My old buddies were staying at one of them new-fangled inns: this one they saw fit to call "Treasure Island". I didn't know about no treasure, but I sure coulda used a good wench. I bellied up to the bar. These boys had already been here a while, and I figured I could use one, seein's how they're a rough and tumble crew. The lobby was full of pilgrims, all playin' cards and dice, and raisin holy hell almighty with their hootin' and hollerin' and carryin' on.
"Gimme a Smirnoff", I said to the barkeep, a bald little cuss with ears like a cactus. "And make it an ICE."
When I got up to the boys' room, I knocked real softly-like, so's to make 'em think I's the marshall. Boy, did I get 'em. All I could hear's a russlin' and a clangin'.
"Isn't Kid Kenny comin'?" I heard one of 'em whisper. I knocked a little harder-like and finally saw the door crack open a piece and a solitarty pair of peepers peered at me. Well, you never did see such relieved faces. For a second, I wondered if they's even cowboys.
"For a second, I wondered if you's even cowboys," I said, and we all started laughin' real hard and firin' our Smith 'n Wessons.
"What're we doin' after we finish our celebr'tory shootin'?" I asked.
"We're goin' to the shootin' range!" came the reply.
We mosied to a range just outside of town, where we tried out all the latest gattlin' guns. They burn hot and pop loud, so's if you want to keep your hand, you better treat 'em like you would a Tijuana whore. The dude who ran the place told us nobody'd been shot up there yet, and not one of us wanted to change that. "Listen to me, or you'll end up like Ol' Jose Anderson," he allowed. We all looked down at our spurs and scratched our heads at the mention of Ol' Jose.
After shootin', we headed back to town for some grub and booze. At the saloon, they got a floor where you dosey doe, surrounded by water, and above it's a big old contraption that shoots flames. This particular establishment is called "Rain". Which made me take off my stetson and scratch my head over why they had flames comin' outta the chandelier.
One of the boys, Eric, 's gettin' hiched. 'S how come we come to this place in the first place. By the time two or three in the mornin' rolled around, it seems we'd both, the groom and the kid, that is, had a few two many sasparillas. The rest of the boys reckoned we better high tale it back to the inn and loaded us onto a wagon like a couple a sacks of feed.
Back at the inn, we bellied up to the bar. I ordered a couple more ICE's from cactus-ears, and Eric reckoned he'd put some cash in the video gamblin' machine. I grapped his hand.
"Don't do it, pardner." The machine lapped at his ten like a whipped cur who ain't eaten in three days. "I'm your pal," I said to my pal. "Don't waste your dough on no four-flushin', peet-eatin', cotton-pickin' machine."
He did it anyway; the machine ate up his money like it was a t-bone. Now, I don't pretend to know nothing about gamblin'. I'm more of a shootin' man myself, and they tend to get a mite agitated if you start shootin' in a casino. Shows you what I know: he went up. Twenty, twenty-five, thirty. Now, I could'nt believe it.
"Get out, dude, you're up. Get out." He wasn't listening. "Get out! Forty bucks!" He knew what he was doin', and he walked away with thirty six bucks.
Well, the rest of the weekend was about the same as the above. I won't bore you with the details...we learned some lessons, dranks some ICE's, lost some hard earned cash. On Monday mornin', I stood in the sunlight said "Happy trails" to Eric, Tim, Paul, a couple of the other cowpokes whose names escape me.
"Where you off to now, Kid Kenny?" one of 'em asked me.
I sipped the cool water that had collected in the brim of my stetson. "West," I said. "West."
2 comments:
Wishin' I had bin there. Thanks for the chuckle.
Hat's off to that entry. The best I've read anywhere for a long time.
Makes me yearn for a time when a cloudy day was for killin.
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