The cowboy way
“Stinking Indians!” whimpered teary-eyed little Clint as he looked down at his empty cap gun holster. “They took my gun, beat me up. No way to treat a cowboy . . .”
Clint was hiding from his three older cousins in an attic closet of their widowed grandmother’s big, old house. Clint’s deceased grandfather was the last person to visit the closet. A grime covered little light bulb hung high above from the dusty rafters on a black, rattail looking power cord. The bulb cast the cluttered, dust filled closet in deep shadows and gloom. Clint could hear, beyond the closed, closet door, advancing, disturbing noises. His tormentors were hunting for him. Clint, in mounting fear realized that other then the door he came through there was no other way in, or out. He was trapped. A soft whimper escaped him as he quietly backed up behind old boxes, crates and stuff into his hideaway’s deepest, darkest corner. He bumped into his deceased grandfather’s old, threadbare hunting jacket. In the light starved closet the dark, dusty camouflage coat was almost invisible. It was hanging on something hidden, hard and unyielding. Clint moved the jacket aside and saw, in the starved light, his deceased grandfather’s old, forgotten shotgun.
“Wow!” whispered a suddenly excited Clint as he looked at the weapon that was taller then he. “Just what a cowboy needs!”
Clint caressed the firearm that had not been touched since before he was born. He then dragged the heavy, cumbersome weapon across the dusty, wooden floor to the front of the closet.
“Cowgirl Clint!” shouted Mason, Clint’s oldest cousin who stood on the other side of the closed closet door. “You little dumb fart! We know you’re in there! We can hear you!”
Mason and his younger twin brother’s Keith and Carl stood in the hall, outside the closet in bright, midsummer afternoon sunlight that streamed through the high, attic windows. Inside the closet Clint grunted with exertion as he lifted the heavy weapon off the floor. He laid it on an old, dusty wooden crate that was full of his deceased grandfather’s hunting clothing and gear.
“This is our house and you’re trespassing!” said Keith. “We don’t want you here!”
Keith, gripping the barrel of Clint’s cap gun, hit the door with the butt, shattering its plastic grip. The door shook and rattled from the assault. Clint ran to the door and on tiptoes, reached up on the wall and flipped the light switch to the off position. The closet was plunged into total darkness.
“We’re going to beat the doo-doo out of you,” said Carl, “for trying to steal our granny from us with your littleness and cuteness!”
Clint, in total darkness, felt his way back to the shotgun and cocked both triggers.
“Here we come!” shouted Mason.
The three boys, older, bigger and stronger then their cousin, wore watercolor war paint and pigeon feathers held in place on the back of their heads by rubber bands. They brandished wooden tomahawks that they had made and wooden sticks for war clubs.
“Yip! Yip! Yip!” shouted the three little Indians as they snatched open the closet door and charged in.
Cowboy Clint, who was five-years-old, used both hands to squeeze, with all his might, both cocked triggers on the 8 gauge, slugs loaded, double barrel shotgun called the elephant killer . . .
