The Cold Hand Of Death

The sheriff wiped his sweaty brow with the back of his hand and spit a soggy half-smoked cigar into the dusty street. Tex Tungsten had been in law enforcement for over twenty years, having survived the wild west by sheer guts and intuition. Now that intuition was telling him something was amiss. 

The middle-aged lawman had stared death down so many times he had lost count, and bore the scars to prove it. He had been shot twice and stabbed three times, not to mention the many fist fights. Still, the cold hand of death had failed to drag him into the grave. 

Two of three cattle rustlers known as the Hawser boys were standing in front of him on the dirt road. Their muscular, big knuckled trail hands hanging down by their worn leather chaps, with their meaty fingers twitching very close to their pistols. The menacing Jim and Pete didn’t unnerve Tex. What did was their younger brother Davey. He was missing, and the three brothers were known to always traveled together.

Tex scanned the street, looking at the windows that lined the wooden structures along the Chisholm Trail, which people had taken to calling Main Street. He glanced up at the church bell tower, and then over to the second story roof of the saloon. Then his eyes studied the newly erected Wells Fargo Staging and Banking Company balcony. Everything seemed in order. You can never be too careful in these situations.

The Hawser boys had been stealing cattle all around Caldwell for the past week. Tex had seen their wanted posters in Dodge City about a month ago, where they usually ran their operation. Maybe the heat of the law had pushed them to his town. They were wanted second only to a new young outlaw called Henry Newton Brown who was rumored to have recently killed a cowhand down in the Texas panhandle. 

None of that really mattered now. The Hawsers had more than enough re-branded stolen cattle to have headed for the cattle yards and trains in Fort Worth, but they still had unsettled business here. When the brothers heard Tex Tungsten was the sheriff in Caldwell, they rode straight to town. 

Five years ago, in 1875, Tex had arrested their father while working in Wichita. Old man William Hawser had been stealing horses, a crime for which he was hanged. His three sons swore revenge, and as Wichita was a growing modern town, the mayor decided to let Tungsten go with a nice severance package. The big city politician feared a shootout in his bustling streets. 

Tungsten found a new home in Caldwell which had just been incorporated as a city about a year ago. Prior to that, it had been little more than a trading post bolstered by the many cow ranchers in the area.

The town had earned its name from corrupt Senator Alexander Caldwell who resigned from congress before being expelled for bribery. It was rumored that the rail line would eventually coming through town, but Tex doubted it.

Now, five years later, his past had come a callin’. Tex wasn’t one to ever walk away from a fight, so he began moving towards the two Hawser Boys. He was very aware he was alone, because he had sent his two deputies out to the Mersons' farm to check on the sick elderly couple who lived there. The Mersons hadn’t been seen in a few days. Now he was regretting that decision. 

Jim and Pete stood their ground in the middle of the road, glaring at the sheriff while he approached. Both men were dirty and had dark hair with Jim wearing a scraggly beard. Pete’s face bore a dark stubble. Once Tex closed the distance to twenty-five yards, he stopped walking. He found it ironic that both Hawsers wore black hats. 

Tungsten wore a brown one himself, and was glad it wasn’t white, like they portrayed in the gunfights in the traveling stage shows in Wichita. Strange what comes to mind when you’re rubbing elbows with death. 

“I’m supposin you’re aware of why we’re here.” The oldest brother Jim spit a glob of saliva covered brown chaw into the dirt while his younger brother Pete stood nearby, looking nervous and jumpy as he shifted his weight from foot to foot. Pete was known to be a bit simple-minded. 

“I’m supposin you’re aware you two can still walk away from this.” Tex eyed the pair with a steely calm gaze that came from many brushes with tumultuous violence. “It’s a much better option than being carried away.”

“You know that ain’t gonna happen, Lawman.” Jim snickered, a brown string of tobacco spittle was left dribbling down his chin. “We’s been holed up out at the Mersons' farm. ‘Dem’ old folks was already dead when we got there, more or less. Nice bonus sendin’ yer deputies our way. If ins I were you, I wouldn’t drink from that well if you catch my meanin’.”

“Yeah, on account a we puts all ‘dem’ bodies down there.” The dim-witted Pete felt the need to clarify as he continued his anxious jittery movements.

“You boys should’ve taken your stolen cattle and hightailed it.” Tex could feel the slight quickening of his pulse as his brow furrowed under the heat of the late August Kansas sun, sweat soaking his hat where it met his head. Looks like I’m on my own.

“Naw, we like it around these parts. Too many tin stars over in Dodge trying to make a name for themselves.” Jim scowled. “‘Sides, we’ve a score to settle for pa.”

“You killed ‘im!” Pete shouted and went for his six-shooter. 

Jim was a second slower than his excited brother, but Tex Tungsten was quicker than both. He put a round between the older Jim’s eyes with the gun that was in his right hand within half a heartbeat. Tex felt the calmer Jim was the bigger threat, even though he drew slower than the quick moving, panic-stricken, Pete. Smooth is always more accurate than fast. 

Two bullets from Pete’s wildly drawn handgun flew wide to the right as Tex crossed the gun in his left hand under the smoking revolver in his right hand and unloaded six shots into Pete’s mid-section. The man fell into the dust beside his dead older brother. 

Tex could see both men held Hopkins and Allen Dictator .32 revolvers, a cheap piece that sold for about two dollars apiece. They were popular, but a bit inaccurate. He himself carried two Colt .32 rimfire revolvers that sold for ten dollars each. They were very accurate. If you put value on your life, then you should put value in your guns.

Tex frowned at the dead men. Live by the gun, die by the gun. That was his last thought. Sheriff Tungsten never heard the Remington fire. He never saw the rifle in the hands of Davey Hawser up in the church bell tower. 

Davey had trouble jimmying the lock on the back door of the church and after climbing the tower stairs, arrived just in time to see his two brothers gunned down. Tex didn’t know any of this, because the cold hand of death had finally wrapped its icy fingers around him . . .