“Captain, ain’t no way in heaven or hell they did what that piss-soaked bastard said they did.”

William Henry Dunton “Back when I first came out here, I was scared shitless of Indians. Heard all the stories; heard about Custer. I thought, damn, I’m goin’ to lose my scalp. And then, one day I was out, not far from here, on a big assed flat mesa and a lightning storm came up. Like you read about. Well, I wasn’t worried about any Indians then, I was worried I was goin’ to be electrocuted right on the spot. I started riding for all I was worth toward somethin’. Hell, I didn’t even know what; a ditch or a swale, anything to get me down low, and then I saw him, away off in a distance: an Indian. He was, I swear, thinkin’ the same damn thing and we rode, both at the same time for the same gully and wham, a big old bolt a lightning come down and knocked that old boy like he was no more’n a fly flicked off old Hobbsie’s ass.”

Rosario smiled at the thought of a fly resting on Hobbs’s backside and looked at Francis. “What did you do, Francis?”

“Well, I can’t tell you what I did first, Mamacita, but, if you’ll recall that boy’s pants, who was in here earlier, you’ll get a good idea. But the second thing I did was went up on that poor Indian fellar and looked him over and I swear, he was smokin’ like a burned out mesquite branch lyin’ on the ground. His horse got the worst of it; poor creature was dead and its feet were all smokin’, and my God, the stench, like burned hair. Blood poured out of his ears and nose and mouth. He was shoed and those horseshoes must have been red-hot.”

Mike spoke up between bites. He liked Francis’s stories, but never believed most of them. “By Jasus and begorrah, this is no yarn. Tell us, Francis, this is no yarn.”

Francis grinned. He was used to not being believed. He held up his hand in honor, “I swear, folks, may God send down another lightning bolt, just like that one, and strike me dead if I’m lyin’. It’s all true, all true.”

He sat back down and resumed his story. “Anyways, that old boy, well, he was really a young boy, he was dead as a church pew on payday, he was, and so I picked him up and hoisted him over my saddle. And you know what?”

“What?” They all leaned forward in their chairs. Francis had them now.

“I plopped that old boy down pretty hard, too hard I guess. It sort of made him start up again. Like kickin’ a sleepin’ pig it was. That old boy coughed and choked and hacked out a bunch a phlegm and he was fine as frog hair. So I pulled him back down and he sat and looked about. He had these silver bracelets on his wrists and you know, they burned hell out of his skin, and he lost a bit of hair, singed off like he got too close to a fire. But other than that, he was good. So, I took him back to his home and I was a great hero and that was the son of old Redshirt, his oldest son Natani, and we’re great friends now and,” he turned to Allingham, “Captain, ain’t no way in heaven or hell they did what that piss-soaked bastard said they did.” Allingham