From One Devil, to Another — Western Short Story

Short-story, Western

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The wound festered, the bandages becoming a second, dead skin on his lower abdomen. Peeling them away revealed yellow pus and the sickening stench of rotting flesh that pulled water from his eyes and a wrenching cough from his throat. There were no clean bandages, he had only wanted to see how bad it had gotten. It hurt now to move, even to breathe, and the burning Mojave sun offered no favors.

He had plucked out the bullet days before, along with several others, but those were less severe. It was a wonder he was alive at all, considering that over half a dozen people had been shooting at him. He sat up and grimaced, which made his dry lips tear. He ignored it all and pushed himself up. The old man and his companion likely already started off—the old man who had escaped, the one he truly wanted to kill, and the boy. Funny how the world worked that way. By his measure, neither were doing too well as they traveled as slowly as he and, for the past three nights, he saw their fire on the horizon—a flickering orange against the vast black expanse that cut the starry sky short.

He rolled up his sleeping fur, packed his supplies, and set them on the saddle of Dusty, a gray-coated Morgan—the last thing in this world he had left of his previous life—before mounting her, grunting and groaning all the way up.

He arrived at the man’s camp around midday and might have gawked, if he were one to gawk, at the sight: a body. The boy. He dismounted and approached with heavy steps. He stood over him, looking into those glassy eyes, grimace deepening, nose curling, breath sharpening, then he whipped out the knife at his belt, fell to his knees, and plunged it into the boy’s chest—again and again.

This one. This one he would have loved to strangle the life out of with his bare hands. The boy couldn’t have been older than sixteen—maybe even younger—but old enough to be the devil’s man.

There was no satisfaction to be gained from stabbing a corpse. He’d have to find it in the fact that it was his bullet that slowly did him in. He wiped his knife clean on the boy’s shirt, sheathed it, stood, unbuttoned his pants, pulled out his member, and dribbled what little piss his liquid-starved body could muster onto the dead face, then jiggled it dry. He worked up some spit and sent it down as a final touch, hoping the boy would feel the moisture extra stark against the fires of hell.

He returned to Dusty and pulled what he needed for his tent. The sun was deadly now, and it was foolish to travel under such. He was sure that the one he hunted had the same idea.

He rested, and his mind wandered. It was best not to dwell on things he couldn’t change, but when he closed his eyes he couldn’t help but see his wife and son smiling at him. Then, he couldn’t help but see the old man with a gray beard who, despite his rough company, seemed like honest folk. He blinked, and then he saw that boy leering at his wife as she walked by in town. He blinked again, and he saw his house thrashed, his son dead, and his wife too—her dress cut open with a knife. His heart pounded, and his nails dug into the palm of his hand. He blinked, and he saw them riding toward him—a half dozen, heading for the bottleneck he had led them to—and he fired, and fired, and fired, and the sand drank their blood. He blinked, and he saw the one he had wanted to kill—the old man he had let into his home—turn tail and run, cupping his side, along with the boy, that damned boy.

Scuttling at his boot woke him. He looked down just in time to see a scorpion scurry beneath the sand. He looked up then measured the sun’s position against the horizon. It was maybe… four hours past noon. Time to get moving.

He traveled until all the stars had come out, and that glistening band—like a river of diamonds and milk—swept across the sky. On the horizon, he saw the flickering light of a campfire, but it was different now. It was closer, as though the old man hadn’t traveled as far during the day as he had assumed… but if that was the case, why would he light the fire knowing he was closer than usual?

The wound on his side throbbed at the thought, as though warning him of danger—a trap. He ignored it and pressed forward.

The moon had already risen and climbed when he arrived at an abandoned ranch house. He dismounted by a fence, tied Dusty’s reins, and pulled his pistol before advancing. The fire was in front of the house, some distance away, across from a water pump, bags were scattered nearby, and a cast-iron pot sat simmering over the fire with the scent of salted pork wafting through the air.

A creak came from inside the house, and his head turned ever so slightly as he stood as still as a cat watching for prey, before starting toward the sound. The door hung loosely on its hinges, swinging lazily in slight gusts of dry wind as he stepped in slowly, gun held close to his side, near the wound, ready to snap up at any threat, the floorboards groaning beneath his feet.

He scanned the room. Too many shadows. The moonlight streamed in through the dusty windows, but left darkness everywhere. From where he stood, all he could see was dust—dust and more dust, with beetles scurrying through it. The dust covered everything, the desert reclaiming its land bit by bit. In years, if no one bought the place, it would seem as though there had never been a house there at all. That’s what chilled him about the desert. To a foreigner’s eyes, it might have seemed inert, but in truth, it was digesting… always digesting, leaving only the stories of what had been, or who had lived—if they were lucky enough for even that.

He continued through the house until he heard a clank from the pots outside. He moved quickly but silently toward the door. The moment he stepped outside, cold iron pressed against his temple. He froze but kept his composure. If the old man meant to kill him, he wouldn’t have felt the gun.

“You smell like death,” the old man’s voice was deep but airy, as though sand sifted in his throat.

He glanced at the old man, ignoring the gun’s shaft. The fire illuminated only a small part of the leathery face, making him seem more shadow than man, more ghost than alive. That may very well have been the case. The old man’s eyes were drooped and shrouded, and he, too, reeked of decay. It was a small comfort to know that his wound wasn’t the only one festering.

“That the one I done gave ya’?” the old man chuckled and wheezed, then winced toward his side. “Not bad for an old coot. Hand me your iron, boy.”

His nose flared, his breath like fire. Why not just shoot him? He paused. “You have no bullets.”

The old man stared at him, then his face curled into what might have been a smile—if not for the shadows distorting the creases of his face.

He spun to level his gun, cocking the hammer, but the man, old as he was, was quick, and struck him in the wound on his side. He cried out, squeezing the trigger, and the iron spit fire, shooting the pot of boiling stew off its stand with a sharp ping, and hissing into the flames.

The old man wrestled him for the gun, hitting his side all the while, but he held on with everything he had. They wrestled until they reached the porch steps, stumbling down as they howled into the night, the gun flying from their grip, spilling rounds everywhere.

He lunged for it as the old man scrambled for a bullet. Gun in hand, he spun about and in one fluid motion, he cocked the hammer and squeezed the trigger just as the old man’s gun popped with a flash of light and smoke. A sharp pain stabbed him in the gut as a spray of blood exploded behind the old man, splattering onto the wall as he fell.

He gripped his stomach, blood pouring out. He gulped dry air, searching for the strength to rise. He stumbled toward the old man, who lay grasping at his gushing neck. The old man smiled a bloody grin. “Some victory,” he sputtered. “Tradin' your life for a man who already had one foot in the grave. You oughta stayed in your own town.”

“Throwing my life away,” he muttered softly, then cocked his gun again. “What else was there to live for but killing you?”

The old man laughed—a terrible, blood-drowned laugh. “I knew it, always knew. The moment I first laid eyes on ya. A coyote who'd convince himself he was a sheep.” He coughed, then wheezed. “Your wife told me.”

He winced.

“She told me before... she told me y'all fought, that you wanted more. You would've died there, a nobody. Even now, in dyin', you seem more alive than you ever did. Look at you—look at what you did to get to me. It'll be a legend... what you've done… remembered by the desert. Consider it a gift... from one devil to another.”

“I’m no devil.”

The old man tilted his head back. “We’ll see, when we meet again in hell—”

He shot the old man in the head, then shot him once more for good measure. He might have shot him again, but his gun was empty. He threw it aside and knelt over the man’s corpse, searching his pockets. Finally, he found it—a gold necklace that shone pale in the moonlight. His wife’s necklace.

He pressed it to his chest, then hobbled toward Dusty, who was still tied nearby. He undid her reins, then removed her saddle. He turned toward the fire, still burning despite the spill.

He was cold... he didn’t like the cold. He lay by the fire, savoring its warmth. Holding the necklace to his chest, he gazed at the diamond river in the sky, then closed his eyes, wondering how long the desert would take to digest him and all he had been.

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-B. H. Schäfer