The Six-Gun Tarot Read Online Free Page B

into the starlight. Clay’s hair was a ragged halo around his liver-spotted pate and he was wearing a pair of filthy long johns. It would have been comical if Jim hadn’t been so scared.
    “Now, git!” Clay shouted. He leveled the shotgun at another of Squint’s pack and fired. The coyote’s whimper of pain was lost in the bellow of the blast. It fell as silent as its brother, unmoving on the ground. Clay frantically scrambled for more shells at his feet as he popped the still-smoking breech open.
    Squint glared at Mutt, who met the gaze with hatred in kind. The big coyote sniffed, and then turned and ran, barking a long string of yips. The pack joined in as they, too, turned to flee. The desert grew quiet again except for an occasional howl.
    “Well, don’t that beat the Dutch?” Clay said, hopping down off the wagon and hobbling, barefoot, toward the others. “Never seen coyotes act like that before. You, Mutt?”
    The Indian shrugged. “Clay, this is Jim.”
    “Jim Ne … Nelson, sir,” Jim said, pumping the old man’s hand when it was offered. “That was some good shooting up there.”
    “Clay Turlough,” the old man replied. “Thank you, son. I’m a mite ornery when I get woke up ’fore I’m ready to.”
    Clay looked out into the darkness. He seemed suddenly distracted. He handed Jim the open shotgun and then trotted into the shadows at the terminator of the fire’s light. He returned cradling one of the wounded, bloody coyotes in his arms.
    “Well, Mutt, don’t seem the trip was a complete loss. This one’s not too torn up and look, he’s still huffing a little air. Let me get him over to the wagon and have a look-see.”
    Jim looked at the Indian.
    Mutt took the shotgun out of his hands and reloaded it. “Clay owns the only stable in Golgotha. He’s the closest thing we got to a horse doctor in these parts. Went to medical school for a few years. Didn’t work out too well from what I heard. He makes a decent living doing taxidermy for folks as far away as Carson City, though. He … collects … dead things.”
    Jim approached the wagon while Mutt tended the fire. Clay had lit an oil lantern and set it next to the dying coyote on the back of the wagon. The old man had put on his boots and a trail coat over his long johns. His hands were black with blood, but he didn’t seem to mind. He was hunched near the animal’s face. Jim thought he heard him whispering to the animal, but Clay stopped when the boy approached.
    “Ah, Mr. Nelson. Come see, young man; this is a unique educational opportunity for a lad of your age. See, see. He’s just at the threshold now.”
    The animal’s eyes were wide. The pupils greedily drinking in every last flicker of light, scrapping for every final detail. Fear clouded the eyes like a cataract, but as the old man and boy watched the fear slid away from the eyes. A dumb peace settled over them, as if the animal was no longer looking at the same world any longer. Then the light flickered, and was gone. Clay audibly gasped.
    “‘Man,’” he muttered, “‘how ignorant art thou in thy pride of wisdom.’”
    Jim stared at him oddly.
    “Shelley,” he said. It’s from Lady Shelley’s marvelous scientific fiction. We understand so little about life or its sister, death. Look at this animal. Why was it, a moment ago, alive and feeling and thinking and now it is changed, dead? Why?”
    “’Cause you shot it,” Jim said.
    Clay looked at him oddly, like he wasn’t standing in front of the old man or he hadn’t heard what Jim said. He blinked and the jovial old man was back, but the sour smell Jim had first caught off of him was there as well—a cross between formaldehyde and lilac water trying to hide it.
    “You’ve had a busy day and a busier night, m’boy,” Clay said with a razor cut of a smile. He placed a bloody hand on the dead coyote’s flank.
    “Get some rest.”
    The two men took turns keeping watch. The coyotes didn’t return. Just