/ASJ||AHC\
My Cousin's Hat
Things've changed the last year and some and I don't mean just us leaving the Hole and going for amnesty and all the changes we didn't know would happen but did. Could be that's what brought on the change but I ain't convinced yet it is.
Talking about my cousin's hat. Was a time he held some kind of special affinity for it being his reflection, like any man's hat is, but it was different with him. He wore it like it was a gold crown. Maybe because his grandda's stories about being chieftains in the old country were swimming around in the back of his mind that he says is brilliant and for what I'm a witness to my whole life, he ain't far off the mark, on that second 'count at least.
Heyes always dressed a cut above back when we lived at the Hole. And he brushed that hat every night, knocking off trail dust, rubbing a damp rag on the band to get off mud, handled it almost like he does a safe dial. And he'd set it on his dresser with flair and casual at the same time, like I wasn't supposed to notice he took the care.
He walked straight and tall wearing that buffed hat! That pride mighta been on account of us always beat down in life, so early on Heyes came to figure that being an outlaw was the only way in this world he could look some men straight in the eye. Then we teamed up leading the Hole and his hat came to be his way of saying to the law, "You and me, we're on the same level in this world." Wore his hat same way the law wears a badge. Yeah, that's what that buffed leader's hat meant to Heyes.
And now? Hoo! The gang would be pole axed to see that crown tarnished and broke! Got a hole square in front that gets bigger every time he doffs it, thing's always dusty, out of shape, and he hardly ever brushes it at night anymore.
There's something about that, the way he don't take that care for it now, cuts a little. And I'm trying to figure why.
Is it because we left the Hole and that ain't sitting well with him? My partner likes to give technology the credit for driving us out but we both knew it was only a matter of time before a bullet added a hanging offense to armed robbery on our wanted posters. I have the fast draw that worries him some and he's worked out plans for that after amnesty but like he told me once, no one will ever call him out to crack a safe. Is he drawn back to that life of easy money that we figured had played itself out?
My cousin knows more in the outlaw world than me, been in it more years, and I see him when he reads a newspaper about some outlaw he once run across been taken out by a sheriff or posse and laid out on a plank in front of the law office for photographs. He dwells on it for a time and that gives me hope that returning ain't high on his mind.
So could it be our crime partnership, now it's over, was the last thing we had to keep us together? Have to ask myself when he tosses his hat on the dresser of some cheap hotel we're laying low in, is he tossing off our partnership in his own mind?
I ain't no stranger to being on my own and neither is Heyes, even told him we might have a better chance at amnesty if we split, but he'd have no part of that, and I gotta agree we're better off when we work together. It's just that... Heyes don't always share his plans.
Then, when I don't see it coming, and I like these times, he smiles at something running through his mind, a memory, an' then he's telling me a story about us being kids at home when things were like they were supposed to be, happy an' safe forever. Heyes, he remembers more than me an' when the feeling hits him, I can get him talking for hours!
Take yesterday. We ride into a railroad town that never got far in life, us both almost drowned in the saddle from the deluge been beating down on us for hours, a hot meal at the saloon, and with the bottle of rye Heyes splurged on, we shiver on back to our hotel room. I'm feeling real beat by the day we had so I ain't giving Heyes much more than silence, feel more like sitting alone thinking on my troubles.
Well, there's a couple scuttles of coal by the pot bellied stove in the corner Heyes splurged more on and after he tosses his hat aside, he's got the room warmed in short time. We sit on the bed with a deck of cards and the rye and it ain't long before I see Heyes is about to open up.
I tell you, we sat up half the night telling memories! Ones we know by heart and new ones to me. I let Heyes take the lead an' didn't have to push much before a good memory rose an' he'd stop dealing cards an' tell me. Seemed the more questions I asked, the deeper he went. Simple ones came to his mind, maybe just a sight.
– "I woke from a nap on your folks' bed so I went into the sod barn an' you were laying your head across your ma's lap while she milked the cow." –
An' I could see what he saw. I can hear their voices again. While it lasted.
– sigh –
Slept sound last night, real sound.
But not long! Heyes is up at crack of a dark, gloomy dawn and to him the day is already late! He's lit the lantern and starts in shaking me and shaking the bed. Aw, Heyes, can't you let me sleep on a rainy day?
He's going on and on about a plan that came to him in his sleep and how we're gonna get us a stake and up our purse with hardly a sous between us! He ain't saying yet what the plan is but he promised me breakfast first knowing that'll get me out of bed and dressed. His brown eyes are all lit, he's so cock sure we'll pull it off! That's when I can't help grinning at what I know deep down.
See, they don't matter to Heyes, the trail dust and mud and that hole.
I know deep down that whatever we do, we do it together like we always done. Because we're cousins and ain't nothing can change that! And us two, we'll always be a cut above, don't matter what we have on.
I'm more than ready for breakfast so I take his hat from the dresser to hand him and damn! That thing's beat and dusty! Besides the hole, he's got three creases ready to bust open. How many more til he let's it rest in peace? And a new thought hits me so hard it stops me dead.
Heyes is counting.
Always figured it's a safe bet if I asked him how long we been after amnesty, he'd pull out his pocket watch and tell me to the second how long since he walked through the front door of Lom Trevors' office.
We were so good! Me and Heyes were so good at robbing we laughed at the danger and risks we took every time, pretty arrogant with success. Even after I was shot we still went on like we'd live forever! Then the railroad upped the bounty over what our crimes were – dead or alive - and we both knew that one day... We won't ever show it, but life got grim fast.
And every day my cousin wears his reminders of all the outlaws fell by the wayside and who could've been us and all the other reasons why he ain't ever going back and why we made the right choice to leave. That's what that old leader's hat means to Heyes, reminders. So he don't take the care for it anymore.
Yeah, that's it. Heyes figures the more beat his hat gets, the closer we are to amnesty.
That's what I'll remember when I look on my cousin's hat, how he's doing all he can to get us through to amnesty. Can't help but find my own resolve to stay on the amnesty trail with that hat leading the way. My whole life I've appreciated my cousin seeing things when I can't.
He's smiling when I look up. That hat might be knocked down since we ain't outlaw leaders anymore, but he still lowers it on his head like it's made of pure gold and flush with diamonds. He flashes his hands along the brims and gives me a wink for courage and – whistle! – I'm following my cousin's dusty and tore hat out the door!
I won't ever say this to him, always been my duty to keep that brilliant mind grounded on important matters like strategy and tactics and regular meals. But you know, he still looks like a king wearing it.
/ASJ||AHC\
Times my cousin doesn't think things through, too quick to act and consequences be damned, he's gonna do a "good deed" if it gets us both killed or locked up for twenty! So many times I've had to warn him to back down from some cowpoke on a Saturday night pushing a woman around, or from some roughnecks giving an old timer the treatment.
It's a natural trait in my cousin, this chivalry code he's lived by all our lives. In all honesty, I've always been proud of him for it. Deep proud. But things are different now. We're wanted men who left the security of Devil's Hole so it's just the two of us, got no gang to back us up. And the bounty on us is dead or alive with a high price on our heads, and dead is always easier for the law. So I'm kept on constant guard against his "good deeds".
And he mostly won't listen to me. So, aliases be damned, pretty soon everyone knows we ain't the kind of men they thought we were half a second ago when some hot-headed cowpoke don't like his manhandling a lady interrupted so he squares off and has a Colt Forty-five drawn on him so fast he never sees the Kid move! So we gotta make another quick exit and put another pleasant town on our list of ones to avoid til the amnesty comes through.
Laid into him more than once, know I've got a temper that needs quelling. Not like my partner. He's cool as the Rockies in December standing up to walk-offs, staring down a card player who doesn't know he's about to lose to the fastest draw in the West. Think I'm the only one in this whole, wide world can ever rile my cousin.
Always regret what I say and how I say it, but that don't stop my 'silver tongue' cutting into him like a razor when I'm after him for putting us in danger just to save someone we don't even know!
These "good deeds" of his been on the rise since we broke from the Hole and lately they're coming at us faster than a locomotive. And I have to figure how to rein in the Kid, for both our sakes.
Take this latest one. Two days late so I went looking for him in the next town, then the next. Found he'd diverged from our job of delivering legal papers, me to one town and him to another, by butting in to stop some bounders accosting a woman in her buggy, then he escorts the woman home, which turns out in his favor since her husband was the recipient of the papers the Kid was delivering. They're the ones filled me in. Said he was paid and headed back to town. So now, besides my anger at him for straggling off course, I'm still in the dark on it all, wondering... Well, we seem to draw bad luck every time we split up.
Hotel clerk says he signed for a room, left for lunch and returned. So, I'm jumping the steps to the second floor ready to lay into him and the room looks empty. Bed not even rumpled. Then I see his hat on the floor to my left and to my right, a booted foot on the floor poking out from other side of the bed.
They must've been waiting in his room and got the drop on him. Ass holes. Worked him over so he didn't come to for hours and couldn't even move to take care of himself. Robbed him of every cent. Doc says he'll recover, in time.
And I got no recourse to the law on this, being we're wanted men. Nothing I can do but sit beside him and wait through the night. First one's always the toughest. And longest.
Why? Yes, I know the ass holes went for revenge. What I'm getting at is, why does my cousin have to be the one to save everybody? We always took care of our own at the Hole, never killed no one, but it's just the two of us now, don't he see the danger? What's going on behind those blue eyes today that wasn't when we were robbing?
The Kid wore a different hat at the Hole, a Boss hat, brims not curved like mine but upturned at the sides, slim band. Wore it into the first year of us trying for amnesty. Then something changed somewhere along the way.
This hat I picked off the floor after the doc saw to him, it's covered in trail dust and that ain't like the Kid. Cleans his new hat as often as he cleans his pistol.
Holding it now brings memories... us two kids trying to make our way in the world. See this? Wide brims, turned down in front and back, the sides straight. See what I mean? Switch out his new silver hatband for a braided cord and my cousin's hat is a cavalry hat.
Did you know it was the Kid who brought up and pushed the amnesty? We had more than one reason to, as my partner put it so good, get "outta this business." Some we shared, some were our own, but it was a decision we made together. Been tougher than we thought and times we get discouraged when the road ain't in front of us clear marked all the time. We'll struggle to pick our way along and one of us will be the one to point the way ahead. All my life I've been grateful having my cousin see things when I can't.
First time he donned this hat I knew right off why the style drew him. Gave him the squint-eyed look, I did, but that was all. Man's got a right to wear the hat that suits him, tells the world who he is. And the Kid's hat, well, he might not think on it this way, might not think on it at all. The Kid thinks with his heart, bless him.
Me knowing him all my life, I say it's a badge of rank to him. Yeah, a badge of rank from our past that draws on the better men in us today. It's the Kid figuring we might just make it to amnesty if we give our best to be the good men still inside us. Deep down, that's what this new hat means to him.
And then I'll see that cavalry hat crossing the saloon or crossing the street and my hands ball up with me knowing another "good deed" is about to blast all our chances for amnesty – or just a hotel room! - straight into oblivion! Aw, Kid, not again!
To be fair, my cousin's hat also reminds me how hard he tries and that encourages me to try that much harder. And yet, here we are in his hotel room with him lying there, beat and robbed... Aw, Kid.
God, he can frustrate me! That inner core of his just can't be changed! Or even pointed another direction! And trust me. I. Have. Tried.
– sigh –
He's sleeping sound now and I'm keeping watch, taking a damp cloth to his forehead and bruises. Times like this my patience runs low. No Kid to talk to always makes me nervous.
– sigh –
Well, as long as I'm gonna be up all night, might as well take a brush to my cousin's hat. Knock off that trail dust... wipe off the band...
Set it clean and fresh on the bed stand for when he wakes.
/ASJ||AHC\