”

  Crouching, inspecting the floor, thick set, with a darkly mystical presence, is Marujo. A native American, covered in buckskin, with tassels and symbols hanging off him, his jet black locks sweeps across his face. He mumbles to himself, as an internal dialogue with the spirits bubbles out in a strange tongue.

  Marujo’s painted fingers, rods on a plate like hand, gently plucks at something unseen. He holds it up to the light. As his crest of ebony hair parts to reveal swarthy flesh, revealing a raven tattooed across his face, like a mask. The whites of his eyes rest in the bird’s unfurled wings, whites that counter in stark contrast to the soulless black pupils they moat. A raven is the symbol of magic, a mystic's totem. His magic is of death, life was given to him, and now he must consume it. Mraujo means born of a raven.

  He holds up a single wiry, grey hair, Jensen’s hair. Dunston notices the Sheriff taking a step back from Marujo. Dunston feels he should explain himself.

  "Gentlemen… This is Marujo. Damndest tracker I've seen, east or west of the Rio Grande. They say he's imbued with the dark arts, kicked him outta the savage lands for practising against their culture… God only knows what those heathens could think uncivil. He helped my unit track down Confederates, Comanche, Apache, Cheyenne, even some of his own tribe. Without him, I wouldn’t have got my two hundred scalps in a month, Kansas record, may I add.” Dunston feels he has justified this heathen’s presence, seen as he has made such an effort to keep them from settling in Dunston.

  Marujo lights a match and burns some of Jensen's hair. He breaths in the vapour. The Sheriff watches on mystified. Then Marujo places the rest of the hair strand in a hessian hex bag. The Sheriff mutters to Daniels.

  “What’s he doing?”

  Daniels shrugs. “I swear he can track a hawk’s shadow cross rock and water. Seen him do the darnedest of things, he cause a man-“

  Colonel Dunston grabs Daniel’s arm, to silence him. He fills the silence.

  “Marujo, what’s next?” Dunston asks.

  Marujo has a thousand yard stare, in a dark foreboding manner, he mumbles one word.

  “Ant’jjhnii.”

  He stands and leaves, the Pinkertons, like saloon doors swing aside for him, Daniels nods for them to follow the Native, they do.

  Beau Dunston turns to Sheriff Tunstall for a private word.

  "What are you trying to pull Sheriff? Are you pugnaciously implying that this here napping is justified, on account of a young lad?"

  “No, sir I-“

  “-Well I say that the crazy ol’ pig farmer finally snapped a spoke. I’ve seen it before. Too much drink, opium, and mixing with another kind. Remember that. Keep your mouth shut, unless spoken to, and don’t go uprooting my men.”

  Tunstall rapidly nods, showing the clarity of his understanding.

  The Colonel straightens his waist coat, and jacket and leaves. Daniels starts to follow. The Sheriff grabs Daniels, as the Colonel moves out of ear shot.

  “What did that Native say?”

  Daniels swaps an unusually unsure glance with Tunstall.

  “I’m not sure, one translation is … Devil.”

  24

  GENTLY ROLLING PLAINS that reach on, the ocean of dry green meets a spooning horizon on a cobalt yonder. Jensen's roan and mule are lightly grazing, as Jensen crouches to the earth.

  He’s making out some tracks.

  He strokes the earth as if she was trying to communicate with him. If so, he does not hear it. Jensen, still crouched, starts to roll a smoke, he talks to his roan.

  “Well, girl you got us into all kinds of shit… an’ I ain’t getting anything from here, in a bag of Sundays.” Jensen holds his hands in front of his face. “It might be I’m needing spectacles on my eyes, can’t tell if these tracks head North or Weste-“

  A true gunslinger moves then thinks, it's how they survive.

  Movement unhindered by thought, feelings, intent, is efficient - purposeful and fast. Before he can measure a response, Jensen snaps out his pistol, twirls, and points the gaping barrel ready to deal death…

  …Startling…

  …A man in a dirty pink suit, with frills, top hat, and next to him a half-man, a dwarf, dressed in loose regal clothing. Both freeze in their tracks, behind them, is the Carnival's caravans from Dunston.

  The Dwarf steps forward, he’s surprisingly calm.

  "Bonjour. I am Lord Louis De'Cart, the last bastard Prince of Lilliput. My companion here is Waylen Daly, an elixir procurer." He says in a lilt of an accent.

  Waylen throws Jensen a bottle of greenish-brown liquid, he snatches it out the air.

  Waylen, never one to miss an opportunity, hits his sales pitch, even if it is under the barrel of a gun.

  “Of the Waylen Daly miracle elixir. For what is life without… With… Ain't quite finished that pitch."

  Jensen stands, holsters his pistol and says one word.

  “…Living…” Waylen is dumbfounded. Jensen examines the bottle and motions to throw it back, but Waylen gestures – It’s yours.

  Jensen shoves the bottle in his saddle bag.

  “Ain’t right to sneak up on folk.”

  The dwarf responds “Never ones to be offending, we just saw a huddled figure and thought, perhaps you were a traveller in need of assistance.”

  "Or you're vulturing for some pickings," Jensen observes.

  "Well, if you were demised… You can't take it with you. So-"

  “-Hey, there ain’t no sham’ in appropriating a dead man’s shoes. Done it mesself many a time.”

  Lord Louis offers his hand in a friendly gesture, Jensen accepts.

  “The name’s Hills.”

  "Our little family is heading north if you're travelling the same road."

  Jensen glances back to the indistinguishable tracks. He lights the smoke he rolled. Scratches his stubbled throat, a course percussion.

  “I reckon we will ride for sum.”

  Jensen mounts his horse, as Lord Louis heads back to the caravan, Waylen stares at Jensen’s back, as he rides off. He whispers.

  “For what is life without… Living." Why didn't the heck he think of that?

  Calls from the caravan, reel him back to reality.

  Jensen is already acquainted with Waylen Daly and Lord Louis. Now Lord Louis walks Jensen’s mount and mule, along the stationary wagon train and introduces the other carnival members.

  Chasing up the rear, a fine wooden caravan, with painted walls. Jensen reads the finely composed words, over a mystical looking Indian Chief, w
ith a totem pole in the background.

  The Seer Chief Running Cloud.

  “The Chief tends to sleep as we travel.” Explained Lord Louis.

  The dwarf introduced Little Sparrow, the Chief’s daughter, a fine built, strong, Native American with a shock of blue in her eyes and a streak of steely independence. Her jet black hair is tied tight from her face, and across her lap, a rifle. She’s ready to drive the wagon. She suspiciously nods to Jensen, who tilts his hat in return.

  The next in the chain is a large long Conestoga wagon, pulled by four medium draft horses. The driver, Joseph Joseph, the strongman who’s arms are eternally exposed to the world, on account of no clothing could contend with them. He has a light beard of brown stubble, a thick jaw, wide skull, shoulders as broad as the Conestoga itself. He looked tall even when sat. In one hand are the reins, the other is wrapped around, Lynn Doll.

  Lynn had considered herself a woman since she was a young boy. It made perfect sense to her; she loved beautiful clothes, the feminine feel of well-crafted shoes, makeup, perfume. Unfortunately, a transvestite was no ways of making a wage, unless of course, you grew a beard and became the bearded lady. Lynn rests her head on Joseph Joseph's shoulder, the only man to make her feel truly feminine.

  They’re both vocal in their welcome of the new arrival, as he rides up next to them. He introduces himself as Jensen Hills. Joseph Joseph eyes Jensen as he rides on. Joseph Joseph sees the spirit of the timber wolf spark in the stranger’s eyes.

  Waylen Daly is next in tow. Behind him a simple Chuck wagon. A kitchen on wheels, ideal for a snake oil sales man to wrangle his wares.

  Finally, Jensen arrives at the front of the wagon-train, where Lord Louis mounts a large covered wagon, like climbing a rock face and seats ready to drive.

  "My daughter is in the back, hopefully doing her studies when we break for food I'll introduce you."