Arizona Blue--Gunfighter, in: "The Baby-snatcher" (#34)

Arizona Blue—Gunfighter, in:
“The Baby-snatcher” (#34)

(Galveston, Texas, 1882)) Heading towards Yellowstone)) He came down the street escorted, hands tied to each other. The delegation that followed him consisted of two deputies, one sheriff and the mayor, in addition to the culprit of course, Ned Mace (he snatched babies from their cribs, in stores, whenever he had a chance: sold them and bribed all and everyone who wished to stop him).
The winds were heavy in Galveston that summer, the ocean seemed to have produced waves as high as houses, and the winds seeped through the streets. Ned Mace, obeyed every word the Sheriff said, as if he was a toy, but that was not Ned’s nature of course. During this journey, which consisted of walking several hundred feet in the twilight, to a stagecoach, that would take him to a prison the ropes were not once removed.
One of the two deputies, by the name of Allison, had to urinate, and asked the others to halt, and he ran in an alley to do his thing, during this time, the culprit complained of his wrists were swelling to a point it was unbearable. The sheriff took a look, ever so attentive it seemed, then the deputy examined the rope closer together with the Sheriff, it was over-tightened, but the duty said, “So what, this isn’t a beauty contest…so they’re red and swollen…!” and the Sheriff left it alone. Then suddenly a bullet hit the shoulder of the sheriff, he fell back, and a great array of bullets came—one after the other—at the rest of the entourage, the conclusion was: all but the sheriff and Ned were dead, and the shooter, the deputy, took off like a bee after honey, and so did Ned Mace. The sheriff stood up looked about and yelled for help, as if he was feeble with his wound, which was a very light wound indeed, just scratching the flesh.
It would seem to an onlooker, accuracy and speed helped this escape, thus it was planned, but who saw it? Who witnessed it, it was twilight, and no one could say for sure, and so the sheriff of course knew this, and it would remain a mystery for which the slayers were, but one could say it was the deputy, not even the town drunk could have seen this.

There were many side streets, dark and dingy around that area of twon, and the one the deputy ran down, was next to a hotel, and in the morning, Arizona Blue, walked out of the front door of the hotel, he was on his way to Yellowstone, stopped for a moment to rest up. Now in the bar he saw the sheriff, quietly he walked up to him, asked how he was, the sheriff knew who Blue, was, and simple said, “A bit of trouble last night!” And perhaps the sheriff should not have, for Blue responded, “I know, I saw it all!” The sheriff took a swallow of his beer, “All you say…? too bad the deputy got away and Ned!”
So, said Blue, “The deputy was the bad guy?”
“Of course, he even shot me here in the shoulder!” Then the sheriff pointed to his shoulder.
Said Blue, “I killed the Deputy.” And the sheriff become lost for words, and just at that time, “Ned Mace came down the street, his horse aimlessly crisscrossing main street, his body was like a sack of potatoes laying over the saddle, tied to the horse, the town folks all ran to Ned, looked at the sheriff. The barkeeper overheard the conversation. And Blue went on to Yellowstone.

6-6-2007 (EP/Lima, Peru)

Arizona Blue: Scarlet with Rage (1844)

Arizona Blue:
Scarlet with Rage (1844)

(1844) He hadn’t forgotten his gun, it was in his hand—although he looked at it, but the sight that greeted his eyes was greater, his mother, and that was more important to focus on, she had vivid eyes, the man behind her made him grip his gun tighter, he would be her brave man, if need be, he set every nerve in his noble body on alert, truthful to the tingling he was but twelve-years old at the time,—expectantly he knew he had to do it.
“Attention,” screamed the voice behind his mother—rapidly he pointed the gun upwards, “Fire” the drunk said, as if he didn’t care, then a smug remark followed, “…if you can!” The drunk was scarlet with rage, the boy cool as steel, his gun heavy in his hand.
“Pa—step back from Ma…!” he demanded, taking aim, his mother bloody, broken nose, bruised ribs, weakly wobbling on her knees back and forth, sideways, and her eyes both closing from the red soreness that circled around them: the old man was drunk again, Blue had seen this before, but not quite like this, and now he knew how to fight back, his father taught him.

Blue made one last appeal—which would be his last in his lifetime, he so generously lent; then out of the corner of his eye he saw his father reach for a weapon (alongside him, believed to be a hunting knife he kept in his boot). A few seconds after this, with his father’s last fleeting glimpse—of insanity, and insensitivity, and a last look of devotion from Blue, a bullet penetrated his father’s flesh: he fell over backwards, and as he fell, Blue heard a cry, “Too late!”


(1882) Arizona Blue sat back by his fire, against a rock in Yellowstone National Park, Camping by himself with his horse Dan, now fifty-years old, and this reelection came back. Then he remembered his mother’s hands, and lifting her up from her knees…then going into the back of the wagon, and her tucking him in tightly with blankets to keep him warm for the night.

6-7-2007 (AP/Lima, Peru)

Arizona Blue--Gunfighter, in: "The Written Word" (#33)) 1843))

Arizona Blue—Gunfighter, in: “The Written Word” (#33)

The Summer of 1843 (A Story out of Chicago)


Arizona Blue, could not of course, write or read for that matter any language whatsoever, and he was but eleven years old; he pronounced words of one to two syllables for the most apart, as was his vocabulary simpler.
Subsequently, he wanted to learn, but he was too anxious, busy fighting at school, working at home, always anxious, restless—unstill.
Every morning he’d consequently direct himself down a path to the school, with good intentions to go, but in the interest of truth, I must say, he seldom make it to the school, Sid Milliard, a close friend, a year older, would be waiting somewhere along that path, waiting for him, and most of the time he found Blue, and they’d go get drunk in the nearby crematory, putting their homemade whisky jugs on the tombstones, talking, drinking, until they’d pass out from the moonshine Sid’s father made in the back of his store in Quincy, Illinois. His mother, Maria, simply said “Son like father,” but it worried her to the marrow of her bones that he was not getting any worthy education in reading or writing. But again she confessed to her sister Sally by letter, “In my life so perfectly I understand, Blue is like his father, in many ways, he is a most exquisite nuance for a son, but I love him.”
And in the summer of 1843, Sally invited the family down to Chicago, both sisters had an idea. (It should be said, Maria was cleaver indeed, well read, and knew the written word well, and perhaps to a high degree the unspoken word as well, for she was a survivor; her vocabulary was a master of intricate words if she wanted to use them; she was breed at an all female college, one a famous poet attended during her times, in New England.)
Blue often thought, ‘If I had one third, just one measly third of my mother’s intellect, I’d be ranked high among my peers, but he liked the art of fighting, and shooting, similar to his father. And he was torn on the drinking part, but he drank nonetheless, often, but at his young age, it seemed more of an emulating thing, than anything else.
I suppose one could say, Blue’s father—in comparison to his mother—was extraordinarily simple, and many of his words were unutterable, thus, communication lay very deep in respect for his father, and the son gave it (father like son; or the other way around), and of course this concerned Maria.

—One day after their arrival in Chicago, Maria introduced Blue to his Aunt Sally Cowden, and her daughter, Sheila. She was all of seventeen years of age, and Blue of course six years younger, but he was big for his age, and serious in his composure, they took a liking for one another, like white on rice, right away. In any case, the two sisters enjoyed the summer together, as Blue’s father was working on a farm outside of Quincy trying to get enough money together to head out west once they got back to the city, in early September.
As a result, the secret of Blue’s learning was really connected to his attraction to Sheila, one Blue would never forget. That summer proved to be an intense study into words, reading, spelling, and Blue concentrated very deeply on this, it would be a period of time he’d never replicate again.
It began and ended with an innate and homogeneous tactile liking between Sheila and Blue—one that seemed to appear with an almost unspeakable ease. As always his mind raced, and thus, picked up her daily lessons quite easily, and in time, she would become a teacher, her life’s goal.
But it would be back to Quincy for Blue and his mother, and then out west, as his father was buying the wagon and supplies needed for the long journey, and on that journey is where Blue would earn his future reputation.

Written EP, Lima, Peru, 6-6-2007

Arizona Blue--Gunfighter, in: The Shooter from Lima (1881))#32))

Arizona Blue—Gunfighter, in:
The Shooter from Lima (1881))Episode #32))

Advance: They had all gathered outside along Main Street, Abilene was the town: Amos—from New Orleans had just got into town, heard the commotion, a gun fight was about to start, he stood by his horse, hung on tight to its bridle, and Bill the Bartender from the local saloon, stood scratching his thick neck, and Zelda, the prostituted was hanging over the balcony, trying to get focused from a long drunken night, it was forenoon, and a cold darkness, a silence crept over the muddy street, through the soupy sky…(It was the day his father died, which was July 1, 1844, he was only 46-years old back then. His Mother Margaret Teresa Dalton, had to raise him then after. It was a rough childhood, coming west from Quincy , Illinois, he couldn’t remember the exact year he was born, he thought his father once said it was 1832 (he would die in 1885), now standing in the sun, he felt like the kid said, ‘Old man’ to him, he was 49-years old to the best of his knowledge, longer than most gun fighters ever got to be (Wyatt Earp, would grow old, but not many like him did, he had met him once in Tombstone). Anyhow, today was a hot day in Abilene, and some kid from the far south had come up through Mexico, he said he was from Peru, Lima to be exact, and he had just killed someone in the bar. But Arizona was really thinking about his dad, and his mother, but not for long, not after the kid smack into him.

[The Shooter from Lima] He wore a clad shirt, the young shooter from Lima, his long lean muscled legs were planted far apart in the mud, in the middle of the street, he shook his head from side to side at the recumbent (the tall man he called to have a shootout with ((His name was Manual something…no one got his last name, they just called him, ‘The shooter from Lima)).
Curiously enough (at least to Arizona Blue), the Peruvian said in English
“Go for it Mister!” then he added “Mister Blue…or whatever they call you!”
Blue murmured ‘I’ll kill you sunny…go on while you can to wherever that place called Lima is…!’
And the Shooter laughed, slowly laughed, and Arizona said in his whispering voice, ‘Enough of this nonsense…!” and like a drummer, he shot four holes in his chest, faster than you could blink an eye; the shooter barely got his gun out of his holster.
As Blue’s bullets climaxed in a thundering push, knocking the young kid down into the mud, steadily cramming through flesh and bone and internal organs, Manual’s voice echoed a producing, but dim vocal cry, “I’m actually dying…!” He said. The young man’s laugh became less and less as Blue approached him—the demonstration was over, complete, Arizona told himself. The shooter from Lima was dying, slowly.
His lips became yellow, his face expressionless, his feet, jerking as Blue approached him with his rawhide look, it had been a long ride from Mexico to Abilene, and he was tired, wind and sun burnt, and now he seemed to produce a fascinating grimes, as he stood over the dying lad, “Old, you say, haw…” commented Blue to the dying man. “I see you got no more profanity for me.”
The Peruvian puffed gently as he lay, internally gasping for air, helpless with miner gestures, and Blue, pitiless with grace; thereat, Blue turned to walk into the bar, allowing the shooter delicately to escape for an abstracted interest, his dying wish, quietly and quickly he removed the gun from under his leg, with a burningness in his chest, and his last efforts, he lifted the gun a few inches, shot it off, and a bullet plunged into the left back thigh of Blue. He stopped, hesitated, then without acknowledging the wound, he walked into the bar as if nothing happened, ordered a drink (he’d not allow himself, or the kid, nor the onlookers a show…he’d take care of it later, and suffer the pain now).


Afterward: The Sheriff was in his office looking out the window, holding a curtain with his left hand, and outside his office was Judas, the drunk of the town sweeping the wooden sidewalk clean, and around the pole, his attire—rages. The sheriff shook his head, murmured ‘had not the young man learned a lesson in the bar, when he nearly got his gun out and shot old Zulu, and then bumped into Blue, and called him on, Zulu was not half as fast as Arizona Blue, alas, no one counseled the Kid from Lima.’

Written in Lima, Peru, 6-5-2007