The town was large even by Texan standards. It sat between two tree-clad mountains and bathed beneath a merciless sun which moved mostly through cloudless sky. Beyond, a vast range of fertile grass swayed like the waves of an ocean and seemed to go on forever. Folks had settled here because of the crystal-clear river that ran down from the nearest of the mountains and fed the range through which it snaked.
To put down roots, all that men with settlers’ blood flowing though their veins needed in the West was a plentiful supply of water and salt with a good ration of courage thrown in. Those who had discovered this place knew that if they provided the courage the land itself would provide the rest. So it had been for more than a decade and the town showed no sign of slowing down its steady growth.
Steers grazed on the sweet grass and twice a year they would be rounded up by their owners and sent east to fill the bellies of those who had acquired an appetite for the beef that only this land could supply. Yet like so many other areas of Texas there was hardly any law, and what there was had a very short life-expectancy. To pin a tin star upon one’s vest in towns like this was like painting a target on oneself.
But even so, there were men who dared to take that ultimate risk, to try and bring a slim particle of civilization to an otherwise barbarous land.
Narrower streets had spurred off from the original main street as the town grew. Like the legs of a giant spider they spread out in every direction. Now about two hundred buildings stood along these streets, yet none was too far from the river.
Although the town appeared to be an Eden, the people who populated it felt that more likely it had been Satan who had really created this land. For it was brutal and full of traps designed to ensnare the unwary. Things had never gone sweetly here. So many souls had perished within the boundaries of the ordinary-looking settlement.
Towns like this were built on the blood of those who had come before. Boot hill stood to the east of the town upon a small rise. Its hundreds of wooden and stone markers bore testament to the fact that places such as this might never truly be accepted into the fabric of civilization.
But men here did not want to be tamed. They had been around long before the law had hung up its shingle and pinned a tin star to the chest of anyone who thought he might be able to tame the unruly two-legged mustangs.
Some mustangs could never be broken.
Never be tamed.
Not one grown man inside the boundaries of the sun-bleached town ever went outdoors without their guns strapped around their hips. They often forgot to place their Stetsons on top of their heads but they never forgot their guns.
Life in the West was already far too short and to be unarmed was tantamount to being suicidal.
Gun law still ruled here.
Even with a town marshal and two deputies on the payroll things still tended to go the way they had always gone. Men were still men in this place.
They lived and died that way.
They liked it that way.
Yet even without the polite Eastern manners that had slowly overtaken so many other Western settlements, things were not quite as wild as the dime novels might have suggested to the gullible readers on the Eastern seaboard. Few men used their weaponry without a reason. Often the reasons were simply the result of bad liquor but they usually had reasons. Men settled their disputes their own way and that way was always with hot lead. Those who knew how to use the gun gathered here in abundance. Some were men wanted in other states and territories, who found that as long as they kept their noses clean they would never be targeted for the bounty money on their heads.
The town had earned its reputation for being brutal, wild and dangerous. It relished the old ways which had served them since the town had first risen out of the wilderness. Men wanted the law like a rancher wanted his herd to get anthrax. But even so the law existed. Back shooters who could not get away with the favorite excuse of ‘self-defense’ had to be rounded up by someone. That was what the men with tin stars mainly did. That and make sure the gambling houses and saloons did not cheat so many times that it became a problem, and last but not least ensure that the soiled doves of the countless brothels gave value for money and did not cause any trouble between their patrons.
The marshal and his deputies were like referees who stood between bloodied prize-fighters. They vainly attempted to keep the peace whilst most of the less law-abiding citizens did exactly what they wanted to do. When dealing with folks who carried guns you had to be careful and those who had never mastered that art rested up on boot hill.
This town remained dangerous.
Maybe that was why none of those who lived within the limits of its sprawling array of buildings had never changed its name.
It still prided itself on that ominous name. A name that was painted in red at all four approaching trails.
This was a town called Death.