Berry I was on the south road Headed for Savannah I was tired of being poor Didn't suit me anymore I'd sung up all the songs you dream on Trying to stay ahead The dollar I had left to live on I'd drank it down instead When I run up on this stranger in the dirt and he looked like some unfinished dirty work He was barely breathing Wasn't nothing left to say I helped myself and took his gun He was dying anyway I was down in Texas Barely two months later I had found myself a name I had stumbled into fame I shot a man from Louisiana with the strangers gun He never even cleared his leather before the shot had run And I'd never shot a six-gun in my life So it's strange to me How I could take a life Now they're telling me I'm faster
Than any living man It must have been black magic I was holding in my hand If I take it off they'll shoot me down If I wear it someone dies The devil made that deadly thing You know I do not lie I don't believe in fortune I do believe in sin It must have been black magic In that gun that done him in I was riding across the border Just outside Durango When a bullet split the night Off behind me to my right I never saw the coward's face I never got no plan I tried to get a shot off I never got the chance And the pain was like no pain I'd ever known So I was satisfied I'd die alone I was barely breathing Wasn't nothing to be said He helped his self and stole my gun and left me there for dead