Welcome to Howling Sands

A man rides, face down, scarved against the blowing sand that fills the air, the
biting wind that tears through the sky. He rides from one unknown to another, from one
shanty, clapboard town to the next, from one bottle in one saloon and one loveless
woman to the dead red sun that hangs over the horizon, a hard wiry man with no future
but whatever lays beyond the present hardship. Into the wind he rides, forever.

On an empty plain there rode a man. A blank and empty landscape, wide and

simmering beneath a red and empty sky; a harsh wind swept the salty sand into the air,

tiny whirling devils that swirled, weakened and died slowly away. Few things moved in

the day or the night, for few things lived there; even the hardiest creatures shunned that

naked expanse of sand. And yet; across that unforgiving plain there passed a rider on

horseback, one man alone, his face covered against the sand that blew and the heat that

blistered.

Morvant rode out over the wide salt flat, and in the hazy distance he saw far

ahead, the land fell away; a berm presented itself, the very edge of the earth, it seemed;

closer to him than the far horizon. The dark earth and the red sky seemed to beckon him

closer to that edge, that precipice, under which, he knew not what awaited. He was man

who searched, silently, for a sign. He went forth on his search alone; the scant bread and

the scant shelter of the solitary way were his; but in his heart there was hope yet for a

sign. Was this it, he wondered, as he always did; the end of my wandering.

When he reached the edge of the berm, he found himself looking down, upon a

town. It was a town that he had never seen, although he realized now, with the strange

foreboding of Déjà vu that he had come to accept as just another of his senses;

Here was a place of fate.

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In the street Morvant passed a sturdy-looking man with white hair, in his fifties

perhaps, shirtless, wearing an aged leather kepi hat with the lid hanging by a string,

tattered short pants, and boots that had long lost their laces. He stood in the middle of the

street, mindless of the whipping wind and the biting sand, pot-gutted and muscled. He

grinned a mad grin and hooted wordlessly as Morvant passed him. Morvant kept his eyes

on the wild figure, until the old man gave one especially loud hoot and ran away down an

alley.

Morvant tethered his horse and walked heavily into the saloon, his spurs clanking

on his heels. A corpulent man sat at the rear of the saloon, mustached, dark hair parted

carefully in the middle, cigar in hand. His face was smug and arrogant. He was dressed in

the clothes of a wealthy man, from somewhere back east; gold watch fob tucked into a

burgundy waistcoat, a suit tailored to fit his girth, a silk cravat. The rich man nodded to

Morvant and gestured towards a vacant chair at his table.

“Please, come, have a drink.” He said in a quiet, cordial voice.

The rich man took a tumbler that sat up-ended on the table and, turning it over,

poured three fingers of whiskey into it from a bottle that sat before him.

Morvant nodded and eased himself down in the chair.

“You’ve just come in from the desert.”

Morvant drained his glass and set it down before nodding slowly.

“I feared for a moment that you were a gunman who is reputed to haunt this place,

but he is a light-skinned black man, which I see now that you are not. He is a most

fearsome monitor, from all accounts.”

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Something distracted the rich man, and his gaze went to the door.

The old man from the street had come into the saloon now, and hooted softly at

the bar, where he was given a shot of whiskey by the scowling bartender, which he

downed immediately, and came to stand next to the rich man, beside whom he squatted,

muttering. The rich man saw Morvant’s quizzical glance, and smiled slightly.

“Fear not, for he is my man. He was in my regiment at Shiloh, and his mind is

now quite gone. He is still, however, loyal, and quite useful, despite his infirmity of

mind.”

At this point, the rich man took from his waistcoat a locket, which he opened and

stared into wistfully, before downing his glass and, eyes blazing with a strange intensity,

poured himself and Morvant another dram of whiskey. He looked again into the locket,

and whispered to himself, “Too pure, too pure.”

His eyes met Morvant’s, and he smiled nervously.

“Forgive me, sir. Allow me to present a portrait of my wife, who is currently back

East. I left her, you see, at our home in Baltimore.”

Morvant glanced at the picture, which showed a smiling woman with golden hair.

Her smile looked rather contrived, Morvant felt, but he said nothing. The rich man must

have seen something of a question in Morvant’s eyes, as he continued, “She is of a

delicate constitution, so I forbade her to travel with me. You, of all people, will

understand, as I have undertaken to travel this vast country, with my man here at my side,

searching for I know not what. A fever to depart overcame me, only days after our

marriage was consummated. My darling wife swooned at my announcement that intended

to leave; however, I was adamant. I own several factories, and left them in the hands of
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capable managers. After the late war, I dismissed all of my laborers, and filled the

positions with freedmen, for half the wage of my former workers, I might add, with the

stipulation that these freedmen workers must rent housing from me. In this wise, I have

added considerably to the fortune that my dear father amassed and left to me. So you see,

my dear wife wants for nothing.”

He puffed his cigar and drank. Beside him on the floor his man hooted softly and

laughed, slapping his bare thigh. The rich man looked at him for a second, then turned

again to Morvant. “Would you believe that this man was the senior non-commissioned

officer in my Headquarters Company? Oh, it is quite true, I assure you, sir. He was a very

brave and competent Master Sergeant, and followed my every order with absolute loyalty

and attention to detail; his bravery was without question. It was at Shiloh that he

distinguished himself forever in my eyes.”

Once again, the rich man filled both their glasses, and they drank; he puffed his

cigar and he turned his gaze, upward, as if seeking absolution, and his gaze fixed the

rafters as he went on,

“There, our regiment suffered greatly when the enemy, from a certain concealed

artillery position, enfiladed our line upon my order to advance. Our losses were great; I

ordered a general retreat, to the cover of a nearby grove, and, though this was achieved in

some good order, it was found that our regimental color bearer had fallen upon the field,

and that enemy troops, braving the fire that still raged across that field, were crawling out

in an attempt to capture our colors.”

“Upon hearing of this, with no regard whatsoever for his personal safety, my man

here,” he waved his cigar at the wild old man, who squatted in the floor, muttering,
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“dashed out upon that field of honor, with rifle balls piercing his cloak, and carrying

away locks of his hair; and he did bring back to our line the regimental colors, and they,

in honor, also, bore many bullet holes to show the peril they had undergone.”

The rich man paused to down another drink, and have another thoughtful draw

from his cigar.

“After the war, he was adventuring with me in the mountains of the west. He was

captured by Indians. When I arrived, after many days tracking, with a rescue party at the

hidden heathen camp where he had been taken, we found him in his present state.

Perhaps torture had erased his mind, although I could find no mark anywhere upon his

body. Perhaps those red Indians had perfected mental tortures of which the civilized man

cannot conceive. In any case, he knew me still, and reacted to me with his accustomed

loyalty and deferment.”

Now the rich man leaned in close to Morvant, so that Morvant smelled the sour

sweat of the big man beneath his expensive cologne, and saw, even in the fading light,

that the mild, dark eyes were shot through with tiny red veins. The rich man was drunk,

perhaps very drunk, Morvant realized; and also perhaps more than a little mad.

“On a certain piece of land that I own, there is a small tributary, and there is a

path that leads down to it. Quite overgrown, and isolated. It is his favorite place. When

we are home, we visit. There, he enjoys himself, quite naked, amidst the vines and

fronds, hooted and splashing about. I assure you, I derive as much pleasure from

observing him disport himself in this fashion, as if I were watching a young boy.” The

rich man wiped a tear from his eye.

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He looked once again into the locket, and said with a sigh, “Never. Never. Too

pure.” And then he clasped the locket and put it quickly away.

The whiskey had numbed him, and now Morvant walked the wooden sideboards

of the buildings of the town to clear his head. The wind howled and blew the dust of the

ragged desert down her streets. He found a door open walked inside. A slender woman,

with dark twinkling eyes and a disarming smile met him at the door. She was dressed in

the low-cut evening gown of the lady of pleasure. She was a natural beauty, however; her

hair was shiny and healthy, her body youthful and lovely as a statue of a nymph; her

voice was pleasant and warming when she said to him,

“Come in out of the wind, mister. Sit down and let me order you something to eat.

You look about done in.” Morvant raked a chair across the bare boards and sat at a table;

the young woman went to the back. Presently she returned and sat a plate of beef and

bread before Morvant. He ate silently, quickly, for he was very hungry, and she smiled

and rested her chin on the backs of her interlaced fingers and watched him with her dark,

twinkling eyes.

“I wonder where you come from,” she mused aloud. “I can tell that you ain’t from

out here. You got the look on you of someone who’s come a long way. A bounty hunter

or a ranger, I’ll just bet. I come here with a man named Carpenter, he said he’d be back

for me, but he never come back. I’m all alone.”

Morvant wiped his mouth and attempted a wan smile, but suddenly the girl rose

and swept a foot over his head, and came down, straddling his lap, facing him, her breasts
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on a level with his face. She looked down at him, with her fine china complexion, and

tiny dimples, inches from him, her perfume filling his senses.

“I sure hope that you are aimed to stay a while in Howling Sands.” She inched

ever closer as she spoke, until her lips came into contact with Morvant’s own, and she

kissed him long a softly, like one kisses someone they love more than anything, with a

quiet heat and desperation that made Morvant’s blood hot, but at the same time made him

recoil, for she had only just laid eyes on him minutes before, and he sensed that this was

somehow tied to the unholy dread that lay upon this place, that, though lovely, she was

just another part of its madness, like the rich man and his insane infantry sergeant, but,

even as he tried to rise, it was too late, because from behind him he now heard someone

say, in a voice full of pain and rage,

“Get away from her, you son of a bitch!”

Sighing, Morvant let the girl thud to the floor on her supple behind, and turned to

face the injured party, a tall young man dressed in a double-breasted red shirt, leather

chaps and jeans, and a battered Stetson and snakeskin boots. A dime-store cowboy,

complete with two ivory-handled Peacemakers, which took the comedy from the scene,

as they were both now presently leveled at Morvant.

“Come here to me, Danielle!” The young man shouted.

“Oh, Cordell, don’t!” The girl cried, but she rose and ran to embrace the young

man, anyway. “He didn’t mean nothing by it…he …just…”

“Nobody kisses my gal and gets away with it!” Cordell shouted. He lowered his

guns slightly. “But don’t worry, I don’t gun nobody down in cold blood!”
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He put holstered the left Peacemaker and wrapped that arm tight around the girl,

Danielle’s, waist. “Me and you’s gone have us a little showdown. Ain’t no back door to

this place, so I’ll give you two minutes, and then me and you’s gone meet out in the

street, at thirty paces, just like them gunslingers in the dime-store books.”

The girl looked at Morvant with a strong plea in her eyes; but whether it was to

refuse the duel, or to kill young Cordell, he could not decipher.

Morvant strode to the rear of the room, after the two young people had went out

the door. There were shelves there; he saw that Cordell was right, there was indeed no

back way out. He took a bottle of whiskey down from a shelf, and, removing the cork,

had himself a drink. He replaced the cork, and, taking the bottle with him, went out into

the street.

As he walked slowly across the street to where his horse was tethered, he saw that

Cordell was standing down the street from him, and that he still held Danielle tightly to

his side. The girl broke away and ran to Morvant. She ran to within five feet of him and

said in a furious whispered growl, “Please kill him and take me away from here, and I’ll

do anything you want, I swear, anything!”

Morvant paused, uncorked the whiskey, and took another pull. He slapped the

cork back home and reached the horse now, and started untying the tether.

“Danielle! Get away from there! Me and that drifter’s fixin’ to shoot it out!”

The girl let out a howl of frustration and ran back into the building where

Morvant and she had met.

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“Drifter! What in hell are you doin’? Me and you are gonna draw down! You

better protect yerself!”

Morvant turned to look at the young man whose name was Cordell, but now he

heard from behind him, farther down the street,

“Where’s my Danielle!”

The dime-store cowboy shifted his gaze down the street, and Morvant turned to

look, too, toward the source of this latest development.

A slender, handsome figure, in the black narrow suit of the gambler, strode out,

mean and narrow as a puritan minister, from the shadows, into the middle of the street.

He was a brown-skinned man, with a slight mustache; beneath the straight brim of his

black hat, a piercing gaze was leveled at Cordell, who stood in the street, still ready to

draw on Morvant.

Carpenter swept back the right wing of his overcoat to reveal a Dragoon pistol

that rode upon his torso.

Cordell licked his lips, and shouted to this new apparition, “You—you left her

here, Carpenter! She’s with me now!”

At the sound of the shouting, Danielle had reappeared in the doorway, and her

hands were over her mouth, as she looked up and down the street, at the two men who

contested her hand.

“We’ll see about that!” Carpenter shouted back, but without heat.

Morvant threw his left leg over his horse, and gave her a little nudge. She started

trotting down the street, past Carpenter and out of town.

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Suddenly, there was gunfire; one, two, three shots; the first two the sounds of twin

Peacemakers; the last, the sullen boom of a Dragoon pistol. Morvant looked behind him,

and saw that Cordell, the dime-store cowboy, lay motionless in the middle of the street,

some thirty-odd paces behind him.

The rich man and his mad old companion were out on the steps of the saloon, as

was the barman, and the rich man raised his glass and nodded to Morvant as he rode by.

The old man pointed his finger at Morvant and made pistol sounds with his lips, “pkew,

pkew, PKEW!” He then gave a saucy laugh and ran inside.

On the other side of him, Carpenter looked hard at Morvant, even as Danielle ran

to him and he clutched her to him with one arm.

“What about you, mister?” Carpenter shouted as he passed. “What do you have to

say?”

Morvant pulled up his horse for a second, long enough to take another pull off of

the whiskey before heading back out into the desert.

Then, he tipped his hat, and said, “Adios.”

A lone man rides, face down, searching over the barren wastes for a sign. He

does not look behind him; he gazes always ahead, and when he sleeps, which is seldom,

that gaze is turned inward, as he remembers all that depends upon his search, and its

success. Into the unknown he rides, mindful that though he rides alone, others are ever

searching, also.

The wind still howls and the sand still bites the traveler. The plain is empty of life,

save a few crawling things that writhe in the dunes, or erupt from the sweltering sands to
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seize and bite. All this under the feet, unnoticed, of a lone, wandering horse, with its

hard-bitten rider bowed low against the red storm flung against his slow progress. The

horizon is his only goal, and the next realm over, the next Hell or Heaven, or perhaps

some middle way, some middle place; for him there is no rest; for if he at last finds what

he seeks, his journey is still only halfway done…