The commotion was emanating from the train station, but no train was landed there, and no train was expected until evening. Cheers rolled in chorus waves up from the depth of the crowd. As they enveloped Philip and me, the duality of their composition became evident. Underneath the enthusiastic cries pulsed choked gasps and sibilant collisions, as if living meat were being tenderized. I tried not to take my eyes from Philip while my ears wandered a vagrant's path. I blinked heavily at him, wishing I could shut the sounds of the world out with my eyelashes.
"You were saying?" I tried to steady my focus.
"Lucene, there's quite the spectacle yonder." He cast his attention high over my head. "Surely you hear that."
"Of course I hear it," I admitted, "it could give the def a headache, but it sounded as though there was a matter of priority you wanted to discuss."
"Nonsense!" he snapped. Nonsense? "There's time enough for all of that later." Later? He grabbed me by the hand and dragged me behind him toward the station. With my hand in those delicate fingers, I hardly noticed the searing pain rushing into my elbow while he jerked my arm as he darted through the street.
"All of this fuss," he shouted over the din, "it's like all hell has broken loose. Stay here, I'm going to see if I can get a better look." He deposited me softly at the edge of the crowd. "I'll report back momentarily." he said, giving me a playful salute before darting around an old woman. In an instant the mob dissolved him from my sight.
From my perch, I could hear the fleshy blows slow. The choking congealed into exaggerated panting, culminating in a mellow dramatic snort and spit. The roar of the onlookers faded with intense anticipation. The whole of the square pregnant with pause. The silence rang out.
Sheriff Chaney approached unnoticed at first. His presence garnered such little attention that when he did finally speak, he caught most of the audience quite by surprise.
"What do we have here?" his voice was a house fire, a smoldering crackle. No one answered, but obediently, the crowd parted in a stunning recreation of the miracle on the Red Sea. A path cleared before him, and before me for that matter, revealing the core of the spectacle proper.
Two men, in various states of repose and relief, attempted to gather their druthers while maintaining a threatening proximity to one another. Neither man wore his hat and therefore both were impressed subjects in the court of the omnipresent sun. A man could lose more than a fight in a sun like that, and what a fight it must have been. Sweat and blood mixed with dust to make mud on the faces and arms of both men. Tattered vestiges of shirts and trousers dangled from each of their bruised bodies. One of the men's eyes was fast swelling shut, and broken open below the brow. This man I recognized, despite his appearance, as Curtis Hembrey. He was the son of a farmer who warrants little by the way of description. His only identifying quality was that he was and remains a perpetually sour fellow. He could make the routine painful. And yet, he was easy enough to ignore. I wondered, intrigued, at what it must have taken to persuade him to use his fists.
The second man stood hunched in the punishing sun. There were very few people in Morrison whom I had never laid eyes on, but this was one of them. As he straightened himself, cupping his arm around his ribs, he shot another mouthful of blood and saliva into the dust. There was little doubt that he had gotten the better of ol' Curtis. His mustache had been waxed into a fashionable handlebar at some point, in fact half of it still was. The other half looked as if Curtis had taken a fistful of it and blindly yanked it into a wiry explosion. The whiskers of his once preened mustache and his beard splayed across his cheek and chin.
Sheriff Chaney sauntered with his usual air of authority up to both of the men.
"Curtis, I expect better of you," he said all but dismissing Curtis Hembrey. He turned to the stranger who seemed to be regarding him with unaffected admiration. "And what's your name?" I leaned over the shoulder of the old woman in front of me, straining to hear the stranger's answer.
"There was a fight!" Philip whispered into my ear as he reappeared by my side. I heard nothing else. "Very exciting, Curtis Hembrey found himself in a row with a stranger, new to town, I presume."
"I see that," I answered, "But Curtis is easy enough to ignore. Who would want to fight him? Who is that man?" Other's in the crowd shared my curiosity. The question was falling all around us in hushed whispers.
"I'm sure I don't know," Philip answered, "But I'm also sure I intend to find out."
"What do you think he's doing here? There's nothing in Morrison of any promise." I bit my tongue. I hoped Philip would not think that I meant to include him in my assessment. Philip was so integral a figure in my fantasy of escape I hardly counted him among any reasons to stay. If he noticed my slip, he didn't let on.
"That is precisely the information I intend to ascertain," he answered.
"Well, I think you'da better come with me, " Sheriff Chaney was crackling at the stranger. "Curtis, go on home and have your Ma tend to that eye, but if I ever catch you disruptin' the peace again, I'll have you in a cell faster 'n you can whistle 'Dixie'." Curtis gave a slight nod before slinking off.
Chaney had the stranger at the elbow as he guided him back through the congregation. The stranger never resisted, and Chaney never released his grip. The two returned down the isle in the Red Sea as if they had just taken vows at the wedding of the damned, but rather than looking magically into the eyes of his new groom, the stranger stared abrasively at me and smiled wide as a clown. Curtis had knocked at least one tooth free on the side making the stranger's smile feel dangerous.
At no interval down the corridor did the stranger's gaze falter. When they passed he craned his neck to afford his gaze. They passed so close I could smell the iron in the blood on his face and neck and shirt, and the dust and sweat in his hair.
"Can I trust you on this steed, or am I gonna have to walk you all the way back?" Only when the stranger addressed Chaney's question did he take his eyes from mine, and only then did I become aware that I had been staring back. In one ginger leap the stranger had mounted Sheriff Chaney's horse, landing just behind the saddle. He extended his marbled arm down to Chaney then, in an offer of assistance that more than resembled a clandestine condescension. Chaney grumbled, but took his hand and allowed at least part of his squat frame to be lifted into his own saddle.
The stranger looked back at me specifically.
"See?" He said, "You can trust me."
And then with inexplicable confidence he winked.
That sun sure can fry a man's brain.
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