Out on the plains, glowing from campfires revealed anticipation on the faces of the Nagawitchi who awaited the upcoming wrasslin match. Some children shook rattles, while mothers laughed.

  Under surveillance of spear-wielding men, I stood next to the muleskinners and Dunbar. They all had been forced to wear some kind of underwear, complete with strings swallowed by their unwashed hides.

  Reactions to the attire from the muleskinners and deputy couldn’t have differed more. They appeared ashamed, with folded hands over genitals, while Dunbar proudly swayed his hips beneath his exposed, hairy beer belly. Suddenly, I felt a surge of gratitude for the grassy dress the chief put me in.

  Trying to focus on anything but Dunbar’s dance, I got a sight of Diamond seated to herself. The light of the half-moon seemed to accentuate her presence, her blond wig and rosy face as colorful hues amongst a dark backdrop. Behind rising flames, she appeared tranquil. It’s as if her blue eyes were communicating the impossible certainty that Chip would emerge victorious over the giant in our path.

  Speaking of the monstrosity, out from the shadows stepped Giant Chief Big Owl in his loincloth. Arms spread at his hips; he made fists the size of large sediment rocks we’d passed by. He followed that with a bellow that promised war to all the heavens.

  Tribesmen in skull paint and mohawks celebrated the chief by beating belly drums, dancing in circles, and repeating chants that could strike fear in the hearts of all Texans.

  In his opposite direction were the hills that led to the cave. There emerged Chip in a long grass skirt and a frame massive to mortals but miniscule to giants. The guerilla man reduced to a dwarf monkey gritted his teeth, while squatting and hopping right to left. Amongst a dead silent audience, Deputy Dunbar’s Texan draw came through. “Gawd! He’s gone git killed.”

  The giant treaded back and forth, sneering as if he was insulted by the sheriff merely trying him. Remaining in a crouched stance, Chip tapped his toes, impatiently. When Owl went to bellow again, the sheriff charged him.

  My hands sweated as Chip buried his head in the chief’s sternum and tried to wrap his arms around all that mass. The giant skimmed the sheriff away with ease. However, the sheriff got up and got a hold of a massive leg.

  From a fire far across from me, Diamond locked her hands together, watching the giant wabbling on one foot.

  I felt my face crack into a smile. Most men would cut and run from a man that size, but Sheriff had him a-hopping. All the big bad situations in life that had challenged me, couldn’t recall a single occasion where I came steamrolling toward any of them.

  My smile faded as fast as the monster had flipped Chip over. Their Goliath had our David squeezed betwixt his colossal calves. As the sheriff began to lose blood flow to his noggin, I poked around for any optimism a posse member may spare.

  “Dirn thang is over,” Dunbar proclaimed

  As for Diamond, a struggle in itself came over her face, one to stay strong for the sheriff, her captured suitor Dylan, and us all. She stood. “Come on, Chip. Come on.”

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  Right when Big Owl raised his hands in a presumptuous victory and laughed, Chip used their combined sweat to slide free.

  “Yes,” Diamond shouted.

  Chip came diving back, but this only seemed to annoy his adversary to the point that he hit a grueling series of slams. Chip fought back up but bent over in pain to a large arm clobbering him. We all heard the sheriff’s back crack, and now he lay face down on the bumpy earth. If Chip hadn’t been squirming, I’d have thought Owl had killed him right then and there.

  The aggressor stopped to smell the desert, and the dry taste must have been the one of our defeats, because he taunted us—outstretched his arms and grinned with plaque all over his gums and teeth. The indigenous women hooted and cheered, and many more of the Nagawitchi consumed the atmosphere with rattling and drumming.

  “Goddamn,” I hollered as that monster stomped Chip’s abdominal. How much can the sheriff take? He sat halfway up, coughing, but his wide eyes seemed to show excitement. “He’s a hell of a fighter,” I said. As soon as I did, that giant shoved him back down with only a toe.

  A hideous chuckle emerged from the abyss inside that monster’s belly as Chip appeared lifeless. Then, all our hearts stopped when Owl leaped in the air, his behind to come down and crush the sheriff’s skull. It felt like he hung in the sky for some bimeby days. Diamond covered her eyes, I cringed, and—

  Sheriff got out the way, and the big man was flat on his back. With spit in his mouth, Chip dashed to his opponent, who’d sat up. He locked his arms around the most enormous head in the West, tightening Big Owl’s curls over his eyes. He bore down on the headlock with more might than he had, using extra leverage from an adrenaline rush.

  The giant fought to his feet, but that damn Chip mounted up on his back, attached himself like a parasite. Owl swung him every which way, but he couldn’t swing him a-loose.

  Finally, Chief lifted his hands for help from possibly what he called creator or light entities, but none came to save him. He tumbled to a knee. This caused Chip to increase the rapid pace that he pushed up and down on the sleeper hold with. In less than a moment, over five hundred pounds of dead weight lay flat on the ground.

  Chip let go, and only the crickets seemed to believe what we all witnessed.

  I broke the disbelief with a declaration. “He’s out. Goddamn it, you won, Sheriff. You won.”

  And before our wrasslin champion could catch his breath, Diamond had scurried over and embraced him in a hug. Those who held us captive with spears had turned their efforts to aiding the sleeping chief. Six of them hoisted him to a sitting position.

  This cleared our path, and Dunbar got over to Chip first. “I never doubted you!”

  The muleskinners with hands covering exposed rears and thin fabric, their privates, stalled. Nonetheless, Charlie Bass, with his head down, droned out his support. “It’s not stature that constitutes a cowboy but guts and perseverance.”

  When I got over to shake Chip’s hand, he flexed a bicep at me, while tribesmen karate chopped the back of the passed-out chief. I let out a hearty laugh and clasped Chip’s muscle. Diamond giggled with her hand covering her mouth. For once, he’d earn his bragging rights and perspiration odor.

  However, when Chip turned, the celebration came to an abrupt end. The sleeping giant had awoken and was back on his feet in the fiercest of moods. He seized Chip by the throat, lifted him in the air; had him gasping.

  Diamond and I hurried to help, but tribesmen with spears from every angle stopped us in our tracks. The big man roared, “My band was not same Comanche that raid your town, but your Texas Rangers gun down my Nagawitchi people and kill our most vulnerable. I heard you were there with them when they do it.”

  Fighting for oxygen, Chip replied, “I made…made…them stop. I did…” He paused to suck for air and continued, “I did everything in my power to help your people.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “While we keep… senselessly warring, the witch is going to…wipe out my people and …yours…I know what she did to your son. You hear me?” As the shade in Chip’s face begin to turn blue, the giant gaped. I read Chip’s lips closely. “I saw the beast she turned your son… Ahote… into.”

  The giant let go, dropped Chip to the ground; left him wheezing; turned and signaled his tribesmen off, and sauntered into the darkness.