He slowly chews the tobacco in the corner of his mouth. His cold green eyes gaze out, under his sweat stained Stetson, far to the horizon. A hawk eyeing his prey. Waiting, Waiting.
He sits with his back to the wall in the veranda rocking chair, left boot across his knee, idly spinning its silver spur. … Spin… Spin… Spin... like the ticking of a lazy clock.
Mrs Roberts walking by noticed the rifle across his lap, she said it was odd how he looked so dusty and trail worn yet his rifle was clean as a whistle and the same for the pistol on his belt. She wondered if he was an old soldier, maybe even from the South, although he wore no remnants of uniform she could see. Mrs Johnson, who’s been living in the town the longest, said she’d never seen anything like it - carrying guns so blatantly in town – it would frighten the children. Sue-Ellen at the Saloon said he hadn’t moved from the rocking chair all day, he just sat rocking in the chair, back and forth, back and forth, playing with that damn spur and chewing – and spitting tobacco. No - Mrs Roberts would not ask Mr Roberts to remind this stranger of the bye-laws on guns ..and spitting – it was not his place and anyhow the Sherriff would be back tomorrow. But everyone agreed there was an air of death about this stranger as he gazed off to the West and a future arriving on the next train from Santa Fe.
