The Three Wise Men
By Haycox, Ernest
In the dusty, half-forgotten desert town of Calent, three local officials—a marshal, a mayor, and a judge—convene their regular poker game above an abandoned saloon, where civic business is conducted between hands of cards and sips of bootleg whiskey. When word reaches them that Peg Nell, a reformed woman they once permitted to stay in town on the promise she would go straight, has lost her job at the Greek restaurant, the three wise men must weigh gossip against judgment. A visit from the town's oiliest busybody turns the quiet card game into an unspoken reckoning. Ernest Haycox's sly, understated western sketch reveals how justice in a frontier town can wear the face of friendship, and how decency often speaks in the fewest words.
Publisher: Overland Publishing Company (in Overland Monthly)
First published: 1921