by MT Murphy
Silver Shells
A Werewolf Gunslinger Tale
M.T. Murphy
http://www.luciferaspet.com
©2010 by M.T. Murphy
All rights reserved.
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Stitches: A Werewolf Gunslinger Tale Volume 2 http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/11101
Turkey Jerky
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/11444
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“Now there’s a feller who’s down on his luck.”
As deputies went, Sam wasn’t the best. He also was about as smart as a wild turkey.
Sure enough, a lone figure was walking the dusty trail a quarter-mile off to the dying light of the setting sun. It was a hell of a trek without a horse from the next town.
“That ain’t a feller, Sam.”
“What do you mean that ain’t a feller, Sheriff? You seen him with your own two eyes.”
“That there is a lady. A tall one, but a lady nonetheless.”
“How do you know?”
“Her shoulders for one thing. They are just a touch narrower than a feller that tall would have. And look at how she’s walking. Even in that dry prairie mud her hips sway a little more than a man’s would.”
Sam stood and walked to the edge of the porch, squinting his eyes and shaking his head.
“Since when does a lady wear britches and carry six-shooters strapped to her side?”
I finished loading my freshly-cleaned Peacemaker and slid it back into the holster. It never hurt to be prepared.
“This is 1877, Sam. You ought to keep up with the times. Ain’t you heard about Calamity Jane over in Deadwood?”
Sam shrugged his shoulders and squinted his eyes harder at the woman. She was now about a hundred yards away.
“Say, look at the size of them guns, Sheriff.”
“Ain’t that a sight? Those are Walker Colt’s. I ain’t never seen a man carry one that wasn’t in a saddle holster. They’re too damn big and they kick like a mule.”
The woman was covered in the thin layer of dust that comes from a long day of traveling a rough trail, but she didn’t have that weary look about her that most folks get. In fact, there was a smile on her face when she finally made it to us.
“Afternoon, lads. Lovely day for walk, ain’t it?”
I know a dozen men who would have envied the confidence that came through in her voice. This was no ordinary woman. And she definitely wasn’t from around here.
“That it is, miss. But given my druthers, I druther ride a horse than walk these trails any day.”
She pushed back the brim of her old leather hat revealing her eyes for the first time. She couldn’t have been a day over twenty-three, but her eyes held all the weariness that her body didn’t show. They were brown with a hint of red. I have never seen a color like that before or since.
Still she smiled. And those tiny lines around her eyes meant that the smile was genuine.
“I’m Lily Farrell.”
I stood and accepted her outstretched hand. I was careful not to squeeze too hard, but she had no such inhibition. It was like shaking hands with a bear trap.
“Jim Hickok. No relation to the other Hickok you may have heard of. I am the sheriff here and this is Sam Wesley, my deputy.”
I rested my bruised hand on my belt. Sam shook her hand and didn’t seem to notice the unnerving strength of her grasp. I must have bumped my hand on the door earlier and only just noticed it. That had to be it.
“Miss Farrell, I can’t help but notice the delightful way you talk. I’m guessing you ain’t from South Dakota?”
“Call me Lily, Sheriff. I was born in Ireland, but I have been spending some time out here. I was riding here from Deadwood when outlaws killed me horse about ten miles up the trail.”
Sam was flabbergasted.
“Outlaws? They killed your mount and not you? How’d you manage that?”
“I guess they figured a woman was easy pickings. They figured wrong. I’m pretty sure I wounded ‘em, but they won’t be bothering anybody again soon.”
This was an unusual woman, indeed. Unusual isn’t always a bad thing, but unusual has a way of upsetting the status quo. I couldn’t afford to let that happen.
“So what brings you to Dusty Fork, Lily?”
“Just passing through, Sheriff. I sure could use a pint, a hot meal, and a place to sleep.”
“You’re in luck. Sheila’s Saloon is the only place in town for all your food, drink, entertainment, and lodging needs. Come on, Sam. Let’s go grab a bite with our guest.”
“Hrumph,” was Sam’s universal reply.
We left the porch of the tiny sheriff’s office and walked along the dirt street, passing the boarded-up general store, the deserted barber shop, and the only other shop in town that was still open, the gunsmith. The saloon was the last building on the single row of structures by the road. It was also the biggest.
A dozen horses waited on their owners outside the front door. They didn’t seem bothered by the raucous mix of piano music, shouting, and singing coming from inside. Darkness was falling and the crowd was settling in for a long night of debauchery.
I opened the door for Lily and waited for she and Sam to step inside.
Sheila’s face lit up when she saw me but her smile faded when she saw my guest. Sheila didn’t care for the term “madam.” If you asked her about her profession, she’d tell you she was an “entertainment and hospitality entrepreneur.” No matter what folks called her she knew how to run a saloon. A day didn’t go by when the place wasn’t packed with miners, outlaws, or gamblers, all parting with their money one way or another.
Our meal started off pleasant enough. Sheila herself took our orders and brought us the house special: buffalo steak and bread. Sheila brought mine and Sam’s out as we liked them, well done. Lily’s came as she requested, just this side of raw.
“Miss Sheila,” Lily said between bloody bites of half chewed meat, “this is a nice place you got here.”
“It ain’t much but it’s my piece of the pie, sugar.” Sheila flipped her yellow hair and flashed the smile that had broken at least a thousand frontiersmen’s hearts—including mine.
“I can’t help but notice,” the young woman choked down another massive bite then pointed to the wall near the bar, “the two help wanted signs over there. This seems like a right prosperous business and you strike me as a fair woman. Seems like you’d have no trouble finding help.”
“It used to be like that. Seems that every week I wake up to find a note saying that one of the girls has decided to move back in with her parents or head back east or some such nonsense. As soon as I hire one, another disappears.”
Sheila grabbed Lily’s hat off her head and brushed a strand of dark brown hair out of the girl’s face. “If you can clean that layer of dust off and tidy up those table manners, you are a right pretty girl, sugar. You looking for work?”
Lily smiled and downed a full glass of homemade South Dakota firewater in one gulp.
“You are very kind Miss Sheila, but I’m just passing through.”
“Suit yourself, sugar. Stop by any time.” Sheila turned her gaze to me and then to Sam. “And that goes do
uble for my two favorite lawmen.”
Sam turned beet red. “Hrumph.”
I nodded with a smile. Sheila placed the hat back on Lily’s head and went behind the bar to serve the next group of dust-covered miners that had just walked in.
Lily finished the last bite of steak and bread, and then turned her attention to me.
“So what do blokes do around here for a living, sheriff?”
“Until a few months back, this town was full of miners trying to find themselves a hunk of gold. When the mines dried up, people moved on. What you see here are the few miners, farmers, traders, and wanderers left in these parts. If not for our local benefactor, Grigore Tanase, this place would have fallen off the map.”
“Tanase? What did he do?”
“He reopened all the mines and hired anybody who wanted work.”
She narrowed her eyes and poured herself another glass of booze.
“If there was no more gold, what is he mining for I wonder?”
“I dunno. Why don’t you ask him yourself if you’re so curious? He’s the right over there playing cards.”
“Where? All I see is four grown men playing cards with a little boy.”
Grigore was sitting with his back to the wall on the opposite side of the round table. The four men around the table were already down to their last few dollars judging by the pile of money in front of him.
“He’s the one with all the cash.”
“That’s a ten year old boy, Sheriff.”
“Ma’am, I think you need to get your eyes checked. Grigore is a head taller than me or you. He’s the one with the long black hair and the beard. Right over there.”
She stared at the man I was pointing to, narrowing her eyes and sniffing the air like a Bloodhound.
“Ah.” The word had an air of finality to it. She stood and patted me on the shoulder. “My mistake, sheriff. I am going to go say hello to your noble citizen over there.”
She had caught me mid-drink on my whisky. By the time I gulped it down, she was halfway across the floor and standing in front of his table.
“I’m looking for Grigore Tanase.”
Damn it. That didn’t sound like a friendly greeting. All eyes focused on the woman.
Grigore replied in his deep baritone, “I am Grigore Tanase.”
A luminous smile burst across Lily’s face.
“Fantastic!”
She pulled both Walker Colts from her holsters, pointed them, and fired both barrels. The exploding gunpowder sent people scrambling under tables. Two slugs hit Grigore square in the chest where he sat. The force knocked him over backwards in his chair and to the floor.
The shooter held her arms out beside her with the two hand cannons dangling from her trigger fingers.
“I surrender. I don’t want no trouble, Sheriff.”
I was on my feet and dragging Sam behind me. I snatched the guns out of her hands and stuffed them into my coat pockets.
“No trouble? Sam, cover her. If she moves, put a bullet in her head.” He looked stunned, but he obliged, drawing his pistol and pressing it against the back of her head.
The four gamblers stood around the table staring at the woman. I brushed past them and knelt down by Grigore. A Walker Colt is a damn powerful gun and he just took two shots to the chest at point blank range. It was about what I expected.
The holes were bloody and right over each lung. Either one would likely have been a kill shot. Two removed all doubt.
The status quo just got shot to all kinds of hell.
His eyes were already closed but I brushed my hand over the lids just to make sure. He was already getting cold.
I expected to see the entire population of Dusty Forks, which just so happened to be in the saloon at the time, all turn and take target practice on the woman who just killed our local savior. Instead, everybody was standing there, not moving, not talking, not crying, not shooting, not anything. They were a bunch of damn statues.
At the time, I reckoned I would take statues over a lynch mob any day, but there was no telling how long the shock would last. A well-liked man didn’t go down like that without his friends trying to get some quick justice. And Tanase had a lot of friends, me included.
“Sam, tend to Grigore’s corpse. I am taking the prisoner to the lock up.”
My Peacemaker was pointed at her mouth when I cocked the hammer back.
“Walk, Miss Farrell. You know the way back to the jailhouse.”
There was no smile on her face, but there wasn’t a drop of remorse in her eyes either. She had done what she came to do.
I followed her out of the saloon, keeping my sights drawn on the back of her head. She kept a slow pace, retracing the steps that took us here to start with.
“Sheriff?”
“With all due respect, Miss Farrell, I ain’t inclined to listen to a cold blooded murderer. You just thank your lucky stars that this badge still means something to me.”
Neither of us spoke again until she stepped inside the cell. I slammed the door shut and holstered my weapon. I placed her six-shooters down on my desk and grabbed the bottle of whisky from my bottom drawer. I was saving it for a special occasion, but I would have to settle for a friend’s death.
“What are they mining for, Sheriff?”
“Again, Miss Farrell, with all due respect, shut the hell up.”
She leaned against the bars looking too damn calm to have just killed a man.
“You said it yourself, Sheriff. The gold ran out. I counted twenty three men in that saloon that were dirty enough to have just walked in out of a mine. There’s gold to be had in other places now that they ran the Lakota out of the Black Hills. Why go digging at dead mines?”
I stepped in front of her at the bars with one hand on my sidearm and the other holding the half full bottle of whisky.
“It don’t matter now, does it? He kept this town alive and you went and killed him. With him, you might as well have killed all of us, too.”
Sam opened the front door and stepped inside, leaving the door wide open. He plodded along in a trancelike state, not blinking or speaking, until he stood next to me in front of the cell.
“What the hell is the matter with you, Sam? You raised in a barn? Shut the damn door.”
He drew his pistol faster than lightning and jabbed the barrel into my ribs.
“Sam?”
My old friend took the Colt out of my holster and tossed it neatly on my desk.
“Don’t be too hard on him, Sheriff. He knows not what he does. None of them do.” A deep voice boomed inside the tiny building from the front door.
I knew that voice, but it couldn’t be him. I turned around to find Grigore Tanase standing at the threshold.
“Grigore? How?”
“Evening, Jim. I have had a hell of a day.” He nodded towards the cell. “Samuel, if you will be so kind.”
The barrel dug harder into my ribs, forcing me to take a step away from the cell. Sam unlocked and opened the door, shoving me inside before closing and locking it back in place.
Grigore strolled over to my desk and picked up my gun.
“That thing in the cell with you is a beast, Sheriff. Pure and simple. Observe.”
He aimed the gun at me and fired before I could move. Pain shot through my right forearm. It was just a graze, but blood ran out in a spurt covering my overcoat and pants.
“Damn it!” We kept a rolled up blanket in the corner of the cell for rowdy drunks to sleep off their liquor. I grabbed the blanket and wrapped it around my arm to stop the bleeding.
“That’s a dirty trick, little boy.” Lily’s voice was raspy and hoarse.
“And shooting me in the middle of my town wasn’t?” Grigore laughed and put my gun back on the desk.
I turned to face my cell mate. Her chest was rising and falling with each labored breath. She took off her jacket and began unbuttoning her shirt.
“What the hell are you doing girl?” She had to be crazy. Maybe
we all were. I couldn’t be sure anymore.
“I don’t want to ruin me clothes.” Her words came through grinding teeth.
“Relax Sheriff. Enjoy the show. You are in for a treat. Actually, you are the treat since she’ll probably kill you in a moment.” Grigore sat down in my desk chair. “Samuel. Step back.” Sam did as he was told, plodding over to silently stand by the front door.
Under other circumstances I would have been mighty thrilled to see a woman who looked like her tearing off her clothes in my presence. She may not have been a murderer, but the way she was flailing around made me think she may have escaped from the loony bin. When she finished hastily removing the last of her clothes I no longer knew what to think. I pushed myself back against the wall as far away from her as I could get.
She threw her pants and undergarments to the side and trembled. Muscles quivered under her tan skin. She convulsed, moving in time to unnatural popping and ripping noises. I thought she was having some sort of attack. Her shoulders jerked and dislocated. Her hips and ankles broke on their own, sending her to the floor.
At first, her moans were like the wails of a tortured soul. The truth was far more frightening. I realized soon enough, she wasn’t moaning. She was humming.
Her back was to me and I was thankful that I couldn’t see what became of her face. Her skin stretched and rippled with the sounds of breaking and resetting bones. A dark shadow spread down her shoulders and arms. But it wasn’t a shadow at all. It was hair. What started as a thin layer grew as thick as a grizzly’s fur.
The humming stopped. It was replaced by a growl.
The huge dark thing that used to be Lily stood up on its hind legs. The ceiling was eight feet high and its head was only a couple inches shy of that.
I pushed myself further back into the corner. I wanted to slip through the cracks. If I had my gun at that instant, I would have shot myself just to end the horror that I couldn’t stop myself from unfolding before my eyes.
“There we are. Go ahead. Eat the man. Think of him as a gift.” I felt like I was alone with the monster until Grigore spoke. Maybe it wasn’t the only beast in the room.
It turned its monstrous head back to look at me. All the light from those oil lamps seemed to be sucked out of the room by its black fur. Even though I saw it, my mind wouldn’t let me completely comprehend what I saw. The only things that I truly remember are those glowing red eyes.
