Twenty-Three
The sky opened up shortly after the shoot-out on the main street of town and the rain didn't stop for two days. During that time, everybody stayed close to their respective ranches. When the storm clouds finally blew away and the sky cleared, The Silver Dollar Kid got his go-to-work orders and rode into town and got him a room at the hotel. That was noticed by all the residents of course, but no one really paid much attention to it. The Kid was a quiet type who didn't drink very much and took his meals alone and at odd times of the day when the dining room at the hotel was least likely to have many customers.
The Kid lounged around town for the better part of a week waiting for Falcon to make an appearance. Not only didn't Falcon come into town, no one from the Rockingchair came into town. Then on a Saturday morning, the Kid looked out his second-floor window and smiled. Falcon MacCallister was just stepping down from the saddle in front of the general store. John Bailey and his family were just reining up in the buckboard in front of the dress shop. The Kid stared at the lettering on the shop window. He never could figure that out.
Shop
was spelled with two p's and two e's. Stupid.
The Kid buckled on his gunbelt and slipped into his fancy vest. He went downstairs to meet Falcon, certain that after today, his name would be right up there with Hardin and Hickok and Earp and Masterson and all the rest. He would be the man who outdrew Falcon MacCallister. He would be a legend. Tough men would step aside for him and singers would write and sing songs about him. There would be newspaper articles written about him, some penny dreadful books published, and maybe even some plays done about his life. The Silver Dollar Kid was sure all those things would happen . . . just as soon as word got out that he had killed Falcon MacCallister.
The Kid walked through the lobby of the hotel and stepped out onto the boardwalk, looking first left and then right. The shops and businesses were busy with customers. That was good. The Kid wanted lots of people to see him gun down Falcon MacCallister. He touched the butts of both guns. He was ready.
The Kid walked slowly up the boardwalk, toward the general store. He met a dozen people but spoke to none of them. He had just one thought on his mind: killing Falcon MacCallister.
Falcon was standing on the boardwalk in front of the general store, chatting with a local. He saw the Kid walking up the boardwalk and immediately sensed the Kid was going to brace him. It was in the way he was walking, the stiff back and the way the Kid held his hands.
“You'd better back away,” Falcon told the citizen. “I've got trouble coming straight at me.”
The local stepped to one side, then backed up until he was standing in the doorway of the general store, out of the direct line of fire.
“Falcon MacCallister!” the Kid called, stopping about a hundred feet from Falcon.
Falcon turned to face the Kid.
“I'm callin' you out, Falcon MacCallister.”
“Why?” Falcon asked.
That confused the Kid for a moment. There was a look of puzzlement on his narrow face. “ 'Cause you're you and I'm me, that's why,” he finally said.
“It was that way yesterday, last week, and last month,” Falcon said calmly. “Why brace me now?”
The conversation was getting just a bit philosophical for the Kid. He narrowed his eyes and stared hard at Falcon. “Don't try to weasel out of this, MacCallister. You knew it was comin'.”
“I did?”
That brought the kid up short again. This just wasn't going exactly the way he'd had it all worked out in his mind. He'd envisioned crowds of people lining both sides of the street, standing silently and watching while he gunned down Falcon. He hadn't expected a damn conversation with MacCallister.
“Yeah, you did!” the Kid yelled in frustration.
“Oh,” Falcon said. “Well. If you say so, Kid. Tell me, what are we fighting about?”
Again, the Kid was brought up short for a moment. He stared at Falcon, anger clouding his features, darkening his face. Finally, he said, “To see who's the better man with a gun, damn you, that's why.”
“Oh. Is that all? OK. You're a better man with a gun. Does that make you happy?”
Several men along the boardwalk laughed at that. The Kid looked as though he was about to cry. This just wasn't working out the way he'd planned.
“No, you bastard!” the Kid shouted. “You got to face me and hook and draw.”
“Aww ... do I have to?”
For a moment, the Kid looked as though he was going to jump up and down on the boardwalk and have a temper tantrum. “Yes, damn you, MacCallister. You have to face me. I'm callin' you out, right now, right here. I'm sayin' you're a yellow dog and you don't have the courage to face me. I'm sayin' you got no guts and you're a damn coward.”
The men along the boardwalk knew then that Falcon could not get out of this fight. No western man would stand and take those insults without reacting.
And Falcon was no different. He sighed and shook his head. “I wish you hadn't said those things, Kid,” Falcon told the younger man.
“Well, I said 'em, and I meant 'em, you yellow bastard! Now step out into the street.”
Falcon stepped off the boardwalk and into the street. There was nothing else he could do. The unwritten code had just been violated.
The Silver Dollar Kid stepped off the boardwalk and walked slowly to the center of the street, turning to face Falcon. The silver dollars on his vest, hat, and gunbelt twinkled in the sunlight.
John Bailey and his family stood inside the general store, looking out one of the large front show windows at the life-and-death drama that was taking place on the main street of town. They did not speak.
“Your play, Kid,” Falcon spoke softly. “You wanted this, now you have it. But I wish it didn't have to be.”
The Kid was all raging torrents inside. Outwardly, he was calm, but inside he was a spewing volcano. This was the moment he had lived for since he was just a pimply-faced boy. He was finally facing a top gun.
The entire town had turned out, lining both sides of the street. The townspeople and those who had come into town to shop stood silently on the boardwalk, not moving, not speaking. Watching and waiting.
“You got anything you want to say before you die, MacCallister?” the Kid called.
“I have no intention of dying this day, Kid. You've got it all wrong.”
“What do you mean? I'm the Silver Dollar Kid. No man has ever beat me to the draw.”
“You never faced anyone worth a damn, Kid,” Falcon's voice carried up and down the street. “All you've ever faced was two-bit wanna-bes and kids. I'm telling you right now to back away and get out. Or die where you stand.”
“You're . . . tellin'
me?”
the Kid was amazed. Nobody talked to him like that. Nobody. It just wasn't done. And he had faced men who were good with a gun. There was that marshal down south, and that gambler who cold-decked him that time. And that cowboy who was supposed to be good with a gun. The Kid laughed at Falcon. “I know what you're tryin' to do, MacCallister. It won't work. You're just tryin' to save your own skin.”
“You're a damn fool, boy,” Falcon told him, his words hard and cold. “What's Gilman paying you, seventy-five dollars a month? You ready to die for a few dollars? Is that all the value you place on your life?”
“You got it all wrong, MacCallister. I'm not the one goin' to die this day. You are!”
Falcon slowly shook his head. “No, I'm not, Kid. Be smart. Turn around and walk away. You've got a long life ahead of you. Don't end it in this street.”
The Kid laughed at Falcon's words. “Time for talkin' is all over, MacCallister. You can't talk your way out of this.”
“I tried,” Falcon said. “Nobody can say I didn't try.”
“Now!” the Kid shouted, and drew.
The Silver Dollar Kid was fast. If anything was ever written around him, that would surely be mentioned. He was only a hair slower than Falcon, and he got off the first shot. But he missed, the bullet digging up the dirt in front of Falcon. Falcon didn't miss. His bullet hit the Kid just under the V of the rib cage and turned him around. The Kid lifted his .45 and thumbed the hammer back. Falcon shot him again, the slug striking the Kid in the chest and dropping him to the dirt. The Kid's .45 slipped from his fingers just as he slumped over on one side, blood leaking out of a corner of his mouth.
Falcon walked slowly up to the young man and stood looking down at him. The Kid seemed to be having a difficult time focusing his eyes. He opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out except a mumble that Falcon could not understand.
The Kid tried to pull his second Colt from leather but he could not make his finger close around the butt. He finally gave it up and lay still in the dirt.
“My aim was off,” the Kid managed to say.
Falcon said nothing in reply.
The town doctor walked over and knelt down, examining the Kid. He stood up, looked at Falcon, and shook his head.
“He just wouldn't listen. I tried to talk him out of it, Doc.”
“I know you did. I heard you. No one can fault you for this shooting.”
Reverend Watkins and some ladies from his church had gathered on the boardwalk and were singing.
“I'm too young to die. I don't want to die,” the Kid muttered, his face pressing into the dirt.
None of the men gathered around said anything.
“It wasn't supposed to be this way,” the Kid whispered. “I was gonna be famous.”
Falcon picked out the empty brasses and dropped them into the street, filling up the cylinder with fresh rounds.
Two little boys darted out and grabbed up the empty brasses and dashed back behind the crowd on the boardwalk. None of those gathered around the dying young man noticed them. Somewhere in the town, several dogs started barking.
Reverend Watkins started praying for the Kid's soul and for the Lord to forgive Falcon for what he'd just done. The ladies broke out in fresh song.
The Silver Dollar Kid closed his eyes and died.
Falcon turned and walked away.
* * *
When the news of the Silver Dollar Kid getting gunned down by Falcon reached the hired guns in the county, some twenty of them packed their war bags and quietly rode out. They wanted no part of Falcon MacCallister. While the Kid may have been goofy in the head, he was still fast as a lightning bolt with a six-gun. Falcon outdrew him. That was it for those hired guns. This war was over for them.
Stegman, Gilman, and Noonan at first did not believe it when they heard the news about the shoot-out, for all three of them had seen the Kid practice and knew how fast he was. This meant that finding anyone now to go up against Falcon MacCallister face-to-face was going to be very difficult, if not impossible.
“Turn the boys loose and ambush the bastard,” Noonan ordered. “It's the only way.”
The fifteen gunslicks picked by the cattlemen's alliance met and discussed plans on how best to kill Falcon MacCallister. A gunslick named Wilbur felt sure he could take Falcon face-to-face. So did a hired gun who went by the name of Dooley, as did another mercenary who was called Ed.
“The Kid was all mouth,” Wilbur said. “He wasn't as good as people thought he was.”
“Yeah,” Dooley agreed. “And neither is MacCallister. I can take him.”
“So can I,” Ed announced.
The twelve others in the group said nothing. To a man, they all secretly believed they were faster than Falcon, but would keep their mouths shut about it for the time being. They all knew that the Kid may have had an off day. He might have had the sun in his eyes. His hand may have been sweaty when he drew. There were a dozen reasons why Falcon dropped the Kid, but none of the fifteen believed any of those reasons would ever happen to them . . . when the time came for them to face Falcon MacCallister. And that day would come.
When the Silver Dollar Kid was buried, there were no mourners at the church or at the graveside service: just Reverend Watkins and the two grave diggers. Not even the ladies from the church choir showed up. The Kid didn't even have enough money in his pocket to buy a decent headstone. The undertaker had to rip the silver dollars off the Kid's hat band, vest, and gunbelt to pay for the services. Neither Stegman, Noonan, nor Gilman attended the funeral services for the Kid.
And no one knew what name to put on the simple marker. No one knew the Kid's Christian name.
THE SILVER DOLLAR KID
was carved into the wooden marker, and the date of his demise. In a couple of years, the wooden cross would rot and fall apart and be no more, and no one would remember where the Kid was buried.
There were countless graves such as the Kid's scattered all over the west; too many for anyone to guess as to their number.
“The Kid was nearabouts as fast as Falcon,” John Bailey told the mountain men and his foremen about the fight. “Maybe a shade slowerâit was hard to tell. But he missed his first shot, and more important, he wasn't as calm as Falcon. The Kid was sweatin' like a pig. Falcon never even broke a sweat whilst they was standin' in the street under the sun. I never seen a man that calm and steady.”
“Of all them boys, Falcon is the most like his daddy,” Wildcat Wheeless said. “Damn near the spittin' image of him in looks, and his temper'ment is just the same. In the weeks that Falcon's been here at the Rockingchair, I bet ain't none of you seen that man get really mad, have you?”
John and Kip had to admit that was the truth.