The Book

Chapter 7 - Broadside

Young Deal McShane sat and listened to an old woman's banter for a while.

"You really should go.  You'll get us all killed.  How'd ya like that, mister?  I wanna see you hangin from that there tree."
"Don't worry." said Deal.  "We'll be leaving here soon as it's done."
"Be leavin us the bodies.  Don't nobody pay fer 'em no more.  Who's gonna pay fer them bodies we gotta bury?"

The boy didn't react, knew not to feed the beast or pay the consequences.  He'd seen plenty of people hang, but it still didn't make it right.

He laid a hand to brow, watching the rider bring in the Johnsons.  The Knight pulled the family across the middle of the field, through the ditches, over the wooden stakes, and anything he felt might cause harm.  When the little boy fell and hurt himself, the Knight pulled reins and sped up, dragging the screaming family across two sets of ditches.  Young Deal waved his banner to draw Worthington's attention.

"Looks like it's gonna be a great day." yelled the Knight.

He halted to allow the couple to pick up their son, and suddenly tugged harder, forcing his horse to jump and clear a ditch-full of stagnant water.  The Johnsons trudged behind, soaked with red mud and a few dark streaks outlined in bright blood.  The boy's pants were missing entirely.

"I think I know them people there." said the toothless man.  He walked out to the edge of his porch.  "Kinda hate to see 'em hangin."  The old timer took another sip of water and sat down on a step.  "Ya know what I think?"

Deal looked directly at his eyes, nervously awaiting a response.

"I feel like I don't know nothin, then I sees them Johnsons yonder an, I'm kinda glad that I don't know nothin.  They's keepin us in the dark, pert near all our lives."  He took another sip of water and smiled, then spilled a dabble of water.  The old man pointed to the wet spot at his feet.  "Ya see that there, that's all I know.  But, it's surrounded by this whole, big place all around us.  An haint nothin in this world worth dyin fer, unless it's that spot.  If ya step on it, well that's mine, ya see.  Protect yer own, boy.  To hell with anything else.  Hit's not worth dyin fer."

The old man looked up, then glanced past the boy.  Deal turned to see Worthington at twenty paces, holding the skinny ropes in a raised hand.

"Go fetch me some bigger rope." said the Knight.  "Mine's cut up awful bad and I like using fresh cord for my hangings."

"Thought there was gonna be a Judgement, a trial of some kind?" asked the Johnson man.
"You gonna hang a woman?" asked the wife.

Young Deal stood waiting for his answer.

"Never stopped me before."  He looked to Deal.  "Go fetch some rope, boy.  Hurry."

Deal speared the banner into the ground and kicked his horse toward the distant barn.


An older woman straddled the doorway of her shack, a small boy twisting and turning side to side beneath her dress.  She tied a bonnet across a gray bun and stepped outside.  A jerky hand caught the child from wandering off.

"Them's the Johnsons.  What'd they do?" she asked.

Worthington pulled off his helmet and wiped the wet, sparse hair over to one brow.  "Gather round, especially women and children.  And, somebody go ring the town bell twelve times for me, real slow."

Deal hopped off Jezebel and slid between the stiff barn doors.  Inside, hay covered the ground, piled up in mounds everywhere.  A small, stick-built ladder on the right led to the loft.  He walked the perimeter of the barn's lower section, scanning the walls for anything of use.  There was a bundle of smaller rope, pitchforks, shovels, rakes and various rusty tools.

'If I find all the rope in town, take it and run with Jezebel,' he thought.  'ain't gonna be no hanging today.'

He found himself back in the center of the barn and rotated slowly, eyes moving up and down.  Nothing stuck out.  He climbed the ladder into the loft.  Up top, cobwebs floated across squeaky rafters.  He picked up a handful of hay and pushed the webbing away as he walked the creaking planks.

The white Knight dismounted, opened his riveted saddlebag and took out a huge, looped section of rope.  Three nooses quickly became visible.

"I always believed in being prepared," he said, shaking a handful of noose at the mud-covered family.

Several townsfolk gathered nearby, mostly women and old men.  Two little boys stood on a porch kicking into nothing but the wind.

"The Lord is my Shephard," said Worthington, placing all three nooses, one by one, on the necks of the Johnson family.  "I shall not want."  He made sure hands were still bound tightly.  "Somebody bring me that crate over there."

He pointed to a wooden, bushel box next to a porch.  The toothless, old man jogged over, picked it up and brought it back, setting it down at the Johnson boy's feet.  He smiled open lips and gum to the stiff, brown-haired boy and laughed, hummed a long lost hymnal, and meandered back to his front porch step.

"I thought there was gonna be a trial?" asked Johnson.
"Oh, there is." said the Knight, drawing all three noose-ropes together and tying them around a metal ring.

The family formed a circle, each tied at the hands and bound together at the necks.  The boy cried as Worthington picked him up and stood him on the crate while the wife cried and begged for her son's mercy.  He adjusted the ring and tied off another rope.  It flew over the stout tree limb above their heads.  Worthington began twisting it into a noose as well, then hooked it over the saddle horn.

He took the horse's reins and spun the white beast pointing down the road.  The Johnsons faced each other eye to eye, the boy helplessly steadying himself on a wobbly crate.

Inside the barn, young Deal looked out the loft window and saw the ropes around three necks.  He hurried to get down, being a little too careless and rushed.

'He tricked me into leaving so I couldn't try to stop him.'

A nail slid out of its hole and the top ladder-rung twisted.  He fell the rest of the way, falling back-first into a shallow pile of hay.  The landing pushed every bit of the air from his lungs.  He gasped and heaved, pulling his britches at the fly and flexing his torso skyward.  This allowed a little room for another surge of dusty air.

The Knight grabbed the saddle horn with the rope tied off, slid a foot into the stirrup and heaved himself atop the white horse.

"Now, the funny thing is, we can't have a hanging without a trial."
"You can't call yourself a man of the Lord," said Pa Johnson, "and do this to us, no Sir."
"You're right," he said.  "They say, judge not, lest ye be judged."

The town's bell began to ring, once, twice.  He pulled the noose off the horn and wrapped it around his own neck.  The rope fed the hanging-tree limb from beneath his chin.  The neck-stringers ran up and back, almost parallel, leaving little play.  He swung a leg over one side and slid toward the ground, slapping his horse in the process.  It ran for the barn in a cloud of red dust.  The choking ropes tightened on everyone, including the Knight.  Three rings, four rings of the bell.  Faces reddened around the circle, though it hadn't been quite enough to properly hang any of them yet.

"Our Father," said the Knight, the rope coming from beneath his chin allowed a partially open airway to speak.  "who art in Heaven.  Hallowed be thy name."

Five rings, six rings.  Ma and Pa Johnson's feet began lifting above the ground.  Their arms clasped together and hands arose toward strained necks, palm to palm.  The Lord's Prayer pulled them into position to pray.  The guilt was running all over them.  Worthington also began to feel the strain of extra weight.

"Thy kingdom come, they will be done," he grunted.  "On Earth, as it is in Heaven."
"Stop it!" yelled the little boy.  His feet hadn't moved, though his Ma and Pa now swung in the air next to the boy's crate, unable to move.

Seven rings, eight rings.

"You can save them, boy." spat Worthington.  "If you jump down, you'll hang me, and not them."
"No!"
"Do it, boy.  Save you Ma and Pa."
"No!" the boy screamed.

The boy raised a foot across the crate's edge and felt the tightening strain on his own neck.  The wobbling worsened, the tugging put pressure on his face and forehead and so, he let off.  He couldn't do it.  There wasn't much time left and too little nerves for a young man of ten to decide anyone's fate, including his own.

"Jump, boy.  Hang me, not them."
"I... can't!" he screamed.
"Give us this day," he strained and unsheathed his long sword, stabbing it into the ground beside the wind-blown banner.  He strained harder, somehow forcing himself to place a knee on the ground to kneel.  The family rose higher into the air, Ma and Pa were completely cradled in the 'prayer' position.  "Our daily bread."

Nine rings, ten rings.  The small crowd began to chant lightly - Jump, Jump, Jump, they whispered beneath the crying of a bronze bell tolling for the family.

The boy squinted and screamed, yet had no tears left.  He turned away from both parents while they hung, swinging and listing ever so slightly until passing out one at a time, unable, but trying so hard to speak to him.  'It was alright, son.  Everything was alright.'

Eleven rings, twelve rings of the bell, and silence.

The Knight's horse galloped across the small town, pushed the barn doors open in a flickering of flashing light and falling hay.  The bright sun showered down upon Deal's face, bringing him into his right mind quickly enough to roll over and stare at the huge, white stallion standing over him.

"If you can't help, you should run." said the white horse.  "Run as fast and as far as you can."