Hero in a Red Suit
David H. Keith
Smashwords edition.
Published by David H. Keith
Copyright 2011 David H. Keith
Smashwords Edition License Notes:
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This is a work of fiction. It stems strictly from the mind of the author, so any resemblance to any real person is strictly coincidental. All characters, despite the life they can and often do achieve within the story, are figments of the author’s imagination and nothing more.
Cover by David H. Keith in collaboration with Elizabeth Rowan Keith. Cover art is public domain art.
Dedication
Dedicated to the memory of all those wonderful Westerns and heroes of my childhood.
A non-traditional Christmas story, with a twist. Sit back, relax, and reminisce about all those Westerns you watched on television as a kid.
The scene: a little town somewhere in “The West.” The good townsfolk (all the men of which wear nondescript, beat-up brown hats, even the Republicans) slink around in abject fear of the black-hatted toughs that work for the evil Ebenezer Grinch, the rich banker/rancher who thinks he can get away with anything he wants. His “ranch-hands” are really nothing more than gun-slingers by a different name. The only thing they know about working a ranch is how to saddle and ride a horse. Grinch and his gang pretty much own the town, which is called Blue Mesa Black Gulch Brownville (the town’s founders 1) weren’t very creative, 2) were exceedingly drunk, and 3) were equally as indecisive as they were drunk when they came up with the town’s name).
The story: One courageous bar-maid, Dolly, has enough of Grinch and his bullies. She sasses Grinch one day after he stiffs her, once again, on her tip. But the final blow comes when he slaps her backside as she walks by and tells the plug-ugly varmint he’s with what a great horse ol’ Dolly is.
That does it! She ain’t no horse and she ain’t going to let Grinch get by with hitting her and she simply ain’t going to forget about his not even giving her a tip.
Dolly sneaks out to the shack of Jeb Vulcan (nickname’s Elf because of his oddly-shaped ears). Now, Jeb’s a beat-up veteran of the Civil War who hasn’t really been “right” since that time at Chickamauga when a cannon ball took off part of his leg. And he’s never forgotten that Yankee bastard who found the missing part of Jeb and threw it into the fire, all the while laughing and making jokes about it. In other words, Jeb’s just another war veteran who lost much more than part of his body, but that’s another story entirely.
Dolly cries on Jeb’s shoulder and asks if he can’t do something to end Grinch’s reign of terror over the good citizens of BMBGB (they call it that because it’s so much easier to say—it’s pronounced “Bumb-gub”). Jeb hems and haws but finally relents because, you see, he is secretly in love with Dolly. She’s never laughed at him or called him names, and she’s even spent the night with him a time or fourteen and hasn’t run screaming into the night afterwards. So, Jeb screws up what’s left of his courage and sets out for the town of North Pole, where, he’s heard, a Hero lives.