Go and Do Likewise

Content warning for depictions of racism.

Go and do Likewise 

I had all that a man could want while I rode those dusty roads.  I don’t know why they hired me as a railroad bull, but there wasn’t much to it in the end.  Lean your rifle over your shoulder, look mean, and if some no-good hooligan tries taking a free ride, you throw ‘em onto the tracks.  Simple as that.  Mostly the passengers were afraid of an attack from them wild Apache.  I never seen none, but I know damn well I would have blown their heads off if I did.  It was still fifteen bucks a head during the war – if you could find the right lawman – and the extra cash woulda been nice. 

But I didn’t need extra cash.  Bulls were paid well.  So after we landed in Albuquerque, I bought myself a young appaloosa stallion, yellow like butter with spots of white.  I got some nice duds – a leather vest and some snakeskin boots – and a Colt Navy Revolver like them army boys got.  I was riding down to San Pedro armed, clothed, and with a full purse when it all went to hell. 

I heard horses stamping around, loud as thunder.  Damn Apache, I thought. They weren’t supposed to come close to government roads.  Before I knew it, I was surrounded by six men and their horses under them, but it weren’t no Apache.

“Mornin’ Partner.  The name’s Rotten Tom,” said a greasy-haired man who earned the name.  He smiled wide.  “Fine day, ain’t it?”

“What can I do for you, Rotten Tom?”  

“We was just admirin’ your fine pair of snakeskins, weren’t we boys?”  The group of men laughed and nodded.  

I tried to keep cool.  “I do appreciate your interest, but they are not for sale.  Now I think you best be on your way and I’ll be on mine.”  I patted down my holster to make sure they understood my meaning.  I held Rotten Tom’s gaze. I knew I couldn’t out-gun six men, but putting the fear of God into the leader is the best chance I had of coming out with my boots on my feet. 

“Now, now,” said Rotten Tom.  “Let’s not come to blows.  Jus’ take ‘em off and leave ‘em on the ground and you can keep on a-ridin’.”

“I know all about you lot,” I replied.  “You’re no real outlaws.  Just a gang of dirty, stupid bandits is what you–”

Rotten Tom drew out his gun, and before I could draw mine, he fired a shot that hit my shoulder.  My stallion reared up and threw me off, and I heard my leg crunch as I fell.  My gun landed a few feet away, and as I crawled to get it, one of Rotten Tom’s men dismounted his horse and picked up my pistol, holding it between his thumb and forefinger.  

“Nice piece,” the man said in a nasally drawl.  “I think I’ll keep this one.”

“Well I want the vest!” said an old man with a scraggly gray beard and no teeth to speak of.  

Soon the group of men were on me.  I covered up my face but the blows came fast and hard.  Someone hit me in my shoulder where I was shot and pain came up through my whole body, and the edges of my vision went black.  I yelled something horrible, and that’s the last I remember of Rotten Tom and his gang of degenerate bastards.  

I woke up to a blazing sun.  It was hotter than hell at high noon.  My lips were dry and I looked for my water but the gang left nothing.  I was naked as a jaybird and I could see my skin turning pink.  Goddamn, I’m gonna die here.  I tried to get up on my feet, but my left ankle felt like it was being stabbed with a hundred knives.  My foot was an ugly purple-yellow and the size of a melon.  My shoulder was covered in blood that was dry and flaking off, though more oozed wet and thick as I moved around.  I noticed blood underneath me as well, and I knew the bullet went straight through.  I couldn’t move.  I had no food, no water, and no hope.  I knew there was only one thing to be done. 

“Dear Lord,” I said aloud.  “I know I haven’t always been your most faithful servant.  I have sinned against you time and again.  Just now, I had every intention of getting to San Pedro to do some whorin’, drinkin’, and card-playin’.  I ask now that you cleanse my evil heart and show me your bountiful forgiveness.  And if you are truly merciful Lord, I ask that you spare me, and send me a–”

Just then I could hear the sound of hooves along the dusty road and a horses snort. 

I began to cry, though I thought I had no water left in me.  “Thank you Lord, thank you, thank you!  Soon as I get back, I’ll be your servant forever and a day.  Thank you and amen!”

A man in a black coat, with a black hat and a black horse came riding by.  I was worried it was death riding by me ‘till I saw his white collar. 

“Down here Reverend!” I rasped.  I could barely talk.  But providence intervened, and the man of God looked down to me. He was tall, lean and had an expensive haircut with a carefully trimmed beard.  He looked as all respectful men should look.

“Afternoon,” the man said as his horse came to a stop.  “This is the work of the Apache, ain’t it?  Oh, I know it is. ‘As they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient.’ Yep, Apache work to me, though it’s a wonder you still got your scalp.”

“No, just some goddamn bandits.”  

He clicked his tongue.  “You oughta’ watch your mouth there, son.  ‘You shall not take the name of your Lord God in vain.’”

“Yes Reverand.  Sorry, but–”

“No ‘buts!’  No sir, if the Lord didn’t intend for us to follow it, he wouldn’t have writ it in his Good Book.  If it’s important to the Lord, you can be sure it’s important to Reverend John Michaels III.  And if it’s important to me, then son, I think it ought to be important to you too.” 

“Yes sir.  Of course.  Could you please help me to San Pedro?”

“Son, let me ask you a question.  Are you a child of God?  Have you been washed in the blood of our savior Jesus Christ?  Have you prayed the sinner’s prayer?”

“Yessum,” I replied.  I’d been baptized anyways, back as a boy.  I wasn’t sure about all the rest and I felt bad that I could be lying to a man of the cloth.

‘Well then I’ll be on my way.”  He said, and spurred on his horse.

“Wait!” I shouted, and burned my throat.  “Please!”

He turned his horse around.  “Look here sir.  I’ve got to preach in San Pedro ‘fore the sun sets.  There are many unsaved souls in that debaucherous city.  A natural Sodom, and yet the Lord has called me there in my dreams as I sleep.  Now what do you think the Lord would have me do?  There is one saved man, who by tonight will sit in glory beside the Lord if what you say is true.  Or there is a group of depraved men, who, if not for the Word of God, could die tonight and spend eternity in damning hellfire. Now, if you’re a man of God, what would you have me do?”

“Please…” I whispered.

He spurred on his horse.  “I suggest you spend your final hours thinking on your selfishness.  ‘Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others.’  May the Lord have mercy on your soul, and deliver you from these trails as he did Job before you.” His horse kicked up dust and the man vanished into the horizon. 

Several hours blended together in wakefulness and sleep.  The pain was immense, but the hunger was harder and the thirst harder yet.  The world spun around me. I thought on what the Reverend said, and if I really would be washed in glory come sunset.  I knew for a fact I deserved endless torment.

That is why I could not believe my ears when I heard another horse coming down the way.  I woke up and the sky was soaked in blood as the sun westered over the mountains.  My head felt like it would burst, and yet the rest of me was cold.  

“Help,” I managed to whisper.  Once again, the Lord intervened and I was spotted. 

“Well who have we got here, eh?”  It was a fat man dressed in colorful threads of red and blue.  He sat atop a cart that was being pulled on the largest Clydesdale I had ever seen.  On the side of the cart, painted in yellow, was written a wavy and elegant James McClellan’s Cures.   “A naked cowboy down on his luck,” he said, “losing it all on gambling and whoring I’ll bet.  Sir, that is not the enterprising mindset one must have if you’re to make it in Ulysses S. Grant’s America.”

“Help me,” I mouthed. 

“Help you, eh?  Well what ails you?  Ah, let’s see.  Well I can see you’ve got a purple foot.  McClellan’s Soothing Linnaments oughta have that right as rain after just two applications.  Nasty wound on your shoulder… hmm… well I’d start with washing it out with my famous bitters, and then rub McClellan Cream on it every day after that for two weeks.  How’s your toilet?  Perhaps McClellan’s Twice-a-Day Fibers could do you some good.  And for your general health and wellbeing, I always recommend an orange pill in the morning, and a purple pill before night.  You’ll keep that hair of yours, and never need a dentist even in your old age.  That’s the McClellan Guarantee.”

“I… just…”

“Now I charge fifty cents for most bottles, and seventy-five for my bitters.  But for you, how’s the whole set for two dollars sound?”

My head fell back into the hot dirt.  

“Well of course you ain’t got a purse on you!” the man said.  “I am sorry, but with my schedule I simply cannot accept credit.  I’m on my way to Rancher’s Cove after this.  Of course every man will say, ‘well I’m headed there myself, why don’t I take your bottles now and we’ll square up when I’m there?’  Bah! Never happens.  To accept those terms is the attitude of someone who does charity.  Do I look like a nun to you?  No, I’m a businessman, and James McClellan did not make his fortune doing bad business.  So off I ride, and if you’re still interested, you come with cash next time we meet.”  Just as he was about to ride off, he looked back down on me.  “Ah well, you are a sorry soul, and I do have a soft heart beating in my chest.  Here, the rest of this one is on the house.”  He tossed down half a bottle of something that landed beside me.  I did not have the strength to pick it up.  He rode off, and I slipped into sleep.

It was dark and freezing when I awoke.  A dark shadow loomed down the road.  At first I thought it might be Michael, the Archangel, come to take me home.  But the shadow, the coldness, the blackness, and the fear.  It was the devil.  I saw horns coming from the rider, and a tail from the back. 

The rider approached and it was something worse than the devil.  It was an Apache woman riding a spotted mustang, and a young boy, likely her spawn, up front.  

“Leave me,” I groaned.  “Leave me! Leave me!”  I had suffered enough.  I didn’t need to be tortured at the end.  But that wasn’t true of course.  I had never lived an honest day.  I harbored nothing but hate for the Apache though they’d never done ill to me or mine, and if they had I daresay it was deserved. If they wanted to get back at me before I died, it was their right.  She lifted me in her arms, and I thought I died as once again all went dark. 

I woke up, leaning on the neck of the mustang.  The boy held my steady from the back.  He said something in Indian-speech, and the woman turned to me, stopped the horse, and took out a leather water-skin.  She poured it in my mouth. I hesitated.  What was this?  Poison?  Blood from a child sacrifice?  But thirst gave out, and whatever it was, it was sweeter than honey.  It dripped down my chin, and I smiled, and drifted off into darkness.  

I came in and out of this world.  I’d open my eyes and the sun would shine from out of a tent.  The woman would come to me, and pour something in my mouth.  I’d wake up again and it would be dark and there would be some sort of sweet cornbread at my side.  I’d crumble some and eat it, and choke, and eat some more.  

Finally I woke up in earnest.  It was cold, but I was covered in blankets.  I sat up, and my shoulder had rabbit skin over the wound.  The Apache woman entered my tent and smiled.  She undid my shoulder wrap, and took some greens she had in a bowl and sprinkled it on before covering my shoulder back up.  She said something I couldn’t understand, and motioned in ways that seemed exciting to her but had no meaning to me.  Finally she left the tent, and an old, squat, sun beaten Apache woman came and sat in front of me.  

“You are awake.” she said.

“Yes,” I said stupidly.  

“How do you feel?”

“I feel good.  Thank you ma’am.”

“We prayed many days that your body would be healed.”

“Thank you.  But… why?”

“Because your body needed healing.”

“Yes, I know.  But… why did you pick me up?  I am an enemy to the Apache.”

The old woman smiled warmly.  “Your body needed healing, but your spirit also needed healing.  Apache know how to heal spirit.  Come.”

She led me out of the tent to a clear, cool evening.  There was a circle of Apache around a fire, wearing coats and colorful blankets.  She led me to a spot beside the woman that picked me up, and I sat.  

I don’t know how to describe that night, but the old lady was right.  They started singing, and some started dancing and playing drums, and the children were playing, and they started smoking something sweet and delicious.  I don’t know what else to say other than that my spirit was healed, just like she said.