DEAD MEN TELL
NO TALES
Killing
just ain't something a man talks about.
-
Doc
Holiday
It's a question people just seem
to think they have a right to ask me, no matter how little we are
acquainted.
Women especially want to know, always thought that
strange, be lying there with a woman, after, and I guess she feels she now has
a right to know everything. All it does
is get me dressed quicker.
As for the others, most I silence with a look, a few I
just walk away from. In total only one
other man knows the truth and they'd get it faster from me than from him.
Jedediah
Curry
Questioned about
how many he had killed.
'The
Legend of Heyes and Curry'
Harcourt
Press 1904
********************
Utah
1881
I've always had a temper; man can't be half-Irish and
human and escape without some ability in that area. As a child I remember my anger as being like a summer storm,
short, loud and quickly over with very little to show it had ever happened.
That changed though.
After the raid it was like the anger never got chance to spill out, run
off, and the Home frowned upon outbursts so I learned to bury my frustration
and resentment. It was Preacher who
warned me about it. Said I had a silent
rage, said you can't keep pushing down water, it will find a way to the surface
somehow.
I remember waiting for Kid to get all indignant when
Preacher said the gang was more afraid of me than him, but he didn't. He just looked at me with those unreadable
blue eyes and nodded his agreement.
When I told them both they were crazy, Kid merely said,
"They know what I'm capable of, they've only had
a hint of what you'd do."
I got very drunk that night and never did ask him what
he meant.
I can remember clearly the first time I shot a
man. We'd been ambushed and I dived
behind a rock and just started shooting back.
I was riding with Big Jim then; Kid was new to the gang and sensed him
beside me firing back.
Suddenly I caught movement from the corner of my eye
and turned to see a figure bearing down on my partner's back. I fired without thinking and he fell at our
feet.
I just froze staring at this man withering in agony
and the blood spilling out of him.
Thank God Kid was there; he pulled me down and sent
the rest running. He then calmly stuck
his gun in his holster, and mine in mine and turned his attention to the man.
"He'll live, but he ain't gonna be too pleased
about it for a few weeks," Kid said finally tying his handkerchief around
the man's arm and yelling for someone to get him a horse.
Seeing the man mounted he sent it to catch up with the
others and then casually turned his attention to me.
"Ain't easy is it?" he said walking over to
Preacher's horse and borrowing his bottle.
Pulling out the cork with his teeth, I watched my
19-year-old cousin take a swig with hands covered in blood and pass me the
bottle as he swilled the drink in his mouth and then spit the whiskey out.
I did the same, grateful for the taste it made in my
mouth, but knowing swallowing would have brought my insides up. But Kid knew that, Kid had been there
before.
As for killing a man, Kid says I spend too much time
thinking on it. Like the raiders that
killed our folks. He said he would
watch me at night and know I was planning what I would do to them if I found
them. He said the look on my face
scared him more than the darkness. Said
he felt like he was losing me to them as well.
I got mad when he said that and we fought about it and
I remember yelling at him, "Well at least I just think about
killing."
The look that crossed his face nearly ripped out my
innards. He should have hit me, hell he
should have flattened me, but he merely nodded and went outside and sat until I
finally found the courage to go out and apologize.
"Kid, look what I said."
"Its done Heyes, let it rest."
"I didn't mean that, you're not a killer."
"Yea I am, no amount of words can change that
Heyes," and then he turned on me almost urgently. "But you don't have to be, ones enough
in the family okay?"
And he walked away.
But what he said stuck with me, until now. Now the sun was not gonna go down before I
killed the man who had killed him.
***********************
Began simple enough, we split up to confuse a posse
outside of Provo. Kid's luck was bad
and they followed him causing me to double back as soon as I was clear.
He lost them easy enough once they realized it was Kid
Curry alone they were chasing, made them get cocky. People always make that mistake, think I'm the brains and Kid is
some wild gunslinger who handles every problem with his holster. He had them
trailing themselves by nightfall and had lost them clean out by morning.
I found his camp a day later and his body at the
bottom of the ravine just after sun up.
************************
Tracks indicated three men and enough blood to
convince me Kid had at least gotten to fire before falling over the edge.
The body was face down and too difficult to reach from
here so I quickly began working my way down to him via the south trail.
It was there I picked up one of his killer's tracks;
he was heading down to claim the body.
Suddenly I had no other goal in life but seeing that man dead.
***************************
It was past noon when I caught up with him. He was perhaps 5 years older, 50 pounds
heavier and smelt like bear grease even down wind.
He carried a rifle and a knife as long as my arm and
was leading his horse down the slate trail trying to keep it from slipping.
I pulled out my gun and clicked it back.
"That you Davey boy?" he said squinting into
the sunlight.
"No."
He froze, "Who then?"
"That was my partner you shot," I said and
saying it out loud made it real and suddenly just shooting him wasn't enough.
"Now mister, calm yourself, your partner ambushed
me and my friends."
My shot got his full attention as the slate next to
his right foot jumped.
"You're a liar."
I had to will my hand not to shake I was so filled
with fury. It was sinking in now; my
only family was lying dead at the bottom of this hill, mere yards from us and
all because this maggot wanted the reward.
I took a step forward and I suppose it was my rage
that saved me. The slate moved and I
almost lost my footing. A bullet
whizzed by where I had been a moment before and I dived down and returned fire.
I was past thinking clearly now, self-preservation had
no play in my plan. It was as if my
very next breath depended on my killing this man.
The sun was hot and the gray rock beneath me burned
through my clothes and cut at me, but I ignored it as I crawled closer towards
him.
The heat and my thirst brought me back to another's
summer day when my stomach had felt the same way and I found myself thinking,
I'm gonna have to dig another grave, gonna be hard in this stone and I gasped
at how the reality of this new memory tore at me.
I guess I just got up and charged. Kid had taught me years ago very few people
can hit a moving target and if you run and surprise them you can probably make
it without a scratch. Not that it would
have mattered I was past thinking clearly, I just charged.
We surprised each other and I fired shooting the gun
from his hand and then stood there only a yard apart my gun aimed at him
unflinching. Sweat trickled down the
back of my neck and I licked a dry tongue over drier lips and pulled back the
hammer.
"You can't kill an unarmed man!" the bounty
hunter hissed from the ground where he was hunched over.
"Watch me," I said feeling a little light
headed. All I had to do was fire, one
shot and this vermin would be ended, Jed would be avenged. Some men deserved to be killed; some men
needed to die.
I'd had to shoot wounded horses before, cattle, this
was no different, this was a mad dog, this was a man who deserved to die. Why the hell was I taking so long to shoot?
The shot came from the side of us and I saw the man
flinch and go still.
I turned my gun and stared in amazement at the
bedraggled figure hurrying up the slippery incline. The clothes were all wrong, but I would have known that worried
look anywhere.
"Your suppose to be dead," was all I managed
sounding indignant and feeling such relief I wanted to be sick.
"You almost were," Kid said simply and
kicking the man over I stared in amazement at the small weapon hid in his left
hand. While I had paused he had been
preparing to kill me.
"What happened," I managed as my cousin
walked over and frowned at me concerned.
"Bushwhacked, two fellas. I got one, second took off. Heard the third coming and figured I'd get
the drop on him easier if he thought I was dead so I changed clothes with his
friend down here and waited to see who would show up. Gave me a real start when I saw you."
His voice was so steady and he seemed so controlled as
he made sure the man was dead and then for good measure kicked aside his weapon.
"You all right?" I asked, because I knew.
"Yea," he said pulling a bottle of whiskey
free from the man's saddlebag and taking a swig spit it out. "Just dandy."
****************************
"Kid," I said quietly staring at the edge of
the fire.
"Yea Heyes," he said resigned as if he knew
I'd get around to it eventually.
It was finally evening. We had buried the bodies, moved up the trail and made camp in the
shade of the mouth of cave.
"I would have killed him."
"I know, I'm just a little bit faster on the draw
is all," Kid said trying to move me on and away. Never was a better person at keeping me from melancholy.
"There was time, you drew to beat me not
him."
Kid looked at me considering this and finally just
nodded.
"Why?" I asked.
"Killing a man takes a piece away from you, don't
care how much the man needs killing."
I looked at him, but he just studied his coffee and
eased back against the rock wearily.
"Kid I didn't mean…"
"Know you didn't. Heyes you’re the only man who'd understand, that's why I couldn't
let you."
We sat for a long time and I considered the weight
killing a man would be on a body.
"See, you didn't even kill him and your
brooding," Kid said and I felt his small smile, as I looked up startled at
having my mind read.
"How do you manage it…" I blurted out and
felt foolish, but he just smiled at my honesty.
"Lost some sleep, helps knowing I never took a
life without the need of having to save mine or my own. Also helps knowing I never killed for want,
just survival. Some will say that's how
an animal lives, maybe they're right…"
I shook my head, "No, you choose, you…" I
was at a loss for words and he smiled again.
"It's okay Heyes, I got a kinda peace about
it. Preacher once told me the 6th
commandment is not thou shall not kill, but thou shall not murder, says God
sees a difference in the two words.
Don't know how true that is, but it gives me a comfort when I think
about the hereafter."
I nodded and realized he had said about all he wanted
to say on the matter and expected me to put it aside.
"Kid?" I said unable to add one last thing.
"Hmmm?" he asked from
under his hat.
"You think some men deserve
killing?"
He raised the hat and gave me
the full force of his unreadable blue eyes, "Only the ones that keep you
awake when you hard bent on sleep Heyes."
And I smiled, and a little of
the rage seeped away.