The Last Thunder Song

The greatest number of the white men who had witnessed the last thunder dance of the Omaha went homeward much pleased. The show had turned out quite funny indeed. “Ha, ha, ha! Did you see how surprised that old cuggie looked? He, he, he!” Life, being necessarily selfish, argues from its own standpoint.

But as the minister rode slowly toward his home there was no laughter in his heart. He was saying to himself: “If the whole fabric of my belief should suddenly be wrenched from me, what then?” Even the question was born of selfishness, but it brought pity.

John G. Neihardt writes this sad tale from a place of wisdom and heart. We are treated to a scene of passing days and that scene is a bit sad, a bit cruel in places, a bit tender. In other words, a human tale.

There is nothing surface here. All depth.

The Builder of Murderer’s Bar

“I remember the day that Lisbeth Peyton announced herself promised to Lysander Cox. Along the Americam, where miners outnumbered women a thousand to one, this was an event of importance. I also remember how Edmond Jones took the news. The camp expected him to get drunk. He didn’t. He went to work.”

Todhunter Ballard brings us this amiable story of a “lazy” dreamer and his Rube Goldberg efforts to mine with as little effort as possible and the ramifications those schemes have upon a community.

The story is infused with mining details but that does not intrude with the amiable drawl of the story. While not an essential read it’s also not bad at all.

Champs at the Chuckabug

“He’s an ol’ time cowman from who skinned the skunk, an’ he loves these moderun cowboy sports knowed as rodeo contests the way he loves ticks in his beard.”

This highly regarded tale from S. Omar Barker really did not a thing for this reader. I’ll admit to being no fan of dialect in prose. I have and can enjoy it in a well-turned work, but I’ll admit to even then finding it exasperating to have to decipher willy-nilly spellings and askew syntax.

But, more often than not, I am left cold by tales told in this way. With that said, Barker’s slight tale of amusing doings at a rodeo may play well for readers who are charmed by dialect exercises.

The Gift of Cochise

“He had several drinks—his first in months—in one of the saloons. As the liquor warmed his stomach, Ed Lowe looked around agreeably. For a moment, his eyes clouded with worry as he thought about his wife and children back in Apache country, but it was not in Ed Lowe to worry for long. He had another drink and leaned on the bar, talking to the bartender. All Ed had ever asked of life was enough to eat, a horse to ride, an occasional drink, and companions to talk with. Not that he had anything important to say. He just liked to talk.”

That passage nails one of the gifts of Louis L ’Amour, his ability to paint a picture of a man’s character in a few brief defining sentences and small actions. This terseness is often mistaken for simplicity. It is as far from simple as gimlet-eyed observation gets.

L ’Amour’s “simplicity” was in aid of propulsive narrative. He at times allowed it to traipse into formula, but when he was working with full burners, as in this story—you’ve got gold.

A fine story indeed.

Traitor of the Natchez Trace

“It was 500 miles through these Indian Nations on the winding Natchez Trace—500 miles through swamp and canebrake and wilderness desolation. Here no law had penetrated, and no religion. Renegade white men, crowded from more ordered lands, found the territory a pirate’s paradise.”

That is the fascinating setting of this Ryerson Johnson tale. Johnson seemed to specialize in well-researched tales of not your usual Western settings and not your usual protagonist occupations—here we have a courageous mail-carrier.

His descriptions of the terrain and the climate of lawlessness are endlessly interesting here, but I must admit the narrative itself didn’t match the background for this reader.

Burn Him Out

“Will Starrett squatted before the campfire in the creek bottom, drinking his coffee and watching the other men over the rim of his cup. In the strong light from the fire, the sweat and the dirt and the weariness made harsh masks of their faces. They were tired men. But pushing up through their fatigue was a growing restlessness. Now and then, a man’s face was lost in heavy shadow as he turned away to talk with a neighbor. A head nodded vigorously, and the buzz of talk grew louder. To Starrett, listening, it was like the hum a tin of water makes as it comes to a boil. The men were growing impatient now, and drawing confidence from each other. Snatches of talk rose clearly. Without the courtesy of direct address, they were telling Tim Urban what to do.”

That magnificent passage opens this lean Frank Bonham tale. He gives us a dirt-grimed account of desperate farmers fighting a grasshopper invasion. In this tale there are no black hats and white hats and no showdowns in the street.

Rather it is one of those tremendous Westerns that takes flesh and blood people, pits them against the elements and sees what shakes out as the stresses of survival and the fatigue of a natural trial grinds them down.

An excellent story.

All the Long Years

“I didn’t think so. Whatever else Lyle Dennison is, he’s not a brand-burner and a cow thief.”

“I’ll tell you what he is,” the boy said. “He’s twice the man you are.”

“Maybe so. But you’re not half the man either of us ever was.”

This highly-regarded tale from Bill Pronzini has got a lot of punch packed into the few pages that comprise its fist.

Historical verisimilitude, well-limned characters, and a bit of the masterful O. Henry twist to bring it home.

A highly regarded tale, and rightly so.