Power in the Blood

by Greg Matthews

  Not a single hand was raised. Judge Poudre turned to Clay. “I believe you just now got yourself one tough job.”

  He was officially made marshal that afternoon. As the badge was pinned to his chest, Clay experienced a sentimental twinge, and had to remind himself that no one witnessing the ceremony in Judge Poudre’s chambers would be so warm toward him if they knew of his past effort at law enforcement in Kansas, and the manner in which it had ended. His name apparently had not spread as far west as Arizona, and the job he wanted most had been handed to him like a birthday gift. It brought a momentary lump to his throat, and an urge to look over his shoulder. He had been accepted instantly by the citizens of Dry Wash, and he would not let them down.

  “Thank you,” was all he could say when invited to give an acceptance speech. “Thank you all.…”

  His first official act as marshal was to visit the cells and inquire of the only occupant if he was being treated well.

  “Well enough,” Maxwell admitted. “So you’re the boss here now. It was me that got you the job. They wouldn’t have been so fired up if you didn’t help put me where I am. Ironic, isn’t it.”

  “It’s a peculiar world sometimes.”

  “I, who take away pain and decay, will die two days from now, while you, who specialize in death, have been given a county-paid job for as long as you want it. There’s more than irony here.”

  “Maybe. I’m no philosopher. You never should’ve left me like that, Maxwell, with blood running down my neck. If it had’ve gone back down my throat I’d likely have choked. I don’t believe you’re evil, but you’re a menace to folks. How much of your stuff did you give that little girl anyway?”

  “The standard amount for someone of her years. I tried to explain that some people, maybe one in a million, have an allergic reaction to chemicals. It’s impossible to say who, until it’s too late. I was by no means careless.”

  “But you ran out on her, just like you did me. Did you think I was a goner too?”

  “I simply had a train to catch.”

  “Well, now you’ve got another kind of schedule to keep.”

  “Thank you so much for reminding me.”

  “Pleasure’s all mine. Care to place your order now?”

  “Order?”

  “Last meal. I’m a believer in tradition.”

  Maxwell pursed his lips in thought. “Pork chops.”

  “I’ll see if we can’t rustle some up. Need a Bible or anything?”

  “I have never believed a word of it.”

  “Me neither.”

  Maxwell and Clay held a number of stimulating conversations over the next forty-eight hours, and Clay began to regret the need to stretch the dentist’s neck; this was one of the most intelligent men he had met. He could do nothing, of course, since he had contributed to Maxwell’s conviction, and that conviction had been in part responsible for Clay’s new job, as Maxwell himself had pointed out. The dentist exonerated Clay for what was to come, understanding the position of his ex-patient with a breadth of forgiveness Clay found nothing less than remarkable.

  “I’ve decided to approach my death from an experimental point of view, Dugan.”

  “How so?”

  “In the morning, I’ll find out one way or the other if there is indeed an afterlife.”

  “I thought you didn’t believe in the Bible.”

  “That book has nothing to do with it. Civilizations that preceded Christianity, and those without its dubious benefits, all agree that after this thing we call life, there is existence of another kind. It will be most interesting to discover what shape it assumes, if there be such a place.”

  “I’m kind of curious myself about what there might or might not be once a man dies. I met with a feller one time, he believed he could prove the soul leaves the body just after death. He had a special beam balance that could measure the difference before and after, he said. I don’t think that’s likely, though, do you?”

  “I couldn’t venture an opinion without examining the device beforehand.”

  “Guess not. Well, can I get you anything for tonight? Your pork chops are all set by for breakfast.”

  “I … well, I hesitate to ask this of you, Dugan, but since you’re clearly not a churchgoing man, I’ll speak my mind. I believe I have a right to do that, as one of the condemned.”

  “You surely do. Spit it out.”

  “Is there any chance you might arrange the presence of a young lady of attractive appearance to share my last hours with me? Dry Wash is a big enough town to have at least one house of ill repute, is it not? I do so like young ladies, Dugan, and frankly, it’s been quite some time since I enjoyed the feel of female flesh. Do I shock you?”

  “No. I’ll see what I can do.”

  Clay went to the house of Judge Poudre and consulted with him in the drawing room, once the judge’s wife had departed, leaving behind coffee and brandy.

  “I appreciate the man’s request,” said the judge, when Clay had explained the purpose of his visit. “I can give you a name, but you better be sure and not let any of this reach anyone’s ears but mine. Tell the girl you’ll go hard on her too, if she breathes a word.”

  “I don’t like to threaten women.”

  “With whores it’s different. She’ll do it and stay quiet, if I’m any judge.… Ha ha! Hear that, Clay? Any judge! Well, she’s a smart girl, smarter than most whores, so I guess you’ll just need to ask her nice, that’s all. Go on down to Willow Street, second to last house on the left, got a fair-sized chinaberry tree in front. Madge is her name. Lives with her old crippled-up mama. Madge looks after her pretty good, so even the women hereabouts that know what she does don’t get too snippy about her. Go see Madge, and put the bill onto something like feed for your horses, or ammunition, or some such.”

  “Thank you.”

  Clay strolled to the address given and knocked on the door, thankful that the house was separated from its nearest neighbors by a broad front yard and moonless darkness. The door opened, and he was beckoned inside without hesitation.

  “Good evening, Marshal Dugan.”

  She closed the door and invited him to take a seat in the tiny parlor. Madge was in her mid-thirties, dark-haired and round of face and form. Clay was ill at ease to be confronting a whore under such unusual circumstances. He tended to include whores alongside others of the criminal class.

  “Miss, uh, Madge, I have a request from someone that requires your, uh, company.”

  “You may call me Miss Clifton if it makes you uncomfortable to address me by name, Marshal.”

  “Thank you. Uh, Miss Clifton, there’s a man in jail right now, you probably heard, and tomorrow he’ll be hanged by the neck. Well, he wants some … female company tonight, if that’d be all right with you. There’s no obligation on your part, understand, but I did tell him I’d find out if there’s an agreeable party to do what he wants.”

  “I would be most happy to accommodate the gentleman, Marshal. I was not present at the trial. Is he a young man, or old?”

  “He’d be about twenty-nine, thirty, maybe younger.”

  “I see. Please allow me a moment to inform my mother I’ll be gone for some time.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Madge returned to the parlor after just a few minutes, a shawl around her shoulders. “If you depart now, Marshal, I’ll follow along presently.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  He stood and reached for his hat.

  “I really would prefer Madge.”

  “Madge …”

  “And may I call you Clay when we’re face-to-face, Marshal, or would that be considered too familiar?”

  “That’s … fine.”

  “Should I enter the jail through the courthouse door or through the marshal’s office door? They are all connected, are they not?”

  “Connected, that’s right … Better use the marshal’s door.”

  Clay hurried out of Madge’s home and returned to the jai
l to inform Maxwell of his good fortune.

  “Is she attractive, Dugan? It’s important.”

  “She’s a nice-looking lady.”

  “Would you consider making the two-backed beast with her yourself, is what I’m asking.”

  “I don’t go with whores, Maxwell.”

  “But if she were not?”

  “I’d consider it, yes.”

  “Good. You’ll leave us our privacy, I hope.”

  “I’ll do that.”

  He heard the front door open and close, and went out to the office, where Madge Clifton was shedding her shawl. Clay jerked his thumb to indicate the route she should take to reach her client, and she nodded, smiling, and went through to the cells. Clay shut and locked the door behind her. He should have searched her first for weapons, but it was too late by then. If Madge was part of an elaborate plot to spring Maxwell from jail, then Clay would just have to be on the alert for whatever happened.

  He took a seat behind his desk, a nicer desk than he had had in Keyhoe, and waited for whatever might follow. He had not thought to ask how long Madge was required to stay. Maxwell might want her to remain till dawn, which would be riskier than if she did her business with him and then went home again. The whole thing could be transacted within a half hour at most, by Clay’s calculation. He busied himself cleaning his shotgun, and the assortment of rifles and small arms that came with the job. He guessed he would stick with his tried and true sawed-off, but the other weapons were in need of cleaning anyway. Clay took his work seriously.

  While he cleaned and polished, he heard Maxwell moaning on the far side of the door to the cells, and saw his own hand shake as it hesitated over the barrel of a .45. Clay made himself continue his work as the sounds became more anguished before ceasing. Clay was glad of the silence, and began cleaning all the guns a second time. Then the sounds began again, and he flung down his rags and oils to jam his hat down on his head and leave the office for the streets of Dry Wash, which were quieter at that late hour than his office.

  Maxwell’s noise had reminded him of the things he used to do with Sophie, his wife. Clay had not touched a woman since riding away from Keyhoe; he regarded it as part of his punishment for having killed his boy, no matter how well-reasoned the motives for that singular act. Punishment was called for, in a moral universe, and Clay was willing to submit, and had done so for all those years. Now the ecstasy of a man who would die come morning had upset his notion of what his life should be. Silan had departed the world four years before, and Clay had been celibate for that long. Maxwell had spoiled everything with his shameless caterwauling. Now Clay had to begin all over again. It was no help to him whatsoever that Madge Clifton was a nice woman whom he would like to talk with some more, and inquire after the health of her mother. No, he admitted with an inward curse, he wanted to discuss more than that with her. He wanted to ask her if she would let down her hair and pop her corset hooks and place her breasts in his hands. That was what he wanted from Madge Clifton, and Clay was mortified that the monkish existence he had followed for so long should have collapsed around him so quickly, with so little encouragement.

  It had been the simple act of talking with her. If he had done no more than pass her in the street, Clay knew he would not have become so enraptured by her. It was the talking, and what he could not understand was, she was a whore. How could he have allowed himself to become so upset and foolish and lovesick over a woman who allowed men to paw her for cash. He pictured them pawing her, and was obliged to lean against a wall to recover his balance. They should not do that, those nameless, faceless men. She should not allow it. Clay should not allow it. There should be no whores in the world, no whores and no whoremongers. It was not fit behavior for humans of good intent.… They should all stop!

  He shifted himself from the wall and entered the nearest bar. Greeted by the bartender, he said simply, “Bottle.” Given what he wanted, he found a corner in which to drink. Seating himself, Clay realized he had left his sawed-off behind on his desk. He had never done that before. What was the matter with him? He poured himself a drink and tossed it down. He had better not do anything wrong in Dry Wash, better mind his business and do his job and not set foot off the path of righteousness, or all the devils from his past would come riding down from the sky to mock him in front of the entire community, tear his clothes from his body and cover him with scorn, and he would be powerless, unable to drive them off, those devils swarming around him. He drank again, shaking like a man with fever, felt the whiskey coiling down into his guts like a hot snake, and wanted for a moment to vomit over the table, turn himself inside out like a glove soiled from within by sweat. He was an impostor, but the people of Dry Wash had accepted him as some kind of savior. They must never know anything, or he would be driven out, banished again to the deserts and the mountains and the endless blue emptiness pressing down upon it all. He could not do that, had no wish to be wandering again. Two days in this town, wearing a cheap tin badge, and he was caught up once more in the business of working steadily for wages. There was nothing wrong with that, he told himself, but all thoughts of Madge Clifton would have to be erased from his mind. She was a person who lived in the same town, nothing more. A whore. He would learn to despise her. It would be easy.

  He drank again, and again, until half the bottle was gone, before becoming aware that the clientele were staring at him. If he wished to avoid a reputation as a drinking man, he had to stop. Clay stood and walked in a straight line to the bar. He handed the bartender his bottle and said, “Put my name on that.” Clay was aware of every eye as he left. The night outside was like a welcoming blanket.

  By the time he returned to the office he was staggering. He had left the door unlocked, an assortment of oiled weaponry on the desk for anyone to steal. He was ashamed to have done that. He was not himself. Tomorrow he would be the person he was supposed to be, and everything would be all right.

  “Marshal Dugan?”

  He turned to the cell room door. A face was looking at him from the small barred window there.

  “You have locked me in here, Marshal.”

  “Oh … Miss Clifton … I’m sorry as hell. I didn’t mean to … Wait now, where’s the keys …?”

  “They’re on the peg over there.”

  “Peg … Yes, ma’am.”

  He fetched them and fumbled to insert the correct key, then yanked the door open to let her out.

  “I didn’t mean to, I really didn’t, just walked out and left you there without thinking.”

  “No harm done. Dr. Maxwell is asleep.”

  “Well, fine … fine. I expect you’ll need payment.”

  “Not right this minute, Mr. Dugan. You may bring me the money at any time. I trust you.”

  “That’s … how much?”

  “Dr. Maxwell is a condemned man. I couldn’t accept more than five dollars. I only request that because I have a sick mother to tend, Mr. Dugan. She needs medicine. It sounds like a very sad plot in some play, don’t you think?”

  “I wouldn’t know, ma’am.”

  “Please call me Madge. Good night.”

  “’Night. Will you be needing someone to walk you home?”

  “I know the way, thank you.”

  “Just asking.”

  “Thank you anyway.”

  She left, winding the shawl around herself. It was a green shawl, with many tassels, a fine and wonderful shawl. Clay wished he could have given it to her for a present, but she already had it. He was thinking like a fool, an idiot, and behaving like one too. It had to stop. He stepped through to the cells and watched Maxwell sleeping on his bunk. How could the man do that when he had only a few more hours to live? Clay felt he understood nothing about life, or death either. He had killed many men, yet had no idea where he had sent them, or how they had felt as the thing called living was taken from them and became the thing called dying, then the thing called death. He knew nothing. Dismayed by his own ignorance, Clay dragged him
self upstairs to the quarters he was obliged to occupy whenever there was someone in the cells, then dragged himself downstairs again in his long johns to lock the front door. He would never go back to claim the other half of that bottle in the saloon. Lurching toward his bed, he pictured Madge Clifton drinking wine. Clay had never drunk wine, nor known anyone who had.

  Maxwell was prepared for the hanging. Clay could not help but admire the man’s calm demeanor as he ate his pork chops with a side dish of hashed browns. He wanted to ask Maxwell many things, among them his opinion of the woman with whom he had shared part of his final night of life, but that subject would not have been proper, even between men. He paced the office and fretted about things, and shouted at the preacher who came to comfort the prisoner, then apologized.

  “Sorry, Reverend, but he’s an atheist, he told me so himself. Excuse me for being rude like that. This is the first time I’ve had to be responsible for hanging a man.”

  “That is Mr. Quick’s concern, Marshal, not yours. I should like to speak with Mr. Maxwell anyway, if you please.”

  “Dr. Maxwell, not mister. He’s a genuine dentist.”

  “And a Christian beneath his atheistic pose, I’m sure.”

  “Oh, you are? Step right on through, Reverend.” They went to the cells. “Dr. Maxwell? Got a man here insists you want to see him this morning.”

  Clay lingered by the door to listen while Maxwell informed the preacher he was a lowly toad, a pimple on the buttock of a creature called superstition, a purveyor of knowledge without foundation in fact, and an unoriginal thinker masquerading as the conscience of the community.

  “Told you,” said Clay as the preacher departed.

  “Allow no one else in here, please,” Maxwell said.

  “All right.”

  “Incidentally, how have your false teeth served you, Dugan? I ask out of professional curiosity.”

  “They’re fine, once you get used to them. It took a while.”

  “I’m gratified. What time is it?”

  “Coming up to eight forty-nine.”

  “I have one hour and eleven minutes left to me. Dugan, please leave me alone for the time remaining.”