You couldn’t tell there was a man there, save for the bright white that flashed in the dimly lit corner every time he smiled. Ol’ Bob Dellinger and his best friend Pokey sat at the table nearest his, and the man couldn’t help but smile every now and then at the stories they reminisced about. The batwing saloon doors creaked open though and the place fell quiet when everyone saw who it was. Everyone except Bob and Pokey. They were talking up a storm while heavy footsteps slowly approached their table.
“Hey,” A gruff voice said.
Bob looked up from his seat and a shiver ran down his spine. “S-sorry Beau, didn’t see ya come in.”
“Well, here I am,” Beau replied with swagger.
“What a- what can we do for yer, Beau,” Bob’s voice cracked nervously.
“Your time's coming, Ol’ Bobby Boy, and it’s coming today,” Beau answered.
“Now wait a minute Beau, jus wait a gaw damn minute,” Pokey spoke up. “We ain’t armed, not a piece between the two of us.”
Beau was carrying a pair of Colts on his belt and he pulled one out and set it on the table in front of the two old timers. “You can take turns with this one,” Beau said with a wicked smile. It was then that the man dressed in black appeared out of the shadows.
“May I have this dance?” He asked somberly.
* * *
Beau stood roughly twenty yards away from the darkly dressed man, his fingers twitched above the heel of one of his .45 Colts. He didn’t even know the name of the man he was about to kill but it didn’t matter to him. The bastard had interrupted business he had with Bob and Pokey, and now the man was going to die. A crowd from the saloon gathered outside on the wooden porch and watched with anticipation. No one knew who the slender man was that had challenged Beau so recklessly but it made no difference to them. It was never too early in the town of Riggins for a shootout, especially when it came to Beau and his brother Barkley, who was known to be equally if not more malicious than Beau. They had made a name for themselves as killers and cow rustlers throughout southern Arizona, but there was no lawman, sheriff or marshal, who would take them on. They ran a tight gang known as the Brand Burners, named so for all of the cattle they had stolen, but when they weren’t stealing cattle they were stealing lives and Beau was certain this skinny black-dressed fool was going to find that out. His hand twitched once more as a yellow toothed grin spread across his face. His opponent didn’t move a muscle though, the stick of a man was totally motionless with his flat brimmed hat pulled low over his eyes. Then he pulled back the fold of his coat revealing a lustrous white heeled .44-40 Colt, and smiled back at Beau. Beau sneered angrily and with great speed jerked his own pistol from it’s holster, but before he could pull the trigger a shot rang out through the street. A hot sensation pulled at his chest and when he looked down, he saw blood pumping heavily from a hole where his heart should have been. Beau dropped his pistol to the dust before landing heavily next to it, dead.
“A father should teach his boy how to dance before sending him to the ball,” The black-dressed man said to himself.
“You son of a bitch, you killed Beau!” A man cried from the crowd before pulling his own pistol and taking aim at the man standing in the street, who in turn shifted swiftly on his heels and loosed a second shot from his hip that struck his new opponent square in the head. The man fell slowly backwards and crashed through the doors of the saloon.
“I don’t believe I asked you to dance,” The black-dressed man said with his .44-40 still aimed at the crowd. The onlookers shrunk back with mouths agape and anyone else who had thought about trying their luck against the mysterious and strange talking man decided it wasn’t in their best interest.
“Who-who are you, mister?” Bob Dellinger asked from his place within the crowd.
The man holstered his weapon of death and said, “My mother named me Genesis, my friends that I don’t have call me Gen, and anyone who served in the Confederate Army knows me as The Slim Reaper.”
There were several gasps from the crowd and whispers broke out at Bob’s findings. “The Slim Reaper!” They said to each other. “The famous Union sharpshooter who can kill a man from thirty feet to a thousand yards!”