I had the misfortune of calling Tim “El Corto” Tucker a friend—son of lightning, enemy of the sun, master of his own destiny, and perhaps the fastest gunslinger the Wild West has ever known. Who hasn’t heard of him? The wretch had a thousand-dollar bounty on his head, and his face—for five hundred miles around—adorned the posters hanging on every police station facade. And since you’ve invited me for a beer, I’ll tell you about the day he dueled with fate itself.

More than once, when he was drunk, he confessed that he feared death. In those moments, he cursed God for having punished him with a talent for handling a revolver. He was convinced that, through that gift, the Creator had deprived him of a premature end at the hands of some bounty hunter, which gave him more time to sin and thus accumulate more than enough reasons to earn his place in hell.

It’s clear he wasn’t very bright. Perhaps that’s why Tim became obsessed with his fate: he spent hours and hours watching the smoke rise from the pipes of Native American shamans; he had his tarot cards read and abused every subject , driven by an obsession to know the exact moment of his death. But he never got an answer.

I never understood that obsession with when, where, and how we’re going to die. For him, at least, it served as a distraction during the years he spent on the run. Between one grief and the next, he never stopped searching for someone or something that might reveal the date of his death. However, not even the most brazen charlatans dared to tell him anything, for fear of being wrong. After all, nothing and no one could kill Tim “El Corto” Tucker, the luckiest bastard in the country. It would have been better never to have been born than to try to deceive him. 

One day he asked me to go with him to a small village, which was a day's ride away. Since I had nothing else to do, I agreed. The fact that he promised to buy me as much to drink as I wanted also played a part in my decision.

On the way, he had time to tell me what had brought him to that remote town. It turned out that he had finally found out when, how, and where he was going to die. A dangerous mix of drugs, pipe smoke, and the best necromancer in town had revealed to him that he would meet his end the next day in the town we were heading to. At last, Tim had discovered his fate in that prophecy.

During the ride, he explained to me how he was going to face death and emerge victorious, since hell was no place for him—his sins would never be punished. I confess I don’t remember all his rambling very well, because I didn’t feel like listening to him. I liked him, but his narcissism and stupidity bored even the sheep.

We reached the town at dusk. Thick clouds covered the sky. We tied up the horses, and just before entering the saloon, my friend let out a curse as he declared himself the sole master of his own destiny. Then he kicked the door, and every eye in that cafeteria toward him. Recognizing the stranger as the West’s most wanted fugitive, some quickly reached for their guns. Tim “Shorty” Tucker drew his gun with lightning speed and fired six times; six men fell dead on the spot. The others took cover under the tables. The women screamed. The clicks of no fewer than ten revolvers rang out. I cursed my luck. I cursed my bastard of a friend.

We ducked behind a column just before the bullets smashed through the wall behind us. Tucker drew his second pistol. With a quick leap, he moved to new cover and fired into the air, hitting someone in the head. I’d never seen him so determined. His skill with the revolver was diabolical: he took out the rest of the gunmen with ease, without missing a single shot. The enemy bullets seemed to avoid him.

When the shooting stopped, I came out from behind my cover. Tim was standing in the middle of the tavern, wearing average , his hat riddled with bullet holes that had missed their mark by mere millimeters. What a lucky bastard! The place had been wrecked: tables overturned and walls torn down. We drank the only bottle of whiskey that had remained intact after the skirmish. We didn’t exchange a single word.

When we stepped out of cafeteria, it was raining. A figure was waiting for us in the middle of the main street; it was the local sheriff. They fought a duel.

I can imagine what was going through my friend’s mind. This wasn’t going to be just any duel. The officer embodied his fate—that is, death, which was reaching out its cold arms to him in fulfillment of the prophecy. If Tim won that battle, he would finally be free.

Tucker knew the procedure: he stood about twenty paces in front of his opponent and took his stance. I had taken shelter from the rain under a porch, though I would end up catching a cold.

They stared intently at each other. Water ran down their hats to the brim, where it dripped onto the ground. My friend was quicker: he aimed and pulled the trigger with his usual speed, but the revolver jammed. My blood ran cold, for Tim Tucker was going to lose.

The sheriff smiled as he aimed at him. He had a fine pistol with an ivory grip. That revolver carried all of Tim’s sins: a single shot, and justice would finally be served. The lawman seemed to know that he was about to fulfill the prophecy, that he was going to act as a mere instrument of capricious fate. Perhaps that was why he took so long to pull the trigger.

I waited for the sound of the gunshot, but it never came: his gun had jammed too. Then a shot rang out, and the officer fell dead.

Tim Tucker smiled to himself, the second pistol in his hand. He holstered his guns and, laughing, climbed onto his horse. With a cry of joy, he spurred his steed on, and in the rain he galloped off into the distance. He surely thought the danger had passed, that he had just cheated death, that no gunslinger in those parts could defeat him.

He was right. He rode all night long.

In the villages of the region, even today, people speak of a ghostly rider who revels in his immortality in the rain. Tim “El Corto” Tucker, son of lightning, enemy of the sun, believed himself to be the sole master of his destiny. But that night, because of the rain, he fell victim to hypothermia. He died the next day. When we found out, his friends laughed at him for weeks. What a total idiot!