Davy Stoddard walked into Hoss Harry's Saloon in Cheyenne, Wyoming, pausing at the swinging doors to swallow his fear as subtly as he could muster before he fixed his eyes on the first open bar stool. Trying to affix a swagger in his stride, he made his way through a bevy of tables loaded with various folks whose faces reported their lives like old newsprint. Most of their eyes looked as if they were wanted somewhere for something and glared at him as if he was the instrument of their calling to a docket. Slinging his possessions, trundled into a gunny sack, over his shoulder, His eyes fell to the women sitting with men at tables, fanning themselves and smiling at him automatically.
He was eighteen, slightly built and without a gun. He wore no star on his new gingham shirt and could barely muster a few chin whiskers to make him look any older.
The other men on the trail up from Abilene had given him the nickname, Milquetoast as a result of his youth and his naivety about the ardors of the long ride driving 70 head of cattle north to the slaughterhouses that would process them into dried jerkstrip and saddle leather, destined for the 7th Cavalry units up in Oregon chasing the elusive Chief Joseph into Canada. It was his first cattle drive, his first time of note away from home and, he had decided after getting paid, his last time.
The route up from Kansas was rough, his cohorts merciless in their chiding and joking at his expense, despite his holding up his end of the job. He was tired, twenty pounds lighter than when he started. But $125 richer. It was the most money he had ever held in his hand in his young life.
The men had particularly ribbed him for not knowing a woman in the Biblical sense. Early on the trail, he got caught trying to diddle with himself under his bedroll and never heard the end of it. Every time he would shy away from the men to water the chaparral, inevitably one of them would catcall to the others about ole Milquetoast firing his gun off and hitting nothing again. Cognizant of the old hands watching him for another such session, he had relented from doing that again. It was a thing he had liked to do very much at home, in the privacy of his room, which he was luckier than many in that he did not share it with a sibling. Now after twenty days of being saddle-sore, poked fun at, worked like a slave, and finally paid in full, he bellied up to the bar and sat there waiting for someone to prod him into what he should do next.
He had never been in a saloon before.
"Boy, I hope your mama sent you with enough of her egg money to pay." A gruff, heavily bearded man, a behemoth whose face and slight accent gave him away as a Russian from up Alaska way. A couple of mangy drunks next to Davy snickered. He drew in a deep breath and tried his best grown-man's glare.
"I got at least two pennies from her satchel. That's more than enough to buy this crumby place and two just like it, ain't it?" He smiled and tossed a silver dollar on the bar. The barkeep smiled and pointed at him to a fellow to whom he had been talking.
"Ain't old enough to piss a hole in the ground yet. But he gonna sass me in my own joint." He chuckled. His name was Peodor but everyone for a hundred miles knew him as Hoss Harry. Wiping his hands on a towel that Davy looked at and reckoned did more harm than good cleaning off those big Russian hands, Hoss sauntered over to him and propped up a giant boot on crate. "We ain't got no milk and biscuits in here, sonny."
"That's great to hear. I was hoping for a rye and some company." Davy smiled like a man, but inside his boy's heart pounded. He never had felt so young and out of place. He felt both the casual and the focused gazes of a few dozen patrons prickling on his back. His neck sweated.
"Whiskey and cunny, eh?" Hoss roared. "You sure your mama would allow her baby's meat to be wiped by another woman? You don't look much like you're more than five months out of your nappies, Babyface."
"I got cash money and a raging case of the needins, barkeep. I done rode up with seventy head from Kansas. I'm tired, I'm hungry, I'm thirsty and if you got any tainted doves around here, I'm needing a bath with a friend. I like mine with a bosom if you got any. But if you ain't, just make sure they're fresh." Davy glowered, trying to lie to rest any fresh insults upon his manhood. "I don't need some old roan old enough to be my mama."
Hoss smiled at the boy's nuts and pulled up a bottle of Moseby's. "So be it, young man. You got money, you man enough for me." He laid a shot glass on the bar.
"Leave that bottle, if you please." Davy said.
"That's two more dollars than your one, sonny." Davy pocketed the dollar and slapped a ten-dollar gold piece on the bar.
"I'll be taking my bottle to a room, sir."
"Suit yourself." Hoss stacked another shot glass in the first one and pushed the bottle and the glasses toward the young man, chuckling along with a few of the other drinkers sitting and watching. "For the night, it's a fiver."
Davy slid the gold coin toward Hoss. "Keep the change. Where's my bunk?"
Hoss pulled a key from a row of keys nailed to the wall behind him. "Number Eight. I'm sending Evie to take care of that bathing for you. You a lucky man she's free."
"I thank you." He snatched up the bottle, key and glasses. "What's the best place to eat around Cheyenne?"
"Rooming house four streets over. Name of Regina's. But don't you be bringing Evie over there. They don't take kindly to fallen women eating over at Regina's. Regina likely shoot you for that."
"Thanks for the warning." Davy tipped his new Stetson and walked up the stairs. When he was on the other side of the door, he flattened against it, exhaling nervously. For all his bluster, he had never been so scared in his life. Until he realized he had just ordered up a girl for his pleasure. His first time for pleasure. Then, his apprehension turned to sheer giddy panic.
Not knowing what to do, his first thought was to hit the privy. It had been weeks since he saw a proper WC.
When he was finished, he paced around the room, wondering what protocols one took when a woman of leisure was on her way. There was a tub in a parlor room with a wood-burning stove still smoldering from whoever left the room prior. A hand pump was fixed to pour fresh water from a cistern into a giant pail left full on the stove. A sort of pipe-funnel contraption was fixed to the lip of the pail so someone could sit in the tub, push a lever, and let in some hot water by gravity at his want. He put some kindling in the stove and got a flame blown up. Truth be told, he would just as easily been satisfied to sit in a cold bath. The sun was a never-ending menace to him on the trail. Cool was better than hot but he figured hot baths were the norm. Besides, his nerves were wired with all kinds of thoughts about his prick's appearance to a woman for the first time. More than one, he had come out of a river and found all his manhood shriveled and soaked up in his crotch. It was a curiosity of the loins that he did not understand, but it made him laugh to see. If it were funny for him to see, a woman would definitely laugh. Just as the hands he rode up with had laughed.
When he had the water in the tub near about where he thought was warm enough and deep enough to use, he pored himself a shot of the rye. It burned like hell. But he figured it was normal and poured himself another. Just as the second wave of fiery steadiness hit his craw, a polite knock at the door startled him. He stood still, trying to gauge something of the woman just be replaying the sound of the demure knock. His heart pounded and he felt his loins respond in kind to the rush of blood. Evie, the barkeep had said...her name's Evie.
"Hello?" He spoke aloud.
"You ask for some company?" The voice was small, dainty.
"Hold on. Be right there, ma'am." He winced at his tone. Ma'am sounded so much like a young un's reply. Today, he was a man, not a young un, by God. He took a pull of the rye from the neck and stared at himself in the shaving mirror.
