Three Men For Three Dollars

It was nearly sundown when the cowpoke rolled into the drowsy little town of Augustus, chewing on a straw of wheat. Strangers were none too strange in this little corner of the West; a great, black steam engine split the earth only five miles to the East, and to the South were the coal mines where men came to find work. People came and went with the howling wind, carrying whispers of the war in the South, all while Augustus never changed. Stagnant as the murky ponds found along the Platte River, and as plainly as the horking toads within.

So, the people of Augustus did not turn their heads to stare as the cowpoke hitched his stallion, a young paint mustang he’d caught in Colorado, in the stables. They did not whisper as he ascended the steps of the saloon in search of bath and beer. Just another faceless, haggard tumbleweed passing through. There one second, gone the next.

The folk within chattered idly, glancing at him with disinterest, as he slipped into the decrepit space. In the corner, an old man hunched over a weathered piano and played a jolly tune. Three men crowded around a broken table, knee-deep in a game of poker. One audacious man in particular, clad in a velvet pinstripe vest and polished boots, called another’s bluff.

The cowpoke approached the barkeep, who was cleaning glasses with a rag and talking to a woman with heavy golden curls.

“What can I do for ya, traveller?”

The cowpoke tipped his hat further up his head. “Could do with a warm bath, friend. And a room.” He placed a crumpled dollar on the counter.

The barkeep pocketed the bill fast as a rattler. “The only room we gots the size of a coffin.”

“Sure.”

“Interested in sharin’ a bed, puddin’?” The woman asked, circling her glass with a nimble finger.

“Nah,” the cowpoke shook his head. “But I’ll take a drink.”

“Mary Lynn. The water,” the barkeep ordered. The woman kicked off her stool with a sigh.

The cowpoke nodded his thanks, removing his hat as he sat down. The barkeep poured him something dark and muddy, akin to piss. “The stablemaster’s been fancyin’ himself a moonshiner.”

The cowpoke downed it with a grimace. His throat burned from the rancid taste, but at least his stomach was warm. “Maybe he should stick to horses,” he coughed.

The barkeep chortled.

The cowpoke busied himself with rolling out a quirley from his tin, thumbing out the paper, and lining up a generous heap of snuff. He had been traveling for nearly a week now, and he still had another week before he arrived at the ranch he was fixing to join for the summer. He figured he could treat himself. Twisting the paper tightly around the wad, he had just dug out his box of matches when a voice called to him.

“Hey, cowboy!”

The cowpoke turned in his seat.

It was the dude. Yellow teeth peered through a predatory smile. “Interested in a game?”

“I ain’t got nuthin’ to gamble with.”

“Bah,” the fancyman waved a hand. Each finger was covered in thick rings. “We’re playin’ with cigarettes and matches. Howd’ya feel ‘bout blackjack? Earl— hey, Earl! Be our dealer!”

The barkeep, Earl, crossed his arms across his spindly chest. “I ain’t interested in seein’ ya kick dirt with my patrons, bounty hunter.” He turned towards the cowpoke, voice cold. “Don’t play with Silas, friend, he’ll rob ya blind. The devil wears a suit’n’tie.”

The smile had never left Silas’ lips. He shuffled the cards, fingernail dirty and chipped. “Ya know, in the city that kinda talk could get ya killed.”

Earl scoffed. “Why don’t you enlighten us how you ended up here then, ya yellow-bellied braggart? Yer all bark, no bite.”

Silas turned towards the cowpoke. “Well?”

The cowpoke lit his quirley up.“I’ll play—one round. If I win, you pay for my room and board.”

“And if I win,” Silas said, smacking the cards into a neat order. “I get that gun there.” He eyed the piece of iron on the cowpoke’s hip. “Shoot, that a Peacemaker?”

The cowpoke touched his gun, fingering the smooth metal. “...Alright.”

Silas cocked a brow. “Wanna Peacemaker, Earl?”

“Gamblers,” he cursed, shaking his head. But he didn’t say no. “Get a move on, then! An’ give me them damn cards.”

Quickly, chairs were shuffled around and drinks were poured at the behest of the barkeep. The musician was ordered to play Dixie, and cards were shuffled once more with deft fingers. The cowpoke was introduced to Silas’ cohorts: the silent Bear, a Mexican big game hunter with a face only a mother could love, and the pox-scarred Benjamin Franklin, who had no relation to the Founding Father other than name. Three whole dollars were placed within a hat, then cigarettes from the two other men, and lastly, the cowpoke’s Colt.

“Alright, gentlemen, this a game of luck, so I don’t wanna see any blood,” Earl warned, then, quick as lightning, dealt cards out to the players. The name of the game was this: don’t go over twenty-one.

Bear was up to twenty-one quick, Benjamin six, Silas four, and the cowpoke eight.

Earl had a Queen of Hearts — ten.

“Mierda,” the Mexican cursed, throwing his cards back.

“Rotten luck,” Silas said, aloof.

Bear shot Silas a dirty look and pushed his chair back, exiting into the night in a huff. Grasshoppers played an anticipatory tune outside. The door slammed behind him, knocking dust from the ceiling.

Earl watched him go with a frown.

Benjamin picked at his teeth– or what was left of them— with a fork. “So, what brings ya to ol’ Augustus, cowboy?”

The cowpoke eyed the man out of the corner of his eye, then stared down into flat beer at the bottom of his cup. “Work.”

“Hmm, a man of few words, I see,” Silas scathed. He tapped the table. “Hit us, Earl.”

“Don’t tell me what to do, Mister Jonson,” but dealt out a new set of cards all the same.

Benjamin was at nineteen now, and the cowpoke at twenty. Silas sat at a comfortable twelve with the addition of a Six of Hearts.

“Seems Lady Luck is in my favor tonight, boys,” Silas boasted, leaning back in his chair. He twirled his mustache with a grin. “Gonna get a new shootin’ iron for my collection, eh, Benji?”

“Eh,” Benjamin said, dejected.

Silas tapped the table again. A Four of Hearts. He was at sixteen.

Benjamin waved his hand next, standing at nineteen. “Are you a Christian?” He asked the cowpoke.

“Not this again,” Silas scoffed.

“I can read the Gospels, if that’s yer meanin’,” the cowpoke replied. He tapped the table. Hit me.

The three other men shared a look.

“You sure ‘bout that, waddie?” Silas asked. “Yer already at twenty.”

The cowpoke held his gaze, cigarette between his fingers. Smoke haloed his head in thick, gray wisps. “Hit me, barkeep.”

Earl released a heavy sigh and flicked out the top card—

An ace. The cowpoke was at twenty-one.

Benjamin groaned. The cowpoke’s bet was higher, and so he had lost.

Silas' mouth curled into an ugly piece of barbed wire.

The cowpoke waved his hand. It was all up to Silas.

“Silas?” Earl asked.

Silas stood up straighter in his chair now, glancing at the cowpoke with a hateful expression. “Hit me.”

Earl threw the next card out—

A Jack of Spades, putting Silas at twenty-six and over the limit.

Earl flipped over his cards. A Queen of Clubs. Twenty.

The cowpoke had won.

A laugh bubbled out of Benjamin’s mouth. “Hah! Eat that, Silas!”

“Shut it!” Silas snapped, spewing spittle. He spun on the cowpolk, face red. “New game. All or nothing. I gotta Colt or–or a Winchester. Ammo — how ‘bout a new holster? Knicked a leather one from a marshall a few states back. What d’ya want? Name it, I got it.”

But the cowpolk simply finished his beer, taking a heavy puff of his quirley. “Good game.”

And then he twisted his gun back into its holster from the hat, pocketing the bills and the cigarettes. The other men watched in shocked silence.

“You cheated!” Silas shot up. “Musta! I won't lose! I— Earl.”

Earl raised his hands. “He won fair and square, Mister Johnson. And I ain't your daddy, so don’t come squealin’ to me.”

Silas sputtered, huffing and puffing, fingers looping around the double pistols kept on his hips, but whatever he had planned next was interrupted by the arrival of Mary Lynn. “Bath’s ready,” she called from the top of the stairs.

The cowpolk put his hat back onto his head and nodded at the others politely. “Good evening, gentlemen.”

The three men watched as the cowpolk climbed the stairs. Silas kicked over a chair with a curse. “Benji, get Bear. We’re gettin’ my money back.”

Benji nodded, running out with the devil on his heels.

Earl shook his head, picking up the chair. “Best not.”

“What!” Silas gripped Earl’s collar, lifting the smaller man off the floor. “Best not what?”

Earl pushed Silas off of him, smoothing out his collar with distaste. “Still water runs deep, s’all. Men don’t go around carryin’ Peacemakers without a reason.”

“Don’t tell me what to do!” Silas spat and took off after Benji in a huff.

Earl rubbed his neck.

The cowpoke and Cormac came upon the river near midnight. He pulled at the mustang’s reins softly, and they stopped at the river’s edge. Slipping out of the saddle, he landed in a smattering of gravel and mud. Reeds licked his boots. The stallion prodded at the cowpoke’s pockets, and he fed his ol’ bangtail an oatcake. Under the dim moonlight, he could make out black water cresting a deadly white as it was ripped and torn around heavy, jagged rocks. The Platte was one of the smaller rivers the cowpoke had ever had the pleasure of meeting, about a thousand yards across. Even then, her rapids were deadly. Better men had been drowned within shallower waters. Still, he had no choice.

“Silas don’t take kindly to losin’,” Mary Lynn had warned him hours earlier. “Now, Earl ain’t gonna let ‘im bring a gun in here, but the second you leave here, he’ll get his money back. And then, he’ll kill you. He’s done more fer less.”

The cowpoke didn’t want trouble, and so he had taken his bath, eaten a hearty stew in his room under candlelight, and then escaped out the window, taking off into the night. So much for treating himself.

The cowpoke hadn’t had the time to ask where it was best to ford the river, and he wasn’t eager to spend hours searching for it in the dark. The water was an inky void— there would be no telling of its depth.

And so, the rapids. It was risky, but the water before the rapids was shallower and could easily be crossed if one was careful. Once crossed, he could find a patch of trees to settle amongst. He had a cold, miserable night ahead of him.

The cowpoke removed his blanket and saddlepacks, throwing them over his shoulders. Then, with a reassuring pat on Cormac’s snout, he slipped a foot into the stirrup and led the stallion into the black water.

Shallow water quickly rose calf-high, and the cowpoke’s boots were soon soaked. He watched the rapids twenty feet to his right warily, encouraging his horse to fight against its magnetic pull. The mustang whined when it slipped on a rock, nearly throwing the cowpoke into the water. But he was quick to dig his heels into the horse’s sides and urged him to push forward.

Too close.

White-knuckling the reins, the cowpoke turned his head again to look back at the white water and caught flickers of orange in the distance. Voices, angry and loud.

A posse. Silas.

And so, he pressed himself to the mustang’s neck, bags dipping into the water, hiding.

The torches approached, the voices grew louder, and hooves thundered. The cowpoke now flicked his eyes between the beast underneath him, the fearsome rapids, and the incoming envoy, pulse beating rapidly in his throat. The situation was precarious at best, and he felt foolish now for choosing to ford the rapids. Wrapping the reins thrice around his left hand, he removed his Colt from his holster, cocking back the hammer. He would be ready if they came, when they came. They were sitting ducks — no trees to cover their positions and one bullet away from being shredded up in the rocks mere feet away.

“Over there!”

The cowpoke urged Cormac to pick up the pace, guiding him to forge against the mighty torrent of the river.

Hoofs clambered down the bank behind him; horses huffed and spat. “Cowpoke!”

The cowpoke risked a glance back. The three of them stood at the river’s edge, torches and rifles in hand.

Silas’ face was shadowed in orange light. “How ‘bout you come back here nice and easy, and you walk away bullet-free?”

The cowpoke didn’t hesitate for a second. A second of indecision was all it took to get killed out in the West. He leaned back, raised his Colt, and fired.

Bam! The bullet met its mark, and Bear was thrown off his horse with a cry, into a heap of muscle and bone and fur on the back. The horse, spooked, took off into the forest. He couldn’t hear their reactions, rapids roaring, but he heard the return fire well enough. Gunfire erupted like thunder in the night; bullets splitting the water with a sickening thwack. They followed along the edge of the river as he cut across to the other side, away from the rapids and into black. The cowpoke dug his spurs into the stallion, forcing him to go faster, and shot rapid fire.

Bam! Bam! Bam! None hit their mark.

Two more bullets left; more in his jeans pockets.

Bam! One bullet left.

Another figure was clipped, releasing a strangled cry. He crumpled against his horse, but, in an act of true grit, raised his pistol once more. The bullet whistled in the air and struck the cowpoke firmly. The cowpoke hissed when the bullet tore through his leg, hot and heavy. The bullet grazed Cormac’s shoulder, and the horse whined, stumbling on the slippery rocks. With a curse, the cowpoke was thrown into the mercilessly cold water. Black water filled his lungs. But he gripped the reins biting his wrist tighter and kicked himself back onto the mustang, coughing out a lung. The leather of the saddle bags damn near choked him in doing so.

Sputtering, wet as a kitten, he began to slip bullets from his pockets into the cylinder of the gun with shaky fingers.

The middle figure, who had to have been Silas, raised his rifle and, with a howl, ordered the horses into the river to pursue.

The cowpolk was running out of time. With only three bullets in the barrel of his gun, he knocked the cylinder back into place and fired once more.

Bam! The man he had shot before, Benjamin, dropped like a sack of potatoes into the river the moment the bullet slipped neatly through his temple.

Silas cursed and drew nearer. He struggled against the white water, horse thrashing underneath him. “I’ll gut ya like a pig, cowboy!”

Bam! The horse jolted, and the cowpolk missed – barely.

He was almost to the other side of the river. If he could get there, he would have the high ground and could easily gun Silas down.

Whispering one last reassurance to Cormac, he pushed through the last part of the river, water growing shallower and shallower.

Bang! A spray of bullets assaulted the cowpoke chaotically, lodging themselves into his back and the flank of the poor creature beneath him. He cried out, thrown against his horse. A lucky shot. Cormac floundered once more, eager to escape, but the cowpoke dug his spurs into the stallion’s ribs painfully and forced him to keep steady.

Bleeding, thigh and back aching like a son of bitch, the cowpoke and his mustang crossed, finally, onto the bank. Immediately, he slipped out of the saddle and told the mustang to go. He groaned when he landed on his bad leg, throwing his sopping wet saddle bags to the ground.

Silas fired again, the bullets erratic. His horse was angry and irritated, eager to buck him, and still the man was attempting to load his rifle once more.

“Nobody steals my money and gets away with it!”

The cowpoke had one bullet left.

“It’s over!” The cowpoke called, breathing heavy. “Drop the gun and I’ll let you live!”

“Let me—!” Silas gasped. “Let me live?! I’m Silas Johnson! Best bounty hunter in the West! I’ll put a bounty so high on your head, boy, that you can’t wake a thousand feet within a town without getting killed! I’ll see you hang!”

The cowpolk raised his gun.

Bam!

The bullet ripped through Silas’ shoulder, and he rolled off his horse, and both of them were quickly carried into the rapids. The cowpolk shuddered at his broken screams and limped towards where his mustang was pitching a fit.

Bloody hands outstretched, he cupped the beast's snout and littered his apologies. He offered the creature a wet oatcake, which it accepted bitterly.

The cowpoke lowered himself slowly to the ground, leaning against a tree. He used a bandana to tourniquet his thigh with a hiss. Digging into his pockets, he pulled out a damp cigarette with a cupped hand, which took nearly five attempts to light. The night air was cool and dewy, and wispy clouds bobbed above.

“All that for three dollars,” he said with a shake of his head. Three dollars, for three men.

“Idiots.”