Blaze! The Christmas Journey Read online

  BLAZE!

  THE CHRISTMAS JOURNEY

  Stephen Mertz

  Blaze! The Christmas Journey by Stephen Mertz

  Copyright 2016 by Stephen Mertz

  Cover Design by Livia Reasoner

  A Rough Edges Press Book

  www.roughedgespress.com

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogues are products of the author's imagination and are not to be construed as real.

  No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  For my sister and her husband,

  Jane and Richard Stang,

  With best wishes for this and every season.

  Chapter 1

  The Santa Claus costume itched like all-get-out.

  The Jolly Old St. Nick outfit included a snow-white beard that latched around each ear. The beard was more moth-eaten gray than white. It was not a new Santa costume.

  J.D. Blaze, who on this occasion was playing Santa Claus, was a clean-cut man, not accustomed to fuzz tickling his chin and throat. Irksome as the beard was, though, it presented no match for the bulky red suit with its scraggly white—make that, gray—fringe and wide black belt. The dang getup was driving J.D. crazy! He was well-muscled but trim of build. A dark-haired man who normally favored a wide-brimmed hat. And that was another thing. The Santa cap additionally irritated him. But nothing compared with the itchy material of the suit, which seemed to work its way through the shirt and Levis J.D. wore underneath the Santa getup.

  He had initially protested.

  "Honey, I tell you I'm too dang lean to play Santa!"

  "Hush," said his wife, Kate.

  She had fixed him with a pillow folded under the Santa suit which she'd already finagled him into wearing.

  Kate was a few years younger that J.D. Fearless eyes set in a face of high cheekbones and kissable lips. Blonde hair worn shoulder length, tied back beneath a flat-brimmed black hat. A brace of low-slung six-guns graced shapely hips.

  J.D. made a last attempt, sounding feeble even to his own ears.

  "But—"

  Kate had said, "Listen to me, Jehoram Delfonzo—"

  J.D. said, "I thought we'd agreed that you weren't going to call me that in public."

  "I'm trying to get your attention. Listen to me. These kids deserve a Santa. The man who was supposed to play Santa is dead drunk in the outhouse out back. J.D., Christmas means something. You don't disappoint children when it comes to Christmas, and these little shavers have traveled in from far and wide to sit on Santa's lap. The rest of the men in this town are either no accounts or they're busy with their business. Now you go ahead." She'd centered the Santa hat squared upon his head. "Do it for me, honey…please?"

  Kate had stood on her tip toes and traced delicate fingers through his hair. She delivered him a kiss that made the watching children giggle.

  He'd been at it for ninety minutes in front of Boulden Mercantile, and it was getting old.

  He wanted to give his left butt cheek a good, hearty scratch. It was that bad, sitting there in the mild sunshine a week before Christmas. It felt like cockroaches were running up and down the length of his body under the Santa getup. If the dag-nab suit would just stop itchin'!

  Of course it would never do for Santa to be scratching his butt in front of all the children. A sort of throne had been fashioned from a nice dinner chair someone had brought West. The high-backed chair was decorated with small pine branches and pinecones; a meager offering to the Christmas spirit.

  As was the whole notion of a gunslinger entertaining a passel of kids in the role of Old Saint Nick!

  They kept coming. A never-ending line of little people! One of the Boulden girls played Santa's elf, escorting each child to their glorious moment with the great man.

  The little girls wanted a dolly or a horse, except for one slightly off-kilter child with faraway eyes who asked for a book.

  The boys wanted a horse and a gun. No exceptions.

  A honky tonk player piano could be heard tinkling something that sounded like Jingle Bells from beyond the batwing doors of a saloon across the street. The clang of a smithy's anvil carried on the cool morning. The clanking of an ox-drawn wagon making its way down the street, carrying supplies to some outlying ranch. The Mercantile, a respectable enough structure, was doing a brisk business.

  Christmas wreaths and an array of decorations festooned the false-front buildings of the small hamlet of Horseshoe, Arizona Territory.

  The mothers of the small children remained with their children right up to the moment that the girl showed them up the step to Santa. The mothers lingered close by. J.D. wanted to think it was so they could adore this special moment for their children but their narrowed eyes, watching him vigilantly, suggested that maybe some of the fellas called upon to play this role in years past had not been good Santas.

  So far, J.D. seemed to be up to muster.

  It was no picnic. Some of the kids didn't smell so good. A few had head colds and their snot threatened to contaminate him. That wasn't pretty. Three of the little buggers needed changing. But Santa did not feel obliged to inform their mothers of this once he had whisked them through. He just wished he hadn't been roped into this Santa Claus thing, but when Kate wanted something…well, here he was!

  If only the line of children would start to shorten.

  If only the Santa suit would stop itching!

  Seated on a barrel, her legs clad in britches and crossed at the ankles, Kate regarded her man with a smile that J.D. read as equal parts amusement and affection, and that was enough for him even if it meant wearing a Santa getup and letting kids sit on his lap.

  He'd rather be swapping lead with owlhoots!

  But he was crazy about Kate. She meant the world to him. She was someone more than special to this once rootless wandering man. He'd do anything for Kate.

  And what the hell, J.D. told himself.

  It was right before Christmas…

  Kate was a big part of the townswomen approving J.D. as this year's Santa in the first place after Kate had volunteered him. These respectable ladies might not have all approved of Kate Blaze but they knew about her. Everyone in this country knew about J.D. and Kate, the two fastest guns in the West who just happened to be married to each other. The thing about Kate was that she could ride and shoot good as any man, but she'd never lost the feminine touch either whether it came to flirting with a man to achieve an end or to simply ease herself into the good graces of townswomen like these whom she and J.D. encountered often enough as they rode the width and breadth of the West.

  Sometimes J.D. could sense envy in such women's reactions to his wife; not because of him, necessarily, but because of the free-ranging life he and Kate led as they took on every imaginable sort of job that could interest gunslingers of their caliber. But few if any of them would ever give up the cozy and respectable stability of their lives for the life of far-flung adventure—and yes, high risk—that Kate and J.D. shared.

  Kate was one of a kind.

  They were passing through. Another day's ride would take them south to Whiskey Bend, along the border, where they intended to spend Christmas with friends. They'd spent the previous three months hiring out to a cattleman up Wyoming way who'd been harassed by rustlers more than he could afford to be and so imported professional gun handlers to send a clear enough message to the rustlers that their activities were not appreciated.

  It was such a good idea that Mr. and Mrs. Blaze had not been required to fire a single shot—except in target pr
actice—during their entire term of employment. The very notion of J.D. and Kate riding that range, looking for trouble, was enough to send the troublemakers off in search of greener, or at least safer, pastures. The cattleman had not particularly wanted blood spilled, only for the owlhoots to stop thieving his cattle. He never missed a payday, which meant that J.D. and Kate had a comfortable bankroll for the holidays as well as having the luxury of waiting for the next job to find them rather than looking for work.

  In other words, J.D. and Kate appeared to be a halfway respectable married couple. Enough so that the ladies of Horseshoe accepted when Kate volunteered her husband as a replacement Santa.

  Everyone gathered before the Mercantile seemed to be having a good time with Santa: the kids, their mothers, Kate; even J.D. was finding the presence of so many happy young'uns to be enjoyable despite the tortuous itch of his costume.

  Yeah, everybody was having a swell time.

  Everybody, that is, except a bedraggled woman of indeterminate age who sat on the boardwalk across the street in front of the saloon, glowering at them and taking long swigs from a whiskey bottle. The dust from passing wagon and horse traffic wafted over her, settling on her, but she seemed not to notice.

  J.D. noted her presence but there was more for Santa to attend to that some gal getting pie-eyed across the street.

  She remained unmoving except for raising the whiskey bottle. Grime coated her sagging face and tattered clothing. No passersby spoke to her. She sat there and drank and glared the whole time Santa entertained the kiddies.

  Then the shattering of an empty whiskey bottle filled the air, drawing everyone's attention.

  Kate rose from the barrelhead. Her hands rested on the grips of her six-guns.

  The drunken woman shambled closer.

  Mothers drew their children well aside.

  One of the mothers said, loud enough to be heard, "You turn around and go back where you belong, you crazy old alky."

  Another said, "You heard her. Go on, git! You got no business associating with decent folk."

  The women kept coming, undeterred if she even heard the remarks. Up close, she looked even worse. Hair scraggled every which way. Eyes, glassy. Disheveled, as if she'd spent her nights sacked out in the hay loft of a barn. She was blind drunk with hardly enough ability to keep a steady footing.

  Her glassy eyes burned, fixated on Santa Claus.

  The mothers drew back further with their children.

  Kate said under her breath, "Watch out for this one, J.D."

  J.D. whispered in reply, "Aw shucks, hon. Can't you see? It's just the town drunk, or one of 'em."

  "I'm just sayin'."

  As a young man, J.D. had worked as a bouncer in what were then known as sporting houses; places where a fella could wet his whistle, play a few hands of poker and spend time with a pretty girl instead of his wife. Sometimes things got out of hand and that's where and when J.D. first learned how to deal with drunks. It was his style to good nature then. Go along with whatever they're saying while you ease yourself out of their vicinity, or ease them out the door. If they start roughhousing, of course, that's a different story...

  The woman showed no sign of slowing down. She reeked of alcohol even from a distance. Stewed to the gills.

  J.D. stayed in role as Santa. He stuck out his lean chest that looked portly thanks to the rolled-up pillow. He threw his head back and emitted that world famous Ho Ho Ho!

  Then Santa said, "Dang, sister, you're a bit long in the tooth to be sitting on Santa's lap, ain'tcha?"

  The woman mumbled something incoherent. Something about Christmas and Santa Clause followed by a string of vivid curses.

  The mothers started covering their children's ears.

  Kate said. "Okay, sister, that's enough. Tamp down on that noise."

  Her hands remained on the pearl grips of her guns.

  J.D. decided to defuse the situation. He'd go on playing up the Santa routine. What harm could there be in that?

  He said, in his best Santa voice, "Now now, there's no reason for a hullabaloo. All righty then, ma'am. What can Santa bring you for Christmas?"

  "He can build himself a coffin!" Spittle spewed from the drunk woman's sneering lips. "And you can burn in hell!" She sputtered another vile string of profanity.

  Then she moved fast for a drunk. Suddenly, from somewhere amid her disheveled clothing, she drew a pistol.

  The crowd of children and their mothers scattered.

  J.D. grabbed for his gun before realizing that his brace of six-guns was not readily accessible beneath the bulky Santa suit!

  Chapter 2

  Up until then, it had been a beautiful morning in southeastern Arizona Territory.

  Kate, born in the East, had come to love this country. When it was her time, when God came looking for her, He would find her in these southernmost borderlands of the U.S. where mountain ranges—the Huachucas, the Whetstones, the Mules—were already dusted with snow above the tree line. Big sky country where a soul could breathe.

  This was her home. A land of open prairie and rugged mountains and isolated pockets of what they called civilization; small towns like Horseshoe. Beyond the town limits, beyond the mountains lush with pine and game, home of the Apache, the vistas swept clear to the distant horizon where you could roam free. She led a free range life with J.D and she could never again live any other way.

  One of the things Kate loved out here was the weather. She could recall snow blizzards that had hammered the desert right around Christmastime but more often the season was like today. The daytime air crisp but pleasant in the sunshine. It beat the hell out of the harsh winters she'd endured growing up as a kid back east.

  A real nice morning...until a drunken crazy old floozy decided to aim a gun at J.D.

  Whoever would imagine anyone throwing down on Santa Claus?!

  One rule ingrained in Kate during her early days, when she had plied her skill with cards on the Mississippi riverboats, and which she had lived her life by especially after tying up with J.D., was to always maintain an awareness of her surroundings. It was a helter skelter world. Big time trouble could slam you from any direction. Any time. She knew this to be a fact.

  So yes, while she sat on a barrelhead, grinning at the sight of her husband playing the Grand Old Man of Christmas, she never for a second let her attention drift far from the disheveled woman who'd emptied her whiskey bottle before lurching to her feet and shambling across the street toward J.D., inebriated insanity clearly visible in her eyes.

  What could J.D. do, surrounded by children and their mothers there in front of Boulden's Mercantile?

  When the woman pulled iron on J.D., and he was unable to reach his own hardware underneath the ratty Santa Claus outfit, Kate went into action. She lunged between the woman and J.D., pistol in her hand. She brought its barrel sharply downward across the barrel of the woman's gun.

  The clink! of metal on metal.

  The assailant hissed like an angry she cat when the pistol was wrenched from her fingers. It dropped to the ground. The woman took a half-step back, her face an angry, drunken mask.

  Kate didn't see where shooting a drunk would do anyone much good. It would hardly be good for all of the children loitering about with their mothers. The Bouldens' daughter, who was playing the elf, eyed the goings-on with a dropped jaw, obviously not knowing quite what to think. No, this was no time to be shooting people. And it was almost Christmas...

  Kate said to the drunken woman, "You need to relax, hon. Look at all these children that are watching. Behave."

  The woman sneered belligerently.

  "You look at 'em!" Every word came out slurred. Dripping with venom. She pointed at Santa Claus. "He's the one. damn his soul! He's all the rotten memories I ever had. All the bad memories of Christmas. I hate it. I want to kill him!"

  J.D. made eye contact with her.

  He said, "I'm betting Santa brought you good, decent memories too."

  The
woman stared at him a moment more. Then her glassy eyes turned misty.

  "You're right." The anger in her voice dissolved into despair. "Oh, God help me," she wailed. "I didn't mean those things...I'm sorry."

  She broke into tears. She collapsed into a sitting position on the ground at their feet, weeping.

  Kate knelt down next to her. A combination of alcohol fumes and body odor assaulted her nostrils.

  She said, "There, there. It can't be that bad, whatever drove you to this. Let's get you sober. You need help."

  The drunk snarled. "No, I don't! I'll kill him all on my own."

  Drunk as she was, the woman moved with lightning speed. She reached for the gun that had been knocked from her hand. Her spittle sprayed. Irrational emotion burned in her eyes, riveted on J.D.

  Kate sighed. "Oh, the heck with it."

  She clubbed the woman smartly along the side of her head with the barrel of her six-gun.

  The woman swayed twice. Her eyes rolled back in their sockets. She keeled over and commenced snoring loudly.

  As a precaution, Kate picked up the dropped gun, securing it in her gunbelt.

  J.D. removed his Santa cap. He dabbed at his perspiring brow, studying the unconscious woman sprawled in the dust.

  He said, "What was that all about?"

  Before anyone could respond, shouting and gunfire erupted from the direction of the bank.

  Chapter 3

  "Halt!" the sheriff ordered.

  J.D. and Kate swung in that direction of the ruckus.

  Two men, rushing from the bank's front entrance and mounting their horses on the run, paid the sheriff no mind. Each of them gripped a bulging money bag. The sheriff fired again. Missed. He shouted out another unheeded command. One of the outlaws fired. His bullet struck the lawman. Minton toppled to the boardwalk in front of the formidable stone structure of the bank.

  Everyone in the front of the mercantile and up and down the street scampered for cover as the bank robbers galloped by in a cloud of dust, whipping the flanks of their horses, shooting back along the length of the street to discourage anyone from attempting to interfere.