The Black Trail

by James W. Marvin

  A skinny man in his fifties took a step beyond the front of the crowd. As he stuck his thumbs in his vest pockets, Crow caught the glint of metal off the silver star. In a worn holster on the sheriff’s right hip he could see the butt of an 1844 Army Colt forty-four.

  ‘Don’t know the face, Mister?’ The hand resting casually on the pistol.

  ‘I’m not familiar with you, Sheriff,’ replied Crow, his voice low-pitched.

  ‘See some strangers we take to and some we don’t, ifn you take my meaning.’

  ‘I take it. I met some lawmen I respected and some with brains in their ass.’

  ‘What the Hell is…?’

  ‘Sheriff keeps that thong tying down his gun while he talks the way you do can’t have a lot of trouble to deal with.’

  ‘Why?’ asked the older man, face flushing, fingers fumbling with the rawhide tie across the hammer of the forty-four.

  ‘You call me out and you’d be lookin’ up at the sky with your guts dirtyin’ up your boots, Sheriff.’

  ‘Don’t you take that shit from a saddle-tramp like him!’ yelled a man from in the middle of the crowd. Crow made him immediately. Knowing the type. He’d seen them in dozens of small towns like Crossworld Springs. A man like Crow carried danger with him and he was used to threats. There was the young kid out to make a name, who usually found that name was carved on a marker up in Boot Hill. And there was the older gunman. Generally someone who’d never been a top shootist but who’d got out early and lived for thirty years on a bubble reputation. Finding a small community and battening on it. Growing old and fat Sometimes getting to be sheriff. Sometimes not.

  The man with the loud voice was one of that type.

  Around forty-five. Crow figured. Average height, in a greasy suit, stained around the lapels and across the front of the pants. Thinning grey hair, pasted over his head, looking as though a breath of wind would disturb the careful layering. And a Peacemaker, strapped right low down on the thigh in a cutaway Mexican rig that looked like it had seen better days.

  Narrow eyes, mostly buried in beds of reddish fat, the nose lined with dark veins. A drinker’s face. A bully’s face. Used to frightening others.

  Crow wasn’t frightened of any man.

  ‘Seems you come here lookin’ for trouble, Mister?’

  ‘You read it how you like,’ replied Crow. ‘I come a long way to get here. I’m bone-tired and the last water was poisoned.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘And ifn you aim to stand there filled with gas and piss stoppin’ me getting’ a drink, you’d better be able to use that pistol, Sheriff.’

  There was a cold venom in the stranger’s voice that finally penetrated through to the middle of Sheriff Rogers’ mind. Suddenly there didn’t seem enough air to breathe in the main street and he gasped, looking round him for support Seeing the red face of Nate Goldsmith.

  ‘Nate. What do you reckon?’

  Crow shook his head. ‘Jesus, Sheriff.’ he said, disgustedly. ‘You run the town or that old drunk?’

  ‘Yousonof…!!’

  ‘Nate,’ warned Rogers. ‘Don’t want no trouble.’ Turning to face the lean man on the black horse. Fighting to keep control of his voice. ‘Listen, Mister . . . Didn’t catch the name?’

  ‘Didn’t throw it your way. I’m called Crow.’

  So far from a Cavalry outpost, his name meant nothing. And he didn’t have that big a reputation as a shootist. Not so far down in Arizona Territory. The faces remained blank and curious. Guarded. Slightly afraid.

  ‘Well, Mister Crow. I’m Sheriff Rogers, and I’d take it kindly ifn you’d tell me what brings you here.’

  There was still that line of onlookers, blocking off whatever it was that lay against the front of the ‘Promised Land’. Now he was closer in, Crow could see that the blood streaking the buckboard was fresh. Not bright red fresh, but not dried and black.

  He swung himself down, flicking the thong off the hammers of the Purdey as he did so, on the blind side away from the lawman and the rest of the town’s people. You kept living by never relaxing.

  ‘Heard you got trouble with some renegades. On top of the usual ‘Pache raids.’

  Crow was sensitive to atmosphere and he immediately knew that something was wrong. There was no reason he could see for the outbreak of whispering and grinning from the people. The fat man, Nate, hawked up a gobbet of phlegm and spat it in the dirt. Shaking his head at Crow as if he’d just heard the best joke in months.

  ‘You must mean Sean Neumann and his boys, Mister Crow. Figure you come after the bounties from some wanted poster somewheres.’

  ‘Yeah. Way you folks find that funny, I guess you know something I don’t Like whose corpses those are against the wall.

  Sheriff Rogers’ grin faded like the dew in the morning. And Crow knew his guess was right. Someone had gotten there firstest. The lawman looked puzzled at how Crow had figured it

  ‘How did…?’

  ‘Don’t take a giant of reasonin’, Sheriff. Blood on the rig there. More folks turned out at dawn than you get for a group lynchin’. I don’t see no weeping women. Has to be bodies. Has to be strangers to the town. I figure that surely has to be Neumann and maybe some of his men.’

  ‘Wouldn’t like to go for the pot and tell us how they died, would you, smart-ass?’ sneered Nate Goldsmith.

  ‘Apaches. Mescalero round here.’ From the way that the ageing gunfighter’s face fell Crow knew that it was his day for guessing. Without a word the crowd parted and there they were.

  Four of them in all.

  Neumann had to be the man with yellow hair. Not that the Apaches had left him any on his head. Just a wrinkled mess of scarred skin, bloodied beyond recognition. The Indians must have been disturbed to have left the arms and legs unbroken, the genitals unmutilated. Each of the four had been scalped and one of them had lost his eyes, with the additional unmistakable evidence of a war-axe having been used to smash in the jaw.

  ‘No bounty there, Mister Crow,’ laughed Nate Goldsmith.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Guess that means you’ll be riding on through, Mister?’ asked the sheriff,

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘I say you will,’ replied the lawman, made bold by the crowd around him.

  ‘Gutless old man,’ said Crow, very quietly, pushing through the line of onlookers, into the ‘Promised Land’, ignoring the babble of chatter his action provoked. Leaving Sheriff Rogers standing, hand resting on the butt of his Colt, jaw sagging.

  Inside there was an elderly black man, hair grizzled white, slowly mopping a cloth backwards and forwards across the polished wood of the bar-top.

  Crow had a feeling that someone would try and do something about him. And, having lost the chance of some bounty money, he didn’t give a sweet damn about it.

  He heard the batswing door clatter open, and knew he was right. The knowledge brought out a rare smile, that only the Negro saw. It was about the most frightening thing he’d ever seen.

  Chapter Three

  ‘Sheriff said you was to go, Mister Crow. Crow.’ Goldsmith rolled the name around his tongue like he was trying it out. ‘Sounds like an Indian name. Crow. Kind of nigger-lovin’ name, Crow.’

  ‘I’ll have whiskey,’ said Crow to the bar-keep, his back still turned to the doors. Hearing from the pushing and shuffling that Goldsmith had brought in half the township with him. To watch his big moment.

  ‘I’m talkin’ to you, Mister Nigger-Lover Crow.’ Nate was becoming more and more confident. No shootist he’d ever heard about carried a scatter-gun like that. Sure there’d been men using them. But not carrying one in a holster like that. Couldn’t possibly draw fast or shoot worth a damn with it.

  ‘I asked for a whiskey, if you please.’

  The old Negro shook his head, muttering to nobody in particular. ‘No, sir, boss. That Mister Goldsmith, he’ll have me whupped, ifn I…’

  ‘You don’t serve me, boy and you are goin’ to grow holes in
your belly big enough to drive a mule train through.’ Said in the same quiet voice. No louder than the summer wind through long grass.

  ‘I can’t. I swear to…’

  ‘He givin’ you trouble, Cassius?’

  The Negro didn’t reply, held fascinated by the controlled anger he saw in the smooth face of the man across the bar from him. He’d seen a lot of evil in his life but nothing gripped him like this stranger.

  ‘Crow. I say it’s time you moved on. Water your animal and yourself and get out. Out of our town.’

  ‘The Hell with it,’ whispered Crow, so that only he and the Negro could hear it. There were times he’d have done anything to try and avoid a fight. But now wasn’t one of those times.

  He turned slow and easy, and there was a ripple of movement by the doors as those at the front pushed a step back and those behind them carried on trying to get in.

  Near the whole township was there, every eye fixed on him. He saw the sheriff was among them. Near the back, trying to make himself invisible. Pretending that he wasn’t even there.

  Crow ignored the squat figure of Goldsmith, crouching wet-lipped in the middle of the room, fingers flicking at the low-slung gun in his belt.

  Addressing himself to the lawman. ‘Two possibilities, Sheriff.’

  ‘What?’ Rogers had aged before his eyes, and the voice shook.

  ‘You’re scared of this…this animal, here,’ pointing at Goldsmith. ‘Or you’re just all over scared of me and life and everything else.’

  ‘I’ll take him, Bob,’ breathed Nate, a fat red tongue rubbing along his lips as he waited for what he had now managed to convince himself was going to be an easy one.

  ‘Be better ifn you took that badge off and threw it down. Just might be someone with a mite of sand in them could pick it up and not be ashamed of wearing it.’

  ‘You better set your mind to prayin’, if an Indian nigger-lover like you knows any decent prayers.’

  Crow finally looked directly at Goldsmith, whistling silently to himself. Wondering how the bully had managed to get away with living for so long. Must have been that there’d been no good guns through Crossworld Springs for a while.

  ‘You want to die here or out there?’ he asked Nate, standing easily, feet apart, ready for the move if it came suddenly. Eyes roaming along the rest of the people, seeing no threat there. Store-keepers and traders and whores.

  ‘Go piss in the wind, Crow.’

  ‘Guess outside’ll make less mess.’

  ‘Bastard.’

  ‘You folks like to move on out of the way, and I’d be obliged if your so-called lawman’d take note that I’m not goin’ into this fight willingly.’

  ‘I see that, Mister Crow.’

  ‘Let’s go.’

  ‘Why don’t you go kiss my sister’s black cat’s ass, Crow?’

  The tall man didn’t even bother to reply to the string of insults.

  ‘If your mother hadn’t been an Indian whore I’d have fucked her, Crow.’

  The people of Crossworld Springs filed out as sober and orderly as if they were going to a Sunday morning church meeting, ranging themselves along the front of the saloon, by the row of blank-eyed corpses. Pushed to the side, one of the whores from the saloon stumbled and stepped clean in the face of what used to be Sean Neumann, giving a squeak of dismay as her heel ripped open the dead man’s cheek, drawing no blood.

  Reluctantly, Nate Goldsmith followed them out, still braying at Crow over his shoulder. Trying to rile him to make him even easier.

  Just as well try to rile a sandstone mesa.

  Crow trailed him out, last to leave the saloon. He glanced back at the bar-keep, but the old man was stooped over, ignoring everything, still slowly rubbing the rag up and down.

  Up and down.

  The sun was breaking the angle of the roof of the saloon, throwing its shadow halfway across the trampled earth of the street Crow stepped down off the wooden walkway, feeling the silence press in around him. Glancing back at the four mangled corpses. Sniffing.

  ‘They could do with getting underground, Sheriff. They aren’t comin’ up roses.’

  ‘Yes, sir, Mister Crow,’ stammered the lawman, wiping perspiration from his brow with a red and white ‘kerchief.

  ‘But I figure you’d do well to wait a whiles and get Mister Goldsmith there in the same plot.’

  Nate didn’t hear him. He was too busy working out where it was best to stand so that the stranger would have the sun in his eyes when it came to the draw. Taking the pistol and spinning the chamber, checking that he was carrying a full load. Spinning it around his finger in a way that he practiced for hours in front of the mirror in his locked bedroom. Hoping that the stranger would be impressed. Feeling a pang of doubt that nothing much seemed to have impressed the lean man in the black, dusty clothes.

  ‘Pick your ground, Nate!’ called Crow, stepping out into the light with a pantherish grace, easing his shoulders against the cloth of his jacket. Flexing his fingers like a concert pianist before beginning a difficult piece.

  The offer threw the older man and he nearly dropped his pistol, fumbling it back into the holster. Adjusting the tie around his leg to try and cover his confusion. Crow watched him, seeing that the gun was worn far too low. That Nate was going to have to reach at least four or five inches further than he needed to get his fingers around the butt of the Peacemaker. Even one inch often meant the difference between walking and being carried.

  ‘I’ll…You tryin’ to…Fine, Mister Fencepost…Guess I ought to have some kind of an edge, you being so much damned thinner than me.’

  ‘I’ll draw a line around you, Nate,’ called Crow. ‘Thin as me. And ifn I hit you outside that line then you can cry “foul” and we’ll do it again.’

  There was a ripple of amusement from the crowd, and a muffled giggle from one of the saloon girls.

  ‘Fuckin’ funny, Crow. Last God-damned laugh you’ll ever have. Come on. Let’s do it.’

  ‘Why not?’ said Crow, moving easily to where Nathan Goldsmith pointed. Tugging down on the brim of the hat, to keep the sun out of his eyes. He’d been around long enough in his thirty years to know that a load of ignorant nonsense was talked about gunfights. To be called out like this in the middle of a street was rare as snow in July. It was only because Nate felt he could take him easily that he’d forced this situation. Normally he’d have waited out back and gunned Crow down from behind. That was the way that most arguments were settled in the old West.

  Every now and then you’d find the young ambitious boy wanting to get himself a name by wasting away an established shootist But, not often.

  And one of the myths was that you always placed your opponent in a duel with his face to the sun so that he couldn’t see you make the move. That was fine only under certain circumstances. Like if you were on a hill at sunset with the brilliant light low on the horizon, at eye-level. Rest of the time you simply turned yourself into a sharp silhouette with every movement etched bright and clear.

  That was what Nate did. Setting himself about ten paces from Crow. Guessing that he should be able to hit him at least once with the Peacemaker at that range. And even if the tall stranger managed to tug the clumsy scatter-gun from its holster, he’d never hit him at that distance with sawn-down barrels.

  ‘You men want to make up this argument?’ called the elderly lawman, his voice showing his disinterest in the answer. Neither man took a shred of notice of the question, keeping their eyes locked on each other.

  Nate feeling a shiver along his spine at the calm confidence in Crow’s manner.

  Crow considering whether he might need to drop the shotgun and draw his own pistol from the back of his belt to cover the crowd for a sudden movement after he’d killed Goldsmith.

  ‘I’d take it kindly ifn you’d watch carefully, Sheriff, and see that I’m allowin’ this drunken old man to draw first on me,’ said Crow. There was something about his voice that was strange. Even when he spok
e quietly, which was most of the time, folks seemed to hear him well enough. When he shouted, which was very seldom, folks jumped like someone had just cracked a twenty foot bull-whip in their ears.

  ‘I’ll watch for that, Mister Crow,’ replied Rogers, fingers tangling behind his back with nerves.

  ‘Come on, you nigger-lovin’ son of a God-damned mother-fuckin’ bitch,’ yelped Nate Goldsmith, feeling a nerve beginning to flicker at the corner of his right eye.

  ‘I’ll not draw on you. Your fight. You draw first. I killed me a lot of men, Nate, and I never once pulled iron first on any one of them.’

  Which wasn’t strictly true. Crow’s sensibilities on killing didn’t run much along the same lines as moralist folks would have thought He had a simple creed which was to kill any enemies before they had a chance to kill him. By any means he could lay his mind to.

  Which meant he didn’t have any enemies. Like a nervy shootist called Lee once said. Lee had gotten himself killed swatting some flies away from a little village south of the border against Calveras. With Chris and a half dozen others. He’d said he had no enemies. Alive.

  Crossworld Springs was seething with life.

  During the scene in the saloon there’d been the clatter of wagons and horses coming into the township, along the trail from the east, kicking up a cloud of dust. Heading by the back of the buildings towards the livery stables and the corral. But everyone had been too interested in what was coming down between their own bully and this whipcord stranger in black.

  So the new arrivals had been left very much to their own devices. More or less forgotten by everyone in Crossworld Springs.

  Crow was totally ready, his mind calm and clear, nerves stretched just tight enough so that he could deliver the maximum effort at the optimum time. He stood, half-turned to the right, to present an even slimmer target to his opponent. His coat hooked back over his hip so that it wouldn’t impede his draw. Fingers dangling loosely over the polished wooden butt of the sawn-down Purdey scatter-gun. Left hand crooked across his stomach, fingers extended, to brush back on the double hammers of the gun.