And the Winners Are...
Carl Ivan Carlson
IV
3rd Place,
Young Writers Category - International
Divison
CHAPTER 3
The local county saloon branded the Cow Whip after the stampede of '39 eventually became the stomping ground of the once estranged man, Monsieur Etienne Philippe IIX. Before Etienne's abrupt and baffling arrival, the Cow Whip was on its last leg and its owner on the verge of bankruptcy, but his frequent patronage saved it from the inevitable. Etienne's untroubled and revelry attitude, combined with his library of worldly adventures and accounts, packed the neglected saloon to seam bursting capacity every night subsequent to his arrival. The locals were constantly fascinated with his extraordinary story that literally landed him in Deer Lick. Etienne never minded repeating it, as his heavy consumption of free brandy put up by the locals always guaranteed the retelling to be equally interesting to him.
"Hey Etienne, Billy here ain't never had de privilege of hearin' abouts how you arrived in this here town" slurred the town drunk between sips of his homemade plum moonshine.
Etienne as always looked up with a devilish smirk that overwhelmed his red and chubby face and hollered to the bar tender the words that seemed to come most familiarly to his mouth, "Crack open another bottle of brandy and lets see if I can remember how it goes." At the drop of these words, the loud clatter of the bar immediately settled to an awkward silence that Etienne eagerly filled following the arrival of the brandy to his centrally located table.
"Following a long and eventless summer at my families chateau in the South of France, I felt like an adventure to break up the tedium I had encountered while entertaining my father in order to fall into his grace and will once again. Father reluctantly agreed to fund a several month trip for me to hunt in North Africa as a reward for behaving uncharacteristically tolerable and sober. Immediately, I packed to avoid my father's tendency to change his mind and my tendency to accidentally provoke him to do so. Seeing as this is my second bottle of brandy and it is approaching morning, I will keep this unusually short.
After crossing over the Mediterranean from the southern tip of Italy to Cairo on a rickety steamboat, I hired several natives to guide me south to the untamed Zaire grasslands. I had high hopes of bagging a large elephant and possibly a gazelle, but many said I was arriving to late in the season to capitalize on the big game. Unfortunately the natives were right and several weeks into my trip I had not seen any game worth mounting. It now seems appropriate to introduce crazy Charlie from a place that escapes me now, but wherever it might have been it was obviously not a place that breed intelligence, manners, or common sense. Charlie's hunting expedition was going as sour as mine. I had settled for spending my days high on cheap whiskey, but old Charlie was determined to make his trip a success. When I met old Charlie, we instantly became friends for he enjoyed the bottle just as much as I did, if not more and he never failed to make the dull African nights interesting with his odd antics and stories. Quickly I discovered that Charlie was eager, ambitious, and to a degree clever, yet his feeblemindedness hindered his ability to amount to anything. Charlie spent most of our nights together impatiently concocting exaggerated and grossly juvenile methods to make his hunting trip a success. Though despite the cleverness he believed his ideas entailed, most of them contained the intelligence similar to that of a young boy attempting to attach wings to his arms and fly off his father's barn.
Eventually Charlie came up with a plan that caught my interest, but it did not do so until I was on my third bottle of whiskey and every shed of intelligence had fled my inebriated body. Early that night a young inventor with an apparent gambling problem mistakenly sat down with old Charlie to a high stakes game of Texas Hold'em poker. Charlie's only noteworthy attribute worth mentioning was his innate ability to play cards. Within an hour Charlie had taken the inventor for all of his money, a gold pocket watch with an engraving on the back that read Best of luck in Africa, may you easily find success, and lastly, but most importantly his version of what he called a hot air balloon.
By the end of the night crazy Charlie had convinced me to attempt a hunt from the air in his newly acquired hot air balloon. If there is one thing I am not it is reluctant, as long as I am accompanied by a bottle of eighty proof. The idea of hunting from the air seemed logical, so I enthusiastically stumbled onboard the hot air balloon with my bottle of courage in my back pocket. Unfortunanly folks, the rest of the story will always be a mystery to me as I have no recollection of the events that proceeded, the only thing I know is that it culminated in John Gray's field."
The end of Etienne's story frequently disappointed the crowded bar, though his excessive drinking rarely allowed him to finish his account. Nevertheless, simply due to the fact that Etienne had experienced life beyond Deer Lick, all of his stories fascinated the locals.
CHAPTER
4
Etienne's abrupt arrival consumed the
attention of the locals and it seemed as if his popularity would never cease. Yet, the
tension between Hugh Gregory and David Gray stole the spotlight at the end of the spring
when it became evident that the two could no longer reside in the same town together. Ever
since John Gray denied Hugh his daughter's hand in marriage following the discovery of
David Gray's will, Hugh developed the bitterest hatred towards David.
Furthermore, the fact that she was four
months pregnant and unmarried increased the tension between David and Hugh because each
thought the other was the father.
Both David and Hugh were regulars at the
Cow Whip, but their mutual hatred constantly pushed them to opposite ends of the saloon.
Though a night rarely passed when the two did not drunkenly throw insults and fists at
each other. Eventually, the tension between the two reached an apex and both quickly
recognized the fact that the town was not big enough for the two of them. Duels had been
outlawed in Deer Lick since the Provisions of 1878 and offenders of this law stood to
suffer severe penalties, yet Hugh and David knew it was the only answer. Secretly, the two
agreed to duel to the bitter end the night before the Forth of July in the field between
the Cow Whip and the Gray's place. The two both spent the evening hours leading up to the
duel in the saloon. At midnight, after each had put down numerous drinks of courage, the
two walk out unnoticed to the agreed upon field to solve the dispute for Mary that had
been plaguing them.
The two stood ten paces apart and at the
agreed upon sound of the next wolf howl, their pistols would inevitably solve their
problem. Immediately following the first note of a wolf's high-pitched howl, Hugh and
David simultaneously drew their pistols and fired. Though they both stood dumbfounded
after the white smoke from the weapons cleared and discovered neither had been shot, yet
their were screams of agony coming from behind Hugh. To their astonishment, Etienne caught
David's bullet in his chest while he was stumbling home to the Gray's place where he had
been living the last six months from the Cow Whip.
Bewildered and confused by the situation,
Hugh and David fled the scene and left Etienne to slowly die an untimely death in the hot
summer night. The discovery of Etienne's body the morning of the Fourth of July sent a
chill down the back of every Deer Lick inhabitant, for everything led them to conclude
that a murder had taken place. This event was so shocking to the county that the Forth of
July firework show, which was nothing grand, but had sentimental value to the town's
history, was canceled for the fist time since 1780.
The mystery of the apparent murder plagued
the town and left all of Deer Lick's inhabitants uneasy. Though time passed and many had
settled to believe that the mystery of the murder would forever remain unsolved. Around
the time the uneasiness in the town settled almost to a quiet hush, Mary expectantly went
into labor and yielded the answer to the mystery that baffled the town. The child that
emerged from her womb resembled Etienne in every conceivable way and consequently sent a
commotion through the town. Finally, Rev. John Hurley broke down and against Mary's will
confessed that he had wed Mary and Etienne in secrecy two month's after Etienne's arrival
for they confessed that they were desperately in love, but Mary knew John Gray would never
allow it.
Quickly and feverishly a mob of angry Deer
Lick inhabitants formed to seek David and Hugh, for it was evident to the town that both
now had a motive for murder. When questioned by the mob, both Hugh and David denied the
charges, but their faces dripped with dishonesty and lies. They were unable to convince
the mob of their innocence and by nightfall, both swung gently by the necks on short ropes
in a tall trees in the cool breeze of the approaching autumn.