Tracy proceeded east to Yuma. His sole intent was to end the torture that his life had become. He was done killing. He could feel the souls of all that he had killed howling in pain, haunting him, wishing they could impose retribution upon him.

He arrived at Yuma at 2 p.m., and perched himself on a chair in the farthest corner of the Tinhorn Saloon, with his back at the wall. The bartender, Warren Dooley, a feeble, unconfident man, approached Tracy.

"Can I help you sir?"

"Get me a bottle of whiskey", Tracy commanded. The bartender did not know why, but when he looked into Tracy's eyes, he was petrified. As the bartender turned and proceeded to the bar, Tracy said with authority, "You!"

"Yes, sir!" Dooley replied. "Might I help you with something else?"

"Yes. After you bring me my whiskey, you are going to tell Sheriff Nash that Tracy Amidon is here. He is to meet me at 3 p.m., and I am going to kill him. And remind him: I am the man who killed his brother. If he does not meet me, and runs like a coward, I will hunt him down and take his life. Got it?"

"Yes sir," the bartender answered, his voice withered with fear.

Dooley proceeded to take Tracy his bottle, then ran two blocks to the Sheriff's office. Sheriff Nash and his deputy, Johnny Witherspoon, were playing cards at the Sheriff's desk, when the bartender barged into the office.

"Sheriff! Tracy Amidon is at my saloon. He says he has come to kill you."

"Tracy!" the deputy howled. "I didn't think he really existed."

The Sheriff replied, "Oh yes, he truly exists, Johnny."

"But why, Sheriff? Why is he here and why does he want to kill you?"

Winslow thought a second, and replied, "He killed my brother eight years ago in Abilene. I searched for the bastard for years, but I could never catch up with him, as he was always one step ahead of me. So I gave up my search; I thought it would be wasting my life to pursue him. I stopped looking for him and figured that if it was destined, then someday I would confront him. Why, after all this time has he come? I have no idea, but I guess I'll find out today."

On June 5, 1889, at 2:58 in the afternoon, Sheriff Nash proceeded to Main Street, slightly before Amidon's designated time. With some trepidation, he approached the Tinhorn Saloon. At that moment, he faced the realization that he was walking to his certain death, death by the shootist that had killed his brother. He had often thought this day would eventually come, and now it was at hand. Twenty years of being a lawman, defending those that could not defend themselves, and it had come to this. Here he was, about to confront a man whom he knew possessed the capability to smite his life, to be killed as quickly as a candle being snuffed by a gust of wind.

Deputy Witherspoon barked at Nash: "What the hell are you doing, Sheriff? Why are you facing this man? You cannot bring back your brother's life, and Tracy will surely kill you."

The Sheriff looked into his young deputy's eyes and replied, "Deputy, it's my job. If you live long enough, someday you may understand." The young deputy stared back at him, thinking it was the last time he would see him alive.

Nash continued: "This was obviously meant to be, and so it will be. Tracy killed my brother; my brother was the deputy in Abilene, Texas. Eight years ago Tracy killed three men there when the Sheriff was out of town. My brother Gabriel attempted to detain Tracy until the full facts of the shooting were understood. Tracy squelched my brother's life to escape. I have no idea why that bastard has come here to slay me, but the one thing I do know is that I cannot run from a man that wantonly took the life of my brother."

The Sheriff arrived at the saloon, seeing Tracy Amidon standing in the middle of the street. At the mere sight of him, he knew he was facing someone who had been bestowed a power few men ever would receive.

"I knew you would come, Sheriff," Tracy belched with his deep, guttural voice. He then assumed his stance of battle. One could see by his demeanor that he had struck this pose many times before; he knew exactly what he was doing. Tracy stared at the Sheriff with his blazing blue eyes, seeming to be able to focus upon every part of his body at once, waiting for the slightest sign of aggression. His eyes seemingly hypnotized anyone who gazed into them, all the edge he needed.

The Sheriff spoke firmly: "Before we draw, can you tell me why you wish to kill me?"

Tracy stared into the Sheriff's eyes; he could see into his soul and knew that he was a noble man.

"Today is a good day to die, Sheriff."

Winslow Nash had rarely tasted true fear, yet at this moment he knew it would take an act of God to stop Tracy from slaying him with ease. Sweat streamed from the brow of the Sheriff, causing his right eye to quiver.

Sheriff Nash had been a lawman all his adult life. He knew his time would come, and in a way he was glad it would come this way, and not sitting in a rocking chair as an elderly cripple. Yes, he did not want to die, but he could not turn away from his adversary. And then it happened: Tracy pulled his pistol, clearly out-drawing the Sheriff. He pulled the trigger at least twice before the Sheriff's gun had even left its holster, yet no bullets were expelled from the Colt's barrel.

The Sheriff knew his aim was true. Tracy was struck twice by the Sheriff's .45 caliber rounds. As the outlaw fell to the rutted street, Nash ran to his adversary, cradled his head, and asked him: "Why, why?"

"I am tired; I'm simply tired of killing," Tracy uttered with failing breath. Tracy's last words were: "Please do not let them lay me out and allow all of the townspeople to stare at my body." He gasped for air. "I know it sounds crazy, but the thought of people gawking at my corpse has always repulsed me." With his brow bleeding forth, he lay slain.

The front page of the Yuma Tribune, June 6, 1889, read:

"The notorious killer, Tracy Amidon, has been slain by our admirable Sheriff Winslow Nash, on Main Street. We don't know how Amidon knew the sheriff, yet the gunman claimed to all that his sole purpose in being in Yuma was to kill him. Amidon called out to the Sheriff and provoked him. Sheriff Nash knew he had no choice but to face Amidon, the most feared shootist known in this part of the country. As his legend was so fantastic, some thought he did not even exist. Who else but a legend could have killed 31 men in the past 10 years, none of which they said had a chance? In some of his gun battles he had slain two or three adversaries before any of them could even draw their weapons. But now, Amidon lies dead by the hand of our dutiful Sheriff Nash, a true hero."

Three witnesses saw Sheriff Nash retrieve a letter from Tracy's vest. He never, to this day, has divulged the words it possessed. Something must have touched him in his reading of that letter, considering the respect and reverence in how he carried Tracy's body to his office, and that he gave his deputy strict orders that no one would see Tracy or touch him, so he could rest in peace.

The letter Sheriff Winslow Nash found in Tracy's vest bore these words:

"My name is Tracy Amidon. Friends and foe both know me only as Tracy. I leave this letter to explain the events that have transpired in my life to bring me to this end. They call me a killer, a bloodthirsty savage. Well if you don't want to believe everything you hear, and if you would like to hear the true facts, please listen to my story.

The man whom I have chosen to slay me is Sheriff Winslow Nash. I killed his brother Gabriel, but I swear I did not want to. The men whose life I took that day tried to kill me first. I was merely defending myself when his brother attempted to arrest me. I knew at once that in the custody of the law I would hang, so I had no choice but to squelch his life. I am truly sorry for that. I was always good with a gun. My father first put a gun in my hand when I was 10 years old, and he taught both me and my brother to utilize a pistol to defend ourselves and our family. I have no understanding why, but I had a true gift for gunfighting. Given to me by God as I saw it then, but now I see it may be a curse bestowed upon me by Satan.

I was 16 years old in 1863; at that time, my father, Nathaniel Amidon, fought by the side of Stonewall Jackson, and was given the task of protecting him the night he was shot by accident at the hands of his own men. The General was scouting the battlefield when they approached from the west. Three scouts from our own company had no idea the General was surveying the field. They shot him down from afar, never knowing that they had just killed their General, who was the only hope the Confederate Calvary had to survive. My Father never forgave himself, as the General's safety was his responsibility.

When he returned home, my father was a broken man. The War had ended and his wife was dying; he never put the cork back on the bottle after that. Yet, he did teach me all that he knew about being a shootist and a tracker, to prepare me, he said, to fend for myself.

That done, I guess he lost his will to live, my Mother soon being dead and all. He himself died two years later. Father just seemed to drift off to the afterlife, a broken man. I will never forget the look on his face when he passed. Yes, his early death did bestow an anger upon my soul; it has had a thirst which could never be quenched.

My father once told me that some things just don't have a reason. Every year you live is like a chapter out of the storybook, he said, and you just turn a new page, that's all, and crying about the yesterdays don't make the tomorrow's any better. If you can learn to live with that, you will learn to live with just about anything, maybe even yourself. Hatred is fuel for its own fire; once it starts it does not stop. So all a man can do is to try to smite that hatred, lest it vanquish him.

In my father's dying words, he said, "Son, never let a man wrong you, never let a man speak against you, lest you counter his words. Most of all, stand tall and remember: dying ain't so bad as long as you hold your honor in your soul, never to be forsaken." With that, his cold hands fell weak, his noble spirit left this world, and now resides with the angels.

I then traveled from town to town, sometimes herding beefs and sometimes working as a bounty hunter, but all of the time simply trying to stay alive. I got myself a reputation as one of the best shootists in the West, yet all I ever wanted to do was live and try to have a respectable, honest life. Unfortunately for me, every bastard that heard the name Tracy Amidon felt they must kill me to feel like a man. This is one thing I will never understand for the life of me. Why can't men live together without butchering each other?

The reputation that has pursued me my whole life started when I was 16. A brutal man raped and killed the love of my life, sweet Darcy Loveish. After the rape and murder of my beloved, the bastard came to me knowing the love I had for her. He came to my home howling like a jackass in heat. As he dismounted his steed, the very image of him repulsed me. He looked at me with an evil that I at that point in my life did not know a man could possess. He smiled at me as if to taunt me; proud of the carnage he had reaped upon the woman that was to have been my wife. The coward slashed my face with his saber, leaving me scarred for life on the outside, as well. He saw me as a mere boy, yet unbeknownst to him I practiced many hours a day to refine my skills with my revolver, and I possessed proficiency with my pistol that very few men could ever claim to obtain.

After my beloved's death, I personally never feared death again. Living without her was worse than any pain anyone could inflict upon me. The bastard feebly attempted to draw his pistol, which was an antiquated Colt Dragoon black powder revolver. Even I was surprised at the ease I had in inserting a bullet between his eyes before he ever had a chance to aim it. At that moment, I knew I possessed a gift, however terrible.

So I used this talent to give me my livelihood; my woman was dead, my father and mother were both gone, and my older brother also was killed, in the Great War. I was alone, so I utilized the only talent I felt God had bestowed upon me.

As the months and years passed, I slowly realized I was cursed. I had been given a talent that would inevitably reap a slow and agonizing death. To this day, I have no conception of why I had been given this destiny. I only wish my talents could have been used to help, not harm other people. Since then there have been 31 men that have opposed me. As soon as they learned my name, they felt it necessary to confront me to show they could defeat the great Tracy; all of these men are now dead. Seemingly every drunken cowboy, bounty hunter or town's vigilance group pursued me at the mere whisper of my name, for the reward or the glory. I wish for the life of me I did not have the capability or the inclination to kill.

I feel the main reason no man could ever defeat me in a gunfight was that I had no fear of death. Something I read once stayed with me: As Miyamoto Mushashi, the great samurai warrior once was quoted, "When a man makes a friend of pain and of death, only then will he find the true meaning of life." Unfortunately for me, I had no fear of death. Any man, no matter how proficient he was with his gun, if he even slightly feared his death, he would hesitate for that split second. And I would kill him.

I have never been a man that could possibly think of taking his own life. So I sought out a man with an admirable career as a shootist, so I would not look like a fool. I apologize, Sheriff Nash, for having bestowed upon you the reputation as being the one that killed Tracy.

Of course, you now realize my gun was unloaded. I respect you, and I wish my skills could have been utilized in the way you have used yours. That is why I have chosen you to take my life. I truly apologize for any retribution this act shall bestow upon you, but this was the only way I could find to stop the unimaginable, agonizing pain of being the best gunman; which meant I was forced to kill every drunken ass that learned my name.

I never wanted to kill. All I wanted was a family, wife and children. Please believe me, this is not the way I wanted my life to be lived. I tried changing my name, living for a while in Texas, Wyoming, New Mexico and some other places I don't even remember the name of, but it would not end. My scar marked me. I was the immortal gunfighter, Tracy Amidon, that everyone said could not be defeated; so, therefore, everyone I confronted had the compulsion to attempt to end my life.

Sheriff Nash, if you wish to tell people that you outdrew me and beat me in a fair fight, that is your decision. Or, you could tell them that I approached you with an unloaded weapon, being a man with a good soul that only wished to die a valiant death. Tell this story as you wish. You have given me the sweet release of death that I have longed for. Please do not give this letter to be published in a newspaper, or share it with anyone else. I know you are a noble man, and the words I state here are between you and me."

Sheriff Winslow Nash paid the $20 dollar charge himself for the burial of Tracy. Nash saw him as a killer, the man that killed his only brother; yet he admired him for having endured the hell his life must have been. As they lowered the coffin six feet below the earth, the Sheriff sincerely hoped Tracy could find happiness and peace in his death, the one thing he had hoped for but could never procure in his mortal life.

The next day, Sheriff Nash woke late; it was 9 a.m. as he returned to consciousness. The first thing he saw was his deputy sitting next to him. As he saw the Sheriff had awoken, Witherspoon asked the question he had been waiting to ask all night. With a congratulatory smile, he queried,

"How in the hell did you do it, Sheriff? You killed Tracy Amidon."

"Boy, you're a good deputy, but there are some things you cannot comprehend at this point of your life. I'm only going to say this once: 'let it lie'. I have nothing else to say about this matter." The young deputy walked out of the Sheriff's office confused, yet he also understood the Sheriff w ould not divulge anything further about what had transpired between him and Tracy.

Johnny mounted his steed and rode to the north of town, to a stream where he had gone to think ever since he was a child. Staring at the cloudless sky, he dreamt that he could be a man like Sheriff Nash someday; he also prayed that someday Sheriff Nash would divulge to him what had transpired between him and the mystical Tracy.

After much soul-searching, the honorable Sheriff of Yuma, Winslow Nash, a week later publicly pronounced that Tracy outdrew him, yet his gun misfired, which tale he felt would spare him from the hindrance of being called 'the man that outdrew Tracy.' Yet, his yarn still preserved Tracy Amidon's name as an intrepid warrior.

Nash's problem: to somehow respect the man that killed his beloved brother. It may be inconceivable to most, but Winslow, having been a law man his whole life, had acquired the ability to put himself in another man's shoes. Therefore, he understood Tracy.

The sweet release of death had been given to a good man that tried, but could not ever live the life he dreamt of. Sheriff Winslow Nash had a tombstone made for Tracy. It bore the words: Here lies a good man that was dealt a bad hand. May he rest in peace.

Winslow relinquished his badge one month later. He had come to the realization that no matter what side of the badge he was on, killing was not a life he wished to live. Yet that was the only life he had ever lived, starting in the War Between the States, then the Indian Wars, and then utilizing his talents as a sheriff. He knew not what he would do, but he did know that more killing was not something he wished to experience in his future.

Winslow saddled up his steed and rode from town, stopping to take one last look at Tracy's grave. "Damn you, Tracy", he mumbled, as he plunged his spurs into his horse's side. No one ever saw Winslow again, nor knew what befell him.