Chapter Five—Don’t Believe Everything You Hear

     Well, you aren’t exactly making my life pleasant, either, woman.
     I guess I’d better introduce myself. My name is Robert Conners, Rob for short, and I’m nowhere near dead. Though sometimes I wish I was.
     The report of my demise wasn’t true, and I’m very glad of it. Follow me around a little bit and I’ll try to explain what happened. At least from my end of the deal.
     After Robin and I separated, my mindset was very much like hers. How could a woman get so deep inside me in less than 24 hours and largely just by staring at me? But she had. We said good-bye, and I watched Robin ride off towards Whitewater. I figured I’d never see her again. I intended to keep my promise to her—that is, that I would give up being an outlaw. But where was I going to go? This area had been my home all my life. I was born and raised in Rogersville, which was about 90 miles south of Whitewater. That’s where my ranch had been. I’d been to Whitewater a number of times in my 31 years of living and knew the area quite well. So all this—Rogersville, Whitewater, and the surrounding hills and mountains had been my whole life. I wasn’t ready to leave it. But I couldn’t stay, not with the law on my tail with a hanging rope for my neck.
     So I rode away from Robin Morrow. And I rode aimlessly, very morose. I ended up where I really didn’t know where I was. Well, in the mountains just north of Whitewater, I knew that much. What I was doing was lying under a tree near a stream, camped out again thinking about my future. Since I had promised Robin that I would quit outlawing, I didn’t know what I was going to do. Or where I was going to do it. Do I have to keep a promise to a woman I only met once and will probably never see again as long as I live? But I knew I would. I wouldn’t go back on my word.
     Well, I was doing one more thing. Thinking about Robin.
     But my thoughts ran pretty much along the same line as hers. I guess she’s at Aunt Martha’s…I wonder what she’s doing…said she was going to teach at the local school…I guess she’ll be there for a long time…find a man, get married, have children…good for her…
     I’ve got to forget her, that’s all there is to it…

     For a few days, I drifted—but still in the region. At the very moment Robin was being offered a job by Len Kramer, I was sitting on Ol’ Paint on top of a hill watching a stagecoach pass by on the road below. A job…I’ll bet there’s some money in there…blast it, why did I have to tell Robin I wouldn’t outlaw any more? I still had plenty of the stuff that I’d taken from the drummer and gambler who had been on Robin’s stagecoach, but whoever has enough money? With a sigh, I turned my horse and headed the other direction.
     I was about 70 miles north of Whitewater at the time. I thought it might not be a good circumstance, for my health or freedom, to stay too close to that town. Sheriffs usually want to lock criminals up, and some of them shoot first and ask questions later. “Save the taxpayers a trial.” So I drifted into a town called Dry Gulch still with no real idea of what I was going to do. Probably settle down as a cowhand at some ranch way, way far away where nobody will have ever heard of me. Might even change my name, just to be sure. Con Roberts, or something like that…
    Anyway, at the moment, I was still Rob Conners. Dry Gulch wasn’t much of a place, dusty little cowtown of a few hundred souls. As I entered the town, I saw a couple of saloons, places that had never interested me much, and there was a brothel or two. They didn’t interest me, either, because there was nothing but ugly pigs inside. And then I wondered how I knew there was nothing but ugly pigs inside since I’d never been in one of them before. I guess I could go find out…but they would probably want money and though I had some, I wasn’t of a mind to spend it on that.
     I saw a barber shop, too, and he advertised “Shave and a haircut, two bits. Bath 10 cents extra.” I thought each of those might be nice, even though I tried to shave and bathe every day. Still a professional job and a hot bath would feel good. Those mountain streams are cold and one has to want to get clean mighty bad to take a bath in one of them. It just so happened that I couldn’t stand being dirty, so I usually bit the bullet and took the plunge, no pun intended. But I could get a hot one this time.
     It was all very pleasant—“I’ll even have your clothes laundered while you bathe for an extra 10 cents”—I tell ya, you get into one of these places and they can always find more ways to take your money—but I agreed, but handed him ALL my dirty clothes.
     “A dime, you said,” and he grumbled, but couldn’t go back on his price. So I ended up with three clean shirts, two clean pairs of pants, and however many pairs of socks and underwear I had. I didn’t make him shine my boots, they’d be dirty again before I crossed the street.
     Which I didn’t do immediately, because there was a general store about a block from the barber shop on the same side of the street. So I headed that way, feeling good with my new haircut, newly shaved face, newly bathed body, and newly cleaned clothes. The barber had even rubbed some pretty smelling stuff on me, so I thought maybe I’d try out the brothel after all…
     Didn’t.
     Not just because of my aversion to such locales of entertainment, but I got a little sidetracked, even before I made it to the general store. I was walking along the sidewalk, minding my own business. I noticed some fellow coming from the other direction, perfidious looking creep, so as we neared, gentleman that I am, I moved aside a bit to give him room to pass, but we bumped shoulders anyway. It had seemed to me that he had deliberately gone out of his way to do it, but I didn’t want to judge his motives. He was indeed a surly-looking sod, a “lewd fellow of the baser sort,” in the words of the Good Book, with red, inebriated-filled eyes and a scowl on his face. He sure looked sore and sour and I wondered if he had gotten turned down at one of the brothels.
     As nicely as I could, I said, “Excuse me,” after we had bumped into each other, but that wasn’t good enough for him. One of the great lessons of history, which few people ever learn, is that thugs and hooligans interpret niceness, not as a sign of good character, but as a sign of weakness. And that’s just what this fellow did, and he was obviously itching for a fight. The having-been-turned-down-at-the-brothel thing, I supposed.
     “Hey, watch where you’re goin’, you stupid baboon,” he said to me.
     I smiled at him, but that was a mistake, too. “I said, ‘excuse me.’ Perhaps you didn’t hear.”
     “Oh, I heard you, you saddle tramp. But you bumped into me on purpose and I wanna know why.”
     I didn’t consider myself very bright, but even I could tell when a man was spoiling for a fight. “Listen, fellow, I don’t want any trouble. I told you I was sorry. Let’s just leave it at that.”
     “No, let’s don’t,” he said through gritted teeth, and gave me a hard shove, which propelled me out into the street and flat onto my back. My hat ended up covering the top half of my face.
     I sighed and lay there for a moment. I was getting a little ticked by this time, and even more so when I realized that the back of my newly cut hair and of my newly laundered duds were now caked with dirt. I slowly lifted my hat, and looked at the ruffian. “Why did you do that?” I asked him, preparing now to get up and pound him into dust.
     “Because yur a cur an’ a snake an’ a slimeball an’ a no-good, low-down son of a whore and I don’t think your type is fit t’ live on this earth. Now git up an’ go fer yur gun.”
     I wondered in passing how he had so rapidly deduced all of that about my character, though I did take great offense at his slight at my mother. A whore she was not. A saint maybe, but not a whore. But, of course, he was simply trying to rile me into doing what he wanted, i.e., “git up an’ go fer” my gun. It was a good thing I didn’t speak English or I never would have understood him.
     I still lay there holding my hat. In my peripheral vision, I could see some of the good citizens of Dry Gulch beating a hasty retreat to someplace safe, though no doubt they’d take a slight chance and watch through the windows as this poor drifter got drilled full of lead. I wasn’t terribly impressed by this slob standing in front of me, however. “You don’t really want me to do that,” I told him.
     He sneered. “Think yur a hotshot, huh. Well, take a good look at the sky, monkey face, and a good, deep breath because you ain’t going to be able to do either in a minute.”
     I looked around for the town sheriff, didn’t see him, and wondered if he let this kind of stuff go on all the time in Dry Gulch. But, given my recent experience with sheriffs, I wasn’t terribly surprised the law was nowhere around. And maybe I understood now where this town had gotten its name, though at least this hooligan was giving me a sporting chance. To “dry gulch,” in western parlance means “to shoot in the back.” Only low-down, snivelin’, cowardly sidewinders wouldn’t confront a man face-to-face. Or perhaps those who wanted to live and didn’t want the other fellow to.
     So, very slowly I got to my feet, dusting myself off. Red Eyes sneered at me again. “Do you know what end of that gun the bullet comes out of, hotshot? Not that it matters ‘cuz you’ll never get a shot off anyway.”
     I wasn’t happy any more and I imagine my face showed it. Red Eyes was a little puzzled because I didn’t seem to be very afraid. “Slap leather, dungheap…” He went for his right as he began to utter the word “dungheap”…

     It was a few days later that Cameron Collins reported my death to Robin Morrow. The first rumor that had come to Whitewater was true. I had nailed Rip Slade in what was clearly self-defense, but the sheriff, who didn’t recognize me as Rob Conners, was going to hold me in jail until he had fully “investigated” the matter. Not necessarily for trial, as Judd had erroneously heard and reported (that which Robin overheard in the restaurant with Cameron), but still, jail was the last place I wanted to be just in case that bozo sheriff in Dry Gulch accidentally discovered who I was. So, yeah, I decked him and took off. I disappeared under a rock and the sheriff made only a half-hearted effort to find me, because people had already told him that I had acted totally in self-defense in gunning down Slade. The sheriff was a little piqued that I had decked him, but folks told him that he shouldn’t have tried to arrest an innocent man. Somebody had recognized me, however, but interestingly, hadn’t said so until after the sheriff had returned from his initial, albeit brief, search. But once the news got out as to who had outdrawn Rip Slade, it didn’t take long—obviously—for it to circulate to the nether reaches of the territory.
     The sheriff decided after he found out who I was to form a posse the next day and try to make a name for his squirrelly self by capturing me. But then the info that Rob Conners had robbed a stage and shot a woman hit Dry Gulch before the sheriff and posse left town, and now he really had a reason to chase me. Only I wasn’t the guilty party. I was far away from Dry Gulch by that time. I had left the town heading north, wanting the sheriff to go in that direction, but I had circled back through the mountains and gone south. I was now only about 50 miles northwest of Whitewater. I hadn’t heard about the stage robbery, of course, and apparently whoever had done it—impersonating me—had been so chewed up by the coyotes, buzzards, and boulders that he was unrecognizable. But he had announced to the world that he was me, and everybody accepted it. After all, I was an outlaw and a killer. So there really wasn’t any doubt in anybody’s mind that I was the one who was dead. Including Robin Morrow’s.
     However, I knew I wasn’t dead. But at the moment, I was the only one.

     So, to recap: I had left Dry Gulch on the double for the reason that old timer Judd had suggested—so that the sheriff there wouldn’t nab me. He couldn’t pin a murder rap on me for killing Slade, but, once he found out who I was, he could hold me and transport me down to Rogersville, the town south of Whitewater where I was wanted for killing Wilson Brant. Even though Brant was dead, that whole county down there now was in the hands Brant people. With the father dead, the son, Martin, had taken over the ranch and vowed vengeance against me, but I had also plugged five of his gunslinging thugs on my way off of Brant’s property the night I had killed Wilson, so Martin didn’t seem to be too terribly interested in my comeuppance. He might try to shoot me if I was right in front of him and didn’t have a gun in my hand—and was asleep—but that was probably all. Besides, I did him a favor, too. By getting rid of his old man for him, he could take over the Brant empire. He might like to give me a medal as well.
     Anyway, bottom line was, I hadn’t cleared out of the area yet and I wasn’t quite sure why. Well, no, I wanted to fool myself, but I really couldn’t. I hung relatively close by because number one, it was my home and I didn’t want to leave it, and number two, I held out this ridiculously absurd hope that maybe, just maybe I’d see Robin again. I just wasn’t quite ready to leave and put it all behind me yet. I even had a fleeting thought of riding down to Whitewater and knocking on Aunt Martha’s door, but I told myself that would be dumb. She’s forgotten you, you dimwit, she’s got a good life now, in a good town, with a good future ahead of her. What could you offer her? Then I’d berate myself for the fool I knew I was. Conners, you only spent one night with the woman, get ahold of yourself. Well, a night and a day. But still, 24 hours. She was probably just a reaction to my loss of Julie….
     I shook my head. Ridiculous. Get out of this country, far away, where nobody knows you and start over again. That’s what I told myself as I sat with my back to an oak tree, idly tossing acorns at a pine cone about 10 feet away. Yeah. That’s what I’ll do.
     And that was what I was about to do, mainly because if I stayed around the Rogersville-Whitewater-Dry Gulch area, I’d be hiding for the rest of my life. So I had to go, for my own safety.
     I started to do it. Then something stopped me. And it wasn’t Robin. At least, not totally.
     This is my home…but I can never return there…