Steve Braunias: The Secret Diary of ... Rob Campbell

“Turns out giving someone a piece of my mind was the last thing I did," said Big Bad Rob Campbell. Photo / Michael Craig

OPINION

MONDAY

Big Bad Campbell strode into the Dodge saloon wearing a black fur Stetson in richly dyed shades, a black heavy-duty canvas duster with leather cuffs, and black jeans with a straight-leg opening that fitted over his black alligator-skin boots that tapered down effortlessly into his stacked leather heel for extra height and badness.

He earned quite good money as a senior civil servant in the sheriff’s department and could afford such niceties.

The drinkers at the bar paid him no mind. No one ever really did. That was the point of being a civil servant in the sheriff’s department. You kept your mouth shut and sat there like a stuffed dummy.

But Big Bad Campbell was cut from a different and definitely more expensive cloth. There were things that weighed on his conscience. How heavily they weighed! Because what was he if not a man of conscience?

All his life he had been directed by his conscience. In his youth, he ran with the ranch hands, and gave the cattle barons a piece of his mind. Later, he supped with the cattle barons and gave the ranch hands a piece of his mind. Now, in his dotage and with the wisdom brought on by age, experience, public service, and incredible salaries, he felt the old familiar stirrings.

He would give someone a piece of his mind if it was the last thing he did.

Big Bad Campbell knocked back his glass of rot-gut and eyed the room. Good old boys played cards. Someone played good old chords on the piano. Members of the press compared good old scalps. And then he saw cattle baron Baldy Luxon at a nearby table drinking coffee and smoking big cigars with the town’s merchants, and said in a loud voice, “Baldy Luxon ain’t nothin’ but a fool.”

The music stopped.

Members of the press eyed his scalp.

A card player drew the ace of spades.

Big Bad Campbell had gone too far this time.

The saloon door suddenly burst open. Standing there, silhouetted against the light, his legs apart and his hands by his gunbelt, was Sheriff Chip.

Big Bad Campbell trembled a little in his stacked leather heels but affected to pay the sheriff no mind.

“Another whiskey,” he growled.

But the barkeep didn’t move. No one did.

TUESDAY

And still no one moved in the saloon. It had been a long 24 hours.

WEDNESDAY

Just as Big Bad Campbell was beginning to relax, Sheriff Chip took a step backwards and in strode Deputy Ayesha Verrall, firing her two silver lady revolvers from the hip.

He staggered backwards and fell heavily on a table. It collapsed, and he lay on the floor, stunned.

But not too stunned for words.

“Ain’t nothin’ but a scratch,” he said.

THURSDAY

He was still lying on the saloon floor when Deputy David Parker strode in and shot him at point-blank range.

“Ya got me,” said Big Bad Campbell.

“Well, obviously,” said the deputy.

He looked down on him and was moved by a sudden pity.

“If only ya had kept ya damned mouth shut and sat there like a dummy,” he said.

Big Bad Campbell searched for a reply.

FRIDAY

It had been a long 24 hours but Big Bad Campbell finally found his dying words. He beckoned Deputy Parker to come closer.

The deputy knelt beside him.

Big Bad Campbell whispered, “Turns out giving someone a piece of my mind was the last thing I did.”

“Well,” said the deputy, nodding at the undertaker, “obviously.”