Fatherhood

He shifted his weight to relieve his aching feet and the rain spilled off the front of his broad brimmed, battered Stetson onto the toe of his right boot. His feet were wet and his coat, even with the collar turned up against the weather, was doing little to keep him warm or dry. Licking his cracked lips was painful and he shrugged himself deeper inside his scarf so that only his dark, watchful eyes remained uncovered.

The town was well built but lacking in repair of late, even standing on the covered walkway, he was receiving a drenching. There was not so much money as there had been, the town was off the trade routes and region had not proved kind. Families had struggled for ten years to make the land pay and then finally, any with the means left, had picked up and moved to less hostile parts. The weather was foul and looked set in; there was no light in the sky, the moon’s pale glow could not permeate the thick cloud which denied him the comfort of the stars above. The night was black but shattered by the light and life of the town, he had become unaccustomed to the way mankind split the night with riotous noise and carelessly ruined all of its beauty, it disgusted him.

He was watching the saloon and had been for a little over an hour, half in interest and half in exhausted wariness. The crowd inside were making their own entertainment and the sounds of their forced jollity offered the comforts of whisky and company but steely determination kept him from going inside and taking his fill. His misery of cold and discomfort was not inspired by the possibilities of money or of taking revenge; he was testing himself.

He had been avoiding the towns for so long that he could not remember feeling clean. The grime in his clothes was ground in and the sour smell almost overpowering whenever he managed to get dry. The freezing waters of cascading streams had done little for the smell but had tried his patience plenty, lately it had rained so relentlessly that every brook was turbulent with mud and grit. To drink he had turned his head to the thunderous sky and drink his fill.

No rain water could ever truly quench his thirst; whisky, vengeance and lust had run his veins thicker than blood in his youth and even now the need for satisfaction on all counts rushed in his mind and gave him no peace. He sought isolation to avoid temptation but he found himself often weakening in his resolve. He had turned from the empty places of the planes when the rain had begun to freeze and the wind blistered his skin and scoured him clean.

On arrival in the familiar small town he had taken a room but had been unable to settle, too used to freedom he had paced the floor until his demeanor had upset the landlady to such an extent that he had, for her sake, forced himself outside again. Checking his horse had only taken a moment, the beast had taken the hardships well, and restlessness had pushed him on into the town.

Inevitably he had found his way to where the solutions to his foul mood and the reasons for it were intertwined like mating snakes in the midday sun, a dangerous mix of fear and attraction. Now it was only a matter of time.

Despite the cold and the cascade of water which ran from his hat, onto the shoulders of his coat where it trickled easily inside through ancient seams he was sweating. He could almost taste the whisky, hot on his tongue and like fire in his mind; he was angry at the thought and hungry for relief from its torment. Foul knowledge and experience held his feet like a lock of iron and prevented him from taking those steps which would carry him to the bar and to an evening which would end in the tangled in the dirty sheets and false arms of a cheap whore or tangling with the sheriff and in the cells for fighting. There had been variations, mostly unpleasant, over the years and while loneliness pulled him in self preservation held him stock still.

The creaking boards of the footway warned him of someone approaching; he cocked his head and watched the woman who came steadily towards him. She was young but she did not sway her hips to seduce, she almost glided despite heavy, wet skirts and a cloak. Her steps seemed effortless and she was completely unafraid, there was a challenge in her eyes but humour too and she had a sweetly countenance hidden under the shadow of her deep hood. She stopped next to him, as far out of the rain as she could manage and into the shadows. While not afraid she had no real wish to be seen with him.

‘You unsettled Mrs. Moore plenty with your pacing and cursing,’ she told him bluntly.

‘Huh,’

‘She thought you looked in a mean fighting mood and she sent me up to warn the sheriff that you was in town and ready to bring all hell down on some feller.’ Her voice was as soft as an owl’s wings on the wind. ‘It’s been a long time.’

‘A year,’ he shrugged.

‘A year ago you’d have already been in there and half way to blind drunk. If you wanted to go in you’d already be at the bar,’ she told him knowingly.

He grunted and she smiled. ‘I know what you are thinking,’ she teased.

‘Oh?’

‘Here’s plain Annie come to save me from my sins but there’s far prettier ones in there,’ she mocked him.

‘True enough,’ he agreed.

‘If I were prettier I’d be in there too and you’d be swinging through the door right now ready to bring me to my ruin. But I ain’t and you ain’t either, it’s far better for both of us out here.’

He smiled then and she was bold enough to step forward and take his arm. He was twice her age and feeling every one of his fifty years, she was clear as a spring day.

‘I’ve got fresh made bread, water on for a bath and strong coffee,’ she offered. ‘You can stand here all night if it pleases you but all you’ll get is a fever and I’ll not be the one nursing you back to health this time.’ He tore his eyes away from the saloon doors and looked down at her. ‘You want none of what you can get in there, at least this way you’ll wake up in a clean bed not on a bed of straw in the sheriff’s pen.’

‘Is that all you can offer,’ he asked familiarly.

‘All? I ought to call the sheriff now and have him take you in,’ she told him flatly.

‘But you won’t?’

‘Not tonight,’ she pulled him gently, her arm still interlocked with his. ‘Least you can do is walk me back, you’ve no idea the rough sorts we get in this town.’

‘Watch your mouth, girl,’ he warned her and she snorted with indignant laughter. ‘What would your father say?’

‘You tell me?’ she raised a mocking eyebrow.

‘I’ve not seen him for years, Annie, he’s probably dead,’ he told her cagily and she shrugged it off as if it was of no matter.

‘You told me that ten years ago and he turned up the next spring asking for money.’

‘It was my mistake that time, that’ll teach me to ever trust what a young cattle rancher says’ he apologised. ‘I am sure this time, Annie, he’ll not be bothering you again.

‘He has not bothered me for years,’ she replied calmly. ‘I never cared a jot for him, I have a perfectly good father,’ she squeezed his arm, ‘I have no need for another.’

‘I’m no father to you, girl,’ he replied, shy in the face of her affection.

‘The day you picked me up and carried me safely away after they killed my mother you acted more like a father than any man I’ve met. I can still remember riding away with you and having to cling to the saddle ‘cos we were goin’ so fast.’ She was lost in the mists of time, a five year old terrified girl who had just seen her mother gunned down and lying in the dust while her father turned tail and ran like a coward. ‘I’ll always be here to rescue you just like you rescued me,’ she told him kindly, ‘I’ve no horse but I’ll be here none the less.’

‘Take me home, Annie,’ he suddenly felt immensely tired and old. ‘That coffee sounds mighty good just now.’