GRAVESET OREGON 1865

A Gothic Western 

It was the last call......Lights out in the small hamlet of Graveset Oregon, population 598 souls (Now 597). It became apparent to everyone in town that something had changed. They had all felt it the day before when the farrier Jack Harney found the dead mans head hanging from a long rope and tied by its hair from the front main beam of the stables, and everyone was equally surprised when their long time acquaintance Mr. Harney had died of a coronary right there on the spot. The expression left on his face was cast in an eerie half scream, it's like he didn't have time to scream all the way....Kinda of like he was dead of fright before his body hit the wooden floor boards in front of that old decrepit post and pole barn. Bob Coulter and his buddy Bob Ricks picked up and carried poor old Jack's body by the arms and legs and laid him down inside the livery on the table beside the tack, Bob scratched his head and looked over at Bob, "you know I ain't gonna touch that damn head hanging over on that wood beam!" Bob looked at him with blood shot eyes which was caused by his drinking binge from the previous night, then one of his suspender loops gave way from his pants button and hit him on the chin. "Ouch, dang spender! I don't give a rats ass what the hell you do Bob, I imagine we ought to leave that up to the sheriff......You know what I mean?" The other Bob scratched his head again, " well I reckon, but you don't have to be so grouchy, ya snake." Both Bobs walked out of the stables, steering clear of the hanging head, "sheeeit!" Bob with the blood shot eyes mumbled, "there must be a hundred flies buzzen around that stinky head." He spat a bottom lip full of chew down towards the ground, hitting the other Bob on the boot. "Bastard!" He shouted, and then grinned, his mouth full of gums except for one tooth on the upper left side.

Lana Jacobs closed the door to the jailhouse then looked through the dirty window and watched Bob walking towards the Ormsby saloon and eatery with the other Bob trailing not to far behind. "You had better cut that head down John, its startin to draw flies." She turned and searched John's eyes for some kind of reasoning behind the latest happenings, but the sheriff just looked back down at his Remington revolver and loaded another charge of powder and ball...Seating them both firmly with the loading lever. "There was an incident down in Humboldt last month," John recalled. " They found eight bodies without heads, two women, a child and five men. They had been roastin out in the desert sun for a week or so, nobody could identify em......But the head over yonder is a real fresh one, maybe only a couple days." He seated the last charge in his revolver, and laid it on the desk. Lana started to shake as she pulled a string of blond hair from her eyes, " It sounds like a killer on the lose John, but scalps I can understand..... Taking their heads......I don't think so." John leaned heavy on the back two legs of his chair. "That's what I was thinkin, we got us a local maniac in the area....Taken heads."

The sheriff cut the head down from the wood beam with his folding whittling knife and let it drop into a burlap sack that he had prepared earlier with some lime and salt. He was careful to tuck the bloody spine in there also, while feeling the morning breakfast in his throat a couple of times. But he held it back. The stench seemed to follow him as he walked back towards the jailhouse, quickly dumping the sack near the front door. The town’s people stared at him though the black windows with half drawn shades as a silence permeated the dusty streets. John looked over his shoulder as he entered, expecting to see a wagon, a horse or a pedestrian.....But all was quite, maybe a little to quite, as if it only took two days to turn Graveset into a ghost town."Just plain messed up." He grumbled, and then closed the door behind him.

The tails of his long black coat rustled in the breeze as the town’s undertaker walked the boards to Jack Harney's stable, a short cigar dangled from lips hidden by a thick brown handle bar moustache. His eyes narrowed, and then darted from side to side. The pale bony fingers of his left hand clutched a cloth measuring tape. " I got a six footer in the showroom, but I thinks Jack was nye on six foot two.....Just do a little cuttin at ankle level....That oughta do it." He said in a hoarse whisper, smiled, then paused at the window in front the eatery, Bob and his Buddy Bob were just finishing up a steak and potatoes when they looked up from their plates to see Desmond staring back through the wavy glass. They both looked the other way for fear the undertaker would start sizing them up. But when they had built up the nerve to turn back and look, Desmond was gone, and both of them got up slowly and looked out the window just when the undertaker was disappearing through the large stable doors. "Crap! That undertaker gives me the willies, the only time I see him is when thar's death!" Bob winched then blinked his eyes nervously as he spoke. "Ya you dumb shat, he's the undertaker!" The other Bob said, his voice cracking in mid sentence. He slapped him upside the head with his open hand as his suspender gave way again, snapping him on the chin.” Son of a!!" They both sat back down, Bob looked over at Bob and they could tell by each others pale white expressions that the death merchant was just beginning the deed, and soon the dead would be stacked in the undertakers shop like dried cord wood, and they wondered if any of them would still have their heads

”Bob………You feelin like a piece a apple pie?”