A Western tale

The sheriff of Carson City leaned on the hitching rail of his jail looking out over the town. He took a last satisfied drag on his roll-up before spitting it onto the ground below him. The town was quiet, people just going about their normal business, early morning shopping and such. The distant clang of a blacksmith’s hammer came over the noise of buggy wheels rattling down the street, just an ordinary day, very civilised and peaceful.

One of the girls from the saloon across the way shook a duster out of an upstairs window and waved to him. He raised his hand in acknowledgment, maybe he’d follow up her invitation in the evening.

Then a smart looking stranger trotted past, nothing wrong with that but the Sheriff’s keen eyes narrowed as he noticed the cut of the man’s coat and the well worn holster of the six gun at his hip. He filed the newcomer in his memory for future use; ‘gambler looking for trouble’.

Slipping the safety loop from the hammer of his own gun, he smiled grimly and walked over to the man as he hitched his horse to the rail outside the saloon.

“Howdy stranger you stopping long, or just passing on through?”

“I’m looking for the man who reckons he’s the fastest gun slinger in the County. I reckon one of us will be dead before nightfall and I don’t expect it to be me!”

“Well now son, without wishing to boast I reckon that’ll be me.” The Sheriff held up his gun hand to show his peaceful intentions. “Come into the saloon for a welcoming drink and we’ll discuss the matter before we resolve it”

The bar-keep poured a couple of shots of red-eye and slid them down the bar then smiled at the pair. “Reckon you’ll be going over to the barn in a moment or two,” he said, “we’ll soon have more lawmen in this town than there are inhabitants!

The gambler raised his eyebrows questioningly at the Sheriff.

“We have a little custom in this town,” said the Sheriff, “when folks like you come along we like to invite them into the barn where we have a shooting range. It’s well out of the way in there and the good citizens of this town feel safe on the streets while we answer the questions we may have about each other. We’ll have a little competition and after that, if you feel so disposed we’ll go out into the street and have it out in the time honoured way. If you decide otherwise you can join up with me and become another deputy.”

“Another deputy?” queried the gambler.

“Yup, we got eight of the blighters now, we’re the most peacefullest town out this way and that’s the way I mean to keep it!”

The stranger produced a sinister smile, “who could possibly ignore a gamble like that?”

The barman gave the Sheriff the keys from the rack behind the bar, then watched as the two men left the saloon and walked together down the road. “I’d give a months pay to know how he does it,” he said, “but then I couldn’t hit the wall of the barn even if I was inside!”

----O----

“I guess we’d better introduce ourselves,” said the Sheriff. “My name’s Jeff, what do I call you?”

“Jake” replied the latest stranger in Carson City laconically.

“Not Black Jake from Wyoming?”

“Nope shot him a month ago, not nearly as good as his reputation!”

The two men had arrived at the barn after this exchange of information, so Jeff used the key he’d got from the saloon and opened the door.

Jake gazed round the inside of the structure with the practiced gaze of a professional on entering a strange building. The walls had been lined with heavy timber up to a height of six feet or so. A low table stood just in front of them as they entered, while at the far end was a strongly made low retaining wall holding back several tons of well packed earth. This wall also supported a large table in front of it and was obviously used for targets such as bottles or tin cans. The light inside was surprisingly good and came in through large windows located just above the reinforced walls.

“Right then” said Jeff, “speed first then accuracy afterwards?”

“Sounds fair to me,” was the reply, “how do we check speed without me killing you?”

“Two ways, first the poker chip draw; although not very accurate unless there’s a big difference between us.”

Jeff opened a drawer under the table and produced a poker chip from the contents. Then placing the chip on the back of his gun hand he held his arm out at shoulder height pointing his gun at the stop butts at the end of the barn. He turned his wrist and went for his gun as the chip fell and managed to fire three times just as the chip hit the floor.

“Two shots,” said Jake, inaccurately.

Then he took his turn and also fired three times. “Three!” He exclaimed triumphantly.

For the next half hour the rattle of gunfire echoed from the old barn. The inhabitants of the town went about their business as normal, but every now and then men wearing deputy’s badges would smile knowingly at each other as a single shot rang out.

“I reckon we’re about equal allowing for personal scoring methods,” said Jeff at last, “just to make sure we’ll try the wax bullet system.”

Jeff reached down again into the drawer and produced a shallow tray with about half an inch of old melted candle grease in the bottom. He also put a box full of empty .45 cartridge cases beside the candle wax with a box of new percussion caps.

“We press the open end of a case into the wax, fit a new percussion cap and ‘hey presto’ non lethal cartridge.”

“So what?”

Jeff held back a sigh, no point in riling Jake, so he continued patiently. “Put on this vest and you’ll see. There’s a target two inches in diameter on the front just over your heart. We each wear one and can have as many goes as you like at killing each other. Just stop shooting when you feel a thump on your chest, that means you’re as good as dead! The remains of the wax bullet will stick there so that we can check accuracy if needed. The percussion cap has enough power to fire the wax for about 30 feet. If we stand 20 feet apart that should be fair enough, agreed?”

Jake was practically laughing as he unloaded his gun and began filling the blank cases with wax.

“You can have the drop on me if you like,” said Jeff “and we’ll go on from there for as long as you want.”

Guns loaded with wax bullets, the men faced each other at the agreed distance.

Jake’s hand flashed down to his gun, cocking the hammer as he brought it up to waist height. He was amazed to feel two shots thump him in the chest before he’d pulled the trigger.

“Guess you got lucky there Sheriff, I’ll have another go to set the record straight.”

Jeff grinned at Jake, as the men reloaded their guns and fired again with the same result.

Jake kept the contest going for five more attempts; finally on the last one he managed to squeeze off a shot that missed his target by a good few feet before he was hit.

“Ok you’re faster than me at close range but how good are you at a longer distance with real bullets?”

The men cleaned their guns and reloaded with normal cartridges.

Jeff set up a few tin cans on the table at the end of the range. Jake fanned his gun and blasted the complete row in one easy sweeping motion. Jeff walked down the range again and set up another row.

His first shot hit one can, but he kept the thing dancing in the air with each of his next four shots.

Jake started to looked upset again.

“One more thing before we go,” said Jeff, “shooting the bottom off bottles!”

“Give it a rest Sheriff, that’s far too easy; surely any kid can do that.”

Jeff went down the range for the last time arranging six bottles so that the open ends pointed towards the firing point. “Three each, I’ll go first”

Three bottles exploded in time with the reports from Jeff’s gun. Jake walked down range in his turn to have a look. The bottom of each bottle had disappeared leaving the neck portion intact.

30 minutes after the men had gone into the barn they walked back into the saloon. The gambler was shaking his head in disbelief.

“Well if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes I would never have believed it possible!”

“Drinks all round barman,” said the Sheriff “we’re celebrating goodbye to a stranger and hello to our 9th deputy!”

----O----

The sheriff of Carson city known to his friends and deputies as Jeff, was relaxing as he always did before a possible gun fight. He was hoping the new man would make a good deputy but you never knew. “Oh well nothing else for it.”

Jeff made sure his gun was able to clear freely from his holster as he wandered over to the saloon where the latest newcomer on the prod was causing mayhem inside.

“I’m so fast he could have his gun drawn and aimed at me and I could still shoot him dead before he realised what was happening.”

The latest gunslinger in the town could certainly talk up a storm. The worn holster and butt of the man’s peacemaker raised some doubts in Jeff’s mind as he came quietly up behind him. So many so-called fast guns went in for fancy gear, but this one looked workmanlike and capable.

Jeff was no slouch when it came to fast draw, but the newcomer whirled round pulling his gun from the holster as soon as he heard the double click of Jeff’ gun cocking as he tried to creep up behind the stranger quietly and safely.

The man he was approaching had reflexes so fast that a shot crackled past Jeff’s chest while he was still cocking his own gun, but then he replied by shooting the stranger’s gun from the man’s hand.

“Easy stranger,” said Jeff, “OK so you’re fast, I’ll give you that but I think you’ll find that I’m more accurate. I would like to propose a small competition before we get down to the serious stuff.”

“I get another chance at busting your reputation?” asked the man before him eagerly while he nursed his bruised gun hand.

“Sure thing, but I think I’ll have a non-lethal competition with you down at the old barn before we go into that situation my friend.”

One of the pot men in the saloon, grinning from ear to ear, picked up the stranger’s gun from the floor where it had been blasted by Jeff’s bullet and handed it to his sheriff. Jeff emptied the cylinder and gave the gun back to the stranger.

I can’t keep calling you stranger,” He asked as he handed back the man’s unloaded pistol, “How do I call you?”

“Back home I’m known as Lightnin’ Luke.”

“Right then Luke we’ll go down to the old Barn and have a little competition. When we’ve finished you can call me out if you really want to, but otherwise I’ll deputise you.”

“Sounds fair,” grinned Luke, “how long d’you reckon it’ll take before I kill you?”

“How about a drink and a chat first, then tomorrow morning your hand should feel better and we’ll go to the barn.”

The two men agreed to this and spent the rest of the day amidst knowing smiles from those of the townsfolk who ventured into the saloon.

Sure enough just after sun-up the pair strolled down to the barn. Luke appeared to be friendly but Jeff was an old hand at this sort of situation and kept himself ready for any eventuality.

The local news-paper man was on hand to take their photographs and several townsfolk wished Jeff luck as they closed the barn door behind them.

The barn had already been set up for the normal range of competition gun play. Jeff went through his routine and was surprised to find that Luke was better than him in one or two disciplines. The score was about equal when Jeff proposed a break.

“Haven’t you got anything more difficult?” asked Luke.

“No offence friend but I reckon your accuracy wasn’t really good enough on the last challenge.”

“I shot the bottoms out of the bottles didn’t I?” said Luke beginning to get aggressive.

“Seemed so, but just to make sure the bullets were going in through the bottle neck I propose making it a bit more difficult.”

“Hell I still reckon that I’m a bit better than you, so I’m ready to give you a chance outside,” blustered Luke.

“I reckon we’ll just stay here a bit,” said Jeff, “all I’m going to do is stick a piece of paper over the opening of each bottle and see if all our shots go through the paper.”

“Fair enough,” replied Luke and he even helped stick the paper on the bottles.

Both men blasted away at the prepared bottles and there was still no difference between them in the number of bottles shot cleanly.

“Never seen this sort of situation before,” exclaimed Jeff, “but I have another idea I’ve never had to use. Come over to the saloon with me and we can bring back two bar stools each. They have swivel seats and we can put one bottle on every seat and see who gets the most once when they’re spinning.”

“Now that sounds interesting,” said Luke as he helped to prepare a new set of bottles, “this is a new one on me.”

“Yup me too,” came the reply, “how about a practice first to see how it goes?”

The practice didn’t go too well. They soon found that to score with a maximum number of shots the last bottle had to be rotating as slowly as possible, but still fast enough to complete the turn.

Once again the men were very close to each other in clean hits and were concentrating so hard they didn’t speak to each other. It was Luke who finally broke the silence.

“Well sheriff I allow you’re nearly as good as me and it’ll be a priv’ledge to serve under you.”

Jeff smiled to himself as he enrolled deputy number 20.