Happy hour

[i_got_vision]

You know who's tanned and well-rested and enjoying life even more than usual--and 'usual' for him is pretty damned good, except when being chased by Pinkertons? This cowboy right here.

Butch Cassidy at the bar, taking a break from escorting the loveliest mechanical lady in all of Galveston. It sure beats working for a living, doesn't it?

Specials
Whiskey

Why mess with the classics? (He'll make other drinks on request, but he can't necessarily spell them, so the sign stays as it is.)

[open all night!]

Comments

[i_got_vision]

"It is," he nods. "But ten percent of a thousand's a bit more than ten percent of a hundred. My father's worked hard his whole life, honest work, but sometimes hard work's not enough. Sometimes the weather's bad and the crops fail."

And maybe the elders missed the story about the widow's offering.

And maybe his father could've gone to services more often, but what's fair and right should be the same either way.

[52_dropoff]

"In other words, money talks. That hasn't changed. Probably never will."

[i_got_vision]

"It's not right, though," he says. "People are supposed to be equal before God and before the law--and I know it doesn't happen before the law, but the police don't claim to be divinely inspired. There should be more responsibility there, to treat everybody equal. It's that much more wrong when they don't."

[52_dropoff]

"If we could only start our own church, I suppose. But I doubt anyone would want me as a preacher." The First Agnostic Church of Hub City??

[i_got_vision]

"Get yourself a medicine show," he says with a grin. "At least they're honest. People know what they're paying for."

Some entertainment, and a bottle of passable alcohol.

"Best preacher I ever heard, sold snake oil on the side. Or maybe the preaching was on the side, and the snake oil was his main business. It was hard to tell."

[52_dropoff]

"I would say that most preachers are snake oil salesmen. At least the one you heard was honest about it.

"I knew one preacher who was selling a bill of goods. And tries to kill my friend's daughter."

[i_got_vision]

"That's how they get in," he says. "People trust them--people know what they're supposed to be, so they give them the benefit of the doubt, choose to overlook things they shouldn't. But I don't think preachers have special powers, and I don't think they can tell me anything I can't figure out for myself. I think I got a pretty good understanding of the world."

[52_dropoff]

"You do, and I do. But when someone's lost a child, or living in a bottle, or is just vulnerable, faith has a way of inviting them in. Which can be good, sometimes. And sometimes..." He's glad that in the end, the preacher he knew was killed by Myra. Some people, sad to say, just need killing.

[i_got_vision]

"It isn't just faith that can do that," he says. "I mean, faith in religion--people can have faith in other things, and in people too, and those things and people can help them or lead them astray. Like those people who say they can talk to the dead. They might give somebody comfort that their loved one's at peace, or they might take all a person's money trying to 'communicate' with them."

[52_dropoff]

"Except that having been here for a long while, I've actually talked to the dead. That's the crazy thing at the end of the day. Somewhere behind everything, there's something we can't understand. The charlatan takes advantage of that, but everyone wants to peek behind the curtain, and I am pretty sure there is something there. Just not necessarily what we expect." Says a man who died and came back to life, and still has doubts.

[i_got_vision]

"Oh, there's, plenty I don't understand, and I know it," he says. "I don't know that there aren't ghosts out there--I've never seen any, but maybe they prefer cities. All I know is, when we were in Denver there were all these signs up about some woman in town from back east, limited engagement, you know. You could buy an invitation to one of her sessions and maybe she could contact somebody for you. Or maybe the spirits would be unclear and you'd have to buy another invitation for tomorrow."

[52_dropoff]

"Yeah, I've seen that, too. It made for good copy." Or the TV equivalent. "But like I said, around here, you end up quoting that line from Hamlet. A lot."

[i_got_vision]

"That's what I like about here, though. Keeps people from getting too comfortable with what they know is true--it helps you to know what you really believe, if you have to take those beliefs out and dust 'em off and look 'em over now and then."

[52_dropoff]

"A very good attitude.

"You know, I never caught your name."

[i_got_vision]

"That depends on who's asking, and where," he says with a grin.

He's got names on top of names, for when his usual alias isn't quite incognito enough. The perils of being a semi-famous criminal.

"But here--Butch Cassidy."

[52_dropoff]

He thought so. And much like the knockoff Butch he met that memorable snowy night, this man is interesting to chat with. But a lot less mercenary, oddly enough.

"I just call myself Charlie."

[ooc: fade?]

[i_got_vision]

"Nice to meet you, Charlie."

The good thing about bartending: meeting people. Interesting conversations. Philosophizing while sober.

[ooc: sure thing. Thanks so much for the thread!]