Ghost Hands

Standing on a cloud bathed in a golden aura, feeling the brush of angel’s wings his cheeks, Elizear Berry found himself before the Big Guy asking the one question that had been plaguing him since his arrival: “What the hell happened?”

Ignoring his profane expression, with a gesture from the Almighty, a huge section of the heavens opened up and scenes began to unfold, scenes from the last hours of Elizear’s 32 years of life in the earthly realm. He saw it all scrolling by in the clear blue…in reverse.

He saw his blood running south, soaking into the grit and sand of Front Street. He saw his corpse heaped upon itself wearing a mask of surprise and agony. He watched himself falling over, hard, heavy, and limp. He saw himself clutching his chest in a jolt of electric reflex sparked by sudden physical destruction. Then he saw a scene in which his gun hand spasmed open, the shiny nickel-plated .45 twirling earthward, sparkling brightly with reflected noon sunlight.

There was a close-up of his eyes widening almost comically as he registered the scalding, blunt rupturing caused by four slugs hammering into his heart. The second, third, and fourth bullets went coursing seamlessly into the hole created by the first. Then he heard, as well as saw, the roaring of a big ugly monster of a pistol sitting in the largest fist he had ever seen.

He shook his head observing himself clumsily clearing leather. He asked the Big Guy to slow the play back on the next scene so he could get a good look at what was in the moment barely a blur of movement capped off by a hellish muzzle flash. In slow-motion he was actually able to see – “Sumabitch! ‘Scuse me, Lord” – the gun seemed to jump out of the holster at the same time as he reached for it!

Back to normal playback speed, he saw his palm hovering over the butt of his brand-new piece purchased for just this particular occasion. He watched as he dug his boot heels into the grit and standing face-to-face with the infamous “Ghost Hands.” He could feel once again the hot breeze from the nearby desert licking all the moisture off of his neck and forehead, leaving behind a trail of bone-dry sizzle.

He shook his head again, this time at his cocksure swagger when pushing through the swinging doors of the Silver Penny, squinting against the harsh glare of the noonday sun. Ghost Hands looking up at him from under the brim of his hat and for a split second it seeming like one of his eyes was glowing. Walking to the table and tapping the dark-skinned stranger on the shoulder. Moving through the murky gloom of the saloon filled with gallons of liquid courage. Sitting at the bar throwing back shot after shot of whiskey. Walking into the Silver Penny and by pure dumb chance running into Clem and the boys who were telling him that he had a chance to kill a legend.

Tying his horse to the hitching post and swinging down with the intentions to pay a visit to the soiled doves that worked the second floor of the saloon. Deciding to take a detour into Germanville to visit the Silver Penny on his way to Oscotia. Looking up at the hand-painted signs pointing in different directions – Oscotia, Germantown, Allenville, New Waterton. Coming to a fork in the road while traveling on Traders’ Pass.

*****

Elizear looked up at the Big Man and asked another question that had been plaguing him since the playback started: “Kin I just go back and take that otha road what went straight to Oscotia? Puhleez!” His skin was uncommonly pale, and otherworldly tone that seemed to melt into the surrounding shadows. But more so than his remarkable complexion, it was his face that set him apart. His cheeks were grand planes sweeping down into a sculpted jawline capped by a stony square of a chin. His aquiline nose was slender along the bridge and grew much larger towards the tip. The nostrils were shaped in such a way as to make them seem permanently flared. His lips were drawn into a perpetual line of tension.

It was his eyes that set him apart. Almond shaped and slanted like a Buddha’s; one was a China white orb crowned with a tar black iris ringed in ocean turquoise. This eye glared at the world from beneath a cocked brow, a glittering, gleaming searchlight perched on treacherous, jagged shores. This was his “Watchin’ Eyen. The other eye was waxy, yellowish, with a cold flatness like a fish’s. This eye wandered beneath a lid that drooped and ticked, a slowly fading star hanging in the endless void of deep space. This was his “Shootin’ Eye”.

But more so than his eyes, it was his brains that set him apart. He sat motionless at a table facing the front of the saloon, the box between his ears swiftly processing a torrent of sensory data: the tepid temperature of the shot glass on the tips of his long, thick fingers; the roughness of the wooden chair on his backside; the plunking, plinking notes rolling lazily out of the piano; dozens of distinct conversations converging in the air as a monotonous buzz; the pungent scent of spilled whiskey and funky, unwashed bodies; the transformation of colorful, three-dimensional folk into dark silhouettes as they drifted in through the swinging doors of the Silver Penny.

The portrait of deep concentration, he kept the Watchin’ Eye on those swinging doors and the corner of The Shootin’ Eye on everything else. A tall brown bottle with a faded label stood at attention on the tabletop. Imbibing spirits didn’t rob him of bis faculties the way it did mere mortals. Instead, it enhanced his already formidable powers of focus. Actually, with enough drink, he could slip into a trance state at will, a state much like lucid dreaming that put him ahead of time itself.

In this altered frame of mind, he became hyperconscious of everything. He knew that THEY were there with him, constantly sliding around in the shadows drinking, laughing, singing the bawdy songs aloud drunkenly, and talking dirty talk to working women in tucked away corners of the Silver Penny. THEY were only pretending to be sloppy drunk, though a couple of them actually were. Particularly the one with the fresh trail dust on his boots who was looking to make a name for himself. THEY were pretending they didn’t know who he was.

THEY never dared a straight-up look, yet he could feel their quick, sneaky glances as a prickly chill creeping up his back. The weird sensation sent The Shootin’ Eye to twitching even more sporadically while his gaze got more faraway and penetrating; his line of sight hardened into nearly a physical thing. The batwing doors started swinging in slow-morion with rh ebb and flow of clientele. The bottle suddenly found its way to his palm. He poured what remained of the whiskey into his glass and snatched his head back in an abrupt, swift movement. The fiery rotgut burned all the way down, from tonsils to toes. He thumped the glass down on the table, the Watchin’ Eye glittering like glass and glaring, the Shootin’ Eye wandering and twitching like a ball of bad nerves.

He let himself slump slightly in the chair, the brim of his hat shading his eyes and much of his face from the furtive peeking and peeping of the inebriated jackals who were starting under the tabletop like a spider crawling ever so slowly. He felt the butt of his trusty weapon push snugly into his hand while the tic of the Shootin’ Eye drew down to a pulsating killer as he came staggering across the saloon. There was a tap-tap-tap on his shoulder. He glanced up and felt himself possesses by the Angel of Death once again.

By the time he came back to himself, he was astride his iron-grey-mule, Young Man heading down the road to Oscotia of all places with the blood of another newly minted ghost on his hands.