The number of words in the 1st draft of DRUMS AT MIDNIGHT is 90,652
Chapter 1
Garrett arrived in Cheyenne Black Hills in the spring and rode south until he reached Mesilla the town was not yet there but now within just a few months there were already thousands of people that had flocked to the town. It was the railroad that brought them there. The Union Pacific railroad reached Cheyenne on November….1867 and was now west of Cheyenne
Since he only had $10 to his name he decided that he would gamble and try to turn it into more. If he were to lose it wouldn’t be that big of a loss but if he was lucky and won he was hoping to turn it into $100 or more. When he arrived at a saloon that looked like it would be a good lively one he dismounted and tied Midnight to the hitching post in front of the saloon and then he scratched Midnight between the ears for a moment and said, “Wish me luck,” and then he reached behind his back and took hold of his hatchet and removed it and placed it in one of his saddlebags and then he walked into the saloon. The joint was jumping. He had a good feeling. He made his way past some faro tables and some tables where men were playing poker and when he at last made his way to the bar he ordered a whiskey and a beer. He now had less than $10 but it was all he needed. He looked around the room at the various tables where men were playing poker. The most important decision of the night was deciding which table he would approach and try to get in the game. As he was looking around the room trying to make a decision he saw a woman walking towards him and then she was standing right next to him. She had a beautiful face and brunette hair that was elaborately styled. It was Caroline, the prostitute that keeps a gun on her thigh. When she heard about Cheyenne San Antonio
Garrett was not a man that had ever sought the company of prostitutes but there was no point in being rude to her.
“I don’t have enough money to have a good time.”
She raised her hand to his face and placed her fingers on his cheek and then she slowly moved them down the length of his face as she looked into his blue eyes.
“That’s a shame. You look like you’d be a lot of fun. It’s not every day that I see a man as handsome as you.”
Garrett didn’t say anything. He laughed under his breath as he looked at her and then he raised the mug of beer to his mouth and took a good, long thirst quenching gulp. He expected that she would walk away and try to find another man that wanted to enjoy her offer once he told her he wasn’t interested but she was still standing next to him.
“Do you have enough money to buy a girl a drink?”
“If I did I would buy you one but I don’t. If I win tonight I’ll buy you one later. How’s that?”
“I hope you win so we can have that drink later and maybe if you’re in the mood we can spend some time together.”
“If I win I’ll buy you a drink or two but that’s as far as it goes. I’m a married man.”
“Since when does being married ever stop a man from having some fun?”
She smiled at Garrett as she placed her hand on his face again and then she turned and walked away. She had approached him the moment he started looking for a table where he would try his luck. He suddenly remembered that he had not drank his whiskey yet. He turned and faced the bar again and set his mug of beer down and then he took hold of the glass of whiskey that had been patiently waiting for him and he raised it to his lips and then he tilted his head back and opened his mouth. It had been a while since he felt the burn of it going down his throat but he knew what good whiskey tasted like and this was not good whiskey of high quality; it tasted more like moonshine that was made from potatoes. His throat was on fire. The beer wasn’t bad though. It wasn’t exotic, dark European beer, it was just run of the mill saloon beer but it tasted good. He finished his mug and then he ordered another beer and then he turned around and with his back leaning against the bar he raised the mug to his lips and took a gulp and then he once more began to look through the faces for a table that had a good feeling to it. He saw what he was looking for. There was a table with four men sitting at it and though he didn’t know why he felt that table was better than the others for some reason it was the one that he had an intuition about. Many of the men that were there were rugged looking downtrodden souls with dirty clothes but these men had nice clothes on and that meant they had some money to play with. They were either wealthy men that had come to town to increase their fortunes or they were professional gamblers or both. One or more of the men could also be a gunslinger. If any of them were professional gamblers then they were also most likely gunslingers. None of them had the ambiance about them like that of Maurice Lamarr, the professional gambler that Garrett had lost a great deal of money to in Mesilla. They looked more like wealthy cattle barons, or ranchers or... Whatever they were they weren’t railroad workers or trappers or mountain men. He didn’t feel compelled by any of the other tables but for some reason he felt compelled to try and get a seat at that table. He set his mug of beer down on the bar and then he reached into his shirt pocket and took out his last cigar and put it in his mouth and then he lit it with a match and once he placed the matches back in his pocket, cigar in one hand, beer in the other, he began walking towards the table that would decide his fate for the night.
“You gents mind if I join you?”
All four of the men looked at him and eyed him over as if he was a piece of land that they were appraising, not sure if they should invest or not. They, of course, noticed his revolvers and the knife that he kept on his belt but they couldn’t see the knife that he kept on the lower part of his right leg and the hatchet that he kept on his lower back. He was a fierce looking man with his black hat and his buckskin clothing and the smell of the wilderness was on him but he presented them a dilemma. He looked much more intelligent than the clothes he was wearing would lead one to believe and there was a confidence about him and though he was calm in demeanor there was something regal and stoic about him.
The one that was shuffling the cards had the most money and or chips sitting in front of him. He was a large man with cunning eyes and………physical description. The man sitting next to his right…………physical description. The man sitting on his left………….physical description……and the man that was sitting closest to where Garrett was standing…………physical description.
The man that was shuffling the cards said, “Sure. Why not. Pull up a chair.”
Garrett looked at the man as he pulled out a chair and sat down. He set his mug of beer down in front of him and then after he flicked the ashes from the cigar he stuck it between his teeth but he didn’t inhale. There was a strong smell to it and two of the other men were smoking cigars too as were many of the men in the saloon. The air was filled with cigar smoke and it smelled of whiskey and beer and the lawlessness of the place so palpable that you could smell that too.
“Thanks.”
The man dealt the cards; it was not a good start to the night. Garrett had a pair of twos, a five of hearts, an eight of diamonds and a Jack of hearts. He had to hide his disappointment though. It goes without saying that the last thing he wanted was for them to know that he had been dealt a bad hand. He threw in three cards and was dealt three more but his situation was no better than before. Rather than lose more money than was necessary he folded. To his relief his luck improved. He was dealt three kings the next hand. Unless one of them had exceptional cards, and the odds of that were not in their favor, Garrett knew he was going to win the hand and he did. It was a few hands later when Garrett realized that they were terrible gamblers. Unless one of them was trying to deceive him and the others by letting them win so that he could set them up for a big loss later they were wealthy men having a good time but none of them knew the first thing about playing cards. They were some of the worst gamblers that Garrett had ever met. It seemed too good to be true but Garrett had learned long ago that wealthy men were often poor gamblers. They had money to lose and so it didn’t matter to them if they won or lost. No man likes to lose. It’s a matter of pride but other than their pride being wounded the loss had no effect on them. They still had plenty of money. Wealthy men were either very careful with their money, they didn’t want to lose a nickel to anyone for any reason and they were always trying to increase what they had by any means possible but there was another type of wealthy men and those were men that had been born with money and they were careless with it. In addition to being impractical and frivolous they tended to view themselves as being more intelligent than other men, more deserving than other men, and this only made them even more foolish.
Within a short time Garrett had more than $50 of their money in front of him and it wasn’t long after that when he had won more than $100. None of them were ready to give up and walk away so they continued to play. They folded when they should have kept playing and they kept playing and throwing in more money when they should have folded. Garrett lost a hand now and then but when he did he didn’t lose much. He knew when to fold and when to keep playing but there were times when he had terrible cards and he didn’t fold. They were baffled when they saw his cards. It was a strategy that worked well though. They had no idea if he had good cards or if he was bluffing. The harder they tried to win their money back the more they lost. When they at last conceded defeat Garrett had turned less than $10 into more than $750. They were gracious losers. None of them accused him of cheating. They all shook hands and then Garrett stood up and looked for the woman that he had talked to earlier. He walked over to where she was standing. She was talking to another woman that worked there. She already had a mug of beer in front of her.
“How’d you make out?” She asked.
“Good enough to buy you ladies a drink or two.”
Caroline smiled at him.
“Why that’s very nice of you.”
Garrett bought both of them a mug of beer and some whiskey to go with it and he bought himself another beer and some whiskey too. He also bought himself some cigars. Caroline raised the mug of beer to her mouth and drank half of it in one gulp and then she introduced Garrett to her friend. Her name was Penelope and though she wasn’t as beautiful as Caroline she too was rather attractive. She was a tall blonde with soft brown eyes that were large and well shaped. There was a tremendous amount of mascara on her long eyelashes and there was colorful makeup not only around her eyelids and there was also an abundance of makeup on her cheeks and lips. Her lips were as red as wine, along with the rest of her mouth, her teeth and tongue, it gave her a very seductive appeal. Her eyebrows were so faint that they were barely noticeable but the mole on the left side of her face just above her sensuous lips was more than noticeable. It was darker in color than her eyes. It gave her a seductive look that was every bit as sexy, if not more, than her large breasts that were falling out of the top of her dress. There were sparkly earrings dangling from both of her ears and she wore a great deal of perfume, so much that it was every bit as intoxicating as the alcohol she was drinking. There was also a shimmering necklace around her neck and there was a bracelet on her left wrist. She had large, white beautiful teeth. Her nose was long and delicate. What stood out most though was her voice. It was every bit as fragile and sensitive as the look in her eyes. Caroline had her brunette curls piled on top of her head but Beatrice’s long blonde hair hung freely around the soft features of her face. Her skin was milky white and there were moles on her arms and hands. She had long, slender fingers and her nails were very long. Her hair was straight but there was a thickness to it, not the fine hair and it looked as though she had spent a great deal of time brushing it.
She was a girl from a small town in…she had been earning her living pleasuring men for less than two years and like everyone else that had come to Cheyenne she had her reasons for leaving the little town in Kansas that she had called home for almost two years. She was the youngest daughter of a father that was…..She too was addicted to opium but she wasn’t the drinker that Caroline was. She finished her beer and then she excused herself. Garrett bought Caroline another beer and then another.
“Are you sure you don’t want to have some fun?”
“If I wasn’t married I probably would.”
“You must really love her. She’s a lucky woman.”
Garrett smiled at her.
“I do, but that doesn’t mean we can’t be friends.”
“Do you live here or are you just passing through?”
“Just passing through.”
“How long are you going to be in town?”
“I’m leaving tonight.”
“Stay with me tonight and leave in the morning.”
“That’s a very tempting offer but I can’t.”
“You better stop and see me the next time you’re in town.”
“That’s something I can do.”
Caroline smiled at him as she reached out and touched his face again.
“I sure do like you.”
“I like you too. I knew right away that you were a very nice person.”
“Really?”
“I wouldn’t be talking to you if I didn’t think so.”
“I’ve never thought of myself as a nice person.”
“Why’s that?”
“Nice girls don’t work at saloons.”
“Sure they do. They’re some of the nicest ones around.”
“Are you trying to break my heart?”
Garrett smiled at her.
“Why would I want to do that?”
“Well you are.”
Garrett reached into his pocket and took out $100 and handed it to her.
“That will keep you from getting thirsty for a while.”
Caroline counted the money and then when she realized how much he had given her she looked at him and said, “It’s too much. I can’t accept it.”
“Yes you can. I want you to have it. I think it was you that brought me luck tonight.”
“What am I supposed to do when you leave? You know how much I’m going to miss you?”
She wrapped her arms around Garrett’s neck and pulled him close to her. She buried her head in his chest for a moment and then she kissed him on the cheek and then she took his face in her hands and kissed him on the mouth.
“I better get going. My horse is waiting for me.”
“You could board him at a livery stable and stay with me tonight.”
“You’re a very beautiful woman and you’re making it really hard to say no but I really must leave.”
Caroline reluctantly let go of his face.
“Stay for one more drink.”
Garrett laughed.
“All right. One more, but you’re buying.”
Caroline laughed.
“It’s the least I can do.”
Garrett wasn’t drunk but he did feel good and warm. When he finished his beer she gave him another kiss and then he walked outside. The moon and stars were out and the autumn wind felt cold against his face. Midnight was happy to see him. He had been waiting patiently for him. Midnight lowered his head and put it next to Garrett’s shoulder so that he could scratch him between the ears. He wasn’t ready to mount him just yet though. He took one of the cigars that he had bought out of his pocket and lit it. He inhaled the smoke several times and then he stuck it between his teeth; it was then, just as he was about to mount Midnight when he heard footsteps coming up behind him. He turned around thinking that it would be Caroline’s face that he saw but it wasn’t her. Two men that had been in the saloon had followed him out and they were now standing in front of him with revolvers in their hands. They had been watching him for hours. They knew that he had a lot of money on him and they were going to take it from him; at least they were going to try to but they didn’t know that the man that was standing before them was Garrett James.
The larger of the two men looked at him and said, “You won a lot of money tonight. We got to thinking that you’d like to share some of that with us.”
Garrett looked at them with his somber blue eyes as he reached up and took the cigar out of his mouth and flicked the ashes and then he stuck it between his teeth again and said, “If you holster your guns and turn around and leave right now I’m willing to forget that this happened.”
They looked at each other and laughed and then they looked at Garrett again. The larger of the two men stood more than six feet tall but there was not great bulk or girth to his body. His shoulders were wide but there wasn’t much meat on his bones. His face was long and thin and bony. There was a sinister quality to his voice but it wasn’t the confident voice of a courageous man, he spoke with the inflection of a man that was timid and unsure of himself. His ragged clothes hung from his bony frame and he smelled of alcohol and he also smelled as if it had been a good long while when he last took a bath. He didn’t have a beard or mustache but there were some scraggly whiskers on his face. At first glance you would come to the conclusion that he was dishonest in some way, a man that could not be trusted and if someone was foolish enough to do so it would be at their own peril. He looked like a man that was born to be a horse thief.
The man standing next to him wasn’t nearly as tall as his partner in crime but there was more flesh on him. He wasn’t muscular though; there was of course some muscle under his fat but overall he had the slovenly appearance of a lazy man. His shirt and pants were filthy as were his hands. His belly was bursting out of his shirt and it was hanging over the belt that held up his pants. There were acne scars on his face and it was a face that was round without distinction. His eyes were where they were supposed to be and his nose and mouth were too but somehow they didn’t go together. There was also a noticeable scar on his face; it began just below his right ear and didn’t stop until it reached the bottom of his jaw. It looked as though he had received it from a saber or from the blade of a knife slashing across his face. He too reeked of whiskey and he was having great difficulty keeping his balance. He was stumbling around like a drunken man that was about to fall over.
“If you don’t give us that money right now I’m going to put a bullet in you,” said the taller of the two men.
Garrett knew that they were afraid to shoot him. If they did everyone would hear the shots go off and men would pour out of the saloon into the street and they would find themselves being shot at. It was, of course, within the realm of possibility that they would shoot him but it wasn’t likely. What they wanted was for him to give them the money without a fight so they could slip away silently into the night before anyone was able to stop them. If they had any brains they would have waited until he left town and then ambushed him when no one was around but they were not intelligent men; they were greedy and lazy and stupid. If they weren’t lazy they would have worked for their money instead of trying to rob someone. If they weren’t greedy they would have been content with the poverty that laziness brings. Their biggest mistake though, other than not waiting to ambush him when he had left town, was that they didn’t anticipate that he would not cooperate with them. They assumed that he would be afraid and hand over the money but when he didn’t they didn’t know what to do. They just stood there looking at him, waiting for him to say or do something. Garrett didn’t say or do anything though. He was waiting for them to make their move.
The larger of the two men was obviously confused and frustrated. He kept looking over his shoulder; he was worried that someone was going to walk out of the saloon before they had the money. He looked at Garrett and motioned with his gun.
“Unbuckle your gun belt.”
Garrett reached down and unbuckled his belt and let it fall to the ground.
“Now reach down real slow and take that knife out.”
Garrett leaned over and took the knife that he kept on his lower leg out of the sheath and tossed it on the ground.
“Get moving.”
Garrett knew he was in serious trouble now. He had pointed with the barrel of his pistol towards the alley that was next to the saloon. He wanted to get Garrett into the darkness where no one would be able to see them. Garrett had to make a decision and he had to make it fast. He only had two choices. He could move into the darkness around the corner as the man wanted him to do or he could remain where he was in the street in front of the saloon. There was rage in the man’s eyes now. Though it would have been stupid to shoot him he looked like he was about to lose his composure so Garrett turned and began walking towards the dark alley where only shadows awaited. He walked very slow. He could feel the pistol against his back now. It was another mistake. Garrett knew exactly where the man was in proximity to him even though he couldn’t see him.
“Hurry up.”
The moment Garrett turned the corner and stepped into the darkness he pivoted on his right foot and spun around. He moved so fast the man didn’t have time to react. As Garrett was spinning towards him he caught him with a powerful backhand. His arm was extended and his fist was clenched. He hit him with such force that his gun fell from his hand and he also lost his footing. He stumbled and fell into the other man causing him to also lose his footing. The gun did not fall from his hand though; he stumbled for a moment and crashed into the wall of the saloon but then he regained his footing and turned towards Garrett and pointed his pistol at him. Garrett had by now planted his left foot and with all of his weight resting on it he lifted his right foot and kicked the gun out of the man’s hand. The larger of the two men, the one that Garrett had sent sprawling with the back of his fist, was now lunging towards Garrett. He had his head down and his arms were outstretched when he drove his shoulder into Garrett’s torso and forced him backwards until Garrett’s back was up against the wall. The other man was on his hands and knees and he was groping around for his pistol but it was too dark for him to find it. Garrett put both of his hands on the back of the man’s head and then as he was pushing down on it as hard as he could he brought his right knee up into the man’s face. It was a hard, devastating blow. The man immediately lost his grasp on Garrett as he put his hands on his face and stumbled backwards. Blood was gushing out of his mouth and nose when Garrett planted his left foot again and kicked the man in the knee as hard as he could. The man’s legs gave way beneath him as he crumpled to the ground. The other man was no longer on his hands and knees. He had found his pistol and he was on his feet again. Right as he was raising it to shoot at Garrett, Garrett lunged towards him and took hold of the man’s wrist with his left hand as he brought his right forearm up and caught the man on the chin. The gun fell from his hand as his neck snapped back. He had lost his footing and was staggering around but he was still on his feet when Garrett kicked him in the groin with his right foot. The man yelled out as he grimaced with pain. He put both hands on his groin as he fell to the ground. Garrett leaned over and picked his hat up and then he brushed the dirt off of it with his hand and placed it on his head.
Garrett walked out of the darkness into the hazy light that was emanating from the front of the saloon and stooped over and collected his gun belt and knife. He slid his knife back into its sheath and then he wrapped his bun belt around his waist and buckled it. Midnight was still waiting patiently for him. Garrett patted him on the neck and then after he had taken his hatchet out of his saddle bag and it was once more between his belt and his shirt on the small of his back he untied Midnight from the hitching post and mounted him. The cigar had fallen out of his mouth during the struggle so reached into his pocket and withdrew another one and lit it. He gathered the heavy buffalo robe around his waist so that it covered most of his legs and then he looked up at the moon and stars as he prompted Midnight with the heels of his moccasins. Caroline was gone as were the men that had tried to rob him. Midnight and Garrett were no longer in Cheyenne
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