by Jasper Bark
Bart put a cut throat razor to the bottom of James’ beard. “D’you swear by yer whiskers, not to lie nor feed us any bull?” Tom swallowed. “Sure do,” he said with a dry throat. Bart pushed Tom towards Big Bill and he fell at his feet. Bill leaned forward in his large leather chair.
“The witness has been sworn in,” said Clem. “So let’s hear his testimony.”
Tom got to his feet and cleared his throat. “Well, if it please the court,” he said. He glanced nervously at Bill. His expression froze into terror and pain at the deafening discharge of the Colt in Big Bill’s hand. A single trickle of blood ran from the hole in Tom’s forehead as the back of his head exploded.
“Aww Christ!” said Billy Williams jumping with pain as the bullet that passed through Tom, clipped his shoulder. Tom’s brains were dripping from Billy’s beard.
“Well,” said Clem. “I guess the case for the defense rests.”
“Yeah,” called a voice from the back. “Rests all over Billy Williams.” Everyone laughed at this, apart from Billy, who scowled and picked the bloody, pink globs from his whiskers.
“Quiet!” roared Big Bill and the laughter died in everyone’s throat. “This ain’t no laughing matter.” The whole bar looked solemn as Bart dragged Tom’s corpse out back to be burned.
Clem watched Big Bill eye Charlie, a thin, weasley guy with a straggly beard and a lazy eye, who was trussed up to a chair in front of Bill. “Ya got anythin’ to say ‘fore I pass sentence?” said Bill.
“Damn right I do,” said Charlie. “How come I’m the only one up here, on trial. What about that bastard injun huh?”
“Rivers Flow?” said Bill. “Don’t worry, I fixed him good.”
Big Bill had fixed him alright. Clem had seen to it. He’d ordered the men at the ranch to butcher the injun’s two boys, the ones Rivers Flow had with the young Mexican widow he took in.
Nothing came in or out of Dead Scalp without passing through the old injun’s hands. This was the first time in four decades he’d been caught doing something behind Big Bill’s back.
Big Bill needed Rivers Flow alive, but he had to learn he couldn’t cross Big Bill. Charlie didn’t have a hope.
“What about Nat then?” Charlie whined. “How come you ain’t tried him?”
“Cos Nat admitted everything and you didn’t, Charlie,” said Bill. “You lied to me. Nat knew the game was up and he came clean. Turned evidence agin you. Told us how the whole set up was your idea.”
Charlie struggled and strained to turn his head in Nat’s direction. “Why you two faced, mother fucking son of a rattle snake! Why’d you go and double cross me? You know it wasn’t all my idea at all. Lemme outta these ropes and I’ll show you whose idea it was. I’ll beat the truth outta the rat bastard.”
“Already been done,” said Big Bill. Nat, a short feller whose hair and beard were jet black, sunk low in his chair and winced from the bruises he was hiding. He was about the only feller in Dead Scalp who looked more weasley than Charlie.
“So that’s it then,” said Charlie. “You’re gonna string me up and hang me out to dry, is that it?”
“Nope,” said Bill. “We ain’t gonna string you up.”
“You’re... you’re gonna let me go?”
“I’m gonna make an example of you. The court hereby sentences you to death by ingrowing.”
Charlie’s eyes bugged and his jaw dropped. Most people in the room caught their breath. Clem had a cold sinking feeling in his gut and the temperature in the bar seemed to plummet. “What?” said Charlie. “You’re joking ain’t ya?”
“Do I look as though I’m joking?”
“Look Bill, I fucked up, I admit that. So just hang me, okay. Shoot me, slit my throat if ya must but not that, please... not that.”
“Sorry, Charlie,” said Bill standing and walking to the bar. “But I gotta make an example of ya.” Bill reached behind the bar and pulled out a pot of glue and Charlie’s wanted poster. Clem could see the looks of terror on just about every face in the saloon. As Bill tacked the poster up, next to the other five behind the bar, Clem took his chance. He walked up to Bill and leaned in.
“Are you sure this is for the best, Bill?” said Clem, in hushed tones. “I mean, you know what happened last time. Is it worth the risk?”
Bill scowled at him. “The swamp root tonic is our biggest money making operation, and it’s legit. I don’t care what happened last time. I’m risking a lot more if I don’t set a precedent here. Now go hold Charlie’s head!”
Clem knew better than to question Bill twice. He walked round back of Charlie and grabbed his head as Bill approached with a razor. Charlie was shaking and fighting his bonds, trying to turn his head away from the razor. “Please Bill, please... it’s me... Charlie. How long did we ride together, Bill? Please, just hang me. Hell, I’ll even climb up on the scaffold and jump my goddamn self.”
Bill took hold of one side of Charlie’s mustache and sliced it clean off with the razor, making sure to leave no stubble. Charlie let out a shrill scream as the hair came off. Clem hadn’t heard anything so high pitched since that little girl whose mother they shot, back in ‘68. Charlie was jerking his head about so much in Clem’s grip, that Bill nearly cut through his top lip taking off the other part of the mustache.
“Fuck’s sake, Clem,” said Bill. Clem just gritted his teeth as Bill returned to the bar, took a big dollop of glue and stuck both sides of the mustache to Charlie’s photograph on the wanted poster.
Charlie continued to scream as Bart dragged him off, still tied to the chair. The veins in Charlie’s neck were throbbing and his eyes were darting wildly about the room. “For God’s sake,” he shrieked. “Somebody shoot me, please just fucking shoot me. Why won’t anybody shoot me?”
“Wouldn’t make any difference now,” said Bart and disappeared into the back room with him.
The men in the bar got to their feet and started to shuffle out. Nobody caught anyone else’s eye. They were all intent on getting home and locking themselves in.
Clem watched Bill as everyone filed out. He stood with his back to them all, staring up at the six posters behind the bar. Each one had a real mustache stuck to it.
CHAPTER 2
James Briggs wiped the blood from his knife and sheathed it.
The hare at his feet was beginning to shimmer. It was sliced perfectly in half, with all its innards carefully arranged around it. Even the skull was cleaved in two, so you could see the tiny brain inside.
James thought the shimmer was a heat haze at first, but neither the sunbaked ground, nor the hare’s innards, were hot enough to give off such a haze. The little pebbles, arranged in arcane symbols around the hare’s carcass, began to rattle and shake.
The shimmer got much bigger and moved up into the air above the hare. It hurt James’s eyes to look as it rose, like a column, over the hare. As it grew, the shimmering reminded James of long strands of transparent hair, vibrating so fast he couldn’t focus on them properly. He had to keep looking away because his mind couldn’t accept what he was seeing.
When the long shimmering strands had risen to about ten feet in the air, they started to part, like a pair of curtains. As they parted they made a shape like a button hole. The more James looked at it, the more it reminded him of a pair of cunny lips. James chuckled to himself. Ain’t never been a cunny I wanted to get into this bad, he thought.
As the center of the shimmering parted further, James could see a place beyond. A place that wasn’t anything like the plateau where he was currently standing. James found it easier to look at the place than the shimmering. Even still, it was disconcerting.
The shimmering pulled back even more and James could see two figures on horseback waiting in the place beyond. Must be the welcoming committee, he thought.
One of the guys was real big, with a long black beard and a huge belly, the black mare he rode was doing all it could to bear his weight. The other feller, on a palomino stallion, was shorter and h
ad a thin wiry body, with the longest sandy colored beard John had ever seen. He decided right away that the shorter guy was the more dangerous of the two.
“Howdy,” said the shorter guy. “You go by the name of James Briggs?”
“Who wants to know?”
“My name’s Clem Sorrel, this ornery looking feller here is Bart Sommers. Rivers Flow tells me you’re looking for safe passage?”
“Got most of Arizona on my tail,” said James. “Can’t make it to the Mexican border from here, so I need a place to lay low.”
“Well we might be able to help you there. Course, there’s a few things we’re gonna need from you first.”
“Yeah I heard about that.” James reached into the saddle bag at his feet and pulled out a folded sheet of paper. He unfolded it and held it up for Clem and Bart to see. “This here’s my ‘Wanted’ poster, with the five hundred dollar reward and everything. Got my photo on it, right here. Looking real purty ain’t I?”
“Tie it round a rock and toss it through the portal here,” Clem told him. James complied. Bart caught the package and took the poster off the rock. “I guess it looks like him,” he said. “You got the money?”
James held up the saddle bag. “Ten thousand in silver dollars, right here.”
“Toss it on through then.”
“Reckon I’ll just hold onto it till you let me in. Not that I don’t trust you fellers or nothing, but I ain’t no fool neither.”
“Okay,” said Clem. “Open up the bag and show us the cash.” James unbuckled the saddle bag and showed them the contents. “You reckon that’s ten grand?” said Bart.
“And a little to spare.”
James smiled. “Well I reckoned I might need a little spending money.”
“Where’s Rivers Flow?” said Bart. “I don’t see the ol’ cuss.”
“He went behind that boulder over yonder.”
“Why’d he do that?”
“I don’t know, you’d have to ask him.”
Bart ran a hand through his beard. “I don’t like it. The injun usually handles the whole exchange. Why ain’t he here to do that now?”
“The portal’s open ain’t it?” said Clem. “Only Rivers Flow can do that.”
“So why did he light out?”
“Considering what we just done to his sons, can you blame him? Would you want to face us after that?”
“He brought that on himself. If he loved those boys so much why’d he give ‘em such stupid names?”
“Sun Shines and Grass Grows? Guess he had a sense o’ humor.”
“Well, I don’t like it. ‘Less that injun shows, I ain’t lettin’ this guy in.”
“Why not? He showed us his poster, we know the law’s after him. He’s got the money. What’s the difference?”
“What makes you all fired up to let him in? You know this guy?”
“No, but I’m a little light at the moment. Maybe I could do with the transporter’s fee I get for bringing him in.”
“You should spend less time at those card tables.”
“Well I’ll be sure and take that advice under consideration. Soon as I get my fee.”
“If you two lovebirds have finished with your little tiff,” said James, “could you see your way clear to finishing up our little transaction?”
“You watch your mouth, mister,” said Bart and reached for his pistol. Clem put a warning hand on Bart’s chest. “Don’t be a fool!” He turned back to James. “Portal closes up in a few moments, so you’d be advised to make your way through as best you can. I ought to warn you though. Once you step foot in here, you can’t leave, not ever.”
“Ain’t got nothing holding me here,” said James. “I’d just as soon never see Arizona again.”
He slung the saddle bag over his shoulder and reached out to the edge of the portal. As soon as his hand came into contact with the shimmering, a force shot up his arm and tore through his body. Every part of him vibrated, his muscles spasmed and went into convulsions. He yanked his hand away before he bit his tongue off.
Bart laughed. “Oh yeah, should’ve mentioned, don’t touch the edges none or you’ll regret it.”
James nodded. “Thanks for the advice.” The edges of the portal were beginning to come together and the space James had to get through was getting smaller by the second.
“Best hurry up now,” said Clem. “You don’t have much time left.”
James took a few steps back, then took a running jump at the portal. He leapt, head first at the space between the shimmering columns. It was like jumping between the ripples in the surface of a lake. He cleared the closing portal but his right foot caught the shimmering edge. The intense vibrations tore up his right side and his body jerked violently. He landed badly, still twitching. His left shoulder ached and his chest was bruised from landing on the saddle bag.
Bart laughed as James got to his feet and picked up his saddle bag. The first thing that struck James about his new surroundings was how still they were. There was no movement of any sort, except for the two men and their horses.
In the plateau James had just left, there had been an intermittent breeze blowing from across the plains. Flies buzzed and birds circled beneath the slow moving clouds over head. Here the air felt stagnant. James couldn’t breathe enough to fill his lungs. There was no depth of sound. It was like listening under water. Everything seemed frozen and unending. It was as though he were in a perpetual dream state.
James was just getting used to the new sensations when he heard the click-click of a hammer being pulled back. Bart was holding a pistol on him. It was an old model Colt from around 1860. Everything about the two men was antiquated. Their weapons, their clothes, the way they acted.
“Reckon I’ll have that saddle bag,” Bart said. He had the drop on James, there was little chance of him missing at this range. James didn’t move.
“You can have the ten grand in silver dollars as we agreed.”
“Nope, I think I’ll take it all. Then leave ya to walk back to town.” Bart pointed behind him. “It’s two miles south.”
“You get a fee for bringing me in, your man Clem just said. You don’t need any more from me.”
“We got overheads to cover. Your fee just went up. Now hand it over.”
James held out the saddle bag with his left arm and slowly approached Bart. When he was four steps away he dropped onto one knee and, using the saddle bag to shield himself, reached for his knife. It was out its sheath and hurtling towards Bart before the big galoot had a chance to react.
Bart yelled as the knife went right through his wrist. He let off a shot involuntarily. Blood poured down his hand. Bart’s mare panicked at the noise and James took the opportunity to charge Bart.
James pulled Bart’s right foot out of the stirrup and pushed him out of the saddle. Bart swore and hit the dirt. Taking a chance, James rolled under the rearing mare and sprang on Bart, who was lying on his back. He brought his knee down on Bart’s chest and was glad to hear a rib crack.
Bart, who stank real bad up close, winced with the pain. He tried a right hook on James who blocked it and pulled the knife out of Bart’s wrist. He put the tip of the knife to the corner of Bart’s right eye.
James heard another click and felt the cold steel of a rifle barrel at the base of his neck. “Now just a minute there, pardner,” he heard Clem say. “We don’t look too kindly on killing around these parts. It brings... well let’s just call it—unwanted consequences. So why don’t you just put that knife away.”
“Why don’t you put that rifle away?”
“Well now, I’m the one with the drop on you, so I don’t reckon you should be telling me what to do.”
“No? You’re the one told me killing has unwanted consequences. So I don’t think you’re aiming to shoot. Whereas me, on the other hand, I just had someone try to rob me. So I’m willing to take those consequences if it means keeping my cash. So why don’t you lower that rifle and I’ll spare this sumbitc
h’s life?”
James felt the rifle barrel leave his neck. He climbed carefully off Bart with his knife held out in front, in case Bart tried something. James grabbed his saddle bag and Bart’s pistol. He took the reins of Bart’s mare, calmed it and climbed into the saddle. “I ain’t the one who’s gonna walk back to town,” he said to Clem. “You got a problem with that?”
Clem just smiled. “See you back at town, Bart,” he called over his shoulder as he rode off.
“Fuck you,” said Bart as he dusted himself down.
* * *
“So how long’ve you been here?” James said, riding up alongside Clem and scratching his chin. His stubble was growing at a rapid pace.
“Around forty years now,” said Clem.
“Forty years, are you sure? You don’t look a day over thirty, even with the beard.”
“Physically I’m twenty nine, but I’ve lived for sixty nine years.”
“I don’t follow you?”
“That’s the effect Dead Scalp has on you. You don’t age, you don’t fall sick, so long as you ain’t fool enough to get yourself killed, you could live forever.”
“Forever?
“If you’ve a mind to.”
“Oh, I’ve a mind to alright.”
“Well you just made an enemy of one o’ the most dangerous sumbitches in these parts. I’d be careful if I was you.”
“He don’t scare me none. I can handle myself.”
“You can handle yourself alright, I’ll give you that.”
“So what’s with the long beards then? Does everyone round these parts have one?”
“Yep, hair’s about the only thing that grows here. Don’t have no trees, nor plants, all we got’s our locks and our beards.”
“Well I’m aiming to visit the barber soon as we get to town.”
“Don’t have no barbers in Dead Scalp. Nobody shaves nor cuts their hair. You’d be advised not to yourself.”
“Let me guess, it has certain consequences.”
“Damn right it does.”
They came to the head of a bluff. Below them, on a level plain, sat the ramshackle town of Dead Scalp. A rough collection of wooden buildings and unpaved streets.