Killers of Men

From On the proportionality of violence, by Adelfried Schreiber

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The violence that does not go far enough

invites more violence,

nay, begets it!

To forego violence

when it is essential

is to accept dereliction

to embrace infirmity

to willfully submit to the effete and ennervating

Violence is a salve

a corrective

a moral imperative

a biological necessity

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*Excerpted from Adelfreid Schreiber’s Collected Works, Vol. II, translated and with an introduction by J.J. Strindberg.

Table of Contents

Epigraph: From On the proportionality of violence, by Adelfried Schreiber

Overture: Remarks from St. Barabbas the Seditious, Home for the Aged

Exordium: On Civilization, by Adelfried Shreiber

Prolusion: Apocryphal Tales Told Round the Fire

Chapter 1  murder in plain daylight at the First National Bank ⁓ two strangers in Tooms Ridge ⁓ a rundown on the outlaws ⁓ posse up ⁓ Mac Miller is given to speechifying ⁓ the man himself

Interlude: Let No Mercy Show

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Chapter 2   a love longed for, a love rued ~ rumors and truth ~ contemplation of the eternal with Big Chief ~ neither hide nor hair was ever seen again ~ rumors regarding the Pecos Kid ~ shortcomings enumerated

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Intermission: The Curious Fate of Mac Miller

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Chapter 3   incidents in and around Madam Mattie’s Pleasure Palace and Fornicatorium ~

in the company of whores ~ passing the pipe with Big Chief ~ the William Tell trick epic fail ~ come the seekers ~ the legend grows

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Digression: The First of Three Chance Encounters in the Reformation of a Reprobate

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Chapter 4  the deputy discusses a bad business ~ the cabin ~ the element of surprise ~ Alonzo’s favorite horse ~ the first volley ~ slaughter of the innocents ~ Preacher Man offers a mercy ~ a final parlay with the deputy

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Entr’acte: From Hiram Landau’s The Ways of the Old West: Eyewitness to History

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Chapter 5  no good men ~ the homesteaders ~ Lot’s solution ~ the homesteader comes clean ~ a duel at ten paces ~ one’s blackened soul

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Interlude: A further selection from Hiram Landau’s The Ways of the Old West: Eyewitness to History

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Chapter 6  the last stand of the Ettingers

Excursis: The Second of Three Chance Encounters

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Coda: Sabbath, Bloody Sabbath

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Valediction: A Third Chance Encounter

Overture: Remarks from St. Barabbas the Seditious, Home for the Aged

It was something that deputy said to me the one time, that come back to me the other day. Made me think back when he’d said it, makes me think now.

Kid, listen to me, he whispered. These men you’re running with, they’ll be the death of you, or worse.

They’re all long since dead and gone. The deputy. That horse a his liked apples. His love, Becky Sue. Big Chief and Preacher Man, too, I imagine. All the Ettinger brothers and cousins. I seen them die myself. Saw Big Chief collect their heads afterwards. Cordwainer Sturm I wonder on. Is he dead? Logic and time dictate such, yet still...I don’t know if I believe Cordwainer Sturm would ever die. Could ever die.

Ah, that’s just horse-pucky, the half-mad, still scared even after all these years ramblings of an old man’s mind. Cordwainer Sturm is dead. He just has to be. Not like he’s going to show up here and fill the doorway one day. Though I fear that will be my final vision.

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Most men, I have come to learn, have a time in their lives upon which they look back as the definitive season marking their days here on Earth. For most I’ve seen, it’s that spell in their twenties or so, when one comes into one’s own as a man, when that last foot planted in childhood uproots and joins its twin on the other side of adulthood and responsibility. For some it comes later, others still sooner. Some even spend their days awaiting its arrival, never to have that ship come in, whereas others carry on blissfully ignorant of its absence.

Lookin’ back on my own history, I can pinpoint a specific time and place, near on a hundred years ago, when I was schooled in the ways of man and nature. When the forces, thoughts, and deeds I’d come to struggle to reconcile the remainder of my days were all presented to my impressionable young self.

It was spring in the late 1800s. Tooms Ridge in the unsettled territories. Now, most all today never heard of Tooms Ridge. I’d wager to say it safe that even back then, most alive in the territories and country, hadn’t heard of Tooms Ridge either. It lacked the fame and luster of a Dodge City or Fort Griffin, the mystery and mystique of Deadwood or Tombstone. If Budd Lake was God’s asshole, and Senasqua Falls the Devil’s Playground, then Tooms Ridge, well, Tooms Ridge was a place where nothin’ much ever came to happen.

Until that spring, that is. When the Ettinger gang come into town, intent on robbin’ the First National Bank, which they did. That spring when I met and rode with the legendary Cordwainer Sturm, the gunman who could not die. With Preacher Man, who peed sittin’ down. With his pal, Chief, the only savage I’d ever known who didn’t go in for that Great Spirit in the Sky stuff. Miscreants all, I should point out, unless you are tempted to think otherwise from anything that follows.

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As my last days approach me now, these many years later, I look across another, final divide. My destination on that other side is unclear to me. Maybe it’ll be like Big Chief told me all those years ago, a dreamless nonexistence, no different than before I was born. Somehow, I don’t think pearly gates and red-cheeked cherubs lie in store for me. More likely it’ll be hot where I’m goin’.

Should I die, and find my seat reserved at the devil’s table, I’ll know it was a place set aside for me back in that spring. That spring when I lost my family, my innocence, and my virginity, in something approximating that order. When I come to realize that men need not be good to serve a good cause.

I won’t be alone at that table. Of that I am sure. Chief and Preacher Man will be there, awaitin’ my arrival. Cordwainer Sturm’ll probably be in charge of the joint.

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Dead and rotten, nothing but bones now the lot of ‘em. And still, I can’t get them out of my head. They visit me in my dreams. They haunt my conscience. The deputy’s words as he lay there, a whispered warning within earshot of the men of whom he spoke.

...the death of you, or worse...

Cordwainer Sturm. Preacher Man. Big Chief. And the deputy; can’t forget him. For near on a week, I rode with these men. Fought and fucked beside them. Nearly died with ‘em. We were hunters and seekers, we killers of men. I can only hope that in the ensuing years I done atoned for what was done that week. Somehow, I doubt it.

Exordium

On Civilization, by Adelfried Shreiber

Excerpted from Adelfreid Schreiber’s Collected Works, Vol. II, translated and with an introduction by J.J. Strindberg.

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Civilization is the fire around which we sit, convinced the only things to be feared lay beyond the light. We have lost sight of the shadow within man. Hence, when the darkness consumes, we fall effortless prey. In our misapprehension we flail, we gibber, while every affliction is visited upon us. And when it is over, the fire still burns, having never wavered; the Stygian depths have retreated, not beyond the light, but within ourselves. Who will sound the alarm? What tocsin can wake us from a self-imposed stupor?

Prolusion: Apocryphal Tales Told Round the Fire

They say his name is Cordwainer Sturm. They say he won’t die.

The five men sat around the campfire, eating their beans. Light from the flames danced over their tethered horses. Beyond the flames, the vast black of night, as though existence itself trailed off on the periphery.

What do you mean, he can’t die? Sort of nonsense you talkin’, Jodie?

"Not can’t. Won’t."

Four of the men were related. The Bluelle brothers: Jodie, Reuben and Porter. Then there was their cousin on their momma’s side, Ike Tarlington. And a stranger in their midst, the man who rode in from the night, unnamed. He wore a dark duster, his Stetson pulled low, masking his features in shadow.

Hogwash, spat Reuben Bluelle. Haven’t met a man yet won’t die, not with the proper dose of lead. He patted the revolver on his side.

I’m just sayin’.

Save your haint stories for the children and the feeble minded. No offense, Ike. Ike Tarlington smiled at the mention of his name but didn’t say anything. More of his beans had made it to his shirtfront than to his mouth. We’re the Bluelle brothers, goddammit! Reuben shouted. And we’re known to be feared in these parts. Least we’re gonna be!

That’s right, Reuben.

Goddamn right that’s right, Porter. You ain’t said much, mister. What you think? You heard of us, huh? The Bluelles?

The man sat where he was, spooning beans, shadows dancing across his face in the firelight.

He don’t say much, this stranger.

No, he don’t, Porter. No, he don’t.

Ya’ll keep casting aspersions at this man because he’s quiet and collected.

It ain’t natural, Jodie.

Ike’s quiet too.

Ike ain’t natural either. No offense, Ike.

You’ll have to forgive him mister. Jodie spoke to the stranger. Reuben is irate on account a’ his nature, Ike is reticent on account he got kicked by a horse in the head. This happened when he was just a kid you understand.

Nuthin’ natural, murmured Porter. Surviving a thing like that.

Jodie. Don’t go tellin’ this stranger our family business. 

I didn’t mean nuthin’ by it, Reuben. You ain’t gonna say anything to anyone about it, are you mister? See, Reuben? He ain’t gonna say nuthin’.

He ain’t said nuthin’ the entire time he been here. Rude, you ask me. Reuben Bluelle sat upright, forearms resting on his thighs, hands hanging off his knees. A revolver holstered on either hip. Eatin’ our beans. Sharin’ our fire. Not sayin’ word one. Rude, I say again.

Aw, lay off him, Reuben. It’s just been a long day for us. Probably for him, too.

Jodie?

Yeah, Porter?

Back to what you was sayin’, ‘bout Cordwainer Sturm? Course I heard of the man, but what’d you mean he can’t die? What’s that nonsense about?

"Not can’t, Porter. Won’t."

How’s that?

It’s not that he can’t die. He won’t.

There a difference?