The Rider

by R. D. Amundson

Overview

After marrying his childhood sweetheart, Virgil John Jordan is pulled into the Civil War as a captain in the Confederate Army. He is a dedicated and brave soldier-until news reaches him that his family, including his new wife, has been murdered by marauding Blue Coats. Rage takes over; as Virgil becomes a murderer, the man he once was disappears.

He becomes "The Rider," a vengeful, ghostly foe. Justice is decided by his hand, and he kills those he believes deserve to die. After killing four men who were abusing a whore, the Rider survives a terrible blizzard, only to end up in a town called Witchita. With his only companion-his horse, Gabriel-the Rider finds himself in a very strange place.

The "witch" in Witchita refers to Mesmerala, a powerful sorceress who runs things with the power of magic. It's not magic that breaks through the Rider's heart of steel, though; it's a gun-toting honey named Pistol Ann. Rider comes to realize he's in Witchita for a reason. His bloodlust can serve a purpose, but will he ever find his way home again?

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781475995046
Publisher:	iUniverse, Incorporated
Publication date:	07/05/2013
Pages:	240
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.69(d)

Read an Excerpt

The Rider

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By R. D. Amundson

iUniverse, Inc.

Copyright © 2013 R. D. Amundson
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4759-9502-2

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CHAPTER 1

The sky didn't lower; it flat out dropped, not on the ground, but close enough to scrape the crown of the man's hat as he crested Gobbler's Knob. Reined in to a stop, his big buckskin snorted out clouds of steam into the December air.

Bleak ... dismal ... empty, he thought as he gazed out at the frozen Kansas landscape, his gun metal gray eyes as hard, as cold, and as deadly as the large bore Colt hanging on his right hip.

A roiling wall of white, stark against the darkening sky, bore down on the plain from the northern horizon coming hard and fast and taking over the sky.

How far away was hard to know for sure, somewhere in the distance. Distance went on forever in this deceitful immeasurable country. Short or long made no difference. Surviving it was all that mattered. Short could take days to reach, long was sometimes reached in a heartbeat, maybe two at the most. You never knew until you got to your destination.

Off in the distance between him and the obliterated horizon, an earthly constellation of golden yellow lights hovered above the billowing wall of snow, offering hope of comfort, if he survived the distance to get to them. But he knew those lights offered no more comfort than did the light of greed in a whore's eye's offer comfort from a warm heart.

Whether housed in a blatant stand-alone hotel, or in the dingy rooms above a rowdy watering hole, every cow town west of the Mississippi offered an ample supply of "ladies of the evening," and he had explored them all.

Lay your money down, leave before sunrise, and he wouldn't have it any other way. Anything more led to pain, the kind you can't see, for at least one person, most likely for both.

And that he knew ... right well.

A smattering of ice granules stung his face—a light kiss from the north wind—as the blizzard picked up speed.

Not able to gauge the distance between himself and the lights of the town, or between the town and the surging wall of white coming in behind it, he went for the town, figuring he and the oncoming blizzard would hit it at about the same time, dark fall.

But no matter, the oncoming storm could cover the town in a shroud of white before he got there. But he would get there, his horse had been on this cattle trail many times.

The powerful gelding had no quit in him and so far had gotten him through all the storms the country could throw at them.

So far covered about seven years now.

The man pulled his red bandana up over his nose, and then pulled down the wide brim of his hat for protection against the increasing sting of the ice pellets. Loosely wrapping the reins around the saddle horn, he replaced the gloves on his hands, leaned forward and whispered in his mount's ear, "Take us on home Gabriel," then thrust his hands into the slits on the sides of his buffalo robe overcoat. He lightly touched the horse's ribs with his boot heels, urging him into a walk. The buckskin tossed his head, snorted out a cloud of frosty breath, and moved forward at a steady unhurried pace.

Before dropping his chin to his chest, he peered out from under the brim of his hat. The lights had disappeared into the cloud of swirling white as the wind from the north howled in his face like a lost banshee bitch.

He felt at peace. Aloneness and oblivion were his only constant companions and that's the way he wanted it.

The horse's rhythm, the unbroken white of the landscape, the wall of the soon to arrive blizzard, along with the drumming of ice pellets on his hat, combined to have a mesmerizing effect on him and caused his mind to slip uneasily back to a time when he had the ability to feel. But make no mistake, he did not labor under any illusions, he knew that where his heart once was, a cold chunk of granite had lodged in its place, wrapped in a bleak, dismal emptiness, matching the Kansas landscape, wrapped in an emptiness so vast and cold it made a mockery of the Kansas winter.

Oh yes ... he felt at peace as he hunkered down into his buffalo robe overcoat, letting the rhythm of the horse's body, the spirals of swirling whiteness, and the steady drumming on his hat take him into a dream to a place where he once could feel. He let his mind drift, trying to find that place where he'd slipped off track and could no longer feel anything except the rage that often erupted out of the constant simmering anger within his lava filled heart. The broad stroke, of course, was the Civil War, the goddam Blue against the goddam Gray.

Before dropping his chin to his chest he peered out from under the brim of his hat. No lights were visible.

He felt at peace, oblivion the refuge he sought.

CHAPTER 2

"Virgil John Jordan," the squat, red-faced man called out. His jowls, framed by white mutton-chop sideburns, jiggled as he spoke. Looking through spectacles Ben Franklin may have worn, he pronounced, "Doctor of Jurisprudence." As Virgil moved to the podium, Dr. Rutherford, the President of the University of Virginia, stepped forward, handed him his diploma with his left hand and shook his right with his own.

A step closer to fulfilling one of his life-long dreams, to protect the rights of all men, he stepped down from the dais to stand in line with the other graduates, another step closer to fulfilling his other life-long dream, to wed the sweetheart of his youth.

Starry eyed, he gazed out over the heartily applauding audience to locate his betrothed. He spotted her without any strain. She was the one on whom the light of heaven fell.

Their eyes met. The rest of the world faded to a translucent blur as time first suspended and then ceased to exist, becoming one of those special moments forever etched in the mind, always there, but over time, harder and harder to reach.

Virgil Jordan was a man of ideals, and "justice for all" was the one he had decided to champion. But the goddam war had killed that ideal by taking away, along with his way of life, his home, his wife, and the six-month-old son he had never had the pleasure of laying his eyes on. Everything he had ever held dear had been beaten, or burned, or pillaged, or raped, or murdered by sadists in Blue Coats, whose acts were sanctioned by the declaration of war and were always overlooked, the occasional inquests or trials nothing but mockery.

So how could anyone speak of the glories of war, except in the name of the State? Do what we say or we'll do our utmost to kill you.

CHAPTER 3

Colonel John Beauregard Jordan never allowed his slaves to call him "massuh." They addressed him as Mister Jordan, and never would they say, "Yassuh, Massuh." He knew the first names of each one and never broke up families. One born on his plantation stayed on his plantation. He didn't deal in the bodies and souls of human beings.

He instilled these same values in his son Virgil who held them through his law studies and into adulthood.

At community gatherings the other plantation owners would get around to saying, after several mint juleps, "You're coddling your slaves, John."

"They're human beings, just like us," was always the Colonel's reply.

On the rare occasions when one of his slaves did run, he'd let him go and not hunt him down. And under the most scrutinizing search, a whip or a whipping post or leg irons or shackles could not be found on the Colonel's plantation.

No one could remember the last time a slave had run away from the Jordan plantation. It was becoming evident they chose to stay of their own free will, which made a good number of influential people give more consideration to what Colonel Jordan said, "They're human beings ... just like us." In time and under the light of reason, the South would have abolished the practice of slavery on its own, and the agony and bloodshed, the destruction, devastation, death, and uncontrolled chaotic lust that followed, would never have happened, and Virgil Jordan would still have his beloved young bride.

Knuckle under to our will and our way of life, or we'll kill ya. A simple ideological disagreement reduced to its most basic tenet. Virgil Jordan simply could not reconcile that idea and course of action as having any rationality. But "right justifies might," is how the self-righteous view themselves, singularly or in groups large or small.

Or maybe the North felt that the South had an unfair labor advantage. Maybe it was a mere matter of economics. Maybe the North's championing of human rights was simply a smokescreen for another, more pervasive and hidden agenda.

History books don't necessarily tell the whole truth, and all through history, that's the way it's been.

Virgil had graduated law school at the top of his class from the University of Virginia where he had learned to question and explore, to contemplate and consider, to take sides and decide. And so he knew, boiled down to its essence, war was simple brutality, reducing the most dignified and refined soldiers to commit acts of pure savagery, not willing at first, but relished in the end.

It has a name ... bloodlust, and like an insidious disease, it rages through a man's veins until it poisons his soul. In the latent sadists and murderers it becomes kill for the thrill, and the poisoning is complete, in many, almost overnight.

Justice? A meaningless word floating about with no weight in reality, he had thought so in the classrooms, and the battlefields had verified the truth of it.

So now he knew the place and the when where he'd slipped off track. It was at the receipt of the news that his wife and infant son had been slaughtered by marauding Blue Coats, after committing their atrocities on her while she was alive. That final stroke completed the picture, and he knew how his heart, that piece of him that once could feel, had turned to a stone lodged in its place.

That was one year into the Goddam War.

The next three years he spent in a red rage of vengeance—bloodlust at its highest level—and he lived for those moments when he was locked in mortal combat with a man in a Blue Coat, and time would cease for one or the other, and if it continued for him, it was only to kill again, and he got very, very good at it.

All in the Name of War declared in the name of God.

And Virgil Jordan adopted his own version of the Twenty-Third psalm, "... surely Death and Hell shall follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the House of the Damned forever."

But he was still a man of principles, and believed in justice—that of his own brand. "Punish the bastards as I see fit ... period," and punish he did. Not many in the country knew his name, but all knew of The Rider.

CHAPTER 4

Five days back he had left four men lying on the floor of a hotel room in Abilene, gutted and bleeding out.

Over time and by that greatest teacher and gauge of all things, experience, the Rider had established a short list of his favorite ladies. He retained it in the back of his mind, recalling it whenever the need arose. At the top was Lily Francine of Abilene, easy enough to remember.

Lily was from back east, maybe New York, maybe Philadelphia, maybe somewhere in between. Educated and possessed of a sharp wit, two qualities he admired, Lily could carry on a conversation and keep up with him on almost any subject. It often turned out that the time he'd paid to be with her was spent in that engagement, the taking of physical pleasure coming as an afterthought, usually around daybreak.

He never asked her how she had gotten into whoring and she never divulged the information. It probably had something to do with survival in this unforgiving land known in the eastern cities as the West.

But what did it matter? What was, was, and that was all. The fact that he enjoyed her company was all he needed to know.

The bar owner Henry James prided himself on the reputation his hard work had earned him. The Longhorn was the finest, the cleanest, and the most trouble free saloon in Abilene, maybe in all of Texas.

He didn't cater to any particular clientele and welcomed everyone from the mayor of the town to the two old geezers playing checkers by the potbellied stove. Sam and Clem had become fixtures in the place.

Everyone was welcome as long as they behaved themselves and paid cash.

It was a damn cold winter night, just past the hour of darkness, when the heavy oak door, the bat wings removed months ago, swung open letting in a blast of freezing air and swirling snow.

Henry James looked up from the glass he'd been polishing. The icy blast from the open door felt as if it blew across his heart. He offered a quick silent prayer to whatever whimsical gods existed, hoping there'd be no trouble. He kept a double-barreled sawed off shotgun under the bar, just in case.

The Rider's frame filled the open doorway, his shoulders white from the relentless snow as was his Stetson. His hands were into the slits of his buffalo robe overcoat, his right hand resting on the butt of his Colt, the other one on the handle of his heavy Bowie knife.

Glancing left, center, and right from under the shadow of his hat, he stepped through the door and then reached back with his left hand and closed it without making a sound. His reputation had preceded him and the saloon fell into the silence of a funeral parlor.

Eyewitness accounts had told that the Rider could bury his Bowie to the hilt in a one-inch thick piece of hardwood with a flick of his wrist and that the heavy knife, driven by the power of the Rider's arm, could cut through a man's bones as if they were butter. He could place three shots, one on top of the other, or in any pattern he chose before most men were able to clear their pistol from its holster.

Removing his hand from the butt of his Colt, he took his time unbuttoning his overcoat. When finished, he turned, shed himself of the heavy garment, and hung it from a wooden peg embedded in the wall. Turning back he once again surveyed the room at a more unhurried pace, taking in Sam and Clem in the corner. They'd been there his last time through. Panning left, a single drover stood at the end of the right side of the bar. A couple of drifters hung out at the other end of the free standing bar, worn and scarred by a hundred years of use. Left of the drifters was an uncarpeted stairway leading to several dark and quiet rooms above and behind the mahogany behemoth of a bar. Left of the stairway, the sidewall held a field stone fireplace, its roaring blaze keeping the nearby upright piano warm. No doubt a player would show up soon. Left of the silent piano four men sat easy at a table playing a friendly game of poker. Shifting his gaze back to the stairway, he followed them up to the doors down the open hall directly above the bar. No movement, no laughter, no slamming doors, no cussing, only an unwelcome silence.

The barkeep, short, stout, jovial, and starting to show his age, stood relaxed behind the middle of the bar. He still parted his hair in the middle, but it had more streaks of gray than the Rider remembered. His mustache was salt and pepper and his belly had expanded. But he was still Henry James, the ex-Texas Ranger, and a longtime friend of the Rider's, who strode slowly up to the center of the bar, stiff from the long ride in the frozen wintered night.

"Virgil Jones! How are you old hoss?" Henry James blurted out. The Rider tossed a gold coin on the scarred top of the bar. "Shot of whiskey," he said. Then with amused eyes and a slight smile at the corners of his mouth said, "If you can find the time that is."

Henry bent at the waist, reached under the counter, pulled out a bottle of the good stuff, and set it down in front of his new patron, along with the glass he'd been polishing. "Barely able to work you in," he replied with a smile.

Many thought Henry's olive colored skin made him of Mexican descent. He never bothered to argue about it although he was mostly Apache with something else mixed in, maybe Mexican. But even that stout blood couldn't stave off the sagging chin and bulging jowls that give testimony to the accumulation of years in most people, but a few are excepted and appear as walking skeletons from the cradle to the grave. Some of it is in the genes, most of it is in what a person eats and drinks, and the Rider had drank more than his share of liquor since the Goddam War, and as a result had spent a lot of time in oblivion, which suited him just fine, and his body stayed trim.
(Continues...)

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Excerpted from The Rider by R. D. Amundson. Copyright © 2013 R. D. Amundson. Excerpted by permission of iUniverse, Inc..
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