A Western End

part 1, part 3, part 4, part 5

Part 2

“I’m just plain tired of it.” Shelby slumps forward in his chair spinning the Colt Dragoon resting on the table.

“We’s gone be fine like always Shelby.”

 
Shelby doesn’t look at his younger brother Odum as he tried to comfort him. Odum was barely 22 yet he has see more than most criminals roaming the territory. His smile was that of an innocent man, yet his mind was darkened by with the souls of many people taken at his hands. His hair was light blonde and his eyes a deep blue, when in Red Creek and all the similar dirt towns he is favored by the women and despised by the men.

“Maybe it is jus’ time to let that old marshal get me. Jus’ ride to town an’ let him have me hung. It’s tha only endin’ that I deserve.” Shelby stands up, walks over to the cabin window, and stares out over the frosted plains. Shelby is not as handsome as his younger brother. His hair is a dark blonde and his eyes an eerie grey, but what he lacks in the looks department he makes up for in intelligence. 

“Don’ go talkin’ like tha’ wha’ would mama say?”

“Mama would say we’s givin’ the Kindel’s a bad name. Sometime I’m glad she ain’t alive to watch what I have become an’ the path I led you down.” Shelby leans his head against the filthy glass window, “I wish I could change my path; I wish I could have made mama proud.

“Mama is proud, we ain’t poor no more.” Odum stands up and walks over to his brother placing his hand on Shelby’s shoulder. “Remember where we was when mama died, you saved us an’ all the boy’s dat’s why we loyal to ya an’ believe in where ya take us.”

“Sure I remember.”

Shelby went deep into his memory and watched as the plains turned into the bustling streets of Paterson. 

Snow covered the trees and the Great Falls were nearly frozen over, young Shelby stood by the shore of the Passaic River staring out at the blooming city above. Odum came stumbling down the hill.

“We can’t stay here. We ain’t got nothin’ left.” Shelby spoke without turning around at his brother.

“We gots Auntie Beatrice.” Odum tried to force a smile.

“She can’t even take care of her own how you think she take care of us?”

“But she said mama tol’ her dat we will stay wit her.”

“Mama is dead, Odum,” Shelby turned to face his brother, “look at us. Tha way we dressed there no way we survive winter here.”

Odum looked down at himself he was wearing a torn grey frock coat that once belonged to Shelby and a pair of faded black pants that were once their older brother who was rotting somewhere in the filth of a Manhattan jail awaiting his meeting with the hangman. He looked back at Shelby who was wearing just a plain green button down shirt without a jacket, his face was red from the winter wind.

“Where we gonna go Shel?” Odum began to cry, “Manhattan?”

“We don’ wanna go there. I went to visit Matthew an’ saw where he was livin’. The Five Points ain’t made for no human livin’. We gotta go west.”

“West?”

Shelby wiped his brother’s tears from his cheek and embraced him. He ran his hand through Odum’s blonde hair. “Yea. we gotta go west. I got us some money so we will take a train out to St. Louis an’ make our way from there.”

“How you gets money for a train?”

“I killed a man.” Shelby let go of his brother and turned back around to the river. “I stabbed him in tha neck an’ tooks his money and pocket watch an’ left him to die alone.”

Odum started to cry heavily.

“I ain’t have no choice, ain’t noone gonna take care of us but me.” Tears rolled down Shelby’s cheeks past the scar that he got from working in the mill when he was younger. “It jus’ us.”

“Ain’t ya worried about hell?”

“Hell is where we livin now. I ain’t worried bout nothin’ but getting us out of bein’ poor.”

The cabin door opens and the mills of Paterson turn back into the frosted plains.

“You right Odum, mama would be proud, maybe not of the ways we lived, but that we taken care of each other.” Shelby smiles and walks back over to take a seat at the table.

“Any sign of the ole marshal?”

“Nah, sir, we gots no sign of him.” Norwood Lyle speaks as he piles firewood into the stove.  “If any of tha fellas see someone dey sure run to tell us.”

“Put some coffee on fo’ the boys. Have em come in fo’ breakfast.”

“But boss whas bout dat marshal?” Norwood asks as he starts the coffee.

“Cummings ain’t gone kill no man while eatin’ eggs. He a man of God an’ ain’t gonna kill no one that ain’t out to harm him.”

Norwood wiped his black hands on his gray shirt and heads to the door. he shouts out “Fellas we’s gone have some breakfas’.” Norwood makes his way back to the stove and starts cracking the eggs the gang stole from a nearby ranch.

“Maybe we should move from here Shel.” Odum takes the seat next to his brother at the table. “Maybe we go north ta Canada, they ain’t got no idea who we are there, maybe we can start again.”

“Till Marshal Cummings is out of the way we ain’t gonna be safe no wheres.” Shelby plucks the Colt off the table storing it safely in the holster on his hip. “We gonna stan’ an’ fight. Sides he ain’t gonna be wit no one.”

“How you know he ain’t gonna have no posse?”

“Ain’t no one in that town he can trus’, bunch of crooks and thieves that never forgave him fo’ killin’ Elsworth Sloane.”

Three men walk into the cabin lead by Archie Bruff a muscle bound man who has a flair for flannel shirts and the lumberjack beard to match, following behind him was Walton McMurry a short anger filled Irishman, and Moses Hagerman a plain looking young kid no more than 16 who joined the gang after escaping an orphanage. They take seats around the table.

“Wha tha nigger cookin’?” Archie asks with a smile on his face.

Shelby stares at him anger boils up and he punches Archie square in the nose, blood spills out onto the table.

“Wha I say ‘bout that word? Norwood is one of us an’ ain’t no one call him a nigger.”

“Sorry boss.” Archie holds his nose and tilts his head back in an attempt to stop the bleeding.

“Don’ apologize to me. You apologize to Norwood.” Shelby stands up and walks over to the cabinet and grabs a ragged cloth and tosses it at Archie.

“I sorry Norwood.”

“Ain’t nothin’ I knows you ain’t mean no harm by it. I used to worse anyways.” Norwood walks over with a pot of coffee and a plate of scrambled eggs placing it in the center of the table. “Yous is the only family I have, I don’t mind some foolin’.” Norwood smiles and takes his seat at the table with the rest of the gang. Shelby brings cups and plates and joins them.