New Faces and Bad Memories

Rousing myself from my rest, I head over to the edge of the prairie. Diabla’s wandered away, she does that, I muse to myself as I settle down. She’ll be back soon enough. Carefully, I sit down and start the process of cleaning my gear. Using my waterskin, I rinse off my knife and water the stone before I slide the former across the latter, applying consistent pressure. After a few minutes grinding and wetting, I dry the stone and the knife, sliding the knife back in its sheath, and the stone back into my pack. I then pull out my revolvers and examine them. They will need to be cleaned, the grime buildup from the powder discharge scaring away those wolves last night was less than ideal. It’d still work for the moment, but the longer I leave it like that, the worse the barrel will degrade. That said, I don’t feel like making a fire this morning. So I’ll head into town early.

As though she read my mind, I see my horse across the plain, leisurely walking her way back to our campsite. I pick up my pack, throwing it over my shoulders, and start to walk to meet her. As I do, her gait hastens to a trot, and before long, she stops in front of me nickering. I pat her head, as I swing the pack onto her back, tying it to my old, wartime saddle. Then, mounting Diabla, I whisper my good morning and we head off towards town.

As I ride into town, a young man, maybe sixteen or seventeen, walks up to me. Wearing a deputy badge. “Sherrif wants to see you, old timer,” he says.

I smirk. “Did your dad tell you why?” I ask.

“Naw,” he replies, “And when you’s involved, I know better than to ask neither.”

He is clever, I’ll give him that, I muse as I slow Diabla down to a walk through town. The town looks different in the morning. Quieter. I take a breath. Then, turning to you Jeremiah Roach, I say, “I know the way. Run on ahead and have some hot water ready for me when I get there.” Two birds, one stone. Walking with a deputy would not be a good look, for either of us. Because Jeremiah is not his father.

He obliges, running ahead. As I slowly travel across town, taking it in, I note a few things. A new buggy in town, someone rich is passing through. Probably not moving in, as I don’t see a transport wagon. And a few horses I don’t recognize are tied up outside the lodge. One has a government issue saddle. Fairly new. Interesting. The nearest fort isn’t that far, about two towns over, but this place is certainly out of the way. I take a deep breath. Then again, there are other people besides the cavalry that might get McClellans. I shake my head and continue to the sheriff’s office.

Tying my horse at the post outside, I head on in. Jeremiah is heating a pot of water on the stove in the corner of the main room. And seated at the desk, with a view of the perpetually empty cells and both the front and side doors, is Sheriff Jackson Roach. I walk over and sit across from him, nodding my head and saying “Sheriff,” as I start to pull out my guns.

He’s nervous, grabbing for the shotgun he has strapped under the desk, but only until he sees the state of my weapons and puts two and two together. “So you were feeling lazy this morning?” he asks.

Taking apart my Remington .44s, I shrug, and otherwise ignore the question. “What did you call me in to discuss?” I ask.

He’s nervous, that much is obvious. But I can’t tell if that is the urgent situation, or just because I’m here, removing capped bullets from a cylinder. “I figured you might want to know that there is a Ranger in town. Looking for someone, though for a reason I cannot say, he’s hesitant to inform me of such details. You think it’d be you he’s trying to find?”

A Ranger. Explains the saddle. Not the buggy. I shake my head. It’s probably unrelated. “If it is, you brought me right to him,” I say aloud, showing him that I know what he’s doing. “Though I doubt he will be.” After all, as far as anyone outside of town and alive is concerned, I’m still an upstanding citizen. Just your average Urbana kid, who moved west after the war.

“Figured I’d check, and warn you,” he says. Jeremiah brings the pot over, and I rinse it through my now empty and broken down guns, take a cloth to dry off the metal.

“Anything else?” I ask. “Problems after last week’s…” I pause a moment, before adding, “Incident?”

Sheriff Roach furrows his brow. “The fight? I assumed that was what you were looking for, so I didn’t try to pinch the guy.”

“Good,” I say with a sigh, “I was concerned some of the bystanders might have pulled you into some business that there was no need for you to be in.” Good, I think, there were no repercussions for the mysteriously vanishing bandit. After having dried my guns, I pull out an oiled cloth and start to wipe it down.

He chuckles. “Oh, I was, but the moment your description was the one given for the victim, I promptly ignored it.”

I chuckle right back. “Alright. By the by, the buggy?” I ask.

“Some bankers, looking to expand the rail routes, connecting the Central to the others now that there’s more silver out there and we’re a state.”

Putting away my oiled cloth, I start to put back together my revolvers. “Hopefully they decide we’re useless enough to not be worth the rail.”

“I don’t know, it might make us all more money,” he muses. Then, he realizes, “And more direct oversight. I mean, I’m well enough established, I might could survive that.”

“You get this nervous when a ranger passes through,” I remind him, “You really want to be that connected.”

“I think you don’t want to be that connected,” he counters correctly. Then, he nods, adding, “Maybe not for another decade or two, though. Once we’re more organized.”

I stand up, reloading my revolvers and holstering them. “Right, oh,” I say. “You think Hiram’s’s open yet? I need a drink.”

The Sheriff shakes his head. “Probably not,” he replies, “Hiram’s got an appointment with Doc Gilly about private issues.” For most people, private issues could be a number of things, but Hiram’s reputation, habits, and the intonation of the sheriff, he’s getting his prescribed silver solution.

I groan. “Really,” I complain, “I hate people with lives sometimes.” Shaking my head, I stand up. Sally will have some on offer, and she probably won’t be upset about me drinking in her shop. “May we never have to talk again,” I say as I head out. Behind me, I can hear Sheriff Roach laughing.

Heading towards my horse, I can hear another horse approaching. Great. Is he looking for me? I wonder. I untie Diabla and mount up, subtly moving the cloth so that my carbine is more easily accessible. Just in case. Taking her around, I am face to face with a Colorado Ranger. “Hello,” he says to me, his eyes looking at my military issue saddle bags, “Who might you be?”

“I take it you’re the ranger?” I reply, avoiding the question.

“I am,” he says, “Lewis Blanc. Denver. Rumor has it a band of railroad heist-doers is camped somewhere nearby. Know anything about one “Micah Calhoun?”

That name makes me furrow my brow. I could have sworn that was a name I heard shouted in the war, when we were getting a safe distance away from the traincars we’d set aflame with ammunition inside. “Was he a Mississippian?” I ask.

Ranger Lewis is surprised, then furrows his brow, as though he is trying to figure out why I know that. Like he knows me, though he looks a bit too young. “He was, before their surrender. How did you know?”

I pat the saddle. “I thought I’d heard his name shouted in a panic before,” I reply.

Ranger Lewis reaches slowly towards his carbine. “Are you working with him now, too?”

I laugh. “Do I sound like a Mississippian?” I ask, checking both ways to make sure the town is still sleepy before showing the hit of my hidden Union Cavalry Saber, before recovering it. He seems to nod and stops reaching for his rifle. “I’ll let you know if I recognize him,” I offer.

He pulls out a list and hands it over. “Here’s a list of the known associates. Don’t engage as some of them are likely to flip on him with minimal pressure,” he says, clearly in this town of people from across the Re-United states, my former service is good enough for this guy to trust me. Interesting. Explains his distrust of our oh-so-honest sheriff. I take a look at the list, and nods. “I will,” I say, before hurrying towards Sally’s general store. Because now I really need a drink. Not just because of my memories of the war. But also because I recognize one of the names. His body is buried about ten miles outside of town. And, assuming the marks by six names of the twenty-two are to indicate the vulnerable, I just recently killed one of the Ranger’s leads.

Riding across town to the general store, I slide off Diabla and leave her untied, and take the front saddlebags with me. It’s going to be a minute, and she’ll come back if she’s bored. I saunter inside. Clearly, there’s a grim look on my face, because Sally instantly calls me out on it. “Dang it, Hiram’s saloon’s closed, isn’t it?” she says.

“Sheriff says he’s got an appointment with Gilly,” I reply.

Sally shakes her head. “I warned him about that actress,” she says, “But does he listen to me? No.”

I smile. “He definitely listens to you,” I assure her, before letting my smile morph into a smirk, “It’s just, in certain matters of, well let’s say not the heart nor the head, he chooses to ignore your sound advice.”

She shakes her head at me. “Just for that, I’m overcharging you.” She gestures towards the shelf by the side wall, where the beers and spirits are kept. I head over, pulling a bottle of whiskey out.

“I’d expect nothing less,” I say, bringing it over and putting some money on her counter.

She counts the money and nods. “And you didn’t tie up your horse out front, right? She scares the locals, and the locals are the only ones who shop here now that Lisel’s set up her emporium over by the house of ill repute.”

I laugh. “I wouldn’t do that to you,” I insist. “Diabla’s off terrorizing the town on her own.”

“Great,” she mutters, “That means you’re going to be here a while.”

I look at the bottle, curiously judging how long it will take. “Probably. Unless I’m really thirsty,” I joke.

“What happened?” she asks. Worried, because I made a joke about drinking as opposed to one about Hiram.

I shake my head as I sit down at a table in the corner. “Nothing too bad. I was tired and lazy this morning, then the new guy in town brought up some memories. Unintentionally, of course.”

“The bankers?” she asks.

“The ranger,” I reply.

She pauses a moment, then realizes. “The saddle, right,” she says, “Must’ve reminded you of however you got that thing.” Like most people in town that don’t know me from my past, she knows better than to press for information about my past.

I break the waxen seal of the bottle and start to drink. “Something like that,” I say, then add, “What’s your picture of the bankers?”

“Looking into the land around here, but between you, Jackson, the Fitzwilliam family, and the failed but hopeful prospectors, no one’s really interested in selling,” she explains. I smile, which causes her to shake her head. “That rail might help out us businesspeople, you know.”

I shrug, and take another swig. “Sorry,” I joke, “I’ve always been a bit selfish.”