by David Boop
Sheffield burst from the station, wrapped beefy arms around Sebastian. He bawled, “I got ’im! I got ’im! Kill ’im! Kill ’im!”
Sebastian leaned forward, lifting Sheffield off the ground, then whirling around, so that Sheffield’s back faced Farrell just as Farrell fired, Sheffield took the bullet meant for Sebastian squarely between the shoulder blades. He screamed and dropped to the porch. Sebastian finished him with a bullet in the throat.
Farrell fired once more, the shot going wide, but Sebastian, without any further distractions, placed his bullet right where he wanted to for months. Farrell cursed as he tumbled to the ground. Farrell lay on his side, reaching for his gun, a few feet away, however, Sebastian kicked it away as he approached. Farrell rolled over on his back, breathing hard. “Dammit, Red. This ain’t no way for a man to die, lyin’ in the dirt.”
“Who said you’s a man?” Sebastian put a bullet in Farrell’s brains. He twirled the big gun lightly back into the holster as if it weighed no more than a feather. He turned and walked back into the station, stepping over Sheffield’s body.
Conroy, standing on the porch, turned as he heard the creak of Sebastian’s boots on the wooden floor, his horror-lined face a portent to what lay before them. Finch sat on the floor, legs outstretched in front of him, his wife’s head resting in his lap. The front of her dress was dark with blood. Her eyes were half-open and her mouth almost appeared to be smiling.
“She caught a stray shot from one of them owlhoots,” Conroy said.
“That’s why I told you all to stay inside.” Sebastian knelt down next to Finch. “You got my deepest sympathies, Mr. Finch. I didn’t want nobody to get hurt save that man out there. I’d even have let those two gunnies of his go if’n they hadn’t drawed on me. I didn’t even want Farrell dead. I just didn’t want him getting on that stage. Guess I should have known the only way to keep him from doing that was to kill him.”
“I don’t blame you, Mr. Red. We should have stayed inside. But when the shooting started, Mr. Conroy and I hit the floor, but Melody froze. Almost as if she had to see it all. Why? Why did she have to see it, Mr. Red?”
Sebastian and Conroy looked at each other and neither of them knew what to say.
The unmistakable sound of a stagecoach approaching gave them the way out.
“It’s time,” Conroy said, as he looked up at the full moon.
Sebastian followed Conroy outside. The moon had been hidden behind thick, inky clouds. They parted and the silver moonlight poured down on the relay station, almost bright as daylight.
The stagecoach made the ground under their feet quiver as if came closer. Bigger than any stagecoach Sebastian had ever seen, and trailing ribbons of azure fire, the iron wheels rumbled like the wheels of some ancient war chariot. Drawn by ten massive horses, black as death with red eyes and hot blue steam for breath. A heap of luggage rested on the roof, held down firmly by a netlike mesh. The stagecoach pulled up to a halt in front of the station with much cursing and yelling from the driver. Faces looked out of the coach windows. Sebastian couldn’t rightly tell how many passengers there were. None of them got off.
The shotgun messenger turned his head to look down at Sebastian. It did not surprise him that the man had no eyes. Just empty black sockets.
The driver spoke to Conroy, ignoring Sebastian. “Got any passengers for me tonight?”
“Thought I did. A man and a woman. But the woman’s dead.”
“Mayhap the man would like a ride.”
“I dunno. But we can find out.” Conroy raised his voice. “Mr. Finch! The stagecoach is here!”
Finch stumbled out of the station like a man in a dream and made his way over to where Sebastian and Conroy stood. The stagecoach creaked and sighed like a living thing as the ribbons of azure fire faded away. “It is real.”
“That it is, boy,” Conroy said. “Best git aboard. It doesn’t pay to keep the driver waitin’. He’s got a schedule to keep.”
“How can I go without my wife?” Finch said in a slightly dazed voice. “We planned this together. It was our dream together. What sense does it make for me to go on now? Melody’s dead. Our baby is dead…”
“Your missus wouldn’t want you to waste your life grievin’, Mr. Finch,” Sebastian said gently. “Mr. Conroy’s right. You get on that stage and get on with your life. Where ever it takes you.”
“Are you getting on, Mr. Red?”
“Me? Naw. Like I told you before, I came here for one reason.” Sebastian nodded in the direction of Farrell’s body.
Finch turned to Conroy. “Why don’t I stay here with you? Surely you could use some help here? I’ve got nothing to go back to. Melody and I sold everything, gave it all away.”
Conroy shook his head. “There’s only one station manager, son. That’s all this relay station ever had. That’s all it will ever have.”
“Then let me take over. You get on the stage.”
Conroy looked hard at the younger man. “Don’t think I won’t take you up on the offer, son. I been doin’ this job a powerful long time, and I’m ’bout due to retire. You sure about this?”
“I am.”
“I ask because the job must be exchanged willingly. Both have to agree to it. I agree to give it up. You agree to take it on?”
“I do.”
“Then take my hand.”
Conroy extended his and Finch took it. The air around them shimmered and it was as if Sebastian saw them through a hazy film for a second before they snapped back into focus.
“Now you say, ‘I relieve you, sir.’”
“I relieve you, sir.”
“I now stand relieved.” Conroy let go of Finch’s hand. “That’s it then. Look under the mattress on my bed. You’ll find a book that’ll explain your duties.”
“Come on if you’re coming,” the driver said. “I got a schedule to keep.”
“Just a minnit.” Conroy smiled, nodded at Finch. “Thank you, son.”
Finch simply nodded back. Conroy stepped over to Sebastian to shake his hand. “Pleasure meetin’ and drinkin’ with you, Mr. Red.”
“It’s been an honor knowin’ you, Mr. Conroy. May your road be free of incident.”
Conroy grinned, nodded and walked over to the stagecoach. The door swung open of its own volition and willing hands reached out to help Conroy in.
The driver directed his next words at Sebastian. “You would do well to come with us, Sebastian Red. It is not an opportunity for many men to be given a way to escape their fate. This could be yours.”
Sebastian shook his head. If he was surprised that the driver knew his name, he didn’t show it. “Like I said, I had no intention of riding your stagecoach when I come here. Still don’t. Go on your way, driver.”
The driver nodded while the shotgun messenger showed black teeth in a diseased grin. The driver cracked his whip and the stagecoach moved off, picking up speed as it did so. Conroy’s hand and arm briefly appeared in a final wave before obscured in a cloud of dust.
And then it was gone.
Sebastian Red sighed.
Harry Finch asked him, “So, what now?”
“Let’s find a suitable spot to bury your missus first. Then we can find another spot as far away from her resting place as possible to bury these others. Then you need to get that book Mr. Conroy mentioned and get to readin’. I ’spect you got a lot to catch up on.”
Finch nodded. “And you, Mr. Red?”
Sebastian Red smiled slightly. “I got a lot more road to ride, friend. A lot more.”
NOT FADE AWAY
Cliff Winnig
Joan Stark dropped the saddlebags onto the dirt road and slumped against the wooden sign. She’d carried them maybe ten miles since Lulu had died. Relieved of her burden, she felt she might float up into the blue Arizona sky. Only the June sun pressing down on her kept the soles of her boots on the earth.
Even her men’s clothes—which she always wore for riding, and most other occasions, tr
uth be told—hadn’t made the walk bearable. The heat and her saddlebags’ weight had dragged at her. She’d run out of water and jerky five miles back.
Her only dress now lay by the gunnysack beside poor Lulu’s corpse with all the other useless stuff, and good riddance! She’d taken only what she needed most: coffee pot, matches, spare bullets for her Colt, and little else. Her Bowie knife she kept at her hip, like her gun. She’d left the spare horseshoes and suchlike back with the horse. No point in any of it.
Lulu, mouth flecked with foam, rose again in her mind. Joan squeezed her eyes shut, but that just brought her right back. The bright desert circled them, closing in. The horse beneath her buckled and fell.
This will not do. Joan opened her eyes wide, willed it all away. Forced it. After a few moments, she succeeded. She was back in the present, alone in the afternoon heat.
The desert broke things down to their smallest components. She could feel it. Her grief became anger became mere annoyance. Her feet ached. Her legs ached. She needed a drink. Water too.
Joan stared at the stretch of empty desert between her and the actual town named on the sign and scowled. Why the hell do they put these signs so damned far out of town?
“Well,” she said aloud, her throat dry. “Not a crazy long walk, at least.”
She could make it. She had to.
She thought about the Thing Behind Her. It did not rest. It had caused her to push Lulu even when the horse took ill. Lulu’s death was one more item on its tab.
Got to keep moving. Joan peeled herself off the faded sign and took her first real look at it. It had originally read LOST VALLEY, POPULATION 340, but someone had crossed through both name and number with chalk so that it now read TRUTH, POPULATION 1. Some of the chalk had rubbed off on her shirt, but she didn’t bother wiping it. Too much effort. Stiffly, she knelt down and retrieved her saddlebags, which still smelled of Lulu and would for weeks more.
As she rose, Joan focused again on the task at hand. The sun would be setting soon. She needed to be indoors before that happened. She hoped she would get along with the one other person in Truth, but either way she couldn’t be out here alone.
Besides, she needed to find and warn that person about the Thing Behind Her. Her fault, and thus her responsibility.
Joan shuddered once, momentarily cold even in the devil’s own heat.
* * *
Late afternoon shadows stretched across the road and crawled their way up the abandoned church, general store, and two-story whorehouse on the east side of the street. They were cast by the hotel and the combination dentist’s office and barbershop facing them.
Joan barely glanced at either set, or at the dozen or so buildings beyond them. She went straight for the stream dead ahead, just past the edge of town. She didn’t see any sign of the one other person in Truth, but she carried her saddlebags with her the whole way anyway, wary for any movement.
Joan knelt when she reached the water’s edge. The stream smelled pure and fresh. The last of the sunlight sparkled on the swift-moving water. She shrugged off the saddlebags and plunged her hands into the cool of the stream. She drank from her cupped palms, not bothering to pull out her tin cup from its home by the coffee pot.
She took a long time drinking her fill and washing her hands and face, but not too long. She knew the Thing Behind Her drew nearer with every breath, every heartbeat. Has it found poor Lulu yet? Probably. Will it stop there to dine? No, I don’t imagine it will. The coyotes will have her, and it will keep coming.
Joan sank the pain of that truth into the deep chambers of her heart, where it became a dull ache, a stone to be carried within her.
Keep moving. She threw the saddlebags over her shoulders and stood. Across the stream, maybe two hundred yards further on, a gentle slope rose to meet the darkening sky. The plain, square entrance to a mine stared back at her, hollow and black. She wondered if the sole remaining person in Truth had the claim to that mine, had chosen not to give up, even after everyone else had left. That would be a dangerous man.
She considered crossing the stream and skirting the mine. She could follow the trail the road became and leave Truth behind her.
No. It would not do to meet the Thing on the open road. And I’m hungry, with no time left to hunt.
So Joan turned back to face the dark town, as hollow, in its own way, as the mine.
A breeze came with the quickening dark and blew through town toward the stream. Joan smelled nothing of horse nor man, just the aroma of chalk dust. When she drew near the center of town, she saw why. Someone had drawn people all over the place: peering through the windows, draped across chairs on porches, lying on the ground like the shadows of invisible men. Two even sat in front of the saloon playing a game of checkers. The arm of one player started on his seat, dropped to the sidewalk boards, and reappeared on the table to hold one of the pieces. Some figures showed details of clothes and face, as if drawn from life, but most were faded, vague impressions of whoever they were meant to represent. She hadn’t noticed them on her way through town, so intent had she been on her thirst and the stream that promised to slake it.
The urge to flee gripped her again, but she could feel the Thing drawing closer. She had no time.
Joan looked around for a place to spend the night, a place she could fortify. The whorehouse was tempting. Unless someone had stripped it bare, there’d be lamps and oil for the use of nocturnal clientele. She’d spent many a night in such places as a paying customer. There was always one whore who wouldn’t mind, and usually two or three to choose from. It had led to her moving on rather quickly from more than one town, as word got around, but even that had been a harmless enough excitement compared to her current straits.
She examined the shadowed building for a minute. Whorehouses had their many windows, their myriad ways of entrance and egress. This one looked pretty typical that way. Hard to defend.
She looked past the general store to the church. Since the Thing Behind Her had started dogging her trail, she’d never tried spending the night in a church. There’d never been an abandoned one on offer, either. This one had large doors, but it doubtless also held pews she could shove against them. While her mother had been Jewish, her father had been Lutheran, originally from Hamburg. Probably it would be all right. The Lord would surely forgive her for seeking shelter there, despite the Thing being her own damned fault.
“The church it is.” Before she could change her mind, she climbed the three steps to the building and threw open the doors. They were unlocked.
Inside, dust motes flew in the last of the sunlight streaming through a window somewhere above her. The rays landed on the plain wooden cross on the far side of the room, making it glow. Joan didn’t know whether that was a good or a bad sign, but she stepped inside.
Everything seemed intact. The pews stood in row after empty row and led to a plain pulpit. A closed Bible lay atop it. A small slate board on the far wall read “Gen. 6:4” for the weekly sermon, in faded but still-legible chalk. The windows along both sides were designed for raids by hostile Indians: tall but narrow, with gun slots forming crosses. They were all shuttered. The Thing could maybe pound its way through, but it wouldn’t be able to slither. A small but ornate organ sat to one side, the only item that smacked of indulgence. It looked new. Joan wondered if it had even been played before the town was abandoned.
When her eyes had adjusted to the gloom, she started briskly down the center aisle, not bothering to remove her hat. A door near the back led to a side room, off to the right. She’d have to check everywhere to make sure she could secure the place. There wasn’t much time. If the church wouldn’t work, she needed to know right now.
A scampering noise caught her attention. Her head snapped in that direction, and she saw that far door swing shut. A small animal? A coyote? Or have I just missed the only other resident of Truth, Arizona?
Joan dropped her saddlebags and sprinted down the rest of the aisle, then tore right towa
rd the door. She threw it open and looked around. A cramped vestry doubled as an office. A writing desk and two wooden chairs filled most of the space. A figure had squeezed itself between the desk and a chair, taking advantage of the shadows that lay thick over the whole room. If it hadn’t been so pale, Joan might have missed it.
She put her hand on the Colt but didn’t draw. “I see you, so you might as well come on out. I won’t hurt you, but I’ll warn you, I’ve got a gun. I can defend myself.”
“Go away!” The high voice came thin but clear from under the desk. “Leave me alone.”
A child.
Joan raised her hands, palms out, and took a step back, so as not to panic the kid. “All right. I’m just looking for a place to stay the night.”
“You’ve got the whole town for that. Leave me alone!”
Might as well ask. Local knowledge and all. “Other than this church, is there another safe place? I mean, one I can defend.”
The child didn’t answer, but Joan heard her adjust her position some.
Joan lowered her hands, but didn’t rest one on the Colt again. “I ask because—”
“You know about it? Then why’d you come here?”
Joan raised an eyebrow. She doesn’t mean the Thing. She can’t. That’s behind me. “My horse died. It’s nighttime. I’ve got troubles of my own.”
The kid poked a bright blonde head up from behind the chair. A girl, maybe ten, maybe twelve. She had sun-bleached hair, but oddly untanned skin. “What sort of troubles, mister?”
Joan chuckled. Despite the Thing Behind Her, despite Lulu’s death, despite this strange kid and her ghost-haunted town, it came back to that. “Ma’am, not mister. My name’s Joan. Joan Stark.”
Another hesitation, then: “Margaret Ross. Not Maggie. Not Peg. Margaret.”
Joan held out her hand. “Pleased to meet you, Margaret Ross.”
The kid stared at her for maybe a full minute before she unfolded herself from behind the chair. She wore a faded blue dress, no shoes, and a haunted, hungry look. Joan wondered when she’d last eaten.