The Bad Moon.
He rode down the gulch and turned left in Lead’s gully. There were cactus growing on the edges of the ravine, and they were silhouetted in a ghostly semi-human form in the pale moon light. The land was bare, dusty and strewn with rocks and stones. The path that his horse walked on was hard and untrodden. The iron horseshoes echoed with a hollow clacking rhythm on the path.
He rode on lazily through the gully, with the cool night wind brushing his face underneath the wide-brimmed hat. A dark figure, on a dark horse, on a dark and lonesome night. Riding slowly by in the cool night breeze. The horseshoes echoing a soft, ghostly tune off the pebbles in the path.
On the far side of the gully the land stretched out to a small piece of flat land before leading into the old ghost town. Long since deserted the pale wooden buildings still stood haunting the night with their silence. The path led the man and his horse into the only street of the old town, and he saw the dim glimmer of solitary fire reflecting from within one the buildings. It was an old saloon with no signs of life, other than the flickering shadows of flames.
The man got off his horse and tied the animal to a nearby pole. Then he went to inspect the old saloon. His boots and spurs jingled gently on the dusty road as he walked towards the door…
II.
He peered into the dark room, illuminated by the flickering fire. “Hello,” he inquired to a single man seated by the flames next to an old iron fireplace. The man turned to him and said, “I heard y’all a-coming a mile off. One can hear everything in this silence.”
“Well, hello again,” said the cowboy, “mind if I take a seat?”
“Help yourself…” said the man.
They introduced one to the other, and the cowboy’s name was Jeff Banks, whereas the lone stranger in the room was only named ‘Jimmy’. With the introductions settled, the two men sat to talking about the current affairs in the county, and how each of them went about their survival, and their business. Then they sat silent for a long time as the cowboy took out some paper and tobacco and rolled them each a smoke.
They remained seated in the darkness and the silence, as they looked into the flames. Two hard men, each occupied with his own hard thoughts. They remained quiet as they sat and smoked and looked into the flickering flames of the fire.
Far off a coyote howled awful lonesome on a distant hill, under the pale full moon…
The End.
JP Brown – 13/06/2008.
