Chapter Two

“What in the … where the hell am I? How’d I get here, wherever here is? Last thing I remember, cops were chasing me and then I was hit by lightning that nailed me bigger than shit. I have to be dead because none of this looks right to me.”

Taking in the room he was in, Mike Wesson saw four rough-hewed logged walls, a single cabinet about five-foot tall, a smaller table with a white tin basin resting on top, and to his left sat a straight back wooden chair where his clothes were laying. Behind him was a window but he couldn’t turn around to look outside. His body was still sore from what happened.

The door to his right opened and a voice spoke out.

“Mister, no need to move around so much, you need to save your strength. One of my ranch hands found you out along the side of Pitch-Fork Road about four days ago. You were looking pretty bad. We almost lost you once.”

“Four days! I’ve been here that long? And where exactly am I?”

“You’re on my spread, The Barrows. Ny name’s Dan Barrows. I took the liberty of going through what few belongings you have to find out who you might be, and I got a few questions that need some answers, Mike Wesson, or whoever you really are.”

“That’s my name. What kind of questions do you have?”

“Well, for one thing, those clothes hanging on that chair. I ain’t never seen duds like them before. Another thing—is this.”

Dan threw Mike, his driver’s license.

“Yeah, so what about it? It’s my driver’s license. You’ve seen them before, haven’t you?”

“Nope. You say it’s a drive-hers license? Okay, because I can read. I know’d what it said; what I can’t figure out is two things. One, how’d you get yer picture on it so small, and according to the date, the way I figured it up, you would be over a hundred years old. It don’t add up right in my head.”

“You can’t be serious, Mr. Barrows. Don’t you have a car? How did your ranch hand get me here, by horse and buggy?”

“Nope. He threw you across his saddle and rode you in. My wife, Betsy, looked after your wounds and that. Too far to send for the doctor, she said. What in blazes is a car, anyway?”

Mike looked at Dan and realized this man wasn’t joking with him. He knew absolutely nothing about a car, a driver’s license, or for that matter, anything period.

A single thought ran through Mike’s head, but he shook it off. No way, he thought, that’s just in the movies. This kind of stuff comes out of science-fiction books.

“If you’ll answer one question for me, it might explain a few things.”

“Shoot.”

“What year is it?” Mike closed his eyes and prayed he heard 1980.

“That’s a funny question. It’s 1880, why?”

Mike let out a groan and a heavy sigh.

“That’s what I was afraid of. That explains why the lightning bolt didn’t kill me. Those clothes over there were made in a factory and sold in a men’s clothing store. I paid almost a hundred bucks for those threads and they look ruined now.”

“A hundred dollars! That’s just a little more than three months wages I pay to a cow puncher. And you’re saying you got hit by lightning? You sure you ain’t pulling my leg, mister?”

“Mr. Barrows, this is harder for me to believe that it will be for you, but you have to believe me when I tell you I was struck by lightning and somehow I’ve traveled from 1980 to 1880. I’m from the future.”

“Sure you are. Tell you what I think. I think you best get a little more rest. I’ll have my wife bring you some of her stew. You’ll like it fine. Then get yourself some sleep. We’ll talk more later.”

Mike laid his head and settled into an all too soft pillow and could just barely hear the conversation on the other side of the door between Dan and his wife. What he heard, he didn’t like.

“Betsy, after dinner, I’m gonna ride into town and talk to the marshal about that stranger in there. Whoever he says he is ain’t important. It’s all his crazy talk about some contraption called cars, whatever they are and the year 1980. He claims he’s from the future but if you ask me, I think he escaped from some looney-silum.”

“Dan,” said Betsy, “he looks harmless and he doesn’t look dangerous. I think all he needs is plenty of rest until Doc Samms gets back from across the river. Then he can take a look at’em and he’ll know if he’s techted in the head or anything. My thinking is, after the way he looked when he was brought in, he must’a have had some kinda fever or something.”

“You can wait for Samms if you want, but I’m not. I’ll have Saul and Andy keep a close watch on him until I get back from seeing Marshal Teachey.”

Mike struggled to get out of bed and gently walked over to where his clothes laid. He took one look at them and knew they were unfit to wear. He would be spotted anywhere with those rags.

Moving over to the cabinet, he opened both doors and saw some shirts and corded jeans and a pair of boots on the floorboard of the cabinet. He tried on a blue shirt, a bit snug but it would have to do. The jeans fit except for the length which he rolled up into three-inch cuffs. Grabbing his own socks and putting them on, he then slipped his feet into the boots that were about a half-size too big but right then, he couldn’t be picky.

Okay. Now I need to get a gun and a car and I’m outta here. Then he gave a dry, deep chuckle. “Car? Maybe I am crazy. I need a horse. Damn, I don’t even know how to ride one. This is just so wrong.”

Mike looked at himself in the dresser-mirror and was amused by what he saw. He felt like he looked like a guy from the city going west to a dude ranch for a vacation.

Walking to the window behind the bed, he saw a corral with half a dozen horses. To the left sat a barn, to the right, a long building Mike figured might be a bunkhouse. It was in front of the bunkhouse he saw three horses tied to a hitching rail. He also took in a rifle attached to one of the saddles.

Make it to that one, I’m home free.

Moving the wooden bed as quietly as he could, he opened the window and slipped out onto dirt about five feet below him. He started running toward the horses but slowed to a fast walk as he could still feel the effects of the lightning strike. He was still a little weak and even though the thought of beef stew sounded good, he needed to get away, and fast.

Coming up to one horse, it had a deep midnight color and looked to have strong legs with a huge barreled chest and a white blaze on its face. It was the same horse with the rifle.

Mike untied the horse and whispered, “You and me, are taking a little ride. Just do me two favors. Be kind to my ass and don’t throw me. This is a first for me.” Mike grabbed the pommel of the saddle, put his foot in the stirrup and swung his other leg over. Just like in the movies, thought Mike. So far, so good.

The horse steadied himself, realizing this was a new rider on his back. When Mike said, “Let’s go,” the horse just stood in place. Mike didn’t understand why the horse wouldn’t move. Then he remembered all the westerns he watched as a kid. He pulled the reins to his left and the horse did a complete turnaround. Next, he kicked his feet into the sides of the horse and before Mike knew what was happening, the horse took off at a dead run.

Mike had no idea which direction he was headed until he looked up into the sun and saw it was leaning toward the east but that could mean it was still early morning or mid-morning. He couldn’t tell for sure.

“I guess I’m going east. But east to where? What the hell city will I come to? Damn, this horse can move fast, but I have to slow him down pretty soon. He’s rubbing my ass the wrong way.”

Mike had ridden about another four miles. A mile before that, Betsy had alerted her husband that Mike was gone.

Dan returned back to the bunkhouse, rounded up a few more of his hired ranch hands, who, all but Monte, had their horses saddled and ready to ride.

“Dan, that stranger took Midnight. Must have been awfully quiet for me not to hear him, but I’ll have to get one of the other horses out of the corral and mount up. You go on and I’ll catch up with you.”

Dan and five others rode off. From what they could see, the tracks from Midnight appeared to be headed west toward Lincoln, about ten miles away. At best, the now horse-thief, probably had a two to three-mile head start on them.

Meanwhile, Mike had managed to slow Midnight down but only because they were crossing over a section of rocks that led to Blaine Point, an older, run-down waystation for the stage lines.

Looking back, Mike could barely see a plume of dust headed his way. He knew it had to be Dan Barrows and some of his men.

“This isn't good. Wish I had a car, so I could put some real distance between me and them. I have the strangest feeling things are going to be a lot different from now on. I almost wish I was back at the bank right now. At least I’d have an idea of what to do and where to go. Here, I’m in a world of trouble, I do believe.”

Looking around, he spotted the waystation which resembled a small shack, but he also saw someone walking around.

“Okay, horse, that’s where I think I need to go. Let’s get going. If those people behind me, catch me, I’m in a world of hurt.”

As they bypassed a layer of rocks on the road, Mike kicked his heels gently this time against Midnight’s flanks, and again, Mike was cursing under his breath as his ass began to throb from the bouncing it was taking. Better my ass than a rope around my neck. “I might be from 1980, but I know in 1880, they hang people for horse theft.”

As he approached the rundown shack, he plainly saw a man who looked to be in his mid-sixties, wiry, bushy beard, also dressed in cord jeans, button-down suspenders, calico shirt and a wide-brimmed hat that had seen better days. Mike didn’t think he would have too much trouble from him. As he rode up and then pulled back on the reins a bit too fast, Midnight reared up and Mike lost his balance and grip and fell hard to the ground. The old man laughed as he grabbed hold of Midnight’s reins and steadied him.

“That’s what ya git, Monte, fer bein in such a dad burned hurry to git here, boy. Now, what’s all the fuss about—what! You ain’t Monte!”

As Mike was getting up from the hard-packed dirt, he saw the old man reaching for his hand gun strapped to his side. Reacting quickly, regardless of the pain he was feeling, Mike raced to the old man and hit him flush on the chin, knocking the old man out.

Looking around for Midnight who had wandered off, Mike saw he was too far away to chase down and time was running out.

Mike unbuckled the old man’s holster, checked the gun to make sure it was loaded, then ran over to a broken-down corral where the old man’s horse stood. He grabbed a blanket and saddle that hung across the top fencepost and muttered, “I hope I get this right. Those other men will be on me before much longer.”

Five minutes later, Mike felt as certain as he could that the saddle was on the right way and was cinched underneath tight enough. Swinging up onto the saddle, he kicked his legs into the horse’s sides and off he went again,

He could still feel that stinging pain in his ass. As far as he was concerned, better the pain than his neck being stretched.

Within five minutes of Mike leaving the old man behind, Dan and the other men rode up and saw the old man getting to his feet. Dan rode up fast, pulled in the reins and dismounted amidst a swirling dust surrounding them both.

“Jesse, you all right? What happened?”

“It all happened kinda quick, Dan. Stranger came in here ridin' Monte’s horse. Thought it was Monte at first, but I know’d somethin' was wrong when that stranger fell off when he pulled back too quick on Midnight. I was goin' fer muh gun when that stranger came up real quick-like and bopped me one. I tell yuh, if’n I git another chance at’em, I’ll take my gun and, and—why that no good thief! He stole muh damn gun!”

One of the other men rounded up Midnight and brought him back and tethered him off to a hitching rail in front of the shack that was now Jesse’s home.

“En to top it off, he stole Abner. He’s got muh horse! Just wait’ll I git muh hands on that horse thief, I’ll string’em up twice!”

Monte rode in and stopped next to Dan.

“Any sign of him yet?”

“Looks like we missed him by minutes, Monte. Your horse is over there tied up in front of Jesse’s place.”

“Wonder why he left him behind,” said Monte. “He’d have been better off he had stayed with Midnight. He’s one of the fastest ponies around.”

“Your guess is as good as mine.” Turning to Jesse, Dan said, “You going to be okay? We’re going after him.”

“I’ll be fine, Dan, but hold on just a bit, somethin’s just come to me. There’s still some old wanted posters in a box from a year ago inside, when the stagecoach last came through here. If’n I remember right, I think that stranger is on one of them posters.”

“Let’s take a look.”

Dan, Jesse and Monte walked inside the shack and watched as Jesse rummaged through a couple boxes he saved and finally found what he was after and went to the table and slapped it down hard.

“Yep. Here it is. Knew it was him. Says here he escaped from a prison over in Lincoln. He’s wanted for escape, bank robbery and murder. We can add horse thief to that list.”

“I remember reading about him in the Gazette when I went to Loadstone a while back,” explained Monte. “Seems like the posse had him cornered and then he simply vanished into thin air. I heard stories that the ground swallowed him up, and that lightning hit him so hard he just disappeared.”

“Hogwash,” said Jesse. A man can’t just disappear in front of half a dozen men. My guess is that he fooled’em so bad they made up that story, so they wouldn’t look bad for losin’em.”

“That sort of explains part of the story he was trying to tell me,” said Dan. “Can you imagine him saying he was from a hundred years in the future where they ride cars instead of horses?”

“Kers? What’s a ker?”

“I wouldn’t have any idea, Jesse.” Turning to the men he said, “Boys, we’d best to get to getting him before it gets dark.”

“Be careful, Dan. Accordin to this here poster, he’s kilt more’n thirty men and he’s quick-mean.”

“Jesse’s right, Dan,” followed up Monte. “From what I’ve read on this Cody Martin fella, he’d just as soon shoot you as to look at you.”

“We’ll just need to be more careful is all. Let’s mount up and get after him.”

By that time, Mike had a five-mile lead and felt more at ease about things, although the horse wasn’t as fast as the other one; at least his ass wasn’t feeling the pain it was earlier.

What he didn’t know was that Dan Barrows and the men who rode with him, had him confused with a dangerous outlaw with a bad reputation.