by Ralph Cotton
“I’ve been nothing all my life,” Peru said, speaking as though it would have made little difference whether or not the sheriff was there. “I’ve been kicked from one spot to the next since the day I was born. I always felt like if I ever did one thing right, maybe it would cut me from the herd and send me running on my own . . . set me free so to speak, make me a somebody.” Finally he looked at the sheriff as if to see if his words were understood.
“I’m listening, Peru,” Foley said quietly.
“Somehow I got good with a gun,” the young outlaw continued. “I don’t know how it come about. I didn’t practice it that much—hell, I barely could afford bullets.” He shrugged. “But one day there I was, fast as a rattlesnake, didn’t even know it at first. It took a couple of my pards telling me before I realized it myself.”
He paused as if to ponder his next words as he spoke them. “Now here I am. I’ve killed the fastest gun alive, but it’s gained me no more respect than if I’d kicked a can down the street.” He gave the sheriff a fixed gaze. “I feel like you know something I need to know, Sheriff.”
“Well, I see you’ve learned a more polite way of discussing things.” The sheriff stared back at him, stalling. This was the same line of talk that had kept Peru in jail twice as long as he should have been. Only now it was different. This was not the same ranting, accusing, cursing young man Foley had shoved into the cell. This was a man running things through his mind, looking for answers about himself, knowing something was missing inside him.
Standing and walking to the door of his cell, Peru clutched the iron bars intently with both hands. “Talk to me, Sheriff,” he said, not loud, not abrasive and demanding, but almost pleading. The new fastest gun alive, looking to a lawman for answers, Foley thought. “Tell me what I need to do. I want to be respected, just like Shaw was, like you, the barber, hell, like anybody . . . except the kind of two-bit saddle-tramp I am.”
Foley knew he could not tell Peru the truth, that he’d killed the wrong man. But instead of pushing the young man’s question aside, he said, “Maybe some men gain respect over a long period of time, the way they carry and conduct themselves, the way they treat others.”
“In my case all they know is what they see,” said Peru with a bitterness in his voice. “I’ve never carried or conducted myself with any respect. What would have been the reason?”
Foley studied Peru’s eyes as he continued, trying to be kinder to Peru than he’d been so far. “In your case, let’s say you chose a faster way. You wanted the respect another man earned. You wanted one bullet to give you what he had, but it won’t do it. Killing the fastest gun alive makes you faster than him . . . but it won’t give you the respect he earned his whole life. You’ll have to work for that, if you’ve got the character to do it.”
“I don’t want to be how I am anymore,” Peru offered. “I’m sick of it.”
“Oh?” Foley put his hand to the side of the coffeepot, judging it. “Then there’s something for you to think about while we wait for some fresh coffee.” He gave a thin, tired smile.
“The coffee sounds good, anyway.” Peru slumped against the bars as if realizing the sheriff was right and wondering to himself if he did have the character to make something better of himself.
Chapter 8
No sooner had the sun risen above Crabtown than the dirt street began to come alive with the sound of horses’ hooves, hammers and nails, and creaking freight wagons. As the sheriff and his prisoner sipped on their third cup of coffee, Jedson Caldwell arrived at the door with a pair of boots wrapped in a bundle of fresh laundry under his arm. Stepping inside the sheriff’s office, Caldwell looked all around, seeing Foley and Peru apparently involved in conversation. Peru sat on the edge of his cot inside his cell; Foley sat at his battered oak sheriff’s desk, one boot propped up on an open drawer.
“Pardon my interruption, but it’s time for breakfast, Sheriff,” Caldwell said. “I told the cook to save you plenty of hoecakes.”
“Obliged, Jedson.” Foley stood from his chair stiffly and picked up his hat from the edge of the desk. Looking at the bundle of clothes and boots under Caldwell’s arm he asked, “What have you got there?”
“Shaw’s old duds,” Caldwell replied. “The China-man brought them to me on my way here, all boiled and washed, boots cleaned and shined.” He laid the bundle on the sheriff’s desk, looked at it for a moment, then sighed for Peru’s sake and said, “Don’t know what I’ll do with them now. Didn’t need them for Shaw. The dead judge’s suit worked out well.”
“Do you ever cut hair anymore?” the sheriff asked, stepping toward the door.
“Victor is filling in for me this morning.” Caldwell smiled.
“He’s doing a good job, is he?” Foley asked, adjusting his hat onto his head.
“No complaints so far,” said Caldwell. As he spoke he looked over at Peru behind the bars and asked, “Is he getting out today?”
“He’s settled down a lot,” said Foley, not mentioning that he and Peru had been talking, not wanting to reveal anything Peru had said to him. Instead he stared at the quiet prisoner and asked him, “What about it, Peru? Do you think you can keep a civil tongue if I turn you loose this morning? That is, after I bring you some breakfast back, of course.”
“Yes, sir, Sheriff, I can,” Peru replied; then he sipped his coffee, looking at the two from over the edge of his cup.
“There you have it,” said Sheriff Foley. He smiled and touched his fingertip to his hat brim, seeing the surprised look on the barber’s face. “Coffee’s strong and hot, enjoy it.” He nodded toward the steaming coffeepot as he walked out and closed the door behind himself.
“Well then,” said Caldwell, gazing at Peru, “looks like when your friend Dolan comes by today, we’ll be setting you free.”
“Yeah, I suppose,” said Peru, not sounding too enthused at the prospect. He stood up, watching closely as Caldwell unrolled the bundle of clean clothes. “Did I hear you say you’ve got Shaw’s clothes there?”
“Yes, that’s right,” said Caldwell. He unrolled the trousers and looked at the shiny boots before standing them on the sheriff’s desk. As the clothes unrolled a folded hat flopped open onto the desk. “I had the laundry wash and clean everything, thinking I would need them.”
“You’ve got his boots and hat too?” Peru asked.
“Yep, boots and hat too,” said Caldwell. “Never know when somebody might need them.” He held up a shirt, looked at it, and shook his head. “Lot of the bloodstain came out, but here’s the bullet hole where you shot him dead. It wouldn’t have been satisfactory for a funeral shirt anyway, the shape it’s in.” He shook the woolen shirt a little and laid it on the oak desk, bullet hole facing up.
“No, I suppose it wouldn’t,” Peru said, trying not to look too ashamed of himself. He watched in silence for a moment, until the front door opened and Rodney Dolan stepped inside.
“No guns!” Caldwell said firmly, his hand wrapping around the butt of his Colt, ready to bring it up from the holster.
“Whoa! My mistake!” said Dolan, his hands rising chest high. He backed out the door, loosened his gun belt, hung it on a peg on the front wall, then stepped back inside.
Across the street, sitting inside the restaurant looking out the window, Sheriff Foley saw what had happened and smiled to himself.
Stepping back inside the sheriff’s office, Dolan still held his hands chest high and said, “There, no harm done, Barber. I’m just here to see my pard, same as yesterday, if that’s all right with yas.”
Caldwell nodded, his hand still on his gun butt. “Go on, you can talk to him. But don’t cross the line.” He nodded at a black-painted line four feet from the iron-barred cell door.
“Wouldn’t think of it, Barber,” said Dolan, walking over to Peru’s cell. At the line on the floor he stopped and spread his hands in anticipation, stared through the bars at Peru, and said, “Well?”
“Howdy, Rex,” Peru replied.
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Dolan looked perplexed and taken aback. “Howdy, Rex? Is that all you’ve got to say?”
“What do you want me to say?” Peru asked, making eye signals to let Dolan know he didn’t want to say too much under Caldwell’s scrutiny. “I’m still stuck here! I’m not getting out!”
“What? This is crazy!” said Dolan, swinging around toward Caldwell. As soon as he’d turned facing Caldwell, Peru waved both hands and shook his head, pleading with Caldwell to go along with him and not to let him out of his cell. “What the hell has he done now?” Dolan demanded.
Caldwell shook his head. “You’ll have to take it up with the sheriff when he gets back,” he said, not lying, but not telling the truth either. “If I were to guess, I’d bet it’s something he said.” The barber gave a slight smile as Dolan turned back to Peru.
“Jesus, Madden! Are you a lunatic?” said Dolan. “I’ve never seen anybody who won’t shut his mouth long enough to get freed from jail!”
“I couldn’t help myself,” Peru said, seeing Dolan had fallen for it. “The sheriff keeps me stirred up, making remarks, treating me like I’m lying about killing Fast Larry.”
Lowering his voice just between the two of them, Dolan held a hand on his chest as if it were a gun, and whispered as he rolled his eyes slightly, “Ain’t it time me and the boys, you know . . . ?”
“No, nothing like that,” Peru said in a whisper himself, shaking his head vigorously. “Not yet anyway,” he added, to make it sound real.
“Not yet? Why, not yet?” Dolan whispered in a rasping voice.
Peru looked all around quickly, searching his mind for something to say. When nothing else came to him, he whispered in reply, “The sheriff hasn’t brought me my breakfast yet.”
Breakfast! Peru’s words caused him to actually stagger back a step. Dolan gave his jailed partner a strange, bewildered stare. “Jesus,” he said finally.
Caldwell watched the stunned outlaw turn and walk out the front door, both fists clenched at his sides. When he looked out the window and saw Dolan walking away, fastening his gun belt back around his waist, he said to Peru, “What was that about? Are you starting to like living behind bars?”
“Obliged for not telling him otherwise,” said Peru, ignoring Caldwell’s question. He gestured a nod at the clothes and boots on the table. “What are you going to do with all that?”
“I’ll find a use for it,” said Caldwell. “Sooner or later, somebody will haul a body in off the wilds buck naked. I’ll need clothes for it.”
“Can I have them?” Peru asked bluntly.
“You want the clothes of the man you killed?” asked Caldwell. “What for? You’ve got your own clothes and boots.”
“I’ll trade mine for them,” Peru offered quickly. “What do you say?”
Caldwell thought about it, then said, “First the sheriff said you can leave, but you won’t leave. Now you’re wanting to change clothes with a dead man? What are you thinking?”
“Just the trousers, boots, and hat,” said Peru. “The shirt’s ruined.”
Out in front of the jail, Dolan turned his horse in the street and rode straight to the Snake Eyes Saloon. He hitched the horse at the iron rail and walked straight through the open tent flap to the plank bar, hardly giving a glance toward Shears and Kuntz, who stood awaiting his return. Shears looked toward the front of the tent as if Madden Peru might come walking in. “Where’s Madden?” he asked.
“Where do you think? Still in jail,” Dolan growled. He snatched a bottle of rye from the plain bar top, filled a shot, and tossed it back in one gulp. He picked up a cork, stuffed it down into the bottle, and shoved the bottle down into his coat pocket. “Let’s ride!” he said in an angry rasp.
“Wait! What about Peru?” Shears asked.
“He couldn’t keep his mouth shut, again,” said Dolan, turning toward the open front of the sagging tent. “I’m through with him.”
“What about busting him out?” asked Kuntz. He hurried to keep up as Dolan walked away across the packed dirt floor, kicking a skinny cat that crossed his path. The cat let out a screech, landed, and darted away.
“I offered us to break him out,” Dolan said. “He said he was waiting for breakfast!”
Kuntz and Shears followed Dolan from the tent to the horses, Shears looking off along the busy street running into Crabtown as if Peru might yet appear.
At noon, Peru stepped out of his cell wearing his own fringed rawhide shirt, but the loose-fitting clothes and boots he thought had belonged to Lawrence Shaw. He recognized the clothes, having last seen them on Stiff-leg Charlie the day he’d shot him. Thinking back, had he realized the man he’d just shot was Lawrence Shaw, he would have kept the gun and holster. But the shooting rig hadn’t struck him as anything special, so he’d sold gun and holster at a trading post for four dollars.
It wasn’t the sort of shooting rig he’d expect a big name gunman like Shaw to wear, he reminded himself as he picked up the Montana-crowned hat from the desk and placed it atop his head. He noted that it sat tighter than the battered bowler he’d grown used to. But now that he’d thought about it, a big gunman like Shaw didn’t have to wear anything new and showy, just something that fit his hand and got the job done. “Now then, Sheriff,” he said, “if I can trouble you for my gun belt, I’ll be on my way.”
“Right away,” said Foley, liking the politer manner he’d seen Peru take on since his arrival. The sheriff walked around behind his desk, unlocked and opened a lower drawer, and laid Peru’s rolled-up gun belt on the desk. Peru’s range Colt stood in a weathered slim-jim holster.
Before picking up the gun belt, Peru drew the Colt and turned it back and forth in his hand, looking it over good. He checked it, saw that it was still loaded, then laid it on the desk. Foley and Caldwell watched him unroll the gun belt, put it on, and stoop as he wrapped the rawhide tie-down around his thigh. “Obliged for trading me the clothes, Barber,” he said as he tied the rawhide, then straightened up and adjusted the holster.
“You’re welcome,” said Caldwell. “I can’t say I understand your purpose in wanting them.” He looked at the worn and battered bowler hat lying on the desk, the worn-down boots Peru left standing in the cell. “Although, maybe they do have a little more life in them than what you were wearing.”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” said Peru, but without sounding like he meant it. He picked the Colt up from the desk and spun it backward and down into his holster slick and expertly, his quickness catching both the sheriff’s and the barber’s attention.
The two watched as Peru drew the Colt fast and effortlessly, as if the act were simply a reflex, like the quick deadly strike of a snake. “The money, Sheriff, if you please,” he said, the Colt slipping quickly into his holster.
“Huh? Oh yes, your money,” said Foley, caught up in watching the fast silent action of gunmetal and human skill at work. He reached in the drawer again, came up with a brown envelope, and emptied a thin folded stack of bills and a small mound of coins, both silver and gold, onto his desk. “Feel free to count it if you like, young man,” he told Peru.
“I’m not going to, Sheriff. I trust you both,” Peru answered. He gave a thin trace of a smile, shoved the bills into his rawhide shirt pocket, scooped the coins into his hand and into his trouser pocket, except for one coin he held in his right palm. He asked Caldwell, “The fellow sitting with you two at the restaurant that evening?”
“Yes, what about him?” Caldwell replied.
“He was Shaw’s pal, Dawson, out of Somos Santos, Texas, wasn’t he?” he asked.
“Yes, that was Cray Dawson,” Caldwell said a bit guardedly, wondering where this was headed. “He has left Crabtown already. Why do you ask?”
“He’s real fast too, I expect, riding with Shaw like he did?” Peru asked without answering him.
“He is fast,” said Caldwell, “but he’s no gun-fighter. If you’re thinking anything about—”
“Where did he go?” Peru
asked, cutting him off.
“Back to Somos Santos, I’m sure,” Caldwell lied, giving Foley a quick glance.
“If you’re thinking about working up a gunfight with Cray Dawson you’d be making a big mistake,” Foley cut in.
“You’re saying he’s faster than Fast Larry Shaw, the man whose hat and boots I’m wearing?” Peru asked.
Foley and Caldwell just looked at one another. What could they say? “Peru, I’ve seen some good in you the past couple days,” said Foley. “Don’t go doing something that—”
“Relax, Sheriff,” said Peru, his tone and demeanor still sociable, “I’m not looking for trouble with Dawson. If he’s not out to ’venge his pal Shaw, I’ve got no fight with him.” He turned to Caldwell. “I am curious how fast he is, though.”
“I’m not a good person to judge who’s fast and who’s not,” said Caldwell. “I’ve seen lots of fast guns. After a while their speed all looks about the same.”
“No kidding?” Peru asked.
“No kidding,” Caldwell replied.
“Tell me something, Barber, and tell me the truth,” he said, his eyes fixed coolly on Caldwell’s. He held his right hand waist high and flipped the gold coin up, not far, only a few inches. Foley and Caldwell watched the coin fall. Peru stood relaxed, as if he would let it fall to the floor. Yet as the coin dropped back to waist-level, suddenly his Colt barrel appeared beneath it, bounced it back up a few inches. It fell again, this time landing in his right palm, his Colt having disappeared back into his holster. “Is that fast?” His eyes seemed to have not left Caldwell’s face. “Or is that about the same as everybody else?”
Caldwell and Foley stood as if stunned. “I hope you’ve learned something here, Peru,” the sheriff said finally, neither he nor Caldwell commenting on what they’d just witnessed.
