Chapter 5

By the time I locked the door of my room behind me, Liz was suddenly feeling shy again. Oh, she still wanted to do more of what we were doing, she just would have been happier if we were doing it in the dark. I persisted though, and finally managed to get her out of her clothes. Let me make it clear right now, it was well worth the effort. I don't care what century's standards you measured her body against - it was extraordinary. Except for her breasts, all of the views I'd had of it till now were covered with layers and layers of clothes. Now I was getting to see it up close and personal, as she stood blushing in front of me, trying to cover her naughty bits.

"Move your hands Elizabeth, you are incredibly beautiful and I want to see you," I said softly.

She blushed redder and she fidgeted, but she dropped her hands to her sides.

"I'm not beautiful," she argued, "I'm too big on top and too small on the bottom. I wouldn't even be able to work if it weren't for my padded girdle."

Liz did have slim hips and a small, high, firm butt. She looked bigger when she was dressed, I guess the padded girdle added a few inches to her hips, and the bustles on the dresses took care of the rest. But still, I've been married four times, and I've dated plenty of women in between wives, yet I've never once had one tell me that her 'ass was too small and her boobs too big'. In the world I came from, that just didn't happen. It was as unusual as a guy complaining about his Johnson being too big. Well, I could complain about that, but modesty prevents me.

"Your body is perfect, Honey, fashion be danged. And I'm about to show you how much I appreciate it."

"You are the only man who has ever seen it, Ty, and when you get undressed, you'll be the first man I've ever seen nude," she said shyly.

Lucky me! I shed my clothes as if they were on fire. When I was down to my birthday suit, my not particularly big Johnson was leading the way by seven inches or so. Liz was looking me up and down, as it was my turn to stand with my hands at my sides. While she checked me out, I had a question for her.

"How could you have been married for six months without seeing each other naked?"

She never raised her eyes from little Ty as she answered.

"We had separate dressing rooms and wore our night clothes to bed. I was curious, of course, but Charles was older and very conservative. We wore nightclothes to bed and he took me in the dark. Everything you've done so far is a first for me."

I liked that, and it was motivational too. If I was going to be first, I wanted everything I did to be the standard any other men were compared against. With that in mind, I laid her in the center of the bed and had at it. I paid homage to every inch of her pale smooth body, before I centered my attention on her little chestnut colored bush. She tried to push my head away in alarm, until I flicked my tongue across her clit. That little maneuver ended any thought of resistance, as she fell back on the bed with a gasp.

Liz couldn't believe it wasn't a fluke when I brought her to a crashing orgasm with my tongue, so after a little rest, I gladly gave her a repeat performance. I left her to catch her breath after her second long and loud climax, as I retrieved the small parcel from my dresser drawer and pulled out one of Mr. Goodyear's Latex Rubber Protective Sheaths. Charles Goodyear had been making the sheaths for ten years, but because of the Comstock Act of 1874, it was illegal to sell condoms in the United States. Luckily, good old Clem at the barbershop had a supply he kept replenished from across the river.

Image this: the condoms were made in Ohio and then sent to Europe. From Europe they traveled to Mexico and then to Texas. I was protected by a piece of rubber that already had ten thousand miles on it, hoping it would last another hundred feet, six inches at a time.

The rubber wasn't neatly rolled like they were in my other time, so it took some effort to get it on correctly. Liz watched me big-eyed as I slipped it on. I figured she couldn't help knowing what it was, what with working in the saloon with the professional girls.

I went slow and gentle getting into her tight little cleft, but it wasn't that difficult, as she was drenched down there. It was almost anticlimactic as I slipped in the last little bit and our hips ground together. All through the exercise, Liz looked at where we joined in awe, I think because it was happening with pleasure instead of the pain she remembered. I told Liz that I was too needy to last long this first time. She replied that it was feeling pretty good to her already.

I lasted longer than I thought I would, thanks to the sensation deadening rubber, so Liz was close when I unloaded. I kept stroking after I came, and stayed hard enough to bring her to another climax. We were two very happy campers snuggled up on my bed after I disposed of the rubber. Liz laid her head on my chest and threw her leg over mine, all of her earlier modesty forgotten in post-coital bliss.

"That was so wonderful, Ty, I don't know how I could ever thank you enough."

Here was a woman who knew how to make a man feel good.

"The pleasure was at least half mine, Elizabeth, and the afternoon isn't over yet."

I swear Liz's big green eyes lit up when I said the afternoon wasn't over. She pulled herself tighter against me and kissed my chest.

"Goody!" she said emphatically.

Goody was right on the money. When I recovered (when you are twenty years old it doesn't take long), I gave Liz a run through of different positions. She liked being on top a lot. She perched herself on me and posted up and down on my rod in the same way she rode her horse. I played with her breasts and occasionally rubbed her clit. I especially liked doing her doggie style, because her cute little ass fit my hands perfectly.

When we were both sated, we cleaned up as best we could with my ewer of water and basin. As we were washing up, I decided I would invent at least one thing in this life and that was a shower.

I invited Liz to have supper with me again, but she said she wasn't dressed for it. So I ended up walking her back to her rooming house. As we walked, Liz held tightly to my arm and chatted away. She told me how good I had made her feel, and how she couldn't wait for us to be together again. I seconded that emotion.

I still felt very good that night when I walked into the El Toro Cantina; I imagine everyone in the place knew what was causing me to smile. I felt even better when Mr. Bemis strolled into the saloon while I was sitting at a table watching the gambling action. I had not tried to get into the game yet, because I was unable to focus. All I could think about was Liz and me rolling around on my bed. Bemis was a welcomed distraction. He was even welcomer when he handed me twenty-five dollars, my remaining pay from the cattle drive. He looked me up and down, but didn't comment on my wardrobe.

"I did real good, selling the cattle, Ty, so I gave everyone a little bonus. We'll be leaving for the ranch, day after tomorrow, so come back to the camp tomorrow night."

I told Bemis I was retiring from the cowboy business and wouldn't be joining him on the ride back to his ranch. To his credit, he tried to talk me out of doing something he knew was wrong for the old Ty Ringo. When I stuck to my position, he sighed and stood up.

"We'll be back with another herd in four months. If you are still alive, you can see me about a job."

I stood up also and shook his hand.

"I know what you're thinking Boss, but almost dying changed me. Next time you're in town, look me up and I'll buy you a drink."

Bemis didn't look convinced, but he didn't say anything as he turned around and walked out of the saloon.

I finally did sit in on Pen's card game. As I knew they would, distracting thoughts of Liz kept me from being as sharp as I needed to be. I lost eight dollars by the time I called it quits.

I was on my way out of the El Toro, when I heard some scuffling and a loud noise that sounded like a hard slap. I turned into the dancehall portion of Pen's saloon, just in time to see a man pull a knife out of a belt scabbard. I looked for the bartender whose job it was to keep the peace; he was nowhere in sight. Sighing, I pulled my pistol and cocked the hammer.

"Drop the knife," I ordered in as firm a voice as I could muster.

The man with the knife turned toward me and sneered. Jesus, he was ugly, with his long greasy hair, matted gray beard and snaggle-toothed mouth.

"Stay out of this, fancy-pants, unless you want to be next. This half-breed bitch slapped me, so I'm going to mark her up."

Being a rodeo clown meant that I counted on my peripheral vision to keep track of the downed cowboy and the bull both at the same time. That's how I saw Mountain Man's partner bringing one of those old LaMat pistol/shotgun combinations to bear on me. I spun in his direction by reflex and shot him in the shoulder. Before the man hit the ground, I was facing snaggle-tooth again. In the small amount of time I took to dispatch his partner, he had reversed his grip on the hunting knife and was drawing it back to throw it at me. I cocked my pistol and tried to shoot the knife out of his hand. Well, it was a real good try, but I hit more hand than I did knife.

All of that took fewer than ten seconds of real time, but to my adrenalin charged body, it had happened in super-slow motion. I was numb-struck as I lowered my pistol. The entire saloon was churchyard quiet as people stood gawking at me. When I holstered my pistol and turned around, Pen Smythe was standing behind me, holding a small .32 caliber Colt five shot revolver.

"Have a seat Mr. McGuinn, and a drink on me while I sort this out," he ordered.

Sitting down sounded like a good idea to me; I'd never shot or even shot at another person in my life. I grabbed a seat at the closest table and Snaggle-tooth's intended victim scurried over with a shot of tequila.

She handed me the glass with a "thank you Senor". I threw back the fiery liquid and held the glass out for a refill.

"De nada," I croaked.

I was on my second tequila, sipping this one instead of throwing it back, when Pen sat down beside me.

"That was commendable marksmanship, Old Sod, and excellent judgment," he said.

I polished off the glass of tequila and held it up for a refill.

"Reflexes and luck," I replied.

It was Pen's turn to nod.

"Whatever it was, Sir, I'm indebted to you. The barman was replacing the beer keg, so you probably saved young Conchita from grave injury."

I nodded absently as I watched someone tending to the two injured men. I was extremely happy to see both of them were alive. Pen pulled a chair out for Conchita when she brought my drink back.

"I have dispatched someone for the Sheriff. I suspect after investigating, you will be exonerated and those two miscreants apprehended."

It happened exactly as Pen foresaw, as the same deputy from the night before asked a few questions of Conchita and me, before hauling the two wounded men off to jail.

"I'll have Doc Willis patch these fellers up. A few days in jail will clear their heads, then I'll send them packing," he told Pen, as he herded the men out of the saloon.

Pen dismissed Conchita and had a drink with me. As we drank, he ran a proposition by me that was very intriguing.

"Tyler old chap, I have an idea that I believe will be mutually beneficial. We both know that it will take some time for you to become fully employed as a Barrister. I think I can help you with that in two ways. Number one, I know a lot of people who'll hire you on my word alone. And number two, I have an office I'm not using right off the main bar and under the stairway. For that help, you would agree to help me run this place. I'd pay you a modest salary, but you keep what you win gambling."

His offer gave me much to think about as I finally headed over to the Gold Nugget. It sure would solve a host of problems for me, and I doubted if there'd be many dull moments. Of course, unless he had a nice quiet room in the back for me, I'd still need a place to live. Then again, the Bull was only two blocks from Mrs. Dean's boarding house.

When I walked into the Nugget, Liz ran over to me and hugged me tight.

"Thank God you are okay, Tyler. I heard about what happened at El Toro and it scared me to death."

I couldn't believe that the news of my misadventure at El Toro beat me here, but it seems some busy body was quick to spread the news. Of course, the story Liz received was that I was involved in a vicious gun battle with two outlaws. I calmed Liz down as we danced, and told her of Pen's offer.

"Mr. Smythe has a reputation among the dancers as a fair and honest employer. He isn't demanding of his girls, but he is supposed to be quite the seducer."

By demanding, Liz meant that the dancers didn't have to sleep with him to keep their jobs. Liz didn't have that problem, because a woman named Vidalia Ecks owned the Nugget. In addition, what Liz said about Pen mostly agreed with Clem the Barber's assessment.

I think the full impact of my adventure at Pen's saloon hit me when I returned to my room that night. Too keyed up to fall asleep, I cleaned the pistol as I sat on the bed. As I ran the cotton bore patch down the pistol's barrel, I reflected on how things in my past life seemed to have prepared me for this trip back to my uncles body and time. I'll give you a 'for instance'.

I became a bull rider and rodeo clown because of Stella, my first wife, and Gracie, wife number two was responsible for my shooting skills. I met Gracie at the rodeo's stop in Santa Fe, New Mexico. I made it a point to come back to Santa Fe to see her on our next tour break. During that visit, Gracie and I fell in hot monkey love. You know what I mean, that insane love when you can't stand being apart for a second. When you are so hot for each other, nothing else matters.

I still sigh when I remember those early days with Gracie; I thought we had a love for the ages. Well, any way, Gracie worked as an actress in the Sagebrush Old West Show. She played Annie Oakley in the show, doing trick shooting with a rifle and a pistol. She was damned good with a long gun, but she was fantastic with a revolver. I was a decent shot with a pistol when I met her, I was a cop's son after all, but she started me from scratch and made me much, much better. She trained me so I could latch onto one of those Sagebrush jobs, too.

Now here I was in 1877, when that gunfighter skill set was not a novelty, it was a survival tool.

The next day, my fourth in El Paso, was a Saturday. Saturday was just another day here in 1877, as folks worked six days a week and rested on the Sabbath. I slept in way too late for breakfast, so I went hungry to Clem's for my every other day bath, morning shave and bull-hockey session. As soon as Clem pulled the drape around my neck, he started talking.

"So I hear you were a hero last night, me Bucko."

I explained to him what really happened as he stropped his straight razor. He laughed and said that stories always grew in the telling.

Clean and fresh shaven, I paid Mrs. Dean another visit in regards to a room. Molly Dean was not what you would normally expect a widowed owner of a rooming house to be like. Molly was a small, energetic and attractive redhead, I guessed to be in her early to mid thirties. She was friendly and had a ready smile, but you could sense she had a backbone of steel. Molly's husband had died not long after they had moved to El Paso from St Louis five years ago.

Her husband had been much older than Molly and well off. In anticipation of the railroad coming through, he had brought them to El Paso so he could trade in Mexican jewelry and leather goods. Mrs. Dean's Rooming House was the large home he'd built for them. It was all Molly had been left with after her husband's grown children had picked his estate clean.

I ended up renting the nicest two rooms she had. They were at the back of the house on the second floor, and had their own entrance. I had a small sitting room and a spacious bedroom with a large bed. Outside in the back yard, about twenty feet from my stairs, was a bathroom with running water and a metal flush toilet. Next door to the toilet facility was a room with a large bathtub. Water for the bathtub came from a water tank on ten-foot stilts. A windmill drew water up to the tank and gravity fed it to the tub and toilet. The hot El Paso sun warmed the water.

The bathroom wasn't the only thing that attracted me to the rooming house. The biggest reason was Molly herself. As soon as I introduced myself to her, I could feel the mutual spark between us. So could she, as she held my proffered hand a few seconds longer than politeness dictated. I had a feeling Molly and I were going to become very good friends.

Molly was surprised when I paid for my first month in advance. Her rates weren't that cheap if you had meals included. The rent set me back twenty dollars, but at least I had a job of sorts now, and a place to call my own.