Dust stayed like that, resting against the door frame and shivering, for a while. He tried not to think, to let the time pass, but his mind kept going back to the man he had been; Dustin Longe, Mainly because he definitely had been free.
Dustin grew up in the ‘Unorganized Territory’ north of Texas, a bit of a wild land but somewhere a fella could set up his family if he had little money and no great love of civilization. That’s exactly what Dustin’s Pappy had done, taking a small freehold hidden away in a forest whilst they were expecting Dustin. He’d spent his youth with just his Ma, Pappy and sister, Jessie. And that was how they’d liked it.
He hadn’t ventured into Dustin’s memories very often but decided to raid them for a distraction. Casting his mind back, he saw that Dustin’s Pappy had actually run a damn tight ship when he was a lad, worked Dustin and Jessie hard from the moment they could be worked. Dustin couldn’t do anything between chores either as his Ma had tutored them from a small collection of books then, one Dustin’s Pappy would sometimes add to when he traded lumber in Texas. Stepping out of line or doing what he wanted usually earned him a good spanking and the man’s disapproval for a good couple of days. Dust still didn’t know which’d hurt Dustin more.
As he scanned Dustin’s memories, Dust realised there was only one time in either of their strange, joint lives where their actions were their own for more than a few hours; when Dustin had left the homestead at eighteen to make his way in the world. His Ma had been against it, as all mothers would, but Dustin’s Pappy had agreed it was time his boy looked after himself. So with a couple of fierce hugs from Ma and Jessie and a paternal handshake filled with pride, Dustin went south to Texas and his fortune.
There probably wouldn’t be quite as much pride in Dustin’s Pappy’s eyes if Dust ever met him. If he were even still alive; he’d be… seventy three now, not the kind of age where you enjoy living on your own. Dustin’s Ma was long dead – she’d gone during his Ranger days from snakebite – but he had no idea about his Pappy or Jessie, who would be… fifty-six by now. Probably with her own family. Probably preferred to think her big brother was dead.
In the present, Dust rolled over on the cold wooden door and looked out into the corridor. Cold, impassive rock stared back at him. Torches flickered to his left and right. Nothing to distract him proper.
So his mind went back to eighteen-forty, when a young Dustin had ventured out with five dollars and a determination to make something of himself. After trekking through the wild forests and into Texas, hunting game and dodging Indians, he’d landed a job lifting and shifting for a railroad company. Made a few friends there too. It’d been hard work followed by hard drinking but he’d enjoyed it, especially learning from men who’d been making something of themselves for years.
Of course, they’d actually been drunken fucks lying about having a family back home because they drank their pay every month but, well, Dustin Longe had been a young fool.
Mere chance was what saw him end this brief flirtation with freedom. It started when a fella by the name of Big John had joined the labourers in early forty one and really shaken up the place; he was a mean drunk, a fighter and a bully. Folk let him get away with it because he was built like the trains they lay tracks for and twice as ugly. People adapted, made sure to give Big John a tithe of alcohol every now and then and include him in any plans or schemes and that was that.
Then Dustin’s birthday came. The fellas – Micky, Sammy J, Dark Meat and Carlos – had clubbed together to get him a small bottle of special whiskey, gone all the way to the nearest town to buy it one night. They’d presented it to him out of the blue that night and the plan had been to get royally wasted on that fine liquor.
Big John hadn’t liked this plan because it didn’t involve him. So he’d barged into the group’s camp fire and taken the bottle from Dustin’s hand just moments after he’d been presented it. He started downing it like it were water. None of his friends had done anything as the poorly-shaven, rough galoot drank away their evening’s entertainment.
But Dustin had. He’d stood up, squared to the man and taken a shot with his young fists. Got him square in the jaw too, knocked the bottle right out of his hands. Big John struck back but wasn’t used to fighting someone who wanted to hurt him; he took risks a smaller man wouldn’t and so got as badly injured as Dustin had. They were both sporting shiners, broken lips and deep gashes by the time the railroad’s orderlies broke up the fight.
A Texas Ranger had been passing through that day and that was where chance came in. Isaac Smith, Smitty to his friends, knew the railroad’s foreman – a man called… Dust tried to find the name but it wouldn’t come to him. Anyway, Smitty had been in the area and decided to see his friend while he was there. So he happened to be dining in the foreman’s tent when Dustin and Big John were dragged in, bloody and dirty, to answer for their crimes. The situation was explained by Hank, the chief orderly, and the foreman had fired them both on the spot.
“I won’t have seditious and unruly men working my line,” the Foreman had bellowed, a great gruff man who wore a scratched monocle he’d most likely found.
Smitty had said nothing, just watched them the whole time, twirling his greased moustache thoughtfully.
The fighters were marched out and told to gather their things and leave within the hour. Dustin, being young, had hoped his friends would kick up a fuss and was bitterly disappointed; the fellas were distraught but they weren’t about to risk their good thing by saying too much. He’d had some pats on the shoulder and they’d patched him up as best they could but that was all.
In the cold, dead night of his birthday, Dustin had made his way south-east toward the town his expensive present had come from. Shivering like a witch’s tit, beaten and hurting in his heart, the young man hadn’t considered that Big John might still be mad with him. He hadn’t known how much danger he was still in when he’d set himself down in a pretty poor place, wrapped a blanket around himself, and fallen asleep.
Dust would’ve gone spare at him.
Dustin awoke two hours later and went for a piss. It was as he put his pecker away that Big John punched him in the back of the head, knocking him to the ground. Then he wrapped those meaty fingers around Dustin’s neck, giving him just enough room to breathe, and lifted the young man into the air, ignoring the kicks and wheezes that Dustin gave him in return.
“You shouldn’t ought to have done that, boy,” Big John said. “You got me kicked outta a job I needed. Now, I’m gonna take something from you that you’ll be needing.”
Big John had tightened his grip with one hand and drawn a piece of sharpened flint with the other. He held the home-made knife right before Dustin’s crotch, which set the boy kicking with a renewed vigour. Which, in turn, made Big John grin.
“Say g’bye to your vegetables.”
