The gambler took a long step from the stagecoach directly to the boardwalk that ran down both sides of Main Street. It had been raining for 6 days straight and a mixture of mud and dung four inches deep covered the road. In another week or so the temperature would drop and the ground would freeze. Then a man might dare to step off the sidewalk. The gambler wore a black suit, custom-made for him by a San Francisco china-man for $25. He unbuttoned the jacket and pulled a ten dollar pocket watch from the right pocket of a fancy waistcoat and checked the time. In the left pocket was a silver, two-shot derringer.

The stage driver reached into the coach and drew out a black bowler hat, a black umbrella, and a small black bag like a doctor might carry, and handed them to the gambler. Carrying everything he owned, the gambler turned and walked into the closest casino. He paid in advance for one nights lodging with the last dollar coins in his pocket, and got enough change back to buy two whiskeys. Then he went upstairs to his room.

At that moment dirt farmer with the unfortunate name of Francis English left the general store and trudged across the muddy street. Frank, as people called him, was in a terrible mood and had been for several months. His daughter took sick and they’d paid the doctor in chickens. The coyotes had already eaten his rooster. His daughter, Francine, died anyway. Then his wife died in child birth last spring and he’d buried his grief in hard work. He’d brought in a bumper crop of hay, as had everyone else apparently since the price at market was so low that he couldn’t make his taxes on the farm. They were coming to take the farm tomorrow and he was about to do the only thing he could think of about it. Drink himself to death.

Fank had just been in the general store selling his buckboard, plow horse and his shot gun for a quarter of its real worth. He’d tried to sell his pistol but the clerk wouldn’t take it on account of the rust and the squeaky sound it made when you drew the hammer back. So he sold the bullets out of it and his gun belt and stuck the rusty antique through his waist band. On the board walk in front of the casino Frank pounded his boots off before walking inside. He was polite out of habit even when he had nothing left to live for.