by: Chet Duke
**Sometime in the summer of 2004.**
Lights shown brightly over the Hazzard County fair grounds, trucks and horse trailers surrounded the make shift rodeo arena. The entire grounds buzzed with laughter and cheers from both the high grand stands and behind the scenes. Young and old cowboys from all over had turned up to try there luck at the local first annual Hazzard Rodeo.
The event was proving worth its while to the aging Boss and Sheriff, Rosco P. Coltrane. He stood watching from the side of the fence as a young man climbed onto the back of a fierce looking black saddle bronc horse and readied himself. As the gate flew open only moments later, the young rider was thrown air born and dropped in the mud.
Rosco laughed softly and sputtered his approval, but his enjoyment was about to be short lived. His deep blue eyes raised as he caught the glint of light off a shiny belt buckle, the buckle being worn by another young man. This one with dark features, his Stetson jet black, matching his hair, jeans and boots. His chaps a deep chocolate color with long swaying fringe. The old sheriff blinked his eyes and hurried towards the bucking chute, there was the very man he’d been seeking to arrest.
Nineteen year old Chet Duke climbed into the bucking chute, where the fierce black horse had been herded back into for his try at the unridable horse flesh. Fearlessly he measured out the broncs halter rope and settled himself in the hornless saddle. Just as the sheriff rounded the corner of the chutes the gate swung open the mighty horse sky rocketed out of there like hell on wheels.
The wild horse sprang and kicked its large hooves into the sky, twisting and turning in angered bucking. The young outlawed Duke boy swayed in the saddle, taking the outlawed horse as a well matched challenge to his own tainted outlaw blood. The crowd stood and a roaring cheer went over the entire arena, they knew the cowboy was about to make the buzzer. Chet rode out the bronc until the buzzer sounded and a pick up man on a bay horse galloped up beside him. He quickly grabbed onto the pickup man and dismounted the bucking outlaw.
Rosco jogged hurriedly to meet the young Duke at the alley gate, stopping and standing a couple feet back from the fence. He watched as Chet slide from his hold on the pick up man and received a firm pat on the shoulder from the older cowboy. Casually he made his way towards the alley gate, pausing to untie his glove then moving forward once again.
Suddenly a fine wave of warning rushed through him to the bone and he looked up. His mismatched eyes met by the deep, intense blue eyes of the sheriff, each man looking through the fence at each other. Both gazed, the cowboys eyes cold and as mean and fierce as the black bucking horse. Chet stood entirely still frozen in his steps, his brow furrowed and his teeth gritted. The Sheriff watched him with keen eyes, the young man was intimidating to say the least.
Tall and well muscled, his dark blue wrangler shirt dusty from his ride, carefully defining the tenseness in his body. They glared at each other, like a man watching a killer 2,000 pound bull with nothing but a fence standing between life and death. Chet snorted a goading breath through his nostrils, daring the older man to come and get him.
Chet’s heart raced in his chest and with a sharp turn from the fence he began running for the end of the arena. On the other side of the fence the Sheriff lit out in the same direction that the outlaw was running, watching him through the fence. The cowboy climbed up on the end of the fence and leapt on his waiting horses back and tor away from the make shift area.
The long red chestnuts Thoroughbreds body stretched out in a long hard gallop understanding ever command that his master asked of him. Rosco ran up to one of the pick up me and grabbed the reins of his horse.
“Im Roscoooo P. Coltrane and Im commandeering this horse!! Khee! Git. Move! Get off!” Rosco sputter and the pick up man disappointed and was replaced by the old Sheriff.
Kicking his heals to the stocky quarter horses sides the Sheriff urged the pick up horse into a run towards the woods, pursuing the cowboy. Deep into the woods the two riders dangerously galloped on horse back.
Although the quarter horse proved to be more sure footed the Thoroughbred moved more agilely over the terrain that he’d been trained to move over. Chet glanced over his shoulder looking to see if he was being chased. His brow raised in surprise as he spotted the Sheriff in the distance moving in on the horse he’d borrowed.
“Your getting smarter old man…” Chet muttered to himself as he came out of the woods and onto a dirt road. He turned his horse onto the road and galloped him over the bridge and down the road for 30 or 40 yards. Then he turned him off onto the grass on the edge of the road and back tracked.
Carefully he steered Red down into the creek bed and wadded him out into the knee high water. With gentle guidance he turned the tall horse under the bridge and backed him up against the concrete walls beneath the bridge. Chet and his horse stood quietly, listening for the Sheriff.
In a few moments the rumble of the quarter horses hooves came closer and soon right over the bridge above Chet’s head. He waited patiently listening as the clopping hooves mellowed out, growing further away as the Sheriff fallowed the road and disappeared around the bend.
Once Chet was convinced that the Sheriff had ridden far enough away he guided his horse out from under the bridge and loped him up the bank. The cowboy chuckled to himself and turned to the west and disappeared into the deep dense forest. He would return to his hide out in the abandoned ghost town known as the Sleepy City and keep clear of town for a few days.
*Two Days Later.*
“Awwwwww right, ya were going 41 in a 40 mile zone. Leme see your license and registration buddy.” Rosco said standing at the window of an old Buick.
The driver mumbled something and handed the sheriff his license and registration as he was asked to do so. The Sheriff checked the information over and abruptly wrote the driver a ticket and handed him back his belongings.
“Khee, don’t let me catch ya speeding again. Kheee, git!” The Sheriff walked back toward his cruiser and the ticketed driver pulled away.
As he approached the patrol car another car pulled up and skidded to a stop directly behind the vehicle. Four men got out of the car and hurried over to the Sheriff grabbing him roughly by his arms and pinning him against the side of the patrol car.
“Cooo! Jit! Let me go I say!” Rosco sputtered in alarm.
One of the bigger of the four drew back his fist while his comrades held the Sheriff pinned down and punched him in the face.
“Ooo! That smarts.” Rosco grimaced and muttered.
The attacker drew back to hit him again, but the Sheriff titled to one side and the mans fist shattered through the window of the car. The sound of the glass shattering echoed over the hay fields.
Both Chet and his horse looked up from resting near a fence in a field a quarter of a mile from the road that Rosco was on. Closely fallowing the sound came a pained yelp and Chet creased his brow.
“That don’t sound good.” He gathered his reins and mounted his horse, turning the tall animal towards the road.
Chet cantered the long legged Thoroughbred up onto the top of the hill and looked down. From there he could see the road and the Sheriff being attacked. His brow furrowed, he couldn’t stand to see the older man beaten to death. Although he was often his very own enemy he was a senior Hazzardite who didn’t deserve such treatment from anyone.
Chet squeezed his legs around his horse, Red burst into a thundering canter down the slope and into the neighboring field picking up speed as the ground leveled out. The well trained equine sprinted gallantly even as they approached the heavy patch of forest that led up onto the road.
Chet leaned over the horses neck, ducking tree branches and hugging the horse with his legs. The scene came into view between the trees as they neared, the old Sheriff doing his best to fight back against steep odds and floundering under a rein of fists.
The horse and rider burst from the trees, leaping over the ditch on the side of the road. Chet leaned to the side and lunged from his saddle tackling two of the four men to the ground. He lit into them with his fists immediately, going for there face in a raging attempt to knock them senseless.
Rosco also quickly took advantage of the men that had been tackled, he began to fight back harder against the two men that still attacked him. The odds more in his favor, he punched one of the men knocking him back towards Chet’s horse. The horses ears laid back and his lip wrinkled in anger. The 1200 pound animal lowered its head bitting the man and striking him fiercely with a front hoof.
Chet plundered the attackers, the man on his right fell unconscious under the rein of blows. But the other slipped away and managed a hard kick to Chet’s ribs rolling the Duke boy over. He got up as quickly as possible with the wind knocked out of him he gasped for air.
Quickly he snapped a hard kick to the mans mid section and he folded. Chet swung a double fisted blow nailing the assaulter square in the face and knocking him onto his back unconscious and out for the count.
Rosco nailed his second attacker causing him to stumble back where Chet caught him and slammed him head long into the side of the patrol car. The ugly man staggered and the Sheriff finished him with one punch. Rosco straitened from landing the punch, his chest heaving in exertion he came face to face with the one man he’d been trying to catch for so many months. Chet Duke.
Chet breathed deeply through his nose, coming down from the adrenalin he’d been spurred on to fight. His mismatched eyes met the deep blue icy eyes the Sheriff, his own nemesis standing only a few short feet in front of him. The cowboys brow creased expecting to have hand cuffs slapped on his wrists at any moment. Anger shielded the fear in his eyes and he swallowed hard.
Rosco gazed into Chet’s eyes in return trying to understand the young mans thoughts and sensing the shields going up hiding….hiding something he thought. He watched him, waiting to find what it was the younger man was feeling. His body seemed so tense, so apprehensive in his presence. The sheriff blinked seeing for a moment beneath the anger and darkness in the Dukes eyes. Fear…had he really just seen fear in this creature, a man known to be so hardened and vile…was afraid. Rosco let his shoulders sag and relax, relieved to be alive and breathing.
Chet’s brow drifted up and he stepped back noting the sag in Rosco’s shoulders, it was obvious he had seen something in his deep intent stare. His conscious mind began screaming for him to turn and get on his horse and run for all he was worth. But it was no use, even that old man could grab him before he could get in the saddle. Chet’s own shoulders sagged in deep dreadful defeat, he was caught right in the laws shadow.
His head bowed in surrender and he slowly held out his wrists awaiting the cold hard steel bands of confinement. All those years of running, escaping and running again were about to come to a end. A honorable end, he thought, he’d saved the Sheriffs life, or at least saved him from certain terrible pain.
Rosco’s brow raised as he notice the sag in the young mans shoulders and the bow in his head. The look of defeat and the dreary thoughts of confinement showing so plainly in his eyes and expression. The old Sheriff glanced down at the beaten men on the ground, he’d known the moment they’d attacked that his chances of walking away or surviving had just been washed out like a bridge in a flood.
This young man in his very presence, a rogue, a outlaw so thickly despised had showed up in just the nick of time. Rosco swallowed looking down at Chet’s offered wrists and open hands of surrender. He was responsible for his very life…. there’ll be other days to chase him, but today it seemed like the right thing to do to just look the other way. Without a second thought or pause for judgement Rosco placed his hand into Chet’s open palm, closing his fingers in a hand shake.
Chet looked up shocked to see the offering of thanks, he shook the older mans hand in return. There grips firm and without words, they were not needed to say what the hand shake meant.
After a few long moments, Rosco released the younger mans hand, clearing his throat as he turned back to his patrol car to use the CB.
“Go on…. get outta here…” He muttered sitting down in the seat.
A side ways grin pulled at Chet’s lips and he turned on his heal and vaulted onto his horses back. Quickly he gathered his reins and kneed the equine into a gallop to the edge of the rode. The horse leapt over the ditch and galloped into the dense forest, bending around trees and brush they disappeared.
“Enos, get out here to Pine Tree Road.” Rosco came over the CB.
“Yes Sheriff, everything ok?” Enos scrambled to start his patrol car and pealed out driving like mad to get to where the Sheriff was.
“Yes you dipstick, now get over here!”
As the sheriff set the mic down the other patrol car slide up to the front of Rosco’s and the middle aged deputy got out. His eyes widened seeing the four men laying on the ground.
“Possum-on-a-gumbush sheriff… did you fight all them yourself?”
“Khee…khee you bet I did.” The Sheriff raised his fists. “Well I did have a little help. Khee-git. I’ll tell you about it later. Cuff em’ and stuff em’ Khee.”
Chet galloped his horse back up onto the hill that he’d witnessed the attack upon the sheriff from. He slowed his horse and drew him to a stop at the peak of the hill turning around to look back again. He could see Enos pull up and help the Sheriff load the four men into the patrol cars and he couldn’t help but grin in a warm sense of pride. The Duke boy kneed his horse gently and trotted down the slope riding away, free to run another day.
THE END [Written January 2007]