Seth MacFarlane's A Million Ways to Die in the West: A Novel

by Macfarlane, Seth

  “Look, I just—I really don’t know anything about you,” he said.

  “I promise I’m not a crazy psycho chick.” She smiled.

  “No, that’s not what I mean.”

  “Can I ask you something about you?”

  “Sure.”

  “Why do you love Louise?”

  An interesting thing happened then. Albert suddenly realized that the past two minutes were the very first since the breakup that Louise had not been in his thoughts. But, of course, the mention of her name brought her luminous image rushing right back to the forefront of his brain: her long, flowing blond locks, her velvety-soft skin, the big blue pools on either side of her petite nose … pools that a man could drown in …

  He had never been asked to quantify his love for Louise, nor had he ever thought to do so. It was something that needed no explanation. It was true love, pure and simple, and he’d always accepted it at face value with eagerness and gratitude.

  Thus, it took him a moment to assemble his answer. “My God, I couldn’t even count all the reasons,” he said. “I feel great when I’m with her. And I feel great about myself. I’m proud when I’m with her, y’know? I mean, she’s the picture of class, but she’s also got this fun, playful side, and of course she’s insanely gorgeous.… ”

  “Well, she’s quite stunning, yes,” said Anna, “but honestly—and I’m sorry to say this—I really don’t see what else she’s got going for her.”

  “Oh, you just don’t know her; she’s got a lot more to her than that,” Albert said with a trace of defensiveness.

  “Look, I could be dead wrong, and it’s only a first impression, but my sense was that she’s kinda sour and self-absorbed.”

  “No, not at all. Trust me, I’ve—”

  “Yes, I know, you’ve known her a lot longer than I have, but keep in mind you’re not exactly the most objective analyst here. And also—big news—I’m a woman. Women can read other women a hell of a lot better than men can. Like I said, I could be way off base, but it’s a pretty strong vibe. And for a guy like you, with so much going for him, I would think—”

  “Well, let’s not get hysterical. I’m not sure exactly what you think I have going for me.”

  “See, there you go, cutting yourself down again. You act like this girl was performing a charitable act by dating you. It’s really frustrating. Albert, you’re sweet, you’re funny, you’re smart. And you’ve made something of yourself. You know, a lot of people out here can’t say that. You’re a good sheep farmer.”

  “Oh, please, that’s a bunch of bullshit. I suck at sheep. Look around you. Louise is right, I can’t keep track of them at all. There was a sheep in the whorehouse last week.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, it wandered in there, and when I went to pick it up, somehow it had made twenty dollars.”

  Anna laughed loudly. It was a sweet, satisfying sound. In fact, Albert was struck by just how quenching it was to hear. Why is that? he wondered. Had he ever felt that way when Louise laughed at one of his jokes? And then it occurred to him: Louise had never laughed at his jokes. She had smiled, yes. But she’d never actually laughed. Albert mulled this realization. But doesn’t that make those smiles that much more meaningful? Sure, we didn’t necessarily share the same sense of humor, but she never failed with that smile after every joke. She made the effort. Still, Anna’s laughter was welcome.

  “Thanks,” Albert said to her. “For saying those things about me. I guess I’m not used to much positivity in my life.”

  She put a hand on his arm. “Look, the West sucks,” she said, “but your problem isn’t just the frontier. It’s you. You need a little confidence boost.” She tightened her grip and raised his arm, helping him aim the pistol back toward the cans. “Now try again, sheepboy,” she said.

  He gave her a cringing smile. “Yeah, that sheepboy thing isn’t helping the ol’ confidence.”

  “I like sheepboy.”

  “You’re basically calling me a pussy.”

  “Point your gun that way, pussy.”

  The first five bullets missed the cans by as wide a margin as before. But on the sixth shot, one of the cans went down.

  “Yes!” she shouted gleefully, jumping like a schoolgirl. “There ya go, pussy!”

  Albert stared, legitimately astonished despite himself. “Holy shit,” he exclaimed, wide-eyed. “So, all I gotta do is get Foy to let me shoot seventy-one times before he shoots, and I win!”

  Anna laughed again. “You’ll get there, I promise.”

  During the following days she drilled him. Hard and often. Everything from tin cans on fences to hand-drawn paper targets to airborne ceramic plates. And soon, armed with the ominous knowledge that what hung in the balance was not only the love of his life but his very life itself, Albert began to improve.

  The lessons were not without their bruises, of course. He grazed his big toe on the first day. On the third day he cut his wrist on a tin can. And on the fifth day he got smashed in the face by one of the ceramic plates that Anna hurled into the air for him to shoot. Although Albert’s face was bleeding profusely from the gash, a trip to Doctor Harper proved less than helpful. When the doctor tried to place a blue jay near the wound so it could peck out the blood and prevent infection, Albert and Anna politely declined treatment, opting instead for a homemade dressing.

  Each day he hit more and more of the targets, until at last he was hitting more than he missed. This was a milestone, and Anna felt it was time for a little reward. She waited until the approach of sunset, then took him up to the ridge overlooking Old Stump—the “swearing place” they had visited that very first night. They leaned against a rock face and stared out at the spectacular vista of the southern Arizona landscape.

  “You did great today.” She smiled. “You’re so much better than you were before.”

  “I guess,” he said softly. The impending reality of the gunfight was now truly beginning to sink in. I could be dead in a couple of days, he thought.

  Anna sensed his anxiety. “Hey, I have a surprise for you,” she said, reaching into the pocket of her dress. “You’ve earned one of Anna Barnes’s very special super secret cookies.” She pulled the cookie from her pocket, took a bite, and offered it to Albert.

  He stared at it as if it were a live tarantula. “Wait, is this … is this a weed cookie?”

  “Yes, it’s a weed cookie.” She laughed.

  “Oh, no, I … I don’t do well with that stuff.”

  “That’s ’cause you’re too uptight. This’ll help. Just have a little.” She moved it toward his mouth, and he backed away.

  “No. No way.” He squirmed. “It’s like my worst fear to OD on a recreational drug.”

  “Albert, it’s just pot. Have a small bite. C’mon, do it for me.”

  She had him beat. Anna had been such a pal to him since she arrived in Old Stump that he would’ve felt like a loser had he declined a request from her that was phrased in such a way. But his past experiences with pot—eaten or smoked—had been less than mellow. Once, after sharing a few too many puffs with a group of peer-pressuring schoolmates, he had been certain that Jim Wegman, the blacksmith, was somehow controlling the rhythm of Albert’s breathing with the clang of his hammer. Another time Albert had flown into a panic when the room began to spin, so he’d lain down on the ground, only to become terrified that remaining motionless for over ten seconds was how people became paralyzed. After a good twenty minutes of lying on his back while waving his arms and legs like an upended beetle in the hopes of staving off paralysis, he had finally started to regain his senses.

  Albert took a crumb-sized nibble of the cookie.

  “Oh, come on, more than that!” Anna snorted, grinning at him.

  He took a deep breath and bit the cookie in earnest, noisily masticating with a sustained wince.

  Anna gave his hand a squeeze. “And now we get to wait for the sunset.”

  An indeterminate amount of time later,
Albert was leaning stiffly against the rock face, doing everything in his power to keep Anna from discovering that he was in a state of unfocused mortal terror.

  “Wow, this—this is so weird. Is it supposed to be like this?” he said, trying to sound nonchalant but feeling like something had gone horribly wrong with his swallowing reflex. Can throat muscles just shut down? Is that a thing? Like, some sort of instant throat atrophy? I won’t ever be able to eat solid foods again. I’ll have to pour liquefied food and water down my throat. But wait—how do I make sure it goes into my esophagus and not into my trachea? I could drown. Oh, my God, I’m gonna die by drowning! Wait, no, I could build a special funnel. Like a throat funnel. To guide the liquid food down the right tube. Edward would help me with that. I’ll ask Edward. We’ll make a funnel, Edward and I. With a funnel, I can live.

  Anna was too perceptive to be fooled by his casual tone. She knew he was having a private freak-out and couldn’t help but laugh. “Oh, my God, Albert, will you relax and enjoy the buzz?”

  “I—you gave me the right amount, right? You don’t think I took too much?”

  “Jesus, I’m sorry I even suggested it! I thought it’d help you mellow out.”

  “You don’t think something went wrong, right? Like … I’m not gonna stay this way, am I?”

  “You’re fine, just ride it out.”

  “But, like, you know other people who’ve tried that cookie, right? I mean, not that cookie, but one like it? Like, a sister cookie? And they’re fine, right? They’re still alive?”

  A prairie dog popped its head up out of the ground nearby, and Albert’s panic level quadrupled. “Oh, shit! Anna, he knows! He knows all about this!” Albert sprinted away, leaving Anna doubled over with teary-eyed laughter.

  CRACK!

  The Wells Fargo stagecoach came to a skull-rattling halt.

  “Oh, shit,” the driver cursed. He handed the reins to the shotgun guard and stepped down off the seat. When he surveyed the damage, he knew they were going to be here awhile.

  The Sherman Creek Trail was known for being relatively mild: smooth, flat ground, no steep inclines, and a more or less straight as-the-crow-flies shot from point A to point B. Thus, it was a logical route for the Wells Fargo Bank to use in transporting its gold shipments, particularly because the terrain was relatively open almost the entire length of the trail. That meant very few places for outlaws to conveniently ambush the shipments. The only exception was the Copper Corridor, a half-mile-long stretch of the trail that wound through and around a series of large natural rock formations, effectively blocking visibility beyond thirty feet at every point along the way.

  The stagecoach had broken down at the center of the corridor.

  The driver furrowed his brow as he looked down at the deep rut that had caused the wheel to snap off. “John, this hole’s been freshly dug,” he said with deep concern on his face.

  The shotgun guard knew as well as he did what that meant. “Bad news,” he said softly, tightening his grip on his Winchester rifle. “Look sharp.”

  Although the primary purpose of the Wells Fargo stagecoach was to deliver gold to its various branches throughout the territory, it was common for the company to piggyback passenger transport during such journeys as well. Thus, a well-dressed family of three—father, mother, and seven-year-old son—waited patiently inside the coach while the two men assessed the seriousness of the breakage. After a few moments, the driver opened the carriage door and addressed the man inside. “I’m very sorry about this, sir, but we need another body.”

  The man sighed with mild annoyance. “It’s all right.” He climbed outside to assist them.

  Realizing that he had a bit of time to spare, the young boy scrambled to follow his father.

  “Don’t you go far, Michael,” his mother said.

  “I won’t, Mama. I’m gonna look for lizards.”

  The woman shuddered. “Don’t you dare bring any of those awful things in here.”

  “I won’t, Mama, I promise.” He scurried out the door and ran across to the edge of the trail. It felt good to run. They’d been cooped up inside the carriage for two days straight, and a young boy couldn’t burn off all his excess energy by fidgeting alone. He scanned the area with sharp eyes, eagerly anticipating the perennial boyhood thrill of capturing a live reptile. As luck would have it, he didn’t have to look far. A tiny lizard darted out from beneath a rock and skittered up the trail. The boy took off in pursuit. As he raced after his quarry, the boy marveled that the lizard’s tiny legs could move with enough speed and agility to make the chase an evenly matched one.

  The lizard darted out of sight around one of the large monolithic rock formations that lined the edges of this part of the trail. The boy raced around the corner after it—

  —and got the wind knocked out of him. He lay on his back for a moment, allowing his head to clear. When he sat up, he found himself staring at a group of four rough-faced riders, led by the coldest-looking man he had ever seen.

  The boy knew something of the famous outlaws of the West from reading stories and playing games with his schoolmates, and, like any boy his age, he was fascinated by the glamorous, adventure-filled lives they seemed to lead. In the eyes of a seven-year-old, these were heroes of a sort, possessing colorful, ribald, charismatic personalities that honey-coated their dastardly acts, making them entirely forgivable.

  He could tell instantly that he was looking at a real-life outlaw. However, this man was nothing like the rustlers, train robbers, and gunfighters he’d read about. There was no swashbuckling magnetism here, only a frosty darkness that emanated from eyes as reptilian as the little lizard that had surely by now made its escape. There was something about this man that struck a deep terror into the boy’s heart.

  The man knelt down to face the boy. “Hello there, young fella,” he said with a smile bereft of kindness.

  The boy sat frozen as the man leaned closer and lightly patted his knee, a sinister caricature of paternal warmth.

  “What are you doing out here?”

  “I’m—I was … I was chasing a lizard,” he said, his voice quavering.

  “Ah, I used to chase lizards when I was your age. You catch him?”

  “N-no, he—he got away.”

  “Oh, that’s too bad. Are you out here all alone?”

  “My mom—my mommy and daddy are here.”

  “They are? Well, that’s a comfort, isn’t it? The trail’s a dangerous place for a little boy to be roaming about all by himself.” The man rose to his full height, his sharply hooked brows lifting slightly. “You know, I think I’d like to meet your mommy and daddy.”

  The three men were still struggling to pull the ruined carriage out of the rut when the shot rang out. The driver, the shotgun guard, and the well-dressed man froze and looked up at the sound. The woman, who rested uncomfortably on a nearby rock, ceased fanning herself and stared with dread at the newcomers. A group of four, all dangerous-looking, all armed. And their weapons were aimed at the three men. Her young son sat atop the lead rider’s horse, stiff with fright.

  Clinch aimed his gun at the head of the shotgun guard. “Drop it,” he instructed calmly. With reluctance, the man slowly lowered his Winchester to the ground.

  The boy’s mother bolted to her feet. “Michael!” she cried out.

  “Oh, you needn’t worry about your boy, ma’am,” Clinch said with a tip of his hat. “He’s gonna be just fine … provided you all do as you’re told.” He nodded back to the burly man who flanked him on his right. “Do the honors, Ben.”

  Ben dismounted, strode over to the wagon, and lifted up the top of the driver’s seat, where the Wells Fargo lockboxes were customarily hidden. Sure enough, he pulled out a medium-sized wooden box coated in peeling green paint. “Got it, Clinch!” he shouted excitedly. The box was sealed with a large padlock. Ben set the box down on the ground and, with just a couple of shots fired, managed to break open the lock. He lifted the lid. “Sweet Jesus, wil
l you look at that,” he uttered with a wide-eyed grin. He turned and presented it to Clinch, displaying its glittering contents.

  Clinch’s reptilian eyes lit up like a summer storm. “Ten thousand in pure gold bullion,” he whispered with quiet intensity.

  All the outlaws were transfixed by the rows of gold bars, which screamed the promise of a future gilded with creature comforts. Even young Michael, despite his terror, could not help but let a small gasp escape his lips.

  There will never be another chance, the shotgun guard realized. He very slowly lowered his hand toward his boot, where he had hidden a spare derringer for just such an eventuality.

  “Ten thousand, hell,” said Ben. “There’s gotta be at least fifteen here!”

  Clinch ran a dusty finger over the bars. “We’ll kindly relieve the Wells Fargo company of this heavy burden.”

  The guard quietly pulled the pistol from his boot. The outlaws were still focused greedily on the contents of the lockbox. The lead rider’s head was bent low over the gold, which meant as clear a head shot as there would ever be without risk of killing the boy.

  The guard pulled the trigger. CRACK!

  And suddenly his gun was on the ground, as one of his fingers sailed away behind him. The barrel of the lead rider’s pistol was smoking. The guard screamed in pain as he clutched his crippled hand.

  “That,” said Clinch, “was a mistake.”

  Clinch dismounted, leaving the boy sitting alone atop the disproportionately large horse. He approached the stricken guard and shoved him roughly against the side of the carriage. “Listen to me closely,” said Clinch with a deadly soft tone as he pressed the cold steel of his pistol against the other man’s throat. “You’re very lucky. Do you know that? Because I’ve recently come into possession of fifteen thousand dollars in gold bullion. Which means I’m in a good mood today. Now, are you gonna try that again?”