Cold Day in Hell

Cold Day in Hell

The Breck Family Chronicles #2

 

 

Ron Lewis

© Copyright 2022/24 Ron Lewis

 

This is a work of fiction and not intended to be historically accurate, but merely a representation of the times. The names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any similarity to any person, living or dead, is merely coincidental and unintentional. Historical characters used are strictly for dramatic purposes. This story contains some violence.

 

Cold Day in Hell

Chapter One

Elizabethtown, NM Territory

Monday, September 30, 1878

 

Marshal Thomas Dullard rode the final mile into Elizabethtown, his hat brim pulled low, and his shoulders stiff against the approaching evening chill. Dust from the stage route clung to his duster. Painting the once-navy blue into a light gray. He wore the badge on his chest polished, the only concession to vanity he allowed.

 

The rest of Dullard spoke with a roadmap of wrinkles and a few scars. The marshal’s eyes scanned every porch and alley as if expecting a shot from the shadows.

 

At the dry goods store, dusk collected in blue shadows beneath the veranda roof. Two men waited, silent as church pillars, their features hardened in the last rays of the setting sun. Cleve Breck leaned against a post, sleeves rolled above the elbow, and hands jammed deep into his duck cloth vest pockets.

 

Cleve wore a gun belt with a holstered Remington. The barrel of the weapon ended three inches below the holster. The front blade sight had been filed down to prevent it from hanging up on the drawing of the pistol. Not that he was a pistolero, he wasn’t.

 

Neither was he stupid.

 

The other feller, Harland Wormer, hunched on the stoop with the heel of his boot grinding down a spent cigarette. The old man’s gaze never strayed from the street’s vanishing point. Between them stood an open sack of coffee and a ledger, neither worth a damn if the night went as Dullard expected.

 

Dullard dismounted and let the sorrel’s reins drop. He squared his shoulders. Swept his hat off and wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of his wrist. The wind carried the briny tang of creosote and old blood. The adobe walls of the few buildings, not made of Rocky Mountain pine, threw back the light in a way that stung one’s eyes.

 

He greeted them with a slow nod.

 

“Hot for one day short of October, gentlemen.”

 

“Marshal. You said before sundown.” Harland grunted, not looking up.

 

Breck’s jaw flexed as he shifted his weight. He, like Harland Wormer, waited for the marshal’s report.

 

“Traffic on the south road,” Dullard said. “Three riders, slow and deliberate. Cut the trail twice between here and the wash.” He set the hat back on his head, adjusted the brim, and let the words hang.

 

Harland lifted his chin, eyes flickering with a lawman’s animal alertness. He was old and out of the game for many years. Now a ranch hand and sometimes child tender for Cleve and Olive Breck. For over half a year, Wormer hadn’t tasted whiskey.

 

Thomas Dullard was amused at the jib from his oldest living friend.

 

“Saw ‘em myself. Runners, not locals. One’s got a blue duster—could spot it in moonlight clear to the Spanish Peaks. Probably others with ‘em.”

 

“Made any turns?” Breck asked, eyes narrowed to knife slits.

 

“No. Circled up to the old sheep camp, doubled back. My guess they want the lay of the land afore tomorrow.”

 

A silence stretched toward infinity. Harland’s hand drifted to the butt of his pistol, fingers resting on the walnut grip. Dullard’s voice took on the cadence of a man dictating a eulogy.

 

“I think they’re the same lot that hit Silver City last month. Methodical bunch of men. Quit patient fellers.”

 

“You saw them up close?” Breck’s breath whistled through his teeth.

 

“Close as needed. Two with pistols, one with a rifle slung over his back. A Sharps buffalo gun, I believe. Sat their horses like they owned the Rockies and all its gold and silver.”

 

Breck nudged the sack of coffee with the toe of his boot.

 

“What about town? Any strangers?” City Marshal Dullard asked.

 

“Saw a couple. Both sleeping off cheap whiskey at the Wild Boar, but they could be decoys. Or advance men. And ‘fore anyone asks I didn’t have a drink.” Harland pulled a fresh bible page from a pack, filled it with the tobacco, and rolled the smoke, never taking his eyes off his friend Dullard’s face. Planting it between his lips, he stuck a match on the hammer of his holstered Colt 44-40 and lit the cigarette.

 

Dullard shifted, the wood of the porch creaking under his boots.

 

“The bank’s holding the mine payroll till Wednesday morning. Thirty-five thousand in gold notes. Tomorrow’s stage will arrive heavy, and every soul from here to Cimarron knows it.”

 

Cleve spat into the muck of the street.

 

“Payroll’s always been bait. But this much?” Cleve asked as soft as a lullaby.

 

“Prospector out of Mystic Copper Mine broke the word. Heard it in Dawson’s saloon myself. That news gets chewed up and spat clear to Raton in a night. But I’ve arranged a little wrinkle for them. To be honest… it won’t arrive for nigh on to a week. And they’ll have some army boys escorting them,” Dullard said.

 

Harland drew the pistol, checked the cylinder, spun it once, and placed it back in its holster. The ritual comforted him. Even if he would never admit as much, Dullard knew he still enjoyed the thrill of danger.

 

Breck met the marshal’s gaze.

 

“What’s your plan?”

 

“I’ll double the watch tonight. Post Deputy Redfield at the livery, pair Ramirez with the Neville Parmelee’s boy. You and Wormer take the church and hardware row. If you see the blue duster, signal from the south bell tower. When it doesn’t show tomorrow, hopefully, they’ll pack up and leave for green pastures.”

 

Breck nodded.

 

“Good plan, Tom, old salt. What about your woman and kid?” Womer asked Breck.

 

Dullard’s jaw tightened.

 

“Keep ‘em close. They’ll stay in the hotel tonight. But I have a ranch to run.” Breck turned back to the store’s door.

 

“If I had my say, I’d put every child in the cellar beneath the parsonage or saloon,” Marshal Dullard said.

 

“Not the worst idea. Naw, sirree, not the worst idea.” Harland’s eyes softened for a breath.

 

The marshal’s gaze drifted down the street, where two schoolboys chased a loose dog across Main. The children’s laughter stung his ears, too bright against the twilight hush.

 

“Banker Neville Parmelee expects us to walk his daughter to church in the morning. Wants a show of force. I’m a rancher, not a nanny,” Cleve Breck said.

 

“He’ll get it. But I won’t trade blood for gold. Not this time,” Thomas Dullard said, voice gravel thick. The men stood shoulder to shoulder, eyes staring into the deepening blue. For a moment, they looked like brothers, or at least comrades in arms old enough to understand the cost of a mistake.

 

“Had gang of men, not unlike this group, try to take my herd on the trail from Texas to here. Heck, Sly and I made the cost too high for them brigands right fast. I don’t like gunplay, but sometimes there ain’t no way round it.”

 

“Sly’s near as dabster as me with a gun,” the old man said. “Almost, not quite, though. And Heck’s right deadly at range with his Winchester Golden Boy.”

 

Dullard settled his hat again, nodded to each man, and started back toward the Marshal’s office. As he went, he felt the eyes of every soul in Elizabethtown measuring the line of his back. The red horse followed behind.

 

“He’s getting older. You notice?” Harland Wormer asked, breaking the silence.

 

“You’re a fine one to talk about, older, old man. Besides,” Breck said, his mouth curled. “We’re all busy getting older or pushing up daisies and daffodils.”

 

Harland watched the marshal’s retreat. “I’ve known him for a long time. Yes, sir. Ole Dullard ‘ll hold his own in a fight with man, beast, or Lucifer his-self.”

 

“He always has.”

 

The sun dropped behind the mountains and dragged the last of the color with it. For a long beat, nothing moved but the dust and the trembling hands of men waiting on the edge of violence.

 

Lamplight inside the Cartwright General Store forced the shadows to the far corners and turned the polished counters a warm yellow. Joan Cartwright took pride in the neat stacks of canned peaches, the lines of penny nails, and the burlap sacks arranged in pyramids behind the counter.

 

She muscled a fifty-pound bag of flour from the shelf to the butcher block. Dusting her hands off on her skirt. The weight barely bothered her, but she pretended otherwise. After all, the customers appreciated her struggle.

 

Hope Cartwright, two years younger but sharper with numbers, counted out coffee beans into small paper parcels. She ran a thumb along each seam before tying the string in neat bows, then lined the bags with soldierly precision. The morning’s tally whispered through her mind as she worked, always hunting for the three cents that had gone missing yesterday.

 

“Sister,” Hope Cartwright said, “we’re going run shy of everything before the supplies come in next week.”

 

“Yes, Hope, we’ve had a busy month. Good for the cash flow. Iffin’ you don’t give away too much candy to the little ones.”

 

Tuesday, October 1, 1878

 

Buck O’Brian and his wife Cara swept in with the cold. Buck left his boots at the door—never tracked mud, not even on an unexpectedly cold October day. He headed straight for the hardware wall. He lifted a new axe handle and inspected the grain against the lantern. Cara stayed a step behind, her own list in hand, and her voice kept low to avoid waking the toddler curled in her shawl.

 

“Ma says we need two more sacks of oats, not one,” piped Sarah O’Brian, oldest at ten and already used to repeating her mother’s commands.

 

Conor, eight and built like a beanpole, trailed his sister but made a beeline for the licorice jar. He pressed his nose to the glass and counted the red twists, mumbling under his breath. Roisin, three, broke free from Cara’s grasp and charged toward the open barrel of dried apples, her feet pounding like a loose calf.

 

Joan watched the O’Brian’s from behind her spectacles, reading the family the way a gambler read a poker table. Buck never said much but treated his wife’s word as gospel. Sarah handled her siblings like a mother hen, and Conor needed only a sideways glance to remind himself she was always there.

 

“Mind the Roisin, Sarah,” Joan called, voice sharp as a tack.

 

“Ma said no, sweets, but if you ask Miss Hope, sometimes she’ll say yes.” Sarah scooped Roisin up and spun her around.

 

“Only if you promise not to tell your ma.” Hope grinned without looking up.

 

Cara made her rounds, ticking items off her list with a pencil tucked behind her ear. “We’ll need salt pork, too. Buck’s brother is coming in from Pecos for a spell.”

 

“That means another body at the table. And three more hands for the chores,” Buck said and grunted like a pig.

 

“We just got a new batch from Mr. Manford. Smoked longer than the last, he says, and with apple wood, not dogwood.” Joan leaned over the counter.

 

“Bless you, Joan. That last side of bacon tasted like river mud.” Cara smiled, a rare show of teeth.

 

“Complain to the pig farmer, Joe Manford, not me. He’s just two mile, as the crow flies, south of town,” Joan said, but her eyes crinkled.

 

In the back, Sarah organized the groceries into piles by size and weight, ordering Conor to stack the tins and Roisin to count dried beans. Roisin managed seven before losing interest, dropping the beans into her pockets instead.

 

The door jangled again. Micah Breck entered with his mother, Olive. The boy’s knees showed fresh scrapes beneath his patched pants, and his dark hair stuck out at odd angles. He held the door for Olive, who nodded thanks but kept her eyes on the list.

 

Micah gravitated to the candy display, where Sarah and Conor had already argued over the merits of horehound versus lemon drops.

 

“Did you know,” Micah said, “Mr. Dawson ate seventeen lemon drops in one sitting, and then he got sick in the alley?”

 

“Boys are disgusting.” Sarah wrinkled her nose.

 

“Pa says we’re expanding the north pasture come spring. Might need another two hands.” Micah puffed his chest.

 

“My ma says we’ll have calves sooner than that,” Sarah replied, not to be outdone. “I can milk two cows before breakfast. Bet you can’t.”

 

“Bet-cha, I could.” Micah snorted.

 

Micah snorted. “Bet I could.”

 

Conor, sensing a competition, grabbed two ladles and held them out. “Race?”

 

Sarah’s face split in a lopsided grin. “You measure. I’ll win.”

 

They set to work, using burlap sacks and a half-empty water bucket as the ‘cows.’ Hope watched from the counter, shaking her head but smiling.

 

“Children,” the two mothers shouted almost in unison. And just like that, the race ended in a draw. The women returned to shopping and visiting.

 

“You got the last of the apricot?” Olive joined Cara near the preserves.

 

“Saved it for you,” Cara said, “knowing your Micah would start a war if he went without.”

 

Olive’s voice softened. “They’re good kids. Just—” She searched for the word. “Energetic.”

 

“Understatement of the year.” There were empty shelves, and Cara turned and asked, “Are you out of love apples?”

 

“Canned tomatoes will be on our fright order. It should’ve arrived already,” Hope said.

 

Outside, dusk pressed against the glass, the street empty but for a stray dog nosing along the gutter. The lamp over the porch flickered to life, throwing slow-moving shadows up the opposite wall.

 

“Looks like snow,” Micah said, fogging the glass with his breath.

 

“Yes, Micha, it does. We’ll be attending church here Sunday. Buck’s worried about the weather, so we’re missing our first Sunday of the month trip to Cimarron to attend Mass at the Mission. We could all eat at Parmelee Hotel after.”

 

“Sound’s delightful, Cara,” Olive said.

 

“Maybe school ‘ll be canceled.”

 

“Or maybe,” Micah said, eyes gleaming, “Pa will let me help guard the horses tonight.”

 

Sarah made a show of rolling her eyes, but the truth excited her, too. She liked the idea of being useful, especially if it meant staying up past dark.

 

Hope joined the kids at the window, her face reflected pale in the glass. “Better do your chores, or your mas ‘ll tan your hides.”

 

“You gonna help, too?” Sarah ruffled Roisin’s curls, which sparked with static in the dry air.

 

“Help! Help! Help!” Roisin squealed and bounced between her siblings. Who took it as a cue to race to the back for the next contest.

 

Joan closed the ledger, swept the loose coins into the till, and watched the three families settling into their routines. She measured the scene like she measured coffee—by the weight, texture, and scent. The adults plotted lists and debts, and the children skirmished over candy and chores. For the moment, every soul seemed protected from the world’s sharp edge by the store’s wooden walls.

 

As the final transaction finished, Sarah and Micah stood side by side at the window, noses nearly touching the pane, watching the first snowflakes drift past the lamp’s glow. The world outside dimmed, and for a moment, the wild urgency of children stilled, their voices hushed in the presence of the season’s first storm.

 

The bell above the door rang as Buck hauled his load to the wagon, Cara following with Roisin asleep on her shoulder. Olive ushered Micah after her, but he lingered a moment, trading glances with Sarah, two young generals promising future truces and future wars.

 

Hope doused the lamps, and Joan locked the till. They watched the families disappear into the twilight, knowing tomorrow would bring the usual business and the start of something else.

 

Then it began, the twilight swallowed by clouds that rolled over the mountains. The first flakes drifted down. Snow gathered in small drifts along the joints between boarded sidewalks and the street.

 

The children’s footprints filled first. Soon, the thoroughfare would be white.

Cold Day in Hell

Chapter Two

 

During cold weather, Dr. Milburn Buchanan kept his clinic at a constant fifty-eight degrees, a triumph in these parts. He trusted the cast-iron stove to hold the temperature against the claws of New Mexico winter. Even as the wind slammed against the windows like a determined drunk. Tonight, he hunched by a miner’s cot in the rear corner. His stethoscope pressed to the ribs of a man whose breath rattled with the special gravity reserved for pulmonary infections and bad debts.

 

The miner’s hand, exposed to the evening air, showed black along the tips. Frostbite, Buchanan noted, old and untreated.

 

“Breathe,” he said. The man obeyed, face twisting as pain met cold. Buchanan ignored the groan, counting beats, listening for the whisper of death in the chest. Footsteps thudded on the plank hallway.

 

“Doc?” Dr. Richard Stone said, voice hesitant at the threshold. “I have those notes from the railroad stable.”

 

“Set ‘em on the table,” Buchanan said, not turning from his patient. “Hold still, Josiah.”

 

“You caught it early?” Stone said and complied, eyes flicking to the miner’s hand.

 

“Late,” Buchanan said in an almost angry mutter, eyes on the man’s pupils, “but not as late as last week’s case. Do you see this?” He probed the hand, searching for warmth or the absence of it.

 

Stone bent to look, his own hands neatly folded behind his back.

 

“Same progression as with horses. Gangrene likes the extremities.”

 

“Congratulations on your diagnostic consistency. Last feller got his leg with an axe. You brought the diagrams?” Buchanan said, snapping the stethoscope free.

 

Stone opened his black satchel, retrieving a folder of crude sketches and water-stained notes. He spread them on the folding table beside the stove.

 

“Tissue discoloration, see here. Then sloughing and—if you’re lucky—amputation before sepsis. The curve matches your case,” he said, tapping with a chewed pencil.

 

“You ever treated this in a person?” Buchanan washed his hands in a tin basin, the water faintly brownish red from the day’s use.

 

Stone hesitated.

 

“No. Not directly. But I’ve revived colts in worse shape than that hand.”

 

Buchanan caught the sarcasm but ignored it.

 

“Old man, panning for gold in this weather is dumber than hammer nails with gun butt. Josiah, you used opium. Have any bad reaction?”

 

“Don’t reckon. Never had the pleasure,” the miner grunted.

 

“I thought,” Milburn Buchanan stopped, not wanting to call him out about his frequent visits to the opium den behind the laundry. Everyone had a right to a secret or two.

 

Buchanan loaded a spoon with laudanum. The measured tremor in his hand betrayed his fatigue. He nodded to Stone, who held the miner steady while Buchanan tipped the spoon into the cracked lips. The miner coughed, grimaced, and lay back, eyes already glazing.

 

Stone hovered.

 

“You’ll try warming?”

 

“Careful, though gradual only. Elset, you kill the tissue faster,” Buchanan said. He drew a blanket over the miner, then turned to the diagrams, scanning for hope among the charcoal lines and notes.

 

“I cleaned this with clean snow, changed its wrapping every hour, and kept the animal inside.” Stone pointed to a sketched hoof, blackened at the tip.

 

“Difference being people die of shock more often. We’ll check every hour. If the color improves, we keep it. If not—” He let the sentence end itself. He wrapped the miner’s hand in lint and muslin, securing it with a strip of cloth torn from a cleaner sheet.

 

Stone nodded.

 

“I’ll help with the watch. What about the heart?”

 

“Already failing. Morphine for pain, quinine if fever climbs.” Buchanan glanced at the man’s chest.

 

Stone made a note.

 

“I can prep the next case if you want.”

 

“There’s another?”

 

“Boy from the livery. Said you told him to come by tonight.”

 

Buchanan closed his eyes, remembering.

 

“He fell on a nail. Shoulder wound, nothing urgent.”

 

“I’ll see him out.” Stone relaxed.

 

“No, I best check it. Don’t want a case of lockjaw.”

 

After the boy left, the two men stood momentarily, the stove’s crackling fire the only sound. Buchanan packed away his tools, dropping each item into its felt-lined slot. “It’s a strange thing. Men lose hands and keep going. They lose hope, they die,” he said, not expecting an answer.

 

Stone smiled rueful, understanding what he meant.

 

“With horses, it’s the same. They stand as long as they can. But when they lay down, they’ve given up.”

 

“We’ll check the hand at midnight. Wake me if it turns.” Buchanan grunted as he made his way toward his table of medicines.

 

Stone’s confidence softened.

 

“You’re the best doctor this town has, Milburn. No shame asking for help.”

 

Buchanan met the compliment with a slight nod, then went to prep laudanum for the next patient.

 

Stone let himself out, leaving the medical man a bit lonely from his absence.

 

Alone with the miner, Buchanan listened to the wind for a while, then to the slow, rhythmic breathing from the cot. The stove ticked and crackled, the lamp hissed, and for a few hours, at least, nothing else needed fixing.

 

One-time eye Doctor Albert Willie dealt cards with a magician’s flourish, thumbs flicking the pasteboards in a perfect ripple. The Wild Boar Saloon filled with the low music of chips stacking. The oil lamps floated puddles of gold atop the green velvet, throwing long shadows across the players’ hands.

 

The town’s eye doctor, Doc Willie, leaned back, let his chair balance on two legs, and watched the table over the rim of his whiskey. The hand-rolled cigarette perched at the corner of his mouth, unlit, and he smiled at the tick it caused in the eye of the man to his left.

 

“Care to give me a light, mister?”

 

“Sure,” the man said, fingers drumming on the tabletop, but made no move for the matchbox. Willie noted the tremor—a drinker, maybe, or nerves.

 

Willie plopped his chair, took the matchbox, and lit his cigarette.

 

“Thanks,” Doc said.

 

“Don’t mention it,” the man said.

 

Across the felt sat two miners, a schoolmarm still in her teaching blouse, and the stranger. The stranger wore his hat inside and kept his coat buttoned against the stove’s heat. Boots caked with melting snow dripped a small pond onto the sawdust, unnoticed by the owner or the regulars. His eyes showed black even in the lamplight, and he smiled with only half his mouth.

 

“Three kings,” Doc Willie said, and the table groaned. The stranger’s expression never changed. The conversation ran dry until the second round.

 

“They say that the mine’s bringing in a payroll tomorrow. Good for the town. Means the whiskey won’t dry up ‘til Christmas,” Willie said, drawing out the syllables in his Southern accent.

 

“Means half these men’ll be broke by the time church lets out Sunday.” The schoolmarm pursed her lips.

 

“Means maybe I’ll buy a new shirt for once,” one miner said, then raised the pot.

 

“Thirty-five thousand, by the reckoning of the fellow at the livery. Most of it in greenback notes but some in yellowbacks,” the stranger said. “I prefer the yellowbacks. They have gold behind them, which sure as bacon with breakfast makes it worth more to me.”

 

The words hit the table like a pistol hammer. Chips froze mid-stack, and the next player’s laugh stuck in his throat. The stranger picked up his whiskey, swirling the amber, then set it down untouched.

 

“You seem well-informed for a man just off the stage.” Willie kept his tone easy.

 

The stranger’s gaze flicked around the room, landing briefly on each patron before returning to his cards.

 

“It pays to keep an ear out. In my line, bad information’s worse than none a’tall.”

 

The first miner folded, mumbling something about bad hands and worse omens.

 

Willie tipped his hat, the gesture ironic and polite. He’d push the point.

 

“You here for business or pleasure, friend?”

 

The stranger’s lips stretched, almost smiling.

 

“Does it matter?”

 

“I like to know who’s in my game. You strike me as a man who enjoys the odds,” Willie said. He peeled a new card off the top and slid it across to the stranger. The stranger looked at the card—ace of spades—then squared it neatly with the others.

 

“I enjoy the game, doctor. Same as you.”

 

“I hope no one tries for that money. Town could use a quiet week.” The school marm peeked at her hand and frowned.

 

“Wouldn’t that be loverly?” The stranger said and nodded.

 

“What’s your name, sir?”

 

“Maddox, ma’am. Schoolmarm playing poker, what’ll the church folk say?”

 

“They don’t like it one whit, but they don’t say anything. Hard to get teachers for this godforsaken place. Mr. Strange, can I have a fresh cup of Arbuckels?”

 

“I’ll boil up a fresh pot,” Sweeny Merrill said.

 

“Never mind, Sweeny, I’ll make do.”

 

Willie’s cigarette smoldered as he watched the stranger’s hands. No tremor now. The man wore kid gloves with the thumb slit and a faded scar traced from the wrist to the cuticle. Sharp as a cleaver, Willie’s memory rifled through every wanted poster from Silver City to Cimarron. The face didn’t match, but the manner did.

 

Someone running from something, or someone chasing it.

 

The dealer—fat, bald, and bored—tossed cards to each player. One for Doc, two for the stranger, and so on around the table, replacing their discards. The stranger’s eyes never left the table. But Willie saw them reflect the batwing doors each time they swung open. At the bar, a pair of cowhands laughed too loudly at nothing at all.

 

Willie counted the seconds, measured the breathing of the table, the way the schoolmarm’s fingers tapped her chip stack, the way the miners looked everywhere but at the stranger. Danger radiated off him, but he wore it with ease, like a clean shirt.

 

The stranger raised the pot, slow and steady, all the while talking low.

 

“Never played a hand in a place this small that wasn’t rigged, one way or another.”

 

“Then, Mr. Maddox, you should fit right in. Yes, I think you should fit well here.” Doc Willie matched the bet, then doubled it.

 

A flash of something—a dare or a warning—passed between them. The hand played out to its end.

 

“Mr. Maddox, my comment was a poor attempt at humor. Ace high full house.” Spreading the cards out with fanfare. “I’m never dumber than when I try to be humorous,” Doc said.

 

The stranger lost and lost big but smiled as if he’d won. He gathered his coat, nodded at Willie, and left the table. The wet footprints traced a path to the door, then vanished into the night.

 

Willie shuffled the deck, eyes on the empty chair. The flavor of the day was anticipation, and the whiskey burned a little sharper. He knew tomorrow’s game would have higher stakes, the players would be meaner, and the risks would be less honest. He dealt a fresh hand, the table silent in the stranger’s wake, and waited for the next move.

 

“Ma’am, you made a frown. How many times have I got to tell you? There is no emotion when you play cards.”

 

She leaned across the table and put her hand on his.

 

“I’m heading home. Are you gonna walk me there or not?”

 

“I fear you’ll not be a schoolteacher for long, playing poker and cavorting around with the likes of me.”

 

“Were I good at poker, it wouldn’t matter. I prefer gambling to children any day of the week.”

 

They left the saloon and made their way through the swirling snowfall.

 

An hour later, Maddox returned.

 

Dawson Strange polished the bar rail with a fury that belonged to men who remembered better jobs. He worked the rag along the wood, rubbing at a two-year-old scratch as if hard labor might sand away the memories behind it. He turned away from it and looked at the plaque on the wall and the bullet hole below it.

 

Beyond the rail, the Wild Boar Saloon boiled with miners, card sharks, and the odd ranch hand lucky enough to have credit this late in the month.

 

Sweeny Merrill manned the far end. Rolling his sleeves to the elbow and pouring shots with a surgeon’s steady hand. He caught Dawson’s eye and nodded toward the back corner.

 

“He’s on his third. Not a friend in sight,” Sweeny said, voice low.

 

Dawson followed the angle.

 

The stranger nursed a glass of rye, his back to the wall. With his hat tipped enough to show a jaw built for trouble. Every now and then, he’d flick his gaze to the street window. Waiting for something or someone only he could see.

 

Dawson watched him ignore a working girl, ignore the laughter at the poker tables, and ignore the piano even when the player fumbled the chorus of “Red River Valley.”

 

Sweeny sidled closer.

 

“Three strangers on the outskirts. That one asked too many questions about the bank schedule. Didn’t care for our whiskey, either.”

 

Dawson nodded, jaw set.

 

“We’re the only watering hole in town, so he’s stuck. Did he tip?”

 

“Yeah, he did, but like a man who expects to leave town rich, not popular.”

 

“Not tipping Dolly good ‘tain’t a good sign. Not with her charms and all.” At the bar, trade never slowed. Dawson poured two fingers for a rancher, a double for a sad-eyed clerk, and another for the local judge, who slid it down in one swift gulp. But every time Dawson reached for the next bottle, his eyes drifted to the stranger.

 

He watched the way the man’s hand circled the glass, loose but ready. Watched the way he clocked every new face through the door. It was the look of a man preparing for violence or already living in it.

 

“Don’t like it. He asked about the livery, too. What time the owner heads for home. Who’s on shift tomorrow.” Sweeny wiped his own stretch of the bar.

 

“Stage payroll’s coming in. If I were a betting man—” Dawson grunted.

 

“You’re not,” Sweeny interrupted, voice flat.

 

“—but if I were,” Dawson continued, “I’d double the watch on that bank.”

 

Sweeny’s smile never touched his eyes. “Town’s got a marshal, right?”

 

“Sure,” Dawson said, “but we got more whiskey than bullets. And trouble always finds the thirsty first.” The piano crashed, then picked up again. Dawson topped off glasses for a pair of loud cowhands, then turned to the stranger as he approached the bar.

 

“Evenin’,” Dawson said, cordial but careful.

 

“Rye. Neat.” The stranger nodded and set his glass down.

 

Dawson poured, eyes never leaving the man’s face.

 

“You new in town?”

 

“Passing through.”

 

“Nice boots,” Dawson said. “Fresh snow?”

 

“Roads are muddy in the low spots,” he said. The stranger shrugged. “You get many travelers this season?”

 

“Most folks stick around for the winter. Unless they’ve got business.”

 

The stranger met his gaze.

 

“That so.”

 

“No charge, pilgrim. You look like a man who’s had a long ride.” Dawson set the glass on the counter.

 

The stranger considered the drink, then tossed it back.

 

“Much obliged.” He left two coins on the bar, not waiting for change. Drifted back to his corner. Dawson watched how the man kept one shoulder to the room, eyes flicking between the window, the door, and the bar.

 

Sweeny leaned in.

 

“He’s waiting on someone.”

 

“Or watching for someone,” Dawson said.

 

The hour grew late. The miners laughed louder, the card games ran hotter, and the smoke thickened to a blue haze beneath the lanterns. Dawson polished glass after glass, always with one eye on the stranger.

 

At midnight, the man stood, buttoned his coat, and tipped his hat to no one. He left by the side door, boots leaving sharp, wet prints across the sawdust.

 

Dawson exhaled slow and easy. The tension drained from his arms but not his mind. He wiped the bar down again. Taking care and doing it with a disciplined experienced ease.

 

“Keep the shotgun close tonight.”

 

Sweeny nodded. “Already loaded.”

 

The Wild Boar roared on, oblivious to its own danger. But Dawson watched the window, waiting for the next move he realized would come. The snow had stopped, the skies cleared, and everyone believed it wouldn’t return until November. Everyone was wrong.

 

The stage didn’t bring the payroll money that week.

 

Cold Day in Hell

Chapter Three

Sunday, October 6, 1878

 

Reverend David Wayne MacArthur gripped the sides of the pulpit with knotted hands, the white of his knuckles catching in the lantern light. The church floorboards creaked as he shifted his stance, a narrow shadow thrown by the hurricane lamp beside the altar. Wind rattled the stained-glass windows, and snow swirled against the leaded panes, framing the preacher in a shifting dance of light and dark.

 

A blizzard pelted the town in earnest.

 

“The Book of Ecclesiastes tells us,” he said, the burr of Scotland thickening his vowels, “To everything there is a season. And a time to every purpose under heaven.” He paused, letting the words settle. The congregation sat close, hunched against the cold, their breath pluming like incense in the dim nave.

 

To the left, the Brecks took up an entire pew. Cleve at the end, his eyes fixed straight ahead, arms folded across his chest. Olive beside him, hands folded as if in prayer but fingers twitching with hidden worry. Young Micah leaned into his father, restless and alive.

 

On the right, the O’Brians clustered together, Buck upright and unmoving, Cara’s gaze darting from the pulpit to the children and back. Sarah sat between her parents, her feet barely brushing the floor, her face bright with the reflection of the altar candles.

 

MacArthur’s voice grew louder. Rolling over the shuffle of boots and skirts.

 

“A time to be born, and a time to die. A time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted.” His gaze swept the benches, landing on Sweeny Merrill at the back, still smelling faintly of tobacco and beer, and on Joan Cartwright, who sat with a ledger propped in her lap, ready to record any transgression for later reckoning.

 

The preacher’s eyes sparkled with the strain of conviction and sleeplessness. “There’s talk in this town, these days, of things coming our way. Some would say it’s nothing new. Only men with hard eyes and quick hands. But I tell you, church, the devil rides in with the storm.”

 

He pounded the pulpit once, sending a shiver through the pine boards.

 

“And the wise man prepares his house for the flood. Even the wise virgins kept oil in their lamps, for the hour was not their choosing.”

 

Leaning toward Cleve, Buck spoke to his friend with a hushed whisper.

 

“That’s the problem with you protestants, all the hand wring and pounding on the pulpit.”

 

Cleve resisted the urge to laugh.

 

Outside, the wind shrieked, and a tree limb scraped the roof like the claws of a desperate animal. MacArthur paused, letting the sound punctuate his words. He saw movement in the back—Dawson Strange, slipping in with collar up, eyes scanning every shadow. The preacher nodded and returned to his flock.

 

“We are charged, everyone, to watch and help others. To mind our brothers and sisters, shield the weak, and hold fast against the darkness. Not just with prayers, but with hands ready for the plow and, when need be, the sword.”

 

He glanced at Marshal Dullard, who stood near the door, face like carved granite.

 

All four of the choir gathered at the side of the pulpit. They opened their mouths and sang “Nearer My God to Thee,” their voices shaky at first but swelling with the wind. MacArthur mouthed the words, letting the melody fortify his message.

 

Snowflakes spun past the windows, some melting on the lead, others clinging in frozen constellations. The congregation sang, voices growing in strength and timbre, rising with the storm.

 

As the hymn ended, MacArthur bowed his head. He offered a prayer for the sick, the lost, and those guarding the town tonight. He prayed for wisdom, mercy, and courage against “the wildness of this world and the wickedness of men’s hearts.”