Savagery of The Mountain Man

“What I mean is, leave that table right now, or stay where you are and draw your guns.”

“Draw our guns? Mister, there are two of us and only one of you. And I don’t mind tellin’ you that we ain’t exactly strangers when it comes to usin’ guns. Either one of us can kill you where you stand, but you say you want to fight both of us at the same time. Now, are you sure you want to go through with this?”

“I’m sure.”

Both Ken and Jerry stood; then they stepped away from each other. “Before we do this, I want ever’one in this here saloon to understand what is goin’ on,” Ken said. “Me an’ my partner wasn’t doin’ nothin’ but sittin’ real peaceful at this table, when this little pissant come in here challengin’ us to a gunfight. Do you all understand that? When the sheriff comes in after we kill this fella, I want to make sure ever’one knows we didn’t start it.”

“All right, mister, we’ll all be willin’ to testify that Mr. Cates challenged you to a fight when you refused to move from his table,” the bartender said.

“Mr. Cates?” Ken said, a look of confusion crossing his face. “What do you mean, Cates?” He turned back toward the little man, dressed in black. “Is your name Cates?”

“It is.”

“Snake Cates?”

Cates’s tongue darted out a couple of times before he responded. “I don’t like that name,” he said. “I prefer to be called Mr. Cates.”

“Ken, what have you got us into?” Jerry asked.

“Look, Mr. Cates,” Ken said, holding his left hand out in front of him, as if by that action he could hold Cates away. “We didn’t mean nothin’ by all this. If you want this table, you can have it. We was just—that is—well, we didn’t have no idea that it was your table.”

“It’s too late for negotiations now,” Cates said. “Like you said, you brought me to the ball, now I expect a dance.”

“But I didn’t know—”

“Ain’t no use it tryin’ to talk us out of it now, Ken,” Jerry said. “This little feller is bound to go through with this. We don’t have no choice in the matter. We are either goin’ to have to kill him, or he is goin’ to kill us.”

For the next several seconds, there was a macabre tableau, a picture that would be frozen in time throughout the rest of the lives of all who were there to witness it. The witnesses fixed the scene in their mind, to be able to recall for future stories the picture of Snake Cates, poised and relaxed, standing in the middle of the saloon floor, facing two men, known then only as Jerry and Ken, who were standing about twenty feet away. The patrons of the saloon had moved to get out of harm’s way, and they stood to one side, holding their beers, watching the scene unfold before them, building the memories that would be passed on to grandchildren and great-grandchildren of having once seen the great Snake Cates in action.

One would think that time itself had been suspended, except for the steady tick-tock of the large Regulator clock that sat against the wall just beside the piano, sending each measured tick into eternity.

A few even took particular notice of the time, the better for storytelling later on. It was exactly thirty seven minutes past six o’clock in the evening.

“Now!” Ken shouted, reaching quickly for his pistol. Jerry reacted at the same time.

Amazingly, Cates made no initial move toward his pistol. For just an instant, Ken and Jerry might have had the impression that they were going to beat him to the draw. What they didn’t realize was that Cates was analyzing their draw to see which one of the two he should shoot first. Because Ken had his pistol all the way out of his holster before Jerry had cleared leather, Cates chose Ken as his first target.

Cates drew and fired twice, the two shots coming so close upon each other that to some of the witnesses the sounds ran together, making it appear as if he had shot only once. That mistaken impression was dispelled, however, when both Ken and Jerry went down, each one with a bullet in his heart.

Cates stood there for a moment longer, holding the smoking pistol in his hand, while a cloud of acrid gun smoke began drifting up, to gather just under the ceiling of the saloon. Not until he was absolutely certain that both men were dead did he return his pistol to his holster. Then, without any further regard for the two men he had just killed, he stepped over their bodies and walked over to his table.

For a long moment after the shooting, everyone in the saloon was quiet. A cloud of gun smoke drifted toward the ceiling and the smell of it burned the nostrils and irritated the eyes.

The bartender drew a mug of beer.

“Julio,” he called.

“Si, Senor?” Julio called. Julio had been sweeping the floor until the confrontation took place. Then he, like everyone else, had stopped all activity to watch.

“Take this beer over to Mr. Cates, then go get the sheriff and the undertaker.”

“Si, Senor Greer,” Julio replied. Julio carried the beer over to Cates’s table. Cates took the beer without any acknowledgment or thanks. It was, Cole noticed, as if Cates believed that being served a beer right after killing a couple of people was his just reward.

“Hey, Greer, how many does that make now?” one of the other patrons asked.

“Four,” Greer said. Greer held up four fingers to illustrate his answer.

“Four? No, that can’t be right. I know he’s kilt a lot more than four,” the patron replied. “Hell, they say he kilt at least ten down in New Mexico.”

“I mean he has killed four men in this saloon,” Greer said. Inexplicably, a broad smile spread across his face. “I’m going to have a sign made and hang it up outside.” Greer waved his hand, as if exposing the sign. “It will read, ‘The famous gunfighter Bogardus Cates kilt four men in this place.’ Can you imagine how much business that will get for me?”

“You know what would get you a lot more business?” the patron asked.