Handsome Stranger, Just Passin' Through

 

Handsome Stranger, Just Passin' Through

Handsome Stranger rolled into town, a rootless tumbleweed of a man, covered in thirty days dust, with nary a drop of drink left in his gullet.  He had no name nor kin, just a mighty thirst.    

Old Parson seen him first and feared him for the devil.  Loners ain’t nothin’ but trouble, and strangers even worse, an’ both them types oughta stay away from proper folk.  Parson had shot enough strangers to fill a hill o’ crosses, but would not shoot this one, not yet, on accounta Stranger looked a smidge too young and handsome to be laid low in the dirt fer now.   

“Where you from and where you goin’?” asked Parson, slidin’ his long carbine in and out of its holster. 

“I ain’t neither from nowhere nor goin’ nowhere.  Just passin’ through.” said Stranger, fingerin’ the six-shooter hung down between his chapped thighs.  Parson gave him the stink-eye, so Handsome Stranger shot him straight through that very eye.  Parson fell off his horse and hit the ground, whispered Dang, and withered up in the sun, getting’ uglier all day.

Stranger rode his ole’ nag up the rutted main street of that mangy town and tied her to the dryrotted hitchin’ post in front of the only saloon in a hunnert mile.  Off he jumped and down he dunked his head in the warm slimy water of the slobbery horse trough.  Then into the saloon he swaggered all cocky, right through them creaky café doors; doors so outta place in a town without no café. 

“Barkeep!  Whiskey me!” hollered the young Stranger.  The ugly old Barkeep said “Who’s askin?” so Stranger took offense and shot a .45 through that Barkeep’s mouth before the words finished comin’ out, just to make a point.  Any other stranger what killed their barkeep woulda been shot dead ten times over by the ornery pack of drunks in that establishment, but this stranger was different from others before.  This one was young and handsome as that Jesus painting with them eyes that seemed to follow you around the chapel at the edge of town.  So that pack of horny old gamblers didn’t shoot him, just bought him a dirty glass of rot-gut whiskey instead, while two town goons plundered that dead ol’ barkeep’s boots, buckles and pockets.

“How long you in town?” asked an ugly ol’ one-eyed scar of a drunk.

“Not long.  Just passin’ through.”

Hearin’ that, all them ugly old whores on the second floor, lookin’ down from the balcony, swooned and raised them skirts, showin’ off their torn and dirty bloomers.  Nothin’ they loved more than a man who was just passin’ through. Handsome Stranger reminded them of their own worthless poppas, who also just passed through and never came back.

“Come on up, Stranger,” said the big-as-a-barrel madam in charge.

Stranger shot her straight up the ass for temptin’ him to stray from the Lord that way. Whorin’ was a sin and God surely was aimin’ a blunderbuss down on them all.  The buttshot madam’s ass, along with the rest of her fouled carcass, fell off the balcony onto the poker table, interruptin’ bad hands and bad bluffs.  Any other gamblers woulda shot Stranger dead right then and there for ruinin’ a lousy game.  But this Stranger was different.  He had the best dimples and squint of any young man in the Western territories.  They bought him another whiskey and watched his chaps a-chafin’ on his slender thighs as he sashayed’ up to the bar.

Stranger drank his fill, paid his tab, snugged his leathers, and swaggered back out through them swingin’ café doors, doors which served no purpose at all, then mounted his nag with a giddy-up cluck, and spurred her on down that God-forsaken ol’ mudhole of a street toward the dusty, fallin’ sun.

The saloon emptied into the street. The townfolk, all God-fearin’ drunks and bible-totin’ whores and their bastard young’uns, gathered in the street to gawk at that young Handsome Stranger go, a-leavin’ that town a tad uglier just by turnin’ his back on it. He coulda raped and robbed every one of them and still got their honor and respect, on accounta his square jaw an’ steely eyes an’ tight chaps.  He reminded them of themselves when they was still young and handsome, ridin’ into that snakebit town,  back when they themselves planned on just passin’ through.