TO-WIT: THE SHOOTIST
Still they come, night after night. One night it’s John Wayne, another Gregory Peck. Each night it is a different Hollywood actor from a different Hollywood western, and each night we act out the same familiar scene.
We stand there fact to face, on a dusty deserted street in a dusty deserted town. We are alone but for the dust, the horseflies and the road apples, the only remaining residue of the high noon bustle recently scattered by our impending confrontation. He stares into my eyes and I into his. I see sadness there, a remorse reflected in eyes all too accustomed to this sight and weary of it to the bone, and I wonder to myself what does he in return see in mine.
One of us says “draw” and does, the other one wakes up, sweating cold bullets. What does it mean, what does it mean?
It means that I’m going to take this opportunity to work out yet another one of my neuroses on you, that’s what it means.
This recurrent dream all started a few weeks ago, the aftermath of a case I undertook a few months back. It was a simple case, and typical. I represented a landlord against residential tenants who had fallen behind in their rent. The tenants had asserted that their inability to pay their rent was the result of a combination of both recent unemployment and the burgeoning financial strain imposed upon them by their professed obligation to feed and clothe their three small children.
Yeah, right! Well, we’ve all heard that one before, haven’t we? My client was buying none of it and instead he had bought me. My instructions were to collect the back rent with interest, collect all future rent due under an acceleration clause in the lease, regain possession of the inner-city hovel they would not for some reason vacate, and if at all possible, obtain the indentured services of their oldest child for three years.
After the retainer check had cleared, I loaded my briefcase with pleadings and, armed with the full weight of the law, I went out hunting justice.
Some weeks later, I had the defendants cornered in the local magistrate’s office. It was not a pretty sight, what with all the wailing and shrieking and flailing of breasts.
“Where can we go?” they cried. “Who cares?” my client shot back, and after the smoke had cleared, their defense lay dead on the floor. I had both a judgment for the full amount and a writ of possession, and they had thirty days to get out of town.
That night, at high midnight, it was Gary Cooper. There was such sorrow in his face as he stared at me, into me, through me, as if I were beneath contempt, as if I were Jack Palance or Lee Van Cleef, for heaven’s sake. I went for my gun, he didn’t move. I shot him, he didn’t fall. He just stood there staring at me, staring at me, and then he turned his back and walked away, boot heels slowly clomping on the sidewalk, spurs forlornly jingling in the air.
The defendants did not appeal, and when the appeal period had passed my client instructed me to execute on both the judgment and the writ of possession, and I did as I was commanded. I sent out a constable to schedule a sale of their personal property and to evict them. He inventoried the property and brought me back a list that included one high chair – broken, one baby crib – broken, one Big Wheel tricycle – one wheel missing, a 12” black and white television and one 1980 Chevette – a Chevette!
In an effort to be witty and sardonic, I asked the constable why he had left off the one-eyed teddy bear.
“You bastard,” he replied, “can’t you leave them anything?”
That night Alan Ladd called me a varmint. I wanted to shoot him, I really did, but he was unarmed. He was also so short. Even still I might have done it, had he only turned his back to me. But instead he just sneered at me in a leading-man sort of way and then he rode off into the sunset. I called after him repeatedly, but he never answered.
I don’t know what the hell got into me but the next day I called my client. “Listen,” I said, “these people have nothing. They have no jobs, no money, no property, no place to go. What do you say we just forget the judgment, forget the sale, give them some time to find another place to live, and let them go?”
“That’s touching,” he replied. “I’m moved by your kindness, your sensitivity to the plight of your fellow human beings, I really am, and just because of that, I’m not going to report you to the Disciplinary Committee for your unmitigated failure to protect my interests. Oh, and can you give me the name of a real lawyer?”
He was right, of course. Oh, I don’t mean about my being sensitive and kind. I am, after all, a lawyer, and sensitivity and kindness are not questions on the bar exam. No, no, I mean he was right that I didn’t do my job. In the heat of battle I flinched, and there are an awful lot of lawyers out there who would have simply shot me where I stood. This time I only got fired. The next time I might not be so lucky.
Last night they all came, even Randolph Scott. They filed past me, one by one, each in turn placing a hand on my weary shoulder, each in turn smiling knowingly. In years past I would have shot them all. Now I merely acknowledged them with a resignation born of the certainty that its only a matter of time before I flinch again. When I do, someone will surely fire off a fatal pleading aimed right at my heart, and for all I know, it may already be headed in my direction.
© 1991, 2004, S. Sponte, Esq.