fascination, naive curiosity, fear, and even some pity.
When the priest was finished, Parnell was invited to give his final words.
“Boys,” Parnell said. “This is really going to teach me a lesson.”
There was a scattering of nervous laughter through the crowd, then the sheriff stepped back to Parnell and offered him a hood. When he declined, Sheriff Dennis fitted the noose around Parnell’s neck. Stepping away from the trap door, he looked over at the hangman, who was standing by the trip lever. The sheriff nodded.
As the lever was thrown and the trap door fell open, the sound of the mechanism was drowned out by the sounds from the crowd, a mixture of shouts of excitement and wails of compassion. Parnell fell through the trapdoor, was jerked up short, then turned one half turn to the left as he hung there, already dead.
A child, who had been brought to the hanging, began to cry. Finding her in the crowd, Smoke saw that it was Maggie, the little girl he had seen when he first rode into town.
He wondered what kind of parent would bring a child to an execution. He had no problem with them hanging Parnell. If he had encountered him on the trail, he would have shot him himself. But he didn’t like the idea of it being turned into a carnival.
He stayed in town for about four more hours, long enough to exchange telegrams with Sally.
I AM STILL ON THE MEND PEARLIE AND CAL ARE PLEADING WITH ME TO LET THEM COME JOIN YOU PLEASE BE CAREFUL
LOVE SALLY
By the time Smoke left town the crowd had dispersed, and only a handful of the most morbidly curious remained standing by the gallows, looking up at the figure who was still hanging there with a stretched neck and bulging eyes. Most of them, Smoke noticed, were young boys, probably between twelve and fourteen.
“You think he can see us?” one of the boys asked.
“Nah, he can’t see us.”
“But look at him. His eyes is bugged way open and he’s starin’ right down here at us.”
“He’s dead, stupid. Dead men can’t see you. Dead men can’t do nothin’.”
“He’s lookin’ at us from hell.”
“He ain’t lookin’ at us from nowhere a-tall.”
“It’s kinda scary, ain’t it?”
“Nah, it don’t scare me none.”
Smoke smiled as he rode by, because even the boy who proudly proclaimed that he wasn’t frightened belied that claim by the expression in his voice.
It was late afternoon by the time Smoke reached the town that did not exist prior to the arrival of the railroad. As a railroad town, it was growing so quickly it had already surpassed many of the older, more established towns that had been missed by the railroad. On the south side of the tracks lay the holding pens and feeder lots for cattle the area ranchers brought to ship to the slaughter houses in Kansas City and Chicago.
The town proper was north of the tracks. Earl Avenue, the main street, ran at right angles to the tracks in a mostly unsuccessful attempt to get away from the smell and the flies of the holding pens. The town, built by merchants and businessmen, boasted a bank, three lawyers, a doctor, a thriving newspaper, a hotel, restaurant, playhouse, and four saloons.
The stores and business buildings had not yet had time to become weather-worn, and stood proudly along either side of the street with boardwalks connecting one to the next so that, even in the worst weather, pedestrians did not have to walk in the mud of the street. Behind those were private homes where the townspeople lived. Most of the houses had vegetable gardens, but the tomatoes, corn, carrots, beans, lettuce, and cabbage plants were nothing but late spring green.
A train sat at the Parlin Depot and its presence had drawn several people to the station to watch its arrival and departure. Because there were so many people at the depot, the main street of town was relatively empty as Smoke rode in. Though it wasn’t yet dark, the lamplighter was already making his rounds, to provide some illumination once darkness fell.
Smoke stopped at the Silver Spur Saloon, not only for a beer to cut the trail dust, but also on the chance that he could pick up some news about Dinkins and the other men he was looking for.
Because of his longtime friendship with Louis Longmont, Smoke had the tendency to gauge all saloons by Longmont’s. Nearly all the saloons he had ever seen came in lacking, but the Silver Spur missed it by a mile. Even in the nighttime, Longmont’s was well lit. In this place, all the chimneys of the lanterns were soot-covered, so the light was dingy and filtered through drifting smoke.
The place smelled of whiskey, stale beer, and sour tobacco. A long bar was on the left, with dirty towels hanging on hooks about every five feet along its front. The large mirror behind the bar, like everything else about the saloon, was so dirty Smoke could scarcely see any images in it. What he could see was distorted by imperfections in the glass.
Against the back wall, near the foot of the stairs, a cigar-scarred, beer-stained upright piano was being played by a bald-headed musician, while out on the floor of the saloon, nearly all the tables were filled. A half dozen or so bar gals were flitting about and a few card games were in progress, but for the most part the patrons were just drinking and talking.
“What can I get for you?” the bartender asked.
“Beer,” Smoke said. “And a recommendation for some place to eat.”
“We got food here,” the bartender offered.
“No, I have a hankerin’ for a real sit-down restaurant,” Smoke replied.
“Kind of a high falutin fella, ain’t you?”
