Pale Horse, Robert L. Ross [beach read book .TXT] 📗

out as most condemned men do with their last great act of defiance being their pathetic and final legacy. “Yeah, I remember you, I remember that little squaw that was with you too!” Colt, shaking his head at the blatant ignorance and downright audacity of the condemned fool sitting before him, started to pull the trigger, but then thought about the way he had defiled his girl, and decided that some retributive violence and the therapeutic spilling of blood might be just what the doctor ordered for his beloved Temperance July. He looked at Temperance and told her to place her hand over his while he held the gun. She hesitated at first, then in a moment of pure devilry and divine clarity, she slowly formed her hand snugly around his, careful not to alter his deadly aim. Without him telling or suggesting her to do so, she took her anxious and determined finger, and pressing slightly over his, she looked her assailant dead in his pitiful eyes and upon raising her voice, announced to him and the entire bar in true Colt Mathews style, “For every woman you have ever beaten, tortured and raped, and for myself and my sister too, I sentence you to death!” Wild eyed and with her heart racing, she grit her teeth and pulled back on the trigger, blasting the guiltless scum right out of his chair and smack into the piano. She then took the wanted poster from Colts left hand, and wadding it up, shoved it in the dead mans gaping mouth and said, “That's one!” Colt, looking down at the carcass, said to the bartender, “Tell the Sheriff I'll be here in the morning to collect my bounty.” “Yes Sir,” said the bartender. Colt, stepping over the body, looked over at July and nodding his approval at the job well done, reached over and took her hand, and together, the gunslingers walked out of the bar and into the night.
Climbing on their horses, Temperance, not the least bit shook up, asked Colt, “Did I hear you say fiance'?” Colt laughed as they rode away and said, there must have been some real strong liquor in that bottle, or it could've been all that noise, or something, I don't know what you're talking about Temperance July!” “Colt Mathews!”
THE LAST CHAPTER

Riding up on their camp, Colt shouted out for the others to hear, “Pale Horse?” as was their usual habit in circumstances such as these, He answered back “Colt Mathews!” As the two of them climbed off their horses, Winter Crow said to them both, “That's some pretty good timing you two, the venison is just now coming out of the skillet.” “It smells mighty good too,” Colt replied back, as he reached over to Pale Horse who was handing him the bottle of Jacks Colt had given him earlier.
“Well, Honey, you wanna tell them, or would you like me to?” Colt asked her as he was making a plate of the fresh venison and grabbed a couple of flat biscuits. Temperance looked directly at her sister as she spoke right up and announced to her fellow camp mates, “The varmint scum previously known as Chris Forgason is now dead in the Shattuck saloon!” Winter Crow, knowing it was one of the men that had attacked her and her sister, but not sure of which one in particular, looked at her with that hint of question in her stare, and Temperance, knowing her like she did, walked over to her and whispered, “The one with dirty blonde hair and that scar across his eye.” She knew immediately who she was speaking of, and taking the bottle of Irish elixir from Colt, she took a rather large drink from it, and toasted the violent death of her now deceased attacker post mortem, then, handing the bottle of retribution to Temperance, who, after nodding her approval to her sister, followed suit. Colt spoke up to tell the part of the story that she had left out, but before a single word had fallen, he decided to leave it to fate, thinking somewhere along the trail, she would speak of it herself, and in this way, he would know her true feelings on the killing that she had helped him do.
Pale Horse, not in the least bit curious of the particulars, being that it was what he did for a living and generally having an idea of what had occurred, placed his hand on his friends shoulder as he had just sat down on his bedroll beside him and said, “Good job.” Colt, with a mouthful of the venison, mumbled back to his partner, “Thank you,” and left it at that. Although another outlaw was now eliminated, Pale Horse started to ask him if he had inquired as to where Shane Walters, or the remaining henchman, William “Sawed-Off” Russell was, but knowing the “shoot now, ask questions later” mentality of his partner, and, since Colt hadn't said anything regarding it, he figured there was no reason to bring it up.
Without saying it aloud, it was obvious as to why the bounty hunters chose to make this journey on horseback rather than taking the train. “One at a time,” he thought to himself, “That will be just fine with me.” Colt broke up his train of thought when he announced to his fellow bounty hunter, “We need to go by the sheriff's office in the morning to collect.” He nodded his head in agreement and not another word of it was said between them for the rest of the night.
After a great meal among friends, the bottle of Jacks was being passed around the campfire, and the discussions were varied and plentiful between them. Temperance spoke up and announced all of a sudden, “I figured out a name for my horse, and unlike my dear sister, I won't leave you hanging in suspense as to the answer!” Each of them remembering the earlier incident, laughed as they looked adoringly over at Winter Crow, who smirked at them all, and laughed as well. “Her name is Winter Shadow,” she announced as she gulped from the open bottle and smiled at her sister. “Winter, for obvious reasons, a tribute to my dearest friend whom I haven't spent time like this with since we were teenagers, and Shadow, because he's black as night, and I like it!” “That's a fine name honey!”, Colt exclaimed as he relieved his intoxicated girlfriend of the Irish culprit responsible and enjoyed another shot himself. “A fine one indeed,” chimed Pale Horse at the name given. Silence filled the vacuous space of conversation passed, until Colt, with the look of contemplation and wonderment, glanced over at his friend next to him and slurring his well meant words, asked, “How did you get the name Pale Horse ?, I've always wondered about that, but for some reason, never found the right moment to ask you.” Winter Crow and Temperance both knew the tale, and knew it well, so, receiving the bottle again from the storyteller to be, she took her final shot for the evening, and passed it once more to Temperance, who did the same. As the girls sank further into their sleeping blankets and began staring up at the summer sky, spattered with shining stars and a moon full aglow, Pale Horse told his story......
“Back when I was 9yrs old, I had come to live with my father, Two Feathers and the rest of my Comanche family. Every Spring, we, along with the other fathers and their sons, would chase the wild mustangs across the prairie, as each son was challenged to capture the one of their choosing. Two Feathers always encouraged me to try, but my horseback skills were nowhere near that of the other boys, and no matter how much I tried, or wanted to make Two Feathers proud, I just didn't have the quickness or skill required to do so. I knew it disappointed him, but he never let on, and did nothing less than continue to support and encourage me. As the seasons would pass, all the other boys would taunt me because they had their horses, and I was still riding the one given to me by my father. Then, at the age of 12, another Spring round-up had once more come and gone, and even though I had spent many days and hours practicing riding as fast as I could, cutting and stopping, and using the lariat, I still hadn't been able to catch anything, much less the one colt I had my heart set on. On the way to our village, this particular Spring evening, after trying so hard and failing again, I told my father I was going back into the canyon where we had last seen the gray, and I wasn't coming back until I had captured him and made him mine. Two Feathers said he was proud of my decision and encouraged me to do so, though I doubt he believed in his heart that I would return with my prize. I rode back into the canyon determined, only to find that the many horses that had been there earlier in the day were now gone, but a few still remained. As fate would have it, there, in the middle of the dozen or so mustangs, was my gray Appaloosa that I had to have. Rather than rushing up on them on horseback as I had unsuccessfully done so many times before, I climbed down off my horse, removing his rope harness and the blanket off his back. Then, with arms outstretched and reaching for the stars, I asked the Great Spirits to grant me this one wish of desire. I was moving slow and easily thru the herd, not to disturb those who continued grazing as I walked among them. To my surprise, there, right before me, just a matter of feet away, looking me in my eye, was the gray himself. I nervously slid the rope harness over his neck, and taking the riding blanket off my shoulder, I placed it on the gray, and jumped atop him. The spirit within him sent him running, bucking and neighing as we rode with great speed throughout the canyon. It took everything I had to hang on, but after a while of talking to him and assuring him that I would treat him with kindness, and care for him for the rest of our days, he seemed to find a calm within himself, and slowed to a halt. I knew at that moment, he and I would be friends for life. I rode him up the mountainous ridge that looked over the mighty canyon, and with the spirit moon shining bright as my witness, I thanked The Great Spirits for the gift they had given me, and returned home to a father proud. While I was telling him of the story of my adventure, father was patting him gently while looking the gray in his eyes, and said to me, “There is great Spirit in him, son, treat him with respect and never break that spirit, and he will always be a great companion to you.” It was at that moment, I decided to name him Spirit as a reminder of what my father had said. Later that day, as I rode purposely and proud throughout the village to show off Spirit to all the boys that had taunted me for the last 3 seasons, Chief 7 Bears remarked as I rode towards him, “He who rides Pale Horse has come to shower me with his pride. After I sat down with Chief 7 Bears and told him of my adventure, he christened me with my Comanche name, Pale Horse, and I've been that ever since.”
A few minutes before the story was over, he heard his friend Colt