David Gates - Blood Money

“He’d be Kick Emory,” Placido Geist said.

“That would be me,” Emory acknowledged.

“This is the man a certain Colonel Benét holds responsible for the death of his son Nathan,” the bounty hunter explained to Duquesne. “The colonel put money on his head.”

“Not that you’ll ever collect,” Emory said.

“Never meant to,” Placido Geist said. “I found the colonel distasteful. I turned his money down.”

“Wasn’t it enough?”

“I’ve no interest in you,” Placido Geist said. “Far as I’m concerned, you’re no longer worth saving.”

“You’ve got too much mouth,” Emory said, moving a little to the right for a clean shot at the bounty hunter.

Duquesne stood in the stirrups and made a quick half turn with his upper body, bringing the twelve-gauge to bear, and blew Kick Emory’s belly through his backbone.

“Will they lift the reward?”

“That’s up to Peter Hagerty.” Placido Geist shrugged, tightening the saddle cinches. “I don’t see him following in his father’s footsteps. You thought he wouldn’t bargain, but we came to an accommodation.”

“He might not forgive you for shaming him,” Duquesne said.

“Forgiveness is for God,” Placido Geist said. “The rest of us muddle along the best we can.”

Duquesne smiled. “What’s the story with Emory, the kid who had it in mind to shoot you?”

“His pelt’s worth fifty thousand dollars, you take it in to Austin and deliver the goods to Randolph Benét.”

Duquesne was shocked at the amount.

“I chose not to be the instrument of the colonel’s revenge, but I’ve no objection to your collecting on the debt.”

“Blood money.”

“And paid for in kind,” Placido Geist said. He mounted the claybank mare. “I’m obliged to you for it.”

He rode out.

Duquesne watched him go. Of course the colonel’s money was tainted. The only thing left untainted was self-respect.

There were always fated moments, though, he reflected. Perhaps his had come the first time the bounty hunter rode into town, bringing trouble the way a storm front presages rain. The sheriff didn’t fault Placido Geist.

It’s said that character is destiny. And how not? Duquesne asked himself. A man’s character was all he had to show. You played the cards you were dealt. Some men lived up to their own expectations and some didn’t. Some men lived lives without expectation and had no credit to redeem when they were called to the final account. What did it matter? You tried to become the man you imagined yourself to be, knowing that every man dies disappointed in himself.

But the dead have no memory. Only the living remember. At the end of the day, they alone survive to bear witness.

“So, a happy outcome,” the judge said.

“I’m not convinced there are happy outcomes,” Placido Geist said.

“Didn’t we have this conversation once before?” Lamar asked him. “The perfect proving to be the enemy of the good?”

“Not precisely my point,” the bounty hunter said. “I meant the scales aren’t balanced.”

“You don’t have a murder warrant hanging over your head, or a bounty on your remains.”

“I find it less than complete.”

“We’ve had this same conversation too,” Lamar said. “When is a thing finished? It’s done when you decide it’s done.”

“I’d imagine it to be done,” Placido Geist said.

“What’s your argument with it, then?” the judge asked him.

“Lack of absolution.”

“Whose? Kick Emory dead, albeit unfortunately. Thus, the colonel mollified.” Lamar held up his hand. “The reverse of your intention, I understand. Still. This ill-found business with the Hagertys resolved, or at least held in abeyance. Where are you looking for indulgence? I’m not the pope in Rome.”

“I have myself to answer to.”

“Answer to yourself, then,” Lamar said to him, “but do it on your own time.” He lifted the decanter of Tennessee whiskey onto the table and set down two glasses. “I refuse to listen to a man sober, if he’s going to wax lugubrious.”

“Lugubrious?” Placido Geist took umbrage. “I’m asking you to parse a moral issue,” he said.

“Horse snot. You’re turning sentimental.”

The last thing he ever thought he’d be accused of. “You’re turning downright Biblical in your dotage,” he said.

“I sat the bench thirty damn years, and I was Moses.”

“Moses, my teeth.”

They glared at each other, and then the judge suddenly burst out laughing. “Here we are, bickering like an old married couple,” he said. “Is that dignified?”

“No, but comforting,” the bounty hunter said.

Lamar put out the chess pieces. “When is justice honestly served?” he asked, rhetorically. “The younger of Hagerty’s sons died at your hand because you knew he’d escape the noose.”

“That was bad luck all around.”

“It was necessary,” the judge insisted.

“I’m not offering an apology.”

“But you doubt yourself.”

“I doubt the wisdom that’s passed down, like the laws of the Hebrews,” Placido Geist said. “We’re drawn to absolutes and condemned to folly.”

“Each of us makes choices. It’s only given to fools to make the easy ones, because they choose the simpler course.”

“The lesser of two evils.”

“Evil isn’t a matter of degree,” the judge said.

“Derek Hagerty wasn’t evil and neither was Kick Emory,” the bounty hunter answered. “Foolish or willful or just plain damn dumb stupid, but wickedness found them by accident.”

“And so did you,” Lamar said. “Was that accident or their own doom? The turning of the wheel, appointed and implacable.”

“Pour the whiskey,” Placido Geist said. “This conversation is making me dry.”

Lamar tipped the shot glasses full. “No man goes dry in my house,” he said.