Butchery of the Mountain Man

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Perdition, Arizona—1872

When Smoke Jensen had ridden into town a few minutes earlier, news of his arrival spread quickly. Even though he was still a young man, his fame had spread, and grandfathers held up their grandsons to point him out as he rode by, so that the young ones could remember this moment, and, many years from now, tell their grandchildren about it.

Smoke had earned this not-always-welcome notoriety, because of his prowess with a Colt. He was in the Rattler’s Cage Saloon now, and had just ordered a beer. Picking it up, he looked around the interior of the saloon. Half a dozen tables, occupied by a dozen or so men filled the room, and tobacco smoke hovered in a noxious cloud just under the ceiling. It was now twilight, and as daylight disappeared, flickering kerosene lanterns combined with the smoke to make the room seem even hazier.

Smoke had come to Perdition because he had heard that his sister, Janey, was here. He and his sister had never been close, not since she ran away from home during the war, leaving a young Smoke to try and run the farm, and deal with their dying mother, all by himself.

He had encountered Janey again, briefly, in the town of Bury, Colorado, just before his showdown with Richards, Potter, and Stratton. Then, he had sent her away. But, at Sally’s urging, he decided to make at least one more effort to find her, and to see if he could patch up things between them.

It had been a false lead though. She wasn’t here and she hadn’t been here, so his trip to Perdition had been a waste of time. He sent a telegram back to Sally, telling her that his search had been fruitless, and he was coming back home.

“Would you be the one they call Smoke Jensen? The famous . . . gunfighter?” It wasn’t a friendly question, or even a question of curiosity. In fact, it was less a question than it was a challenge.

In Smoke’s young life, he had already encountered dozens of men like this: angry, belligerent, challenging. He said nothing in reply to the question, but simply held his beer glass out in sort of a salute.

“You too good to talk?” the challenger asked.

Smoke sighed. “Mister, I’ve ridden a long way on a wild-goose chase. I hope you aren’t going to make any trouble.”

“Make trouble? Make trouble, you say?” the young man replied. He turned to address the others. The saloon had grown deathly still now as the patrons sat quietly, nervously, and yet titillated too, by the life-and-death drama that had suddenly begun to unfold in front of them. “You don’t want me to make any trouble for the great gunfighter, is that it? Do you think I should just shut up and be scared of you because I am in the presence of the great Smoke Jensen?”

Smoke put his beer down with a tired sigh and turned to face his tormentor.

“What’s put the burr under your saddle, mister? Have I killed someone close to you? A brother, perhaps? Or maybe your father or just a friend?”

“No, it ain’t that. It ain’t nothin’ like that, at all,” the young man answered. “I’m just a-thinkin’ that if I killed the great Smoke Jensen in a fair fight, why, folks would be sayin’ my name the way they say yours now.”

“And is that what you want?”

“Oh, yeah,” the man said with a sardonic grin. “That’s what I want.”

“What is your name?”

“The name is Moore. Lennie Moore, though you’ve probably heard of me as Fast Lennie. That’s what most folks call me.”

“Fast Lennie, huh?”

“Yeah. Have you ever heard of me?”

“As a matter of fact, I have,” Smoke replied.

Moore’s smile broadened. “So, you’ve heard of me, have you? What have you heard?”

“I’ve heard that you are an ignorant young punk, trying to pass yourself off as a man.”

Moore’s smile quickly turned to an angry snarl. “Draw, Jensen!” he shouted, going for his own gun even before he issued the challenge.

Moore was quick, quicker than anyone else this town had ever seen, and quicker even than anyone Smoke had encountered for some time. But midway through his draw Moore realized that he wasn’t quick enough. The arrogant look of confidence on his face was replaced by the knowledge that he knew he was about to be killed.

The two pistols discharged almost simultaneously, but Smoke had been able to bring his gun to bear whereas Moore had not. Smoke’s bullet plunged into Moore’s chest. The bullet from Moore’s gun smashed the glass that held Smoke’s drink, sending up a shower of beer and tiny shards of glass.

Looking down at himself, Moore put his hand over his wound, then pulled it away and examined the blood that had filled his palm. By the time he looked back at Smoke the fear had been replaced by acceptance, and a little expression of surprise.

“Damn,” he said. “You’re good. I would have bet my life that I could beat you.” Moore tried to chuckle, though the chuckle ended with a cough. “I guess I just did that, didn’t I?” Moore fell on his back, his right arm stretched out, his forefinger still sticking through the trigger guard.

Moore had been wearing a black hat, with a silver band from which protruded a red feather. The hat was upside down on the floor behind him. The eye-burning, acrid smoke of two gunshots hung in a gray-blue cloud just below the ceiling.

Smoke turned back to the bar where all that was left of his drink were pieces of broken glass and a small puddle of beer.

“Damn, he spilled my beer,” Smoke said.

“Yeah, it looks like he did,” the bartender said. Grabbing a new mug, he opened the spigot of the beer barrel, and a golden liquid began climbing the sides of the glass.

The saloon had grown silent in the moments just before the gunfight, but since the gunfight it had become a buzz of excitement as everyone shared with each other what all had just seen. Smoke was only halfway through his drink when the sheriff and one of his deputies arrived.

“What happened here?” the sheriff asked.

The question wasn’t directed to anyone in particular, so everyone started answering at once, availing themselves of the first opportunity to tell a story they would be telling for the rest of their lives.

“Hold it, hold it!” the sheriff said, holding up his hands. “Don’t everyone talk at once.” The sheriff looked over toward the bartender. “Abe, what happened here?”

“Moore tried to brace Jensen.”

“Moore started the fight?”

“Oh, yeah, Moore started it,” Abe replied.

“Abe’s tellin’ it true, Sheriff,” one of the saloon patrons said. “All this feller here done”—the patron pointed toward Smoke—“was try ’n have hisself a drink in peace. Next thing you know, why Moore there, is gnawin’ at ’im.”

The sheriff stroked his chin as he looked down at Moore’s body. Death had made the young would-be gunman’s face appear slack-jawed and distorted.

“Let me guess,” the sheriff said. “Moore recognized Jensen, and was trying to make a name for himself, wasn’t he?”

“That’s exactly what it was,” Abe said.

The sheriff walked back down the bar toward Smoke, who hadn’t spoken a word since the sheriff and his deputy came in. He was calmly drinking his beer.

“Mr. Jensen, I thought you told me when you found out your sister wasn’t here, that you would be goin’ back up to Colorado.”

“I am going back,” Smoke said. “Train’s leavin’ tomorrow.”

“Too bad it didn’t leave an hour ago,” the sheriff said.

“I would have been on it,” Smoke said.

“And Moore would still be alive,” the sheriff said.

“For now. But with his attitude, he was sure to get himself killed, sooner or later.”

“I expect you might be right.”

“I know I’m right.”

“I reckon you’ve run across people like Moore before.”

“More often than I want to,” Smoke said. “Most of the time it’s all jaw. Not ever’one has the guts to actually make the try, like Mr. Moore did.”

“And you say your train leaves tomorrow?”

“That’s right.”

“What are your plans now?”

“My plans are to go back home.”

“No, I mean from now until your train leaves tomorrow.”

“I thought I might have supper and get a good night’s sleep,” Smoke said. “Unless you need me to stay around for an inquest or something.”

“No, no, that won’t be needed. Uh, but it would be good for all of us, if you’d maybe have your supper and turn in early. You wouldn’t want to sleep late and miss your train tomorrow, would you?”

Smoke chuckled. “No, I don’t think I would want to do that.”

A tall, very gaunt-looking man dressed in black tails and a high hat came in then. Two other men were with him.

“Hello, Gene. I see it didn’t take you long to get here,” the sheriff said. “Gene Ponder is our undertaker,” he added, speaking to Smoke.

“Oh, my, I do believe that is young Mr. Moore, isn’t it?” Ponder asked. “He has given me business before, but always before it was the other gentleman I would be carrying away.”

“Get him out of here,” the sheriff said.

Ponder nodded toward his two associates, and they picked the body up and carried him out. Immediately after the body was moved, one of Abe’s workers began cleaning up the blood.

“Mr. Jensen, I apologize for this,” the sheriff said. “And I do hope nobody else gets the idea to come after you.”

“Yes, I hope so as well.”

Sugarloaf Ranch

Smoke and Sally were sitting in a porch swing watching the light show on the mountains as the sun dipped lower in the western sky.

“And this man, Moore, just challenged you for no reason?” Sally asked.

“Oh, he had a reason all right. He wanted to be known as the man who had killed Smoke Jensen.”

Sally shivered. “That’s no reason.”

“It was to Moore, and it is for other men just like Moore.”

“Smoke, will you ever be able to just hang up your guns and become a gentleman rancher?” Sally asked.

“Oh, I don’t know. That’s pretty hard.”

“What’s so hard about it?”

“The ‘gentleman’ part,” Smoke said, teasingly.

“Oh, pooh, you know what I meant,” Sally said with a little laugh, hitting him playfully on the shoulder.

“To answer your question, truthfully, I don’t know,” Smoke said. “It seems to me like my trail has already been blazed. I don’t know as I have any choice but to follow it.”

“But wouldn’t you like to see Sugarloaf become a productive ranch?”

“It will become a productive ranch, Sally, I promise you that. The day will come when Sugarloaf will be one of the biggest and the best ranches in all of Colorado.”

“But if someone is always trying to kill you?”

“I’ll deal with it,” Smoke said, confidently.