his sinister Buntline Special blazing. 'I'll blow ya apart!' he yelled 'I'll -'
But at that moment Slade carefully put a bullet through his head. Pinky Lee flopped, his evil days done.
'Lee?' Sam Columbine called. 'Pinky: You out there:' A craven cowardly note had crept into his voice. 'I just dropped him, Columbine!' Slade yelled. 'And now it's just you and me...and I'm comin' to get you!'
Sinister.45s blazing, a Mexican cigar clamped between his teeth, Slade started down the hill after Sam Columbine.
Halfway down the slope, Sam Columbine let loose such a volley of shots that Slade had to duck behind a barrel cactus. He could not get off a clear shot at Columbine because the wily villain had hidden behind a convenient, giant bottle of mayonnaise.
'Slade!' Columbine yelled. 'It's time we settled this like men! Holster yore gun and I'll holster mine! Then we'll come out an' draw! The better man will walk away!'
'Okay, you lowdown sidewinder!' Slade yelled back. He holstered his sinister.45s and stepped out from behind the barrel cactus. Columbine stepped out from behind the bottle of mayonnaise. He was a tall man with an olive complexion and an evil grin. His hand hovered over the barrel of the sinister Smith & Wesson pistol that hung on his hip.
'Well, this is it, pard!' Slade sneered. There was a Mexican cigar clamped between his teeth as he started to walk toward Columbine. 'Say hello to everyone in hell for me, Columbine!'
'We'll see,' Columbine sneered back, but his knees were knocking as he halted, ready for the showdown.
'Okay!' Slade called. 'Go fer yore gun!'
'Wait,' Someone screamed. 'Wait, wait, WAIT!'
They both stared. It was Sandra Dawson! She was runniug toward them breathless.
'Slade!' She cried. 'Slade!'
'Get down!' Slade growled. 'Sam Columbine is-'
'I had to tell you, Slade! I couldn't let you go off, maybe to get killed! And you'd never know!'
'Know what?' Slade asked.
'That I'm Polly Peachtree!'
Slade gaped at her. 'But you can't be Polly Peachtree! She was my one true love and she was killed by a flaming Montgolfer balloon while milking the cows!'
'I escaped but I had amnesia!' She cried. 'It's all just come back to me tonight. Look!' And she pulled off a blond wig she had been wearing. She was indeed the beautiful Polly Peachtree of Paduka, returned from the dead!
'POLLY!!!'
'SLADE!!!'
Slade rushed to her and they embraced, Sam Columbine forgotten. Slade was just about to ask her how things were going when Sam Columbine, evil rat that he was, crept up behind him and shot Slade in the back three times.
'Thank God!' Polly whispered as she and Sam embraced 'At last. he's gone and we are free, my darling!'
Yeah,' Sam growled 'How are things going Polly?'
t
You don't know how terrible it's been,' she sobbed 'Not only was he killing everybody, but he was queerer than a three-dollar bill.'
'Well it's over,' Sam said.
'Like fun!' Slade said. He sat up and blasted them both. 'Good thing I was wearing my bullet proof underwear,' he said lighting a new Mexican cigar. He stared at the cooling bodies of Sam Columbine and Polly Peachtree, and a great wave of sadness swept over him. He threw away his cigar and lit a joint. Then he walked over to where he had tethered Stokely, his black stallion. He wrapped his arms around Stokely's neck and held him close.
'At last, darling,' Slade whispered. 'We're alone.'
After a long while, Slade and Stokely rode off into the sunset in search of new adventures.
THE END
'Slade.' The Maine Campus June-August 1970. 'Slade' is in some ways the most exciting of King1s uncollected juvenalia, an engaging explosion of off the wall humor, literary pastiche, and cultural criticism, all masquerading as a Western - the adventures of Slade and his quest for Miss Polly Peachtree of Paduka. Published in several installments in the UMO college newspaper during the summer following King's graduation, the story is most important in showing King reveling in the joy of writing.
-excerpt from 'The Annotated Guide to Stephen King, p.45.
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