Woeful Gifts in Gilt Boxes

Wasn't like it was the first time someone tried to rob me. It's all part of that same package – when you live your life barreling down those Teyach highways, and you're known to give a wanderer a lift for the company, and you're also known to carry other people's precious belongings with you for a fee, then you can't bee too surprised when one of those wanderers waves a weapon in your face and tries to help himself to those precious things.

The little man was a typical sight, too. Reckon I've had that same rusty one-shot sidearm trained on me a dozen times, like as not brandished by someone with those same dull-knife eyes nearly lost behind a dingy bandana. It was about the same voice, too, without enough gravel in it to sound tough. “Don't try nothin', don't say nothin', just give me the money and I go.”

I say, “Sorry friend, I'm traveling light in the wallet. Can't give you more than a few coins.”

“Ain't no one funnin' around here!” The man jabs that ancient pea shooter at me, makes sure I see him stroking the trigger. “One more minute, and I'll feed you all this lead and take all you got. Take your truck, take...”

That was when those dull eyes settled on my cargo. It was a small thing, real easy to miss – just this funny little box maybe a hair bigger than your hand, made from some black stone I can't quite place and dolled up with just a little bit of golden trim and one red gem.

The man says, “You ain't got money? What you got in there?”

Now, the fella who was paying me to transport that box for him gave me just two instructions, but he was real firm about both. First: Never open the box. Didn't say why, but he said those words twice and made me repeat them, and this wasn't the kind of man you'd take for a jokester.

So I answer honestly: “Don't know what's in there. Never opened the thing, and maybe you shouldn't either.”

“That's real funny, comin' from a guy 'bout to go to the Judge.” The man claps his hand over the box, trying to open the latch with just the one thumb. “How you get it open? Give me a hand, 'less you want that lead I got waitin'.”

I say, “Son, you can take that box if you want, but I ain't a pledge breaker.”

“Your head's too soft,” he says and keeps on fumbling, trying his best to brace the box in his gun hand without taking the pea shooter off me. “You better hope it's something real good, because I'm fixin'-”

As soon as he flicks open the latch, there's this sound – not from the box, or at least it doesn't sound so close. It's more like the first crack of a distant storm on some other road, or maybe a sharp breeze cutting through your windshield for just a second. And those dull eyes of his vanish into the shadow thrown by that bandana, and then he falls back to the prairie earth – not talking, or moving, or drawing in air. He falls back, and you can't see a mark on him or a drop of blood or nothing, but any man with eyes can see he's gone, off to the Twilight Court for his last sentencing.

So I get out and walk to him, and I give him just a memory and a moment out of respect for who he might have been, and then I ease that little gilt box out of his stone-frozen hands. Then I walk to the bed of the truck and get the shovel. That was the second instruction I got, by the way – bring a shovel with you, just in case. I reckoned I figure out why I needed it. Suppose I did, after all.

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