He’d have the rest of her, too, he thought with a quick grin. Most importantly, though, he’d have her land. And everything in it.

  16

  After riding a few miles from town, Jeb Crowfoot found an area forlorn enough to meet his standards, and stopped to make camp for the night. There was never any question that he might stay in town. No filthy hotel beds for him. He preferred his saddle for a pillow and his own blankets, laid upon the relatively grime-free soil. Free of human grime, that was.

  First, he took a fresh, white handkerchief from the wrapped bundle in his saddlebag, and tied it over his face to prevent the inhaling of any more dust than necessary. Then, he thoroughly curried and brushed his horse, picking out its hooves and combing its mane and tail thoroughly before wiping it down with a clean, soft cloth. He refolded the cloth, dirty side in, wrapped it in the handkerchief he’d tied over his nose and mouth, and placed them inside the other saddlebags. The curry comb and brush, he fastidiously and laboriously cleaned on the leaves of a nearby plant before he wrapped them in a scrap of chamois and put them away. That done, he set to making his camp. He made a small fire: the kindling, in even numbers, neatly arranged. He got out his spotless coffeepot and filled it and started it to boil, and then unwrapped the jackrabbit he’d shot on the way out from Indian Springs.

  He skinned and cleaned it, cut it into pieces and put it in a frying pan. And then he set to making a bed.

  His bedroll was placed on the cleanest, most even spot of ground he could find, which he swept free of every last pebble. After the blankets were neatly rolled out and patted free of creases, he placed his saddle at its head, the stirrups arranged just so. His rifle went neatly alongside the bedding.

  At last, he sat down.

  While his coffee heated and his jackrabbit fried, he pulled a dull nail from his pocket and from his belt, two new cartridges—one for the kill shot, and one just to make certain.

  He then began, laboriously, to tap-tap-tap the tiny head of a cougar into each casing.

  Drugman Cassidy had no more than gotten comfortable in his room when a knock came on the door. “Go away,” he shouted from the bed. He figured to take himself a little nap and rest his eyes, then go down for a late supper.

  But a voice from the hallway called, “Mr. Cassidy, sir? Mr. McMahon would like you to have supper with him. In fifteen minutes, downstairs?”

  Cassidy sighed. Goddamnit, anyway.

  Without opening his eyes, he shouted back, “Okay. Fifteen minutes.” He heard footsteps going away, down the hall.

  His eyes had bothered him more and more this past year. Not just the seeing out of them, either. It seemed like lately they always felt full of grit or something. He’d given up on washing them out, or at least, trying to wash the grit out.

  He’d grown to accept it. That was just the way it was.

  But they were worse on days when he’d spent a long time out in the wind, or even just plain outside. For the past year, he’d stayed mostly in his hotel room back home, except when he had a job. That had been exactly twice.

  He had really needed this five hundred that McMahon had offered. It would put his retirement fund over the top, and he wouldn’t have to work anymore, if he lived simply and within his means. His life sure wouldn’t be extravagant, but at least it would be comfortable. He could just settle in and grow to be a blind old man with no worries. No worries? Now, that was a laugh. Blind. He didn’t know if he’d be able to bear it. Sometimes, he wondered if he’d end up putting a slug in his skull in order to escape his impending world of darkness.

  He sat up and opened his eyes, and the room came slowly back into focus. Well, the dresser did, anyhow, then the far wall, although both of them ran downhill when he looked with one eye closed. But he knew that when he went out the door, the hall would be in focus and even McMahon would be clear. Not like the old days, but clear enough. But the things going on across the street would be a fuzzy blur of colors and shapes and blind spots. If he walked out into the street, the end of the town, just three blocks away, would be a complete mystery to him. He had planned on this job being his last. Just getting on his horse and riding out alone was too dangerous for him these days.

  Drug Cassidy had never been the foolhardy sort. He knew when it was time to quit, and this was just about it.

  He turned the latch, stepped out into the hall, and went down the stairs.

  McMahon, smiling amiably, was waiting for him in the lobby. He stepped forward and stuck out his hand. “Cassidy,” he said.

  Cassidy shook his hand reluctantly and said, “McMahon.”

  McMahon led them into the hotel’s small but elegant dining room, where the waiter, bowing and scraping, rushed to seat them, and handed them two menus. Cassidy hadn’t eaten here before. Something about dining in a restaurant owned by McMahon rubbed him the wrong way. But here he was. “So, what’d you want to talk to me about?” Cassidy asked, squinting at the menu.

  Damn! It was bad enough that he was going blind, but the last couple of years he couldn’t see close up, to read, to save his life. Presbyterian eyes—or something like that—his doctor called it. Said it meant “old eyes,” a translation Cassidy found a little offensive. He held the menu out at arm’s length.

  “I’ve hired someone new,” McMahon said, without preamble.

  Cassidy didn’t look at him. The stewed cabbage looked good. But then, so did the pounded steak. The roast chicken, too. Eyes on the menu, he said, “Yeah, you said you were gonna.”

  The waiter returned. McMahon handed over his unopened menu and said, “The usual, Paul.”

  “Yessir,” came the reply. “Are you ready, sir?” he asked Cassidy.

  Cassidy folded the menu. “I’ll take the pounded steak dinner. With peas, if you got ’em, mashed potatoes and gravy, and plenty of coffee.”

  “Certainly, sir.” Cassidy’s menu slid away in the waiter’s hands.

  The dining room was painted and papered in dark green with mahogany trim, with dark green tablecloths and dark green napkins. Only the many ornate oil lamps and the crystal chandelier—which was just being hoisted back to the ceiling after being lit by two boys—and the large mirror at one end of the room kept the place from feeling like a unnaturally verdant tomb.

  Most of the tables around his and McMahon’s were filled with diners, though, including one impossibly fat woman in a dull purple dress, who sat alone at a corner table. She kept looking at them, but every time Cassidy caught her eye, she quickly looked away.

  “Shall we get to the meat of the matter?” McMahon asked abruptly, and Cassidy forgot about the fat woman in purple.

  Cassidy replied, “I reckoned there was something more to this invitation than you wantin’ to have company for a meal.”

  Idly, McMahon ran a finger over his water glass. “The point is that the man I sent for is here.”

  Cassidy felt his brows shoot up. “Already? Where is he? At your saloon?”

  McMahon chuckled.

  Cassidy didn’t much like the sound of that laugh. There was no humor in it.

  “Actually,” McMahon went on, “I wired him in San Francisco. But you know that. You read the telegram, didn’t you? I would have.”

  Cassidy nodded. There was no point in denying it.

  “I thought so,” McMahon continued, a hint of satisfaction momentarily creeping into his voice. “Turns out that he was quite close. On business. His assistant forwarded my telegram on to him.”

  Cassidy noticed the slight stress that McMahon put on assistant. He had the feeling he was being accused of something—for instance, being a two-bit operator—because he didn’t have a goddamn secretary, but he kept his mouth shut.

  “At any rate, he’s promised to take care of our little problem on the morrow.” And before Cassidy had a chance to react, McMahon continued, “Ah! Here’s our meal. Thank you, Paul.”

  The waiter slid steaming plates in front of them: pounded steak with peas and mashed potatoes for Cassidy, and some kind of noodle and beef dish for McMahon. It smelled a little like sour cream. Which for some reason, reminded him of the fat woman.

  Without thinking, he flicked his eyes toward her corner. She was gone, and the waiter was clearing her table.

  McMahon picked up his fork.

  Cassidy frowned. “This your roundabout way of tellin’ me I’m fired?” Around a mouthful of noodles, McMahon mumbled, “More or less.” He swallowed. “Of course, I’m willing to pay for your time. Would a hundred dollars be sufficient?” He salted his dinner, then forked in another mouthful of beef and noodles.

  Cassidy, who had not yet moved either toward his food or his silverware, tersely said, “Not nearly.”

  McMahon stopped chewing. He frowned, and swallowed again. “What?”

  “I said it ain’t nearly enough,” Cassidy said flatly. “I rode down here to do a job for you, and I’m ready, willing, and able to do it. It ain’t my fault if you want to go callin’ in some fancy San Francisco gun. Want to know the way I figure it? Since you fired me before I had a chance to do anything, you owe me.”

  For the first time, he saw something ugly cross McMahon’s face, something without passion or remorse. He had known it was there, all right. But the sight of it—and the suddenness of its intensity and depth—startled him.

  It passed in an instant, but it was long enough for Cassidy to realize that he’d underestimated McMahon. He’d figured that McMahon was just one of those Johnny-come-lately town-hungry types who wanted his name on everything, wanted to own everything. He wished he’d pressed Slocum about just plain plugging him.

  After a long silence, McMahon said, “All right. I’ll pay you.”

  “The whole five hundred,” Cassidy said. It wasn’t a question.

  “Yes,” came the answer. “Provided you stay in town. If I’m going to pay for a damned backup anyway, I want him around.”

  Cassidy nonchalantly shook out his napkin. “A backup? You mean, in case this new fella can’t pull it off. Or ends up dead.”

  With no hesitation, McMahon said, “Precisely. And should that happen, Mr. Cassidy, and should you be called upon to handle the situation, I’ll be happy to pay you if you succeed. And if you don’t? Well, I won’t have to pay you anything if you’re dead.” Smiling, he picked up his fork again and gently stabbed at his noodles.

  Cassidy was far from his boiling point, if that was McMahon’s intention. Besides, his pounded steak looked pretty good. He simply picked up his fork and his knife and began to cut his meat. “Nope,” he said amiably. “Don’t reckon you would.”

  17

  By one o’clock in the morning, Cassidy figured it was safe to ride out of town. He had taken himself a two-hour nap, and while he didn’t exactly feel all that refreshed, he figured that at least he wouldn’t fall asleep in the saddle.

  He made his way down the silent, empty street—no signs of life, except at the saloon—to the livery, and quietly tacked up his horse. Nobody was in the barn, just a few drowsing horses. The little closet where the hostler slept was closed up tight, and no light shown from beneath the door, although a few snores made it through the ragged wooden planks.

  He led the horse out into the street, gave a last tug to the girth strap, then mounted up.

  As he started down the road, he was a little concerned about making the trip at night. It wasn’t all that far, maybe a half-hour or forty-five minutes out to the S Bar J, and there was a full moon. Or close to it. But still, his vision was pretty poor come nightfall—as if it wasn’t bad enough in the daytime.

  He figured he’d stick to the road like glue and hope for the best. He also hoped that Slocum wouldn’t have some hot-shot, trigger-happy cowhand out there waiting to nail whoever came up that road toward the ranch.

  He sure didn’t want to end up shot full of lead, he thought as he left town, keeping a watch for prying eyes and shifting curtains. Not this close to retirement.

  Once he had put a little distance between himself and the town limits, he urged his horse into a soft jog. Not fast enough to get him in trouble, but twice as fast as a walk.

  The desert sure looked different when a person was traveling at night. It had been a long time since he’d seen it this way. The moon silvered the brush and prickly pear and barrel cactus and palo verde he passed, which threw soft pewter and purplish shadows over the rough desert floor, giving it a soft, almost pillowy look.

  Every once in a while, small pairs of bright green eyes flashed at him, reflecting the moonlight. An owl screeched in the distance, and there were soft rustles of night-hunting things crawling around in the brush. He’d camped in territory like this, sure. But it had been a coon’s age since he’d traveled through it at night. It was almost peaceful. Except for the fact that everything past a distance of forty feet or so was just a silver-gray blur.

  As he traveled west along the road, he began to hear an odd jangle and creak up ahead. It sounded suspiciously like a rig of some sort. He reined in his horse and sat there, listening.

  Yes, it was a buckboard, maybe a buggy. He could hear the single horse’s hoofbeats and the creak of the wheels. The horse was walking.

  He considered the possibilities.

  If it was Crowfoot, well, they hadn’t met, had they? He might have a chance to get rid of him before he even got close to Slocum. Slocum wouldn’t like that, he supposed, since he was so damn set on getting to the bottom of this whole thing, but he couldn’t find out anything if he was dead, now, could he?

  Then again, it might not be Crowfoot. After all, what the hell would Crowfoot be doing in a wagon or a buggy? Four wheels wasn’t the best thing for a getaway, especially when you planned to plug somebody like Slocum, who had those cowhands of Miss Becky’s wrapped around his little finger.

  ’Course, it might be some rancher traveling home after spending a little too long at the saloon. An inebriated driver would account for the horse’s slow pace.

  He decided that must be it, and urged his horse forward.

  He caught up to the rig—which proved to be a buggy, the kind that doctors or ladies drove—in less than five minutes. It crossed his mind that maybe it was the town doc, out on a house call.

  Made sense.

  Once he got close enough, he could see that the driver was a great big fellow, wide more than tall, and all wrapped up in a beaver coat to keep out the cold. He wore a slouch hat pulled firmly down over his head. The driver was concentrating so much on the road ahead that he didn’t see Cassidy until he rode up next to the driver’s seat.

  “Evening,” Cassidy said, and tipped his hat. And when the driver turned toward him in surprise, he added, in equal surprise, “Ma’am.” It was the woman he’d seen in the café, the fat woman in the purple dress.

  Well, I’ll be double dogged, he thought, shocked. Triple dogged!

  “I have no money,” the woman said right out, and she wasn’t smiling. She whoaed her horse, and Cassidy reined in, too. “If you are planning to rob me, you can just go on to the next person,” she went on. “Also, I have a Colt pistol beneath this coat, and I am prepared to use it.”

  “I got no intention of robbin’ you or harmin’ your person,” Cassidy said quickly, holding up his hands, palms out. “Just thought it was odd that somebody else was out here in the middle of nowhere, travelin’ in the dark, hard center of the night.”

  “I’ll have you know,” she said, “that this is not the middle of nowhere. I know exactly where I am going, and it is imperative that I get there. You’ll excuse me, sir?”

  With that, she slapped her long reins over her horse’s back, and said, “Get up, Mordecai,” and started moving again.

  Cassidy, not one to give up, kept pace with her.

  “If’n you don’t mind, ma’am,” he said, “I’m wonderin’ where you’re headed,” he said.

  She didn’t answer his question. Instead, she said, “I saw you dining with Mr. McMahon at the hotel this evening.”

  “Yes’m, that was me,” he replied, and came to a quick decision. He added, “When a man offers to buy me a meal, I’ll take it, even if that man’s a certified skunk.”

  He’d made the right decision, because she laughed out loud, and dimples sank deep into her cheeks. He decided she was kind of pretty for a fat gal. ’Course, she’d be prettier out of that ugly slouch hat.

  “I’m Drug Cassidy,” he said. “Short for Drugman. Pleased to meet you.”

  “Yes,” she said, and nodded. “I’ve seen your name on a paper at the office.”

  Cassidy frowned. “At the office?”

  “Mr. McMahon’s office. Did he by any chance fire you tonight?”

  This gal had more on the ball than he’d given her credit for. He said, “Tried to. How’d you know that?”

  “Because he always takes people out for a meal when he’s firing them. I’m Evie Siddons, by the way. I work for Mr. McMahon.”

  This left Cassidy speechless, a fact which was not lost on Evie Siddons.

  “I take it you’re surprised,” she said.

  Cassidy nodded. “You could say that, ma’am.”

  “I work there because it’s the only job I could find,” she continued, “so don’t go thinking that I’m some big fan of Tate McMahon. He’s ‘a skunk,’ to quote you. He’s a very self-absorbed skunk, too. He thinks he’s so smart. He thinks I don’t know anything, that all I do is the busy-work he hands me. In a way, I’m his beard, I suppose. But what he doesn’t know is that while he’s out, I have access to the whole office. And I use it.”

  She made a tsk-tsk sound and shook her head. “The idiot. You’d think he’d at least lock his private filing cabinets.”

  They came to the big palo verde that marked the crossroads.

  Cassidy, impressed with her deviousness, said, “Miss Siddons, are you turning north?”