Incident in Dodge
I don't own these characters; I just like to spend time with them. No other profit to be had other than that.
(Set after Season 19)
M&KM&KM&KM&KM&KM&K
Matt Dillon and Kitty Russell were dead and not a single one of their friends mourned them. Not a one. To be certain, there were few who were glad of the matter, but none who actually grieved.
Now, before you get all excited and upset at me for saying that, let me tell you two things. First of all, I am only a humble story teller. Nothing more. I shall neither gain nor lose by telling you this tale. And secondly, this is just that. A tale. A tale to be told on a cold winter's night when there is little else to do besides sit by the fireplace and pray for spring.
So sit back, relax and I will relate to you, all that I know in this matter. And I assure you, I know quite a bit.
It all began years ago when I was very young woman. (I'm old now, in case you couldn't tell.)
I was fairly new to town, having only arrived by stage just 60 days prior. Being a young green kid from Bug Tussell, I have to admit, I was a little intimidated by the rough town of Dodge City. I had heard many evil things about it. I was told by more than one person that a proper young woman had no business in there.
But you see, I was tired of being a proper young woman. I didn't want to be proper. I wanted to be different. But the only thing different about me was my name and it was just a nickname given to me by my mama. (My real name is none of your business.)
And I was tired of being thought of as the property of my father and older brother. Tired of being told that my place was to keep their house, make their meals, do their washing and accept whatever man, they deemed suitable for me.
I suppose I should've been grateful and maybe even flattered slightly, that so far, they hadn't deemed any man suitable. However, I knew, just as surely as I knew my name was Randi Larkin, they weren't concerned with who was right for me. They were concerned with who would do their chores once I was married off.
So it was, with that thought in mind, that I rose early one morning, packed what few belongings I had, including the small amount of money I'd been able to squirrel away over the last four years and left. I was 18 years old and thought myself quite capable and plenty old enough to take care of myself.
I soon found out differently when I finally arrived in Dodge City, Kansas, Gomorrah of the Plains, as it had once been called. Of course, by the time I finally arrived on the scene, Dodge was less Gomorrah and more plain. I learned from a very talkative drummer, whom I'd shared a stage ride with, that a US Marshal by the name of Matt Dillon had pretty much cleaned up the town of Dodge as well as a large portion of Kansas.
That thought should have made me rest a little easier as the stage carried me ever closer to it, but it didn't. You see, it was excitement I wanted. I'd had enough of clean on the farm.
I yearned to be free from the long tailed cotton frocks with the long sleeves and proper undergarments that good girls wore. And tired of always having to curtsy and be polite and never being allowed to do what I wanted. I was tired of being a good girl.
I wanted to be a bad girl for once in my life. I wanted frilly dresses which left little to the imagination as to what my legs looked like and I wanted to be able to laugh when I wanted at whom I wanted and how I wanted without being told it was un-lady like. I didn't want to be a lady and from what Doby Clark told me, Dodge was the place to go to accomplish my goals.
Who is Doby, you ask? Only one of the sweetest and wildest men you'd ever want to meet, is all. If his tales were to be believed, and at the time I did believe them, he'd done just about everything a free man could do in the span of his 60 years. Hunter, trapper, buffalo hunter, Indian fighter, guide for the army, prospector, cowboy and a dozen other things I've either forgotten or don't care to mention.
From the time I was 14, which is when he first came to work for us on my papa's farm, he filled my head and my heart daily with tales of his travels and exploits. Of course, Papa and my brother Gary knew nothing of it. If they'd of known what things Doby had told me, they'd fired him and locked me away for a good number of years.
But they didn't know, and Doby and I continued to talk. It was from that talk that I got the desire, actually the fever, to go to Dodge and get myself a job as a saloon girl in the famous Long Branch saloon. Silly? Maybe. But when I figured that I'd stowed away enough money to do so, I took off.
I arrived in Dodge City exactly three days later, jostled, weary, aching and feeling like I'd eaten half the dust between Bug Tussell and Dodge. But I was there at last and I couldn't be happier.
That happiness lasted all of about 30 minutes. Just long enough for me to realize that I was in a strange town, with people I didn't know and all of about five dollars left to my name. And to make matters worse, I happened to catch a glimpse of myself in the storefront window of the mercantile and realized, no one, absolutely no one, would hire me as a saloon girl.
At least not the way I looked right then. You see looking back at me from that window, was not the petite, blue eyed blond with the slim figure and firm chest that I envisioned when I thought of myself or looked at myself in the pond back home. (Papa never let me have a full length mirror. He said it was sinful for a young girl.)
Nope, what I saw in the window, was a bedraggled girl, with hair sticking out every which way, wearing a dress that was just a little too big and looking like she'd just been rescued from a cave somewhere. That girl would not only not win any prizes for beauty, but more importantly to me, she wouldn't win a job at the Long Branch. And that was what I'd come for.
Mentally weighing my options, I decided my first course of action was to get a room over at the cheapest place in town and get cleaned up. What little money I had, might only pay for one nights lodging, but it at least would allow me the opportunity to get prepared for my job interview.
However, little did I know, as I walked down the boardwalk, my job interview was going to come sooner than I expected.
TBC
(Author's Note: We all know, I can't stand those movies and I refuse to acknowledge season 20 as it appeared on TV and I missed Sam and Louie so much so please keep that in mind while reading this.)
