The Time Has Come
Arnold Ashford’s Journal Entry #24
“CARLOS! I told you tonight you would die, and you spend your last day playing your stupid trumpet? You are more loco than me!” The man with the wild glare hollered at Sandy, pacing back and forth all the while. Sandy stood still and somber, head angled down, leaning against a post outside the Saloon; he smiled. “Today was a good day.”
The mettle of the Gunslinger cannot be explained; it must be witnessed. To stand across from a man whose sole aim is to kill you, he is equipped to do so, and to wait…wait…for that right moment. The only option if you are to avoid dying in that moment, is to execute with cold, practiced precision, and take a life. This is not a fight, where unexpected things may happen, but more’n likely there’ll be nothing more than a swollen face, some busted knuckles and bruised pride.
In a Shootout, the end of one’s life is the expected outcome, and going into it, you know well and good that it’s a coin flip whether that life is yours. A split-second hesitation of remorseful thinking, reflection, second guesses, will get you killed in a dusty street. I have never experienced anything that carries the sense of finality that comes with a Shootout. This… is it.
Perro Loco continued walking back and forth, never taking his eyes off Sandy, glaring as if he’d kill him with his stare. I saw Sandy softly muttering to himself, before standing tall and crossing himself as he walked out to the middle of the street, lighted by the flickering oil lamps. As Sandy walked out, Perro Loco centered himself in that street and stood still, fingers still tweaking.
Two shots rang out in the night, so close that it was hard to distinguish between them. Sandy dropped, holding his left side. Perro Loco stood with his arm still outstretched, his eyes had lost their wildness. Slowly, and then all at once, he fell forward flat on his face. I ran over to Sandy; he looked up at me and smiled wide. “You know, ugh, I’ve always wanted a dachshund.”
— Check back next week for a new entry in Ashford’s journal —