I again explained that I was a writer of books and films, not a newspaperman.
This seemed to “settle his hash” somewhat, however, it was then that I changed my mind about the writing of this book. I had planned to pen it pretending to be Marshal Fury himself, using the first-person narrative you had asked for. However, in light of Marshal Fury’s attitude (and also, there being other witnesses still living), I decided to write it in third person.
And so, as they say, on with the show!
CHAPTER 1
The black, biting wind was so strong and so fierce that Jason feared there was no more skin left on his upper face—the only part not covered by his hat or bandana.
His nostrils were clogged with dust and snot, despite the precautionary bandana, and his throat was growing thick with dust and grit. Whoever had decided to call these things dust storms had never been in one, he knew that for certain. Oh, they might start out with dust, but as they grew, they picked up everything, from pebbles to grit to bits of plants and sticks. He’d been told they could rip whole branches from trees and arms off cacti, and add them into the whirling, filthy mess, blasting small buildings and leaving nothing behind but splinters.
He hadn’t believed it then.
He did now.
He could barely see a foot in front of him, and just moving was dangerous—his britches had turned into sandpaper, and his shirt was no better.
At last he reached his office—or at least, he thought it was—and put his shoulder into the door. He hadn’t needed to. The wind took it, slamming both the door and Jason against the wall with a resounding thud that must have startled folks as far away as two doors up and down, even over the storm’s howling, unending roar.
It took him over five minutes to will both his body and the door into cooperating, but he finally got it closed. Slouching against it, he went into a coughing jag that he thought would never quit. He would rather have been cursing up a storm than coughing one up, but when it finally stopped, a good, long drink from the water bucket put the world right-side up. Well, mostly. He still couldn’t breathe through his nose, but a good, long honk—well, six or seven—on his bandana put that right again.
With the wind still howling like a banshee outside and flinging everything not tied down against his shutters and door, he thanked God for one thing: the storm was, at least, keeping everyone inside, which included Rafe Lynch—wanted for eight killings in California, across the river—and currently ensconced at Abigail Krimp’s bar and whorehouse, up the street.
He didn’t know much about Lynch, other than that he was clean in Fury, and for that matter in the whole of Arizona, and Jason was therefore constrained by law to keep his paws off Lynch, and his lead to himself. Actually, he felt relieved. He didn’t feel up to tangling with someone of Lynch’s reported ilk. Still, he was worried. What if Lynch tried to stir up some trouble? And what if he or Ward couldn’t handle it? Ward was a good deputy, but he wouldn’t want to put him up against Lynch in a card game, let alone a shoot-out.
He sighed raggedly, although he couldn’t hear himself. Outside the jailhouse walls, the storm pounded harder and harsher. Dust seeped in everywhere : around the door and the windows, even up through the plank floor. Jason knew damn well that the floor only had a two-inch—or less—clearance above the dirt underneath, and this occurrence left him puzzled.
He’d managed to make his rounds, although a bit early. It was only three in the afternoon, despite the dust and crud-blackened sky. Everyone was inside, boarded up against the wind and wrapped in blankets against the storm’s detritus and the sudden chill that had accompanied it.
Couldn’t they have just gotten a nice rain? Jason shook his head, and two twigs and a long cactus thorn fell to the desk. He snorted. He must look a sight. At least, that’s what his sister Jenny would have said, had she been there to see him. But she was nestled up over at King’s Boarding House with her best friend Megan MacDonald, or she was at home, madly trying to sweep up the dust and grit that wouldn’t stop coming.
His thoughts again returned to Rafe Lynch. It gnawed on him that Lynch was even in town. In his town, damn it! Well, not actually his. The settlers had christened it Fury after his father, Jedediah Fury, a legendary wagon master who had been killed on the trail coming out from Kansas City. He supposed the place’s name was attractive to scofflaws, but they seemed drawn to the tiny, peaceful town in the Arizona Territory out of all proportion. Why couldn’t they ride on over to Mendacity or Rage or Suicide or Hanged Dog or Ravaged Nuns?
He shivered. Now, there was a town he didn’t want anything to do with!
His sand-gritted eyes were weary and so was he. He glanced up at the wall clock again. 3:30. No way that Ward was going to make it down here on time, if he came at all. It wouldn’t hurt him to get a little shuteye, he figured, and so he put his head down on his dusty arms, which were folded on the desk.
Despite the battering storm outside, he was asleep in five minutes.
Roughly twenty-five miles to the west of Fury, a small train of Conestoga wagons fought their way through the dust storm. Riley Havens, the wagon master, had seen it coming: the sky growing darker to the east, the wind coming up, the way the livestock skittered on the ends of their tie ropes, and the occasional dust devils that swirled their way across the expanses on either side of them.
But now the edge of the darkness was upon them, and if Riley was correct, they were in for one whip-tail-monster of a dust storm. He reined in his horse and held up his hand, signaling for the wagons to halt.
Almost immediately, Ferris Bond, his ramrod for the journey, rode up on him and shouted, “What the devil is that thing, Riley? Looks like we’re ridin’ direct into the mouth a’ hell!”
“We are,” Riley replied grimly. “Get the wagons circled in. Tight.”
“What about Sampson Davis? He rode off south ’bout an hour ago.”
Riley didn’t think twice. “Screw him,” he said, and turned to help get the settlers, with their wagons and livestock, in a circle.
Down southeast of town, the storm wasn’t as much sand and grit as twigs and branches, and Wash Keogh, who’d been working the same chunk of land for the past few years, was huddled in a shallow cave, along with his horse and all his worldly possessions. Well, the ones that the wind hadn’t already taken, that was.
But despite the storm, Wash was a wildly happy man, because he held in his hand a hunk of gold the size of a turkey egg. It wasn’t pure—there was quartz veining—but it sure enough weighed a ton and he was pretty sure that pay dirt was just upstream—up the dry creek bed, that was—a little ways. If this damned wind would just stop blowing, well, hell! He might just turn out to be the richest man in the whole Territory!
That thought sure put a smile on his weathered old face, but he ended up spitting out a mouthful of mud. The grit leaked in no matter how many bandanas he tied over his raggedy old face.
Well, he could smile later. The main thing now was just to last out the storm.
Like him, his horse waited out the wind with his back to it and his head down. Smart critters, horses. He should have paid more attention when the gelding started acting prancy and agitated. But how could a man have paid attention to anything else when that big ol’ doorstop of gold was sitting right there in his hand. He’d bet he would have missed out on the second coming if it had happened right there in front of him! And, blast it, he didn’t figure Jesus would be mad at him, either! ’Course, he’d probably “suggest” that 10 percent of it go to the Reverend Milcher or some other Bible thumper.