Lassiter and the Stampede of 1885.

Lassiter, the lone, stone cold professional killer for hire with steely gray eyes had just returned from El Paso in the Territory of Texas after straightening out some crooked Texas Rangers and was about to sit down at his favorite stool for a well deserved dram at The Hole in the Wall Saloon when he felt the ground tremor. As the trembling increased in intensity, he heard a rumbling sound off in the distance. The miscreants, drunks, derelicts and degenerates at the bar started to panic and screamed, "It's a bad prairie dust storm, no its an earthquake." Then Gums, the toothless barkeep not known for his intellectual prowess screamed, "Save yourselves, it's the end of the world as we know it!" Lassiter stood up and calmly emptied both of his Smith and Wessen 44 magnum six shooters into the ceiling of the saloon to get their attention and restore order. By now the ground was violently shaking and there was a thunderous roar as Lassiter forcefully stated, "Relax, it's them damned Texas cowpokes runnin' their heard of longhorns too close to town trying to make time getting their heard to Kansas City to be butchered so they can get top dollar selling their beef to the insatiable, fat, pampered and spoiled city slickers in New York City. Just as Lassiter was about to sit down, Minerva, his abandoned daughter making a new life for herself in the dirty, dusty, forgotten town of....Forgotten burst through the doors of the saloon and shrieked hysterically, " 'Lil' Madeline is missing!" She was last seen playing in the dirt outside in front of their one room sod buster's house. Lassiter immediately ran out the door of the saloon and leaped onto the back of Blaze, his trusted and much loved steed. Digging his spurs deep into Blaze's flanks they headed at lightning speed toward the stampeding heard. Seeing 'Lil' Madeline playing on the prairie floor directly in harms way looking for pine cones totally oblivious to the danger of being trampled to death by thousands of pounds of beef, Lassiter kicked harder sinking his spurs deeper into Blaze's flesh. Lassiter was now in front of the stampede and swooped down like an American eagle with outstretched talons and grabbed 'Lil' Madeline's tiny hand swinging her up and onto the saddle where she instinctively clutched Lassiter's rough hewn shirt and hung on for dear life. Milliseconds after realizing the relief that 'Lil' Madeline's life had been sparred, Lassiter felt a thump from behind and knew immediately that Blaze had been gored in the hind flank by one of the charging longhorns. As the stampeding heard passed, Lasssiter, 'Lil' Madeline and Blaze limped back to town. Lassiter dismounted Blaze and handed 'Lil' Madeline to her mother Minerva whose face was streaked with dirt and tears from crying uncontrollably. Lassiter walked back into the dirty, dusty street to care for the mortally wounded Blaze. Drawing his 44 Magnum he stepped up to his horse and without saying a word sent with surgical precision a 246 grain lead round nose slug directly between Blaze's ears putting the beast out of his misery. Remarkably, the bullet passed through the horse's head and hit Rowdy Higgins, the trail boss responsible for the irresponsible stampede who was returning to apologize, right between the eyes killing him instantly. All present agreed, it was an unavoidable accident. Lassiter said, "Dump Blaze and Rowdy in the same hole and let the buzzards have their beggar's feast." Later that day, all gathered at The Hole in the Wall Saloon where Lassiter poured drams of Dalmore "Black Isle" 12 year old vol. 43 with a dark reddish copper color, sherry, apricot, cherry and tobacco nose, orange and mincemeat taste and liquorice finish. Just as Lassiter lifted his dram to his lips, 'Lil' Madeline's silver dollar sized light gray steely blue eyes caught Lassiter's stone cold gray eyes and said, "Me try." Slàinte, Tommy Maaltman.