Jory Sherman: Blood Sky at Morning

Tolliver’s throat went dry as the dirt under his feet, but he managed to squeak out a question.

“Damn, where’d you come from?”

Zak said nothing. He looked at the two men. Both were armed, but they didn’t look ready to defend anything they might have inside the adobe or on their persons.

“Mister, you oughtn’t walk up on a man like that,” Grubb said. “You could get yourself killed for no good reason.”

“I’ve been watching you two fellows,” Zak said. “Had my eye on you since late afternoon. If ever I saw a couple of dunces, you two were they. I doubt if either of you could hit the broadside of a barn at five paces. But if words were bullets, you two would be champion shots. I haven’t heard such arguing since I stayed with a married man and his wife up on the Judith.”

“You been listenin’ to us?” Tolliver said, gape-mouthed.

“Voices carry out here,” Zak said. “A long way.”

“Well, what you sneakin’ around for?” Grubb said. “Spyin’ on people like that. Ask me, you’re the one ain’t got good sense.”

“I’ll tell you why I stopped by, mister.” Zak looked at Grubb. “Danny.”

Danny recoiled in shock that the stranger knew his name. “Yeah? How come?” he said.

“There was a wagon come through here with a kidnapped soldier in it. I want you boys to tell me where it’s going to wind up. I’ll give you five seconds, Danny, and I’m counting real fast.”

“Ain’t none of your business,” Tolliver said.

“Three,” Zak said.

“What you gonna do if we don’t tell you?” Danny asked.

“One of you I’m going to blow straight to hell,” Zak said.

“Which one?” Danny asked.

“One second left.”

“Jesus,” Tolliver said, and he wasn’t praying.

Danny, rattled, spoke first.

“Ferguson,” he said.

Tolliver chimed in on the heels of Danny’s one word statement.

“Edge of Tucson. You find Cantina Escobar, you’ll see the freight company a stone’s throw away.”

“Either of you know a man named Ben Trask?”

The two men looked at each other, their expressions showing their bewilderment.

“Naw,” they said, like a chorus of jackdaws.

“You know the soldier’s name? The one that was in the wagon?”

“They called him O’Hara,” Danny said. “Young feller. Still wet behind the ears.”

“Tied up,” Tolliver said.

“Where’s the next station?”

“Huh?” Danny said.

“Is there another one of these ’dobes where that wagon was headed?”

“Two more,” Tolliver said.

“You boys are out of business,” Zak said. “As of right now. I’ll leave you two horses. The rest I’m running off.”

“You can’t do that,” Tolliver said. “They hang horse thieves in this country.”

“I’m not stealing them. I’m just turning them loose. You got any apples inside that ’dobe?”

“Apples?” Danny said.

“Yeah, my horse likes apples.”

Both men shook their heads.

“Does this look like a damned orchard?” Tolliver said, suddenly belligerent.

“I don’t see no horse,” Danny said.

Zak turned his head, gave a low whistle. Then he called, “Nox.”

The black horse, his coat shining like dark water, came around the corner of the adobe, reins trailing. He ambled up to Zak, who rubbed the hollows over the horse’s eyes, worried his topknot with massaging knuckles.

“I ought to burn you out,” Zak said. “But I’m just going to turn those horses out and ride on.”

He grabbed his reins, separated them, and draped the ends over the horse’s neck, just in front of the saddle.

“Mister, you ain’t running none of our horses off,” Tolliver said. “I’m callin’ you out.”

Zak turned toward Tolliver and stared him straight in the eyes. He let his right hand slide easily down his horse’s neck until it was parallel to the butt of his pistol.

Tolliver sat there, blinking. Under the brim of his grease-stained hat, his eyes glittered with lantern light and shadow. He screwed up his lips as if chewing on something distasteful. Seconds ticked by as the silence deepened into a great ocean tossing with soundless seas. Grubb swallowed and his Adam’s apple bobbed, a sharp pointed spearhead beneath the skin.

“If you do,” Zak finally said, “it’ll be the last thing you call out.”

“You don’t scare me none,” Tolliver said.

“You’re going to hear two things, Tolliver,” Zak said.

“Yeah?”

“One is the sound of my Walker Colt calling out your name. The other is old Angel Gabe blowing his trumpet, calling you to Judgment Day.”

Tolliver snarled, uttered an oath under his breath. He came up into a crouch, his hand diving for his pistol. Danny sat there, trying to hold back his bowels, his face drained of color, leaving only the white stain of fear sprawling on his features.

Zak didn’t take his eyes off Tolliver as his fingers grasped the butt of his pistol. Tolliver was pulling his own pistol from its holster. In that wink of eternity, it seemed as if it took hours for the barrel of the pistol to clear the sheath. In that split second, Tolliver’s face mirrored his final thought: He was going to make it.

Zak’s pistol seemed to leap into his hand, and when he thumbed back the hammer, the click made Danny jump inside his skin. Tolliver’s barrel came clear and his thumb pressed down on the hammer to cock the single action.

Zak’s Colt bellowed, spewing a bright orange flame, unburnt powder, and a .44 caliber lead projectile from its muzzle. The roar of the explosion was like a single thunderclap drowning out the sizzle of the bullet as it sped faster than the speed of sound, making a crack like a bullwhip just before it smashed into the center of Tolliver’s chest with all the impact of a pile driver.

Tolliver’s finger closed around the trigger, then went slack as he was slammed back against the wall of the adobe, a jet of blood spurting from his chest, a crimson fountain that drenched his belly and the crotch of his trousers. Danny put his arms up over his head and ducked as if to ward off the next shot that he was sure would come.

Tolliver slumped against the adobe. His pistol slipped from his hand and made a dull thud as it struck the dirt. He stared a thousand yards without seeing anything but a blur, an afterglow of orange light burning into his brain.

Danny swallowed his tobacco. It made him sick and he pitched forward, vomiting it back up, along with the moil of his supper and whatever else was inside his tortured stomach.

Zak walked over, picked up Tolliver’s pistol, stuck it inside his belt. He then lifted Grubb’s pistol from its holster as Danny went through the throes of the dry heaves.

“I’m leaving you two horses. One for yourself, one to pack out that dead man there. You tell Ferguson and Trask I’m coming for them. And I’ll ask you one more time, Danny, how many more of these line shacks between here and Tucson? The ones Ferguson is using.”

A watery-eyed Danny looked up at Zak, wiped vomit from his chin.

“Two more, that I know of. Hell, I don’t even know who you are,” he croaked.

“The name’s Cody.”

Zak walked inside the adobe and kicked over the stove, threw the lantern onto the coals. Then he walked out, past Danny, and climbed into the saddle. He rode down to the corral, tied Nox to a pole, went inside. He ran all but two of the horses out and closed the gate. He looked up toward the flaming adobe and saw Danny pulling Tolliver’s body away from the conflagration.

Zak untied the reins, pulled himself back up into the saddle.

He rode off through a shimmering band of firelight, into the night, following the wagon tracks. He heard the horses galloping away and the neighs of those left behind.