ONE

‘Well, isn’t this something?’ Josh Banks said dismally. He sat his white-eared mule in the middle of the street of the dead desert town. Above the two men the red mesa jutted skyward, casting its deep shadow over them.

‘The man who drew the map seemed to know what he was talking about,’ Wage Carson answered unhappily. They looked around them at the boarded-up windows, broken awning supports and collapsed plank walks.

‘Well, I guess he did, because here we are,’ Josh said sadly. He swung down from his mule and stood massaging his cramped leg.

‘Wonder where everyone went,’ Wage Carson said, looking across the deserted ghost town as the rising wind lifted yellow dust. His gray horse shifted its feet uneasily. They had been riding long and hard and had expected to find food and water, human company here.

‘The wind probably blew ’em away,’ Josh said as the gusts continued to increase. He shrugged, ‘Who knows why these towns grow up or why they die. I think there was a little silver ore up there.’ He lifted his whiskered chin toward the bulk of the mesa, ‘And it just petered out.’

‘Do you think that it was the fever that did it?’ Wage Carson asked with trepidation.

‘Who knows?’ the older man said. ‘For now, let’s see if we can find some water. There must have been a water source here … once.’

Or, he was thinking, perhaps that was the reason the town had died. Maybe the water had just dried up, and nothing lived out on the desert without a source of water.

‘Where?’ young Wage Carson asked the bearded man. ‘Where do we look, Josh?’ The big-shouldered bear of a man was not more than twenty years old. He could bend iron with his bare hands, but he looked to the scrawny Josh Banks for advice always.

‘First, any local business. If we can’t find a working pump, then we look around the base of the mesa. That’s where water is most likely to be seeping. We don’t need enough to support a town, just enough for us and our mounts.’

‘We were right,’ Wage said as they walked the dusty street, ‘this is the place.’

He had kicked over a fallen plank sign on which was ineptly painted ‘Hangtown Commerce Bank’.

‘Well,’ Josh Banks said tugging at his silver beard, ‘we were right about where we were. The question now is, what in hell are we going to do about it?’

Wage Carson turned and surveyed the empty street with its skeletons of buildings, shuttered establishments and treeless lanes and scratched his head as if probing for an idea. ‘I know what we can do,’ Wage Carson said finally, a boyish grin on his face.

‘Any idea, I’m willing to hear it,’ Josh Banks said. He had removed his hat to wipe the perspiration from his forehead. The dry wind lifted his shaggy gray hair.

‘Joshua, my old trail friend – don’t you see!’ Wage Carson turned in a tight circle, his big hands raised skyward. ‘We now own us a town.’

Josh Banks frowned thoughtfully. He supposed that Wage was right in a way, but even if they did, what in the world was to be done with it? Hangtown was dead. Hangtown, population 2, was not a livelier proposition.

‘Let’s find some water,’ Josh growled, but in his mind the wheels were turning.

Owning their own town was surely something. Better than owning only the mule he sat on.

It gave a man pause to consider.

They were able to find a little seep east of the town where the great mesa’s shadows lay heavy and cool, and there they allowed their mounts to drink their fill. Sprawled on his back, hands behind his head, Wage Carson commented:

‘It’s a shame that the work of man falls into disuse.’

‘Meaning?’ Josh Banks was seated on a large, flat-topped rock, watching his mule drink.

‘Like I already said, Josh – here is this entire town men labored to build, with a lot of sweat and maybe a little blood. Now it sits empty and forgotten. I’m still thinking we ought to claim it. It must be good for something!’

‘Such as?’ Josh asked.

‘I don’t know,’ Wage said to the older man with a shake of his head. ‘But it is shame to let. …’

Josh Banks was tired; he let the kid’s words flow past unheeded. Wage did have a point of sorts. They could rest up here with plenty of water for their mounts, with a roof over their heads. They were in no hurry to get anywhere and they had been long on the trail.

‘… Find out what the law really is in a situation like this,’ Wage was saying.

‘It’s something to consider,’ Josh Banks said, rising from the stone to dust off the seat of his jeans. ‘For now, let’s get out of the sun and see what we can scrape up to eat.’

There was a hotel in the ghost town. Not much of a place, but it seemed sound. With dusk settling they threw their saddles down in the cobwebbed lobby and looked around. Two front windows were broken out and the dry desert wind whistled through. Upstairs were six small rooms with musty bedding. The cots were relatively comfortable, and it would sure beat spending yet another night on the open ground with snakes and scorpions for company. There were lanterns, but the kerosene seemed to have leaked out or evaporated. An emergency supply of candles was discovered in an upstairs utility closet. They lit four of these to burn in the room they had chosen and their flickering light offered some small solace against the settling night. Outside the wind had begun to build, and it rattled the windows as the cold desert night darkened the land. But in their bedrolls spread over tick mattresses they were as safe and comfortable as they had been for days.

Josh Banks fell to sleep thinking that maybe the kid was not so dumb after all. There were worse fates than owning your own town.

Morning dawned cool and bright. Only a few wisps of pinkish clouds colored the high skies. The old mule Josh Banks rode and Wage Carson’s gray horse were picketed out in the long grass behind the town where they had discovered the flowing water. The two men were left to consider their position again.

They had shifted two old but serviceable chairs from the dusty hotel lobby out on to the plankwalk where they sat, indolently enjoying the warmth of the rising sun. Josh had his stubby pipe lighted, and he squinted up and down the street through narrowed eyes. Wage had his hat tugged low against the glare of the morning light.

‘Well, here we are,’ Josh said at length. ‘And what have we got?’

‘Roof over our heads,’ Wage said, stretching his thick arms lazily.

‘Yes, but Wage, that is about it. It won’t sustain us long.’

‘We don’t even know that,’ Wage said, leaning forward, rough hands clenched together. ‘There could be all sorts of useful items strewn about – things people were in too much of a hurry to cart off. There might even be some silver ore left in that lode – little enough to profit them so that they gave up on mining it, but enough to see us through a winter. If we could find some tools, we could take a look.’

Josh Banks just nodded. His younger companion had more ambition, higher hopes than he did. ‘We don’t even know what happened here, Wage. I’ve an idea—’ he jabbed the stem of his pipe in the direction of the squat yellow building across the street. A barely legible tilted sign hung on its face could be seen there. ‘Hangtown Sentinel,’ it read.

‘What’s that?’ Wage asked.

‘Newspaper office. I guess in its heyday there was enough population in Hangtown to support one.’

‘What did you want to do?’ Wage asked with a laugh. ‘Get the morning edition?’

‘No,’ Josh said with one of his infrequent smiles, ‘but there might be some back issues left around, why would anyone want to take them away? Maybe we can get an idea of what happened here, why everybody just pulled up stakes and left.’

‘It’s a thought,’ Wage said, ‘then maybe we can poke around and see if anyone left any food behind. If not, I’ll be grazing in the grass with our mounts before the day is out.’ He rubbed his belly.

‘We’ll find us a deer,’ Josh said confidently. ‘Didn’t you notice those tracks up along the seep yesterday?’

‘I guess I didn’t,’ Wage replied. He hadn’t seen the deer sign or noticed the newspaper office. He had to give it to Josh Banks. The old man was keener of sight, and maybe more clever than he himself was. That was why they made a good team of saddle partners, Wage decided. Josh did the thinking and Wage did most of the work. It made it easier on both of them.

They crossed the street under clear skies, a light wind bending the branches of the solitary cottonwood tree in the town square – someone’s idea of adding permanence to a town which could never have had the chance at anything but a passing existence.

Clumping up on to the sagging boardwalk opposite, the two went to the front door of the Hangtown Sentinel office. There was a lock on the door, but Wage was easily able to shoulder his way inside. Josh followed. There was nothing in the office; no printing press, no desks, no chairs. But strewn around the room were yellowed copies of the town’s one-sheet newspaper. Josh bent and picked one up. Carrying it to the greasy window he scanned it. Wage who had never learned to read, waited.

‘What’s it say?’ he asked finally.

‘Pretty much what we thought, though the man had a flowery way with words.’ Josh Banks leaned against the wall and read: This being the final issue of the paper founded with such high expectations.… ‘No sense wading through all of this,’ Josh said. Just a sentence or two pretty much tells the story.’

With the exhaustion of the silver seam which many had hoped would provide for the area’s prosperity.…

Again Josh paused. ‘Here is the matter in a nutshell, Wage:’

With the first of the prospectors having struck their tents and the last of the hopeful settlers surrendering Hangtown to its inevitable demise, wagons heaped with their poor belongings, the column of dejected pilgrims.…

‘It goes on a while more but don’t say anything much,’ Josh said, letting the newspaper flutter to the floor. ‘Silver ran out; town’s deserted. Which we had kind of figured already.’

Wage watched the old man stifle a yawn. ‘What do you think?’ Wage asked, as they went out again into the brilliant morning sunshine.

‘About what?’ Josh asked. The utter silence of the town was beginning to spook him a little. The loudest sound to be heard was the dry wind rattling the leaves of the cottonwood tree.

‘You know,’ Wage Carson said with eagerness. ‘The town – can we keep it for our own?’

‘Is it worth the having?’ Josh Banks asked, looking around.

‘I don’t know,’ the younger man said. ‘But, Josh, we had nothing where we came from and we are going nowhere. We’ve at least got a roof, water, and like you said I can knock down a deer now and then for food. It seems to me it beats riding the long trail again with winter coming on.’

‘You do have a point,’ Josh said, placing a gnarled hand on his companion’s shoulder. ‘The open trail’s getting harder on me as the years pass.’ He shrugged, ‘Why not at least give it a try? Let’s look around a little more.’

They next tried the old jail house. There was nothing much there. Cell doors standing open, an empty gunrack. There was, however, a dilapidated desk with one broken leg. Three or four ancient wanted posters were tacked to the wall. Wage Carson rummaged through the desk. He stood with a shiny object in his hand.

‘Look, Josh – a town marshal’s badge. Can I keep it?’

‘Might as well pin it on,’ Josh said with a shrug. His young, bull-shouldered partner sometimes had a childish side to him. Just a big, half-smart, good-natured kid. Josh Banks had been half-kidding, but Wage pinned the badge on his faded blue shirt with delight.

‘Is this official?’ Wage asked.

‘Unless we can find someone who objects,’ Josh answered.

‘I know!’ Wage said, animated now. ‘We can make you mayor and you can appoint me to office.’

‘I accept the office of mayor,’ Josh Banks said tolerantly. ‘What about holding an election first, though?’

‘Oh, Josh,’ Wage said, nearly blushing. ‘We can hold that here and now. I’ll vote for you.’

Josh smiled. What the hell, he might as well become mayor of a ghost town. It was the highest office he was ever likely to hold. If it made Wage happy to be officially appointed, the hell with it – why not?

It was time, however, to get on with more practical matters. They had shelter, water, it shouldn’t take much to hunt a deer. The animals probably hadn’t seen a human being in years and would not be wary of hunters. Then, Josh considered, it would be a good idea to take their mounts to the shelter of the stable, after they had checked it out and seen what kind of shape it was in. Josh smiled, lit up his stubby pipe and slapped Wage Carson on the shoulder.

‘Marshal, let’s see what needs to be done around town. It’s my duty as mayor, after all. You just make sure that you keep the peace in Hangtown.’

That was said lightly, but it would prove to be much more difficult than either man could have imagined.