Max Collins - The Legend of Caleb York

He was nodding. “You got Harry Gauge’s word on that. All I want is that herd. And I need it now. Right now.”

She grabbed the pencil and signed the paper, and pushed them both back at him.

York was sitting up.

He said, “You shouldn’t have done that, Willa.”

Gauge, still seated, swung the .44 and its long barrel his prisoner’s way.

Over by the bar, Maxwell, eyes glittering, said, “Go on and kill him, Harry! Blow his brains and then it’ll be just you and me.”

Gauge thought about that, then glanced at his new number two. “You know, I don’t think so. I think I have all the partners I need right now.”

The bug eyes widened even more. “Well, I just thought...”

“See, really, that’s what I liked about Rhomer. He didn’t think. He left me to do the thinkin’. And what I think right now is, you and Rhomer and all these other former outlaws scattered around these premises, dead, mostly thanks to our friend over here, well... With where I plan to go in my life, havin’ such unsavory associates don’t put me in an at all favorable light.”

“Boss...”

“And I don’t really need any witnesses to back me up, since who’s to say somebody’s story might not change, if it was to that witness’s advantage? You follow me, Maxwell? Thinker that you are?”

“What are you sayin’, Harry?”

“I’m sayin’ goodbye, Maxwell.”

And he shot him in the head.

The man was dead before his surprised expression could change. Gun tumbling from dead fingers, he slid down the side of the bar and sat on the floor, head hanging.

The room reverberated with the blast of the .44, gunsmoke drifting, leaving its scorched scent behind.

“You’re out of your mind,” Willa said to Gauge, horrified. “You said you’d let us go!”

“Hell, that didn’t apply to him. ” Gauge pushed back his chair and got to his feet. “ Mister! Can you stand? I want you standing. Because I want to see you fall.”

York struggled to his feet. When he got to them, he felt unsteady, and fought to maintain his balance, still woozy from the pistol-whipping.

“She’s right, Gauge,” York said.

“Is she? About what?”

“You are out of your mind.”

Gauge ambled from the table to a position more directly facing the prisoner.

“Maybe I am,” Gauge said. “Maybe not. Matter of opinion. But what are you besides mad, mister, comin’ to Trinidad, tryin’ to buck Harry Gauge?”

“I told you. I was just passing through.”

“Sure you were.” He used the gun for a pointing finger. “Listen, before I kill you, just answer me this... I know you’re not Banion. Banion’s dead, that’s a fact. So since you’re not Banion... just who the hell are you?”

“Caleb York.”

Willa’s eyes widened, then immediately narrowed, as if she weren’t sure she heard right. Just beside her on the floor, her father was straightening, saying, “What... what did he say?”

She whispered, “I don’t know what he thinks he’s doing, Papa.”

“ You’re Caleb York,” Gauge said.

“That’s right.”

“No, no — you’re the crazy one. Banion killed Caleb York. It’s well-known. Established.”

York shook his head, just a little — more would have hurt too much. “Banion killed the wrong man,” he said. “And he used a shotgun, and that... confused the issue.”

Gauge thought about it. “All right... so you’re Caleb York. Say I buy that. Why play dead?”

York sighed. “Because I got tired of shooting kids trying to take me. Trying to be me. Because...” He gestured to the carnage. “Because I wanted to be finished with this kind of thing.”

Gauge grinned and laughed. “Oh, well, Caleb — mind I call you ‘Caleb’? Caleb, you’ll be gettin’ your wish soon enough.”

Cullen was muttering to himself, “Caleb York... all this time... Caleb York...”

Willa spoke up, saying, “Gauge, you wouldn’t have the guts to face Caleb York down if you both had guns.”

Without looking at her, Gauge said, “It’s not a question of guts, Miss Willa. It’s a matter of brains. You don’t want a stupid fool like Rhomer over there as your partner, do you?”

York said, “Sorry, Willa. He’s just fine with shooting me down in cold blood.”

Gauge nodded slowly. “You understand me, at least, Caleb. Killers under the skin that we are.”

“Harry...”

The ragged, harsh, pain-racked voice belonged to Lola, from the floor where she looked almost as much a corpse as Rhomer and Maxwell. Worse than them, really, beaten and battered.

It was as if a ghost had spoken.

“Are you still alive?” he asked her coldly.

“We... we were something once, Harry,” she said.

“Your opinion in this don’t interest me, Lola. Stay out of it.”

“Harry!” It was a desperate cry. “This man... this Caleb York... he was good to me. Like you never were.”

Gauge grunted a laugh. Gun still pointed at York, he said, “You know, I’ll give you this much, Caleb. You sure do make an impression on the ladies. They all go for you, in a big way... even when they’re dyin’.”

“Harry,” she said. “Let me kiss him goodbye... Would that kill you?... Let me die... with a kiss from somebody... who’s a real man.”

Gauge started to laugh. “Like anybody would want to kiss a face like that! Lips swelled like those! Go ahead, Caleb York. Have a ball!”

He gestured toward the broken woman, in an archly magnanimous fashion.

“You heard the lady, Caleb!” Gauge raved. “Give her a kiss goodbye. It’ll be the last thing either of you do on this earth.”

York looked at Gauge, cocked his head.

“I mean it! Go ahead, I said. My treat!”

York went to her, slowly, and knelt to her, putting his back to Gauge, who stood in the middle of the dingy room with the .44 waiting to fire in his hand.

Lola’s eyes seized York’s, then led him to her right wrist, and limp fingers that hung loose on her right arm, which itself hung loose, as it had been broken early in her humiliation. The cloth on her blouse was ripped, torn, and next to the flesh were exposed two narrow shafts of metal.

Parts of the gambler’s trick sleeve rig that held the derringer that Lola, injured badly right away, had never been able to get to.

He leaned in to kiss her puffy lips, which he did ever so gently.

Then she smiled, life leaping in her eyes, as she whispered, “Hurry. I want to see it.”

Impatient now, Gauge said, “That’s enough! That’s enough. You’re makin’ me sick.”

York, the little gun palmed in his right hand, stood.

“Thanks for that, Harry,” he said.

“My pleasure, Caleb.”

York fired two .22 slugs into Gauge’s chest.

The big man staggered, as if suddenly drunk, the .44 tumbling from his fingers.

“Those were for Lola,” York said.

Then he went over and picked up the shotgun and aimed its barrels at Gauge.

“And these,” he said, “are for me.”

He emptied both into Gauge, who was blown back through the batwing doors and outside, his sudden exit leaving the doors swinging.

“Goodbye, Harry,” Lola said.

York looked over at her. A mess of a woman. So beautiful.

“Goodbye, Caleb York.”

Her eyes closed and breath left her.

Then Willa was there and they embraced.

In a few moments, York picked up the piece of paper Willa had signed, gave it to her, and they went out, his arm around her shoulders, her arm around his waist.

Harry Gauge was on his back with two overlapping bloody black steaming holes in his belly, as he stared up at the sky with an expression as stupid as anything Vint Rhomer ever mustered.