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  [February 2023]   

Chapters: 1

Word Count: 2,792

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Warnings: Character death

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REGRETS

 

by

Eleanor Ward

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Everyone has regrets to a greater or lesser degree, but some regrets can have a lifelong impact.

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“’Go to hell!’  Those were the last words I ever said to him. Had I known they would be, I would never had said them.  But none of us know where, or when will be the last time we will ever see or speak to someone.  If we did, no doubt we would choose our words more thoughtfully.  Saying those words is my biggest regret, that will stay with me for the rest of my days.

 

We’d been bickering on and off for weeks, having been chased out of town after town after being recognized by Sheriff’s, bounty hunters and even former associates keen to get their hands on the twenty-thousand dollar reward on our heads, camping out in freezing weather, on the brink of starvation much of the time.  I started to think that quitting trying for amnesty and heading to Mexico - which we’d discussed many times before but dismissed, because two Gringos would have stuck out like a sore thumb amongst the locals - might not be such a bad idea after all.  He got all stubborn about it, when I suggested it, saying that after all the time and effort we’d put in we should stick with it until we got a decision either way. If, in the end, it was refused, then we could make a break for Mexico, or Canada.

 

It all came to a head just after Christmas. Both of us got sick with the grippe and because we barely had any money, and were too sick to even go and play poker to boost our funds, we ended up in the shabbiest hotel we’d ever had the misfortune to frequent, because it was all we could afford. Cramped, uncomfortable and a good deal less than clean, we would probably have been more comfortable sleeping at the livery with the horses. The only good thing you could say about it was that it was dry, and relatively warm – well, marginally warmer than being outdoors at least.

 

We were holed up there for more than a week, feeling like death warmed over, living mostly on broth and biscuits, although we did splash out one night, when our appetites started to come back, and shared one, small steak dinner between the two of us.

 

The bickering got worse during that week - after being stuck in that one small, cold room together, and feeling under the weather, it was probably a case of cabin fever -  and by the end of it, it had descended into a full-scale row.  We said some pretty harsh things to each other, raking over old disagreements and other things we both thought had been long forgotten about but which were suddenly remembered and blame dished out.  It was pretty ugly, and it ended with me saying that I’d had it, with him, and the amnesty, and I was leaving.

 

He called me stupid, for thinking that leaving and going it alone would make things any better, or either of us any safer, saying that I was an idiot to throw away what we’d achieved.

 

What we’d achieved?  If I hadn’t been so angry, I would have laughed at that remark. Instead, I reminded him that we’d achieved nothing. That we’d been living like gypsies for more than a year, broke and hungry most of the time with nothing to show for it. What was more idiotic than carrying on with it?  As far as I could see all the governor was doing was stringing us along, using the amnesty as a carrot, dangling it in front of us to keep us on the straight and narrow but with no real intention of ever granting it, and I’d had it with his hollow promises.

 

As I packed up to leave, he launched into a tirade, calling me a fool, a clown, a moron… I know he didn’t really mean any of it, he was just frustrated because he couldn’t reason with me, and panicked at the thought of us splitting up.  As I opened the door to leave, and he realized he wasn’t going to talk me round, he yelled, “Fine! Go!  But don’t expect me to come and bail you out when you end up in jail. Leave now, and we’re done. For good!”

 

I was halfway through the door by then.  I turned back to look at him, and that’s when I said it. “Go to hell!” 

 

I can still see the look on his face when I said it. His eyes were full of anger and frustration but, in their depths, I also saw desperation, and fear. Fear of being alone. I could tell he was desperate to beg me to stay, but pride wouldn’t let him say the words and I was too angry to consider the pitfalls of parting company and so I just slammed out of the room and left town.

 

What he’d said was right.  Travelling the country together, as wanted men, was tough.  But doing so alone was even tougher.  It wasn’t long before I regretted walking out.  I missed having that presence there to watch my back, and, even as irritating as he often could be, I missed his company.  I decided to seek him out and try and repair our friendship, but that turned out not to be so easy.   I contacted Lom to see if he knew of his whereabouts, but he hadn’t heard from him since the last time we’d wired him, a few weeks before we split up. He was pretty annoyed that we hadn’t kept our promise to keep him informed of our whereabouts, but said he would make enquiries to see if he’d been arrested, or spotted anywhere.  I wasn’t surprised when he wired back to say there were no such reports.  We were both good at laying false trails when we needed to. No doubt he was using a different name and, hopefully, was managing to keep out of trouble.

 

Everywhere I went, I searched for clues that he might have been there before me, but found none. It was like he’d disappeared off the face of the earth. Several months went by and I was no nearer to tracking him down.  I deeply regretted our argument, and the things I’d said, and I was sure he felt the same but his pride had driven him to stage a disappearing act, just to prove a point.

 

When he thinks he’s made his point he’ll get in touch, I told myself. He’ll know I’ll have asked Lom to let me know if he hears from him and he’ll send a message to him when he’s ready.

 

I kept telling myself that, but no message came.  I kept on the move, kept my head down and stayed out of trouble. Goodness knows why.  After everything I’d said, about quitting trying for amnesty and leaving the country, I didn’t know why I was still here, skulking around, living like a gypsy, instead of heading down to Mexico, or up to Canada, where I could live freely under any name I chose.  Except, deep down, I did know why.  I didn’t want to do it if he wasn’t with me.

 

So, I carried on moving from place to place, doing odd jobs and keeping out of trouble as per the terms of our agreement with the governor. If the governor decided to grant us amnesty it would be big news around the country that would, when he heard it, hopefully bring him back to Porterville.  Then we could mend our relationship. It was a hope to cling to, and cling to it I did.

 

Then, one day, 22nd September, 1882, to be exact – the date is forever etched in my memory -  I arrived in Greeley, Colorado, hoping to find some ranch work.  After stabling my horse, I was heading towards the hotel when my attention was drawn by a bunch of people huddled around a man with a newspaper, their attention on the front page as they all talked animatedly.

 

“Well, it’s been a long time coming.” I heard one of them say. “The law has been trying to catch up with them for years.”

 

Automatically, my feet turned in their direction and I crossed to the group and craned my neck to try and see who they were reading about, my heart leaping into my mouth when I glimpsed the headline;

 

OUTLAW, HANNIBAL HEYES KILLED.

 

Somehow, I managed to stay on my feet even though my senses were reeling.  It couldn’t be true. It must have just been someone who looked a bit like him. They had to be mistaken. He couldn’t be dead.

 

I headed to the newspaper office to get another copy of the paper and headed down a secluded alley to read it in private, still telling myself that it couldn’t be true.  But the paper seemed certain that it was.

 

It said that he’d been recognized by the Sheriff in Buena Vista, Colorado, when he’d stopped off in the town.  According to the news report, he had attempted to flee, had been chased by the town’s posse and shot during a gun battle a few miles out of town,  just three days previously.  His body, it said, had been shipped to Cheyenne for identification after which the necessary reward would be paid out before, if no relatives came forward to claim it, being buried in the local cemetery.

 

Sliding down the wall of one of the buildings lining the alley, I just sat there, on the ground, staring at the report, feeling like my heart had been ripped out of my chest.  He was gone?  There would be no reconciliation. No chance to apologize. No future to be shared with him, with or without the amnesty. 

 

I don’t know how long I sat there, before the thought occurred to me to contact Lom. He would be able to get to the truth of it. Whether it really was Heyes who had been killed or just someone who fitted the description on his wanted poster.  I was only a day’s journey from Porterville so instead of wiring him, I went straight over there.  Only, when I arrived, his deputy told me he’d gone to Cheyenne “on business”.  I didn’t need to ask what business he was on.  Obviously he’d heard the news too and had gone to investigate without telling his deputy anything.

 

He’d told the deputy where he would be staying in Cheyenne, in case he needed to contact him for any important town business, so I sent a wire there, telling him I was coming over on the next train.

 

As I stared out of the train window, trying to take in the news, my mind went back to our time at that sleazy hotel, and our argument. My parting words echoed over and over in my head - Go to hell! - seeming almost prophetic now, in retrospect, because, for certain, the manner of his death – chased and then gunned down by an over-zealous posse when he’d never harmed anyone in his life, with no-one at his side to comfort him in his final moments – must indeed have been hell. If only I hadn’t said those words…

 

Lom was waiting for me at the station, when the train pulled in, his face as sombre as mine must have looked as I disembarked from the carriage.  For several moments we just stood, looking silently at each other while other passengers milled around us.

 

“Is it true?” I finally managed to ask, my voice sounding strangely high-pitched, still clinging to the faint hope that the dead man was someone else and not Heyes.

 

“Yes.” Lom nodded, his face grim.  “I’m sorry, Kid.”

 

For a second or two, the world seemed to spin around me, and then I felt Lom’s hands on my arms, Apparently, my knees had buckled and I would have fallen to the ground but for him grabbing me. 

 

He steered me across to the hotel and took me up to his room and gave me a shot of whiskey. He told me that the authorities were satisfied the deceased was Hannibal Heyes and his body had now been moved to the undertakers in readiness for burial.

 

“Did you go and look for yourself, to be sure?” I asked, quietly, still unwilling to believe it was true.

 

Lom nodded, dejectedly. “Yes. It’s him.”

 

“I don’t want him buried here, in Cheyenne.” I told him. “His grave will just become a place for people to come and ogle and laugh about.  Can we take him back to Porterville and have him buried there?”

 

Lom said he would organise it.  I wanted to go over to the undertaker’s to see him myself but Lom said it was too risky, that someone might recognize me. So I stayed at the hotel and drowned my sorrows with his whiskey.

 

The following day we loaded his coffin onto a wagon Lom had procured, and began the long trip back to Porterville.

 

Rather than bury him in the town’s cemetery, we found a nice spot in a clearing in the woods, behind Lom’s cabin, which we thought he would like better.  We’d placed his coffin in Lom’s spare bedroom and, that night, before the burial, after Lom was in bed, I went in there and opened it up for one last look, and to satisfy myself that it was really him and not just someone who resembled him. Even though Lom had confirmed it, I still needed to see for myself, to be sure.

 

He looked merely to be sleeping, the bullets that killed him having hit him in the chest and torso, not his head, and for a moment I could almost convince myself that he was indeed just sleeping. Until I placed my hand on his to feel it icy cold. A cold that seeped into my own body with the knowledge that he was truly gone.

 

“I’m sorry, Heyes.” I told him. “I should have been there, watching your back, like always.”

 

I stood there for a long time, unaware of the tears on my face.  If we hadn’t parted company, he would probably still be alive.  And if I hadn’t said those words, and stormed off, we probably wouldn't have parted company. It was all my fault. The death of my partner and best friend since childhood was all down to me.

 

I said as much to Lom the next morning, after the burial.  He told me not to be ridiculous, that it was just down to bad luck that Heyes had been recognized, and a bad decision on his part in trying to make a break for it, but he was just being kind, to ease my guilt.  I could understand Heyes preferring to get himself killed rather than rot in a jail cell for twenty years - if it had been me I’d have been inclined to do the same - but I still believe that if I hadn’t walked out that day, we would still be partners and he would still be alive.

 

It's two years today since he died, and I’m living in Canada now.  I gave up on getting amnesty for myself after his death, changed my name and moved here, to Quebec. I run a small mercantile store, which keeps me busy and gives me a decent income. I’m accepted in the community and nobody has any idea of who I am or what I was.  Lom sends me periodic letters, filling me in on the latest news back in the USA, but I only respond occasionally.  I left my old life, and a large part of myself behind when I left to come here. I don’t want to be reminded of it – of the hardships we had growing up, of our time as outlaws - even though that did give us a great life, for a few years at least - or of the tough times we endured while trying for amnesty.

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So, I focus on the here and now and try to enjoy life as best as I can. Yet, every night, when I go home to my small cabin, light the lamp and sit down with a glass of whiskey, those words still echo in my mind. “Go to hell!”  

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Saying them is my biggest regret and they will haunt me until my dying day. Those three little words changed the course of both our lives. Because of them I drove away my closest friend. Because of them he lost his life. I can only hope, if I see Heyes again on the other side, he will forgive me.  Because I certainly can’t forgive myself."

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--oo00oo--

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