In the middle of the night, the moon hid into a black cloud, and there was a rustle in the woods, and a young woman walked briskly through the leafy forest in her tutu tu, her face showing fear and anxiety, but still tirelessly moving forward......

Once again, Ella passed the three brothers' red and green house, the gloomy building, which she had paced back and forth several times tonight, and she had been chanting the names of five people she had been on a mission to greet: John, Miller, Ducky, Fantesi, and Tarn.

Time passed in prayer......

At the last moment before dawn, when Ella returned to camp to fiddle with her dress, the Van der Linde gang finally waited for the long-awaited sound of horses' hooves.

"Perth, Ella, we just escaped from death...... Desperately need a break!" Ducky rode forward and shouted to the Van der Linde gang as they gathered around.

The women came to the horse, and were responsible for helping each of the valiant warriors off their horses, and it was a fat lady who answered John, Catherine, who winked at him, and when she grabbed John's two arms, Catherine dragged him close to her with her big breasts and big belly, because she was too tired John did not resist, in fact, he knew that when Catherine first entered, she took the initiative to ask for some non-partisan actions against him, and the fat woman had a "good feeling" for John.

As John lay on his cushion, he saw Ella as if she had foreseen something, and Darch was interrogated with tears in front of him.

Ducky replied coldly—quietly, presumably no one could hear her, but Ella's tears were like pearls with broken threads, and she crouched down to hide her face and weep, so John guessed that it was Tarn's death.

After a while, sadness crept up on the faces of the gang members, and everyone went back to their respective beds in a huff to say goodnight to others with a cry......

A sad evening passed like this, and there was another unpleasant morning, when it was noon, and John woke up from his dream, and the sound of yesterday's guns still lingered in his ears like a nightmare, and he stood up, and suddenly felt a wave of dizziness. I finally froze my mind, looked around, and found that everyone was doing things seriously, but some women kept touching their swollen eyes.

"Mr. Coster, lunch is stew, in the pot over there." Ella walked over at some point and tapped John's right shoulder with her slender and slender index finger.

"Oh, okay." John replied.

Ella nodded in understanding, John saw that the small and delicate face was set with two large blue eyes, Ella's delicate skin showed a curved curve under the support of the jawbone, even if there was a faint red line swollen around the eye socket, but it still did not affect Ella's interpretation of the definition of beauty.

John looked at her skinny back and called out to her, "Just call me John."

"Well, John!"

Taking advantage of the nap during the meal, John took a closer look at the others, including Bolic and Bibo swimming in the river, Fantessy playing with a black man and poking his fingers with a knife, Thomas the Mexican, who sat and watched the flames, Ella and Gremes, the mistress of Gremes, who was eating under a tent, Catherine who told Burth an unfunny joke, Miller who brushed his horse, and Ducky, who was drunk and lying under a tree...... Everyone lives their own lives, and John is curious to know what Tarn likes to do, and although they have known each other for a short time, the kid accommodates John, unlike the others who come to play tricks on him. Now that the child is buried in a grave made of mineral earth and coal, John has an unspeakable guilt and even a little self-blame. What did Ducky do about the death of a gang leader? The answer was in John's eyes: the drunkard was leaning on a large yellow tree, his legs spread out to form a dustpan, and his strong upper body alone thought that he had been cut off and stood on the ground, admiring his legs with only a few nerves and muscles connected to his waist, just like the Athenian general who was defeated in the Peloponnesian War, and was cut in half and then stood in the vast sea of sand and died of blood. But the only difference is that he is still full of vitality even when he is drunk, his body is still shaking under the anesthesia of alcohol, his lips are rolling up and down for a while, rubbing his tongue and spitting out endless drinking words.

"Mika Bell, you said Arthur was a black-lunged guy, and you were a black-hearted guy known to women and children, and I'm so glad I beat you into a sieve on the snowy mountains of Hagen. Oh...... My dear Arthur, you're my son, I've aged so fast these years without your company, and I fucking wish you woke up from that damn illness and ...... for me Do it for me? I confess that I was distracted, lost in the desire to cash in the railroad bonds of Griezri, and the mayor of Lemieux and Sheriff Lambert had torn me apart, and although they were indeed resourceful, Brontë's death had messed them up. Haha, God knows I'll knock that beast into the water with a pistol in Anissberg! I always had a plan, always ...... I must say that no one dares to envy my wisdom, we can choose to go to Tahiti to do farming, and when we have golden mangoes in both hands in the summer, I can guarantee that your honest cowboy will have a smile on his face, and after all these difficulties, this is how life should have been, isn't it......"

Is this crazy? Maybe not, but for John, the name that appears in the words John is a no-brainer, just like the hidden logic in Brett Hart's short story, as an outsider can't figure out the details between the characters, if you haven't experienced that kind of life, it's easy to confuse beggar A with beggar B, and put the romantic deeds of technician C on the head of technician D for no reason - in the western prairie, if the cowboys have no personality, it is easy to be confused.

"Young man!"

John sensed someone calling him from behind, and he turned his head to find that it was a white-haired old man in a formal suit, who had not appeared in John's limited impression of the Van der Linde Gang.

The old man looked up at the drunken Daqi, lowered his head again and shook his head: "Hey...... It seems that he has a lot of stories, and Fantesi always said that he is the collective salvation of an era. ”

"He's a complex person." John replied.

"Well, as you say...... Young man, how long have you been here? Oh...... I was away for a few months because of some business, and I remember you didn't come then. That's right! My name is Hutton, and who are you as the pastor chosen by this group to teach them the will of God, and it turns out that it is necessary to do so? ”

"My name is John Coster, and I'm a hired thug for the Van der Linde gang, oh, I think it's a bit straightforward to say that, but it's true."

"It doesn't matter who you are, time will explain it all. I don't want to be like some old people who brag about their wasted time all day long because they were born a few years earlier than others, what I want is equality, and what I pursue as young people. ”

John made an ugly expression: "Pursuing the same holy religion? I'm glad I'm not a young person myself. ”

"Do you believe in Jesus? Sir, do you have a soul to belong to? ”

"If I had a Bible in my hand all day long, I would never have been able to pick up a gun to protect you old things."

Hutton just wanted to refute, but when the words came to his lips, he didn't say anything, so he simply spread his hands and put on an indifferent posture: "It's true." ”

John continued to talk with the old man for a while, and he found that Hutton's words were full of admiration for Jesus and the gods, and in short, Hutton was a rigid speaker, as if the Bible were the only holy book in his life.

John climbed the hill where Ducky liked to stand and think, and he didn't know what decision the legendary leader would make next, especially at a time like this. Ducky – will the gang thrive? Or will the Van der Linde gang shrink a little bit by continuing unnecessary sacrifices? As Pastor Hutton said, it will take time to prove this......