That went clear past me, so I got down to the bone of it. “He finds out you’re talking, he gonna kill you?”

  She stared bleakly at me and finally looked out the window, into the night. “That’s why I need to go to Butte and catch a train,” she said.

  “You think you were followed over here?”

  She looked frightened. “I don’t know. I come and go as I please.”

  “I think maybe we had oughta douse that lamp, and you should get away from the window.”

  “Cotton—do you really think?”

  “Carter Scruples is a lot smarter than I am,” I said.

  I turned down the wick, and the light blued out. “I’m going out for a look. Maybe you should get back into whatever you was wearing.”

  She began to shuffle around in the dark. Very little starlight drifted in, but that’s how I wanted it. I creaked open the door, listened hard, and stepped into the night.

  I didn’t get far. That thug Arnold, he landed a whack on me that sent me into the manure. I knew it was Arnold. And that meant The Apocalypse was around there somewheres, and things weren’t lookin’ so good as I tried to get out of the muck.

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  I rose up mad. That Arnold, he knew all the tricks, but he didn’t ever meet a man growed up in the West. He come from someplace I never heard of, New York or somewhere, and I wasn’t gonna let him and his tricks take me down. So I went after him like a longhorn bull, all horns. And I was ready for the knee to my groin and the chops at my knees and the whacks to my temple that could knock me senseless.

  I just gone after him like a bull moose, whacking back at that punk, and I landed some good ones, too, and got a hand on his arm and twisted it good until he yowled and bit me. I was so steamed up I didn’t even feel his whacks. They was just bouncing off me like raindrops. I was so mad that I was kicking and hammering, and he was starting to weaken a little. He was doing stuff I never seen, hooking his leg around to drop me, punching right under my ribs to take the breath out of me, and it didn’t make no difference. I was hot, worse’n I ever been before, and I wouldn’t take no for an answer. So I was evening up the odds with Arnold at last, and whatever he was landin’ on me wasn’t doing him any good.

  Then I lowered down and thumped into him and sent him sprawling in that cow muck, and I was on him and whacking his face to pulp. I could feel that jaw crack and feel his head bouncing around and I knew I’d finally got the best of Arnold, and high time, too.

  Then I heard the click. There’s no mistakin’ that click. Anyone who’s been around some knows the click of a revolver being cocked, and I was hearing that click square in my ear, so I quit working on Arnold to see what was clickin’, and it was The Apocalpse, all in black, smiley as he saw me quiet real fast.

  “Get off Arnold. Stand up. Once false move and you’ve bought the ranch.”

  Bought the ranch, he says. That sounded just like The Apocalypse, always fancying with words. I got up real slow. Arnold, he thumped my kneecap as I did, and I lurched, but a bullet didn’t plow into my skull, so I got the rest of the way up.

  There was Amanda, pale and afraid, in the moonlight. The Apocalypse was keeping an eye on her.

  “Cotton, you’re privileged. You get to witness what happens when a contract is broken. You get to see the enforcement of a transaction. An agreement ought to be honored, right? And if it’s not, then it needs to be enforced.”

  I didn’t know what the hell he was talking about, but Amanda did, and began shaking. Arnold got up and scraped muck off his tweeds, and grabbed Amanda’s arm and led her behind the barn, to a place not visible from the Carboy’s darkened ranch house.

  Then The Apocalypse pressed his popgun to her ear and shot her. She collapsed into a heap, staring at the night sky.

  “A completed transaction,” that little killer said. “She was squealing. She was Carboy’s snitch. So of course Mr. Scruples was forced to act.”

  I stared at the woman lying in the dirt, who had found herself and found purpose only a short time before, and I felt bad.

  “Carry her to the veranda. She’s a gift to Carboy. And don’t make any noise or the next shot will go through your own thick skull.”

  She sure weighed a lot. She was a medium-sized woman, and she weighed about ten tons. I was pretty sure I’d be next. We’d get to the veranda and I’d lower her and then I’d join her. But after I lowered her before Carboy’s darkened door, the little killer waved me away. Seemed I’d live a few minutes more anyway. Arnold waited until we got back to the barn and then chopped me one with his balled-up fist, and I tumbled in a heap. Nice fellow, that Arnold. I got up slow, and he cracked my kneecap, and I went down again and stayed down until The Apocalypse told me to get up.

  I hurt so much I couldn’t think of nothing else, except Amanda.

  “Mr. Scruples wishes to entertain you,” the natty little killer said. “We’ll walk.”

  So I started limping through the moonlight, which lay white and ghostly over the valley and the town and the hills beyond. Pretty soon we got to the hill with that Pullman Palace Car perched on top, and from there we could see down the slope to the great marsh that gave Swamp Creek its name. It was quiet around there. That enameled railroad car had a lamp in the rear window, the only light shining for miles around there. It looked bright and welcoming, but I knew I wouldn’t get no welcome up there, and it might be the last light I’d ever see.

  A prod from The Apocalypse sent me up them iron stairs at the rear of the car, and Scruples opened the door. He was in that red satin smoking robe, or whatever they call them things, and his hand was in the pocket where he probably kept a little bit of safety.

  “Why, come in, Mr. Cotton,” he said.

  He eyed us all. “I think I’ll ask you to stand, rather than sit,” he said. “The furniture might be stained.”

  He eyed Arnold. “You’re a little the worse for wear,” he said. “That is something I will take into consideration.”

  He eyed The Apocalypse. “Perfectly groomed as usual. You may sit.”

  The little gunslinger settled in a chair, but his hand still had that popgun in it, and that popgun was aimed at my heart.

  Scruples turned to The Apocalypse. “Was the transaction completed?”

  “Perfectly, Mr. Scruples.”

  “It’s a pity, but people must learn to abide by their agreements.” He turned to me. “The poor dear decided not to fulfill her obligations. Just like you,” he said.

  That didn’t set well with me. “I quit you. So what?”

  “You welshed on your agreement with us,” he said.

  I wasn’t going to get into this all over again, especially with Amanda lying dead on the porch of Cletus Carboy. So I just shut up and thought of ways to take out Scruples with my last breath if they was thinking of another execution.

  “I’m going to give you a new agreement. You will do exactly as I tell you, on your part, and on my part I will let you live, if you conduct yourself as required.”

  I just kept my big old mouth shut. Some deal.

  He smiled. “You’re wise to listen carefully. This transaction I am making with you will be renewed at sundown each day, or canceled if you fail to meet your obligations. I’m sure you’d not like to be…canceled.”

  I didn’t say nothing. Why bother?

  “I’m now in the final phase of completing this transaction,” he said. “The entire Swamp Creek District is for sale, being advertised in Eastern papers and financial journals. I have excellent brokers. Within a short time, I believe, we will have a contract. After that, I may or may not retire. It will depend on whim. But I will have approximately a million dollars, give or take some commissions.” He stared into the night. “It was well worth the effort, in spite of a few difficulties.”

  I sure didn’t know what this had to do with me.

  “Financiers and deep-pockets men are cautious with their funds, and want to know everything there is to know. They want a history of the mines, an estimate of ore remaining, a detailed accounting of the mill and how much refined gold was shipped from the district. They will want titles and deeds and claims. They will check with the territory. They will, in short, examine every possible facet of the business, which of course they should. I’m ready for them. In my safe are deeds and claims, and a few mineral patents. Bills of sale. All that sort of thing. When they send their accountants and lawyers and mining engineers and geologists to look it over, I will be well prepared. It should all go smoothly, save for one thing. I don’t know what Cletus Carboy will do, other than lick his wounds. If he entertains visions of getting it all back, or simply plans to be a spoiler, raising questions, spreading gossip and lies, then I will have to deal with it. He’s well guarded, of course, and his sudden departure would be embarrassing just at this moment.”

  He eyed me cheerfully.

  “That’s where you come in, Cotton. You are going to be my informant. Oh, forgive me, that’s too long a word for you. My snitch.”

  “Doin’ what?”

  “Extracting information. Every iota of it. What Carboy’s up to. His plans. What he wants you to do. Who he is talking to.” He eyed me again. “And if you spill the beans, Arnold here will pull your fingernails out, and cut your privates off, and flay the flesh off your body before your contract…expires.”

  Well, that was putting it right on the dotted line, I thought.

  He smiled. “Of course, that’s up to you. Actually, you’re a bit smarter than I’d thought. That gambit with the woodcutters was clever, Cotton. It almost got by me. Shutting down the mine and the mill. Very good. I had to deal harshly with it. My excellent man Rudolph Glan made it clear to all the woodcutters that they had a contract with us, and we wouldn’t let them out of the contract. Not now. I don’t care what happens after I’ve sold out. But until then, they’re going to cut wood, each day, every day, cord by cord, and bring it into Swamp Creek. And if they don’t keep up, they’ll…shall we say, disappear. Glan is first-rate at making people disappear. They simply vanish from the earth, and are soon forgotten. Wilderness is a marvelous thing, Cotton.”

  So the sniper would be busy with any woodcutter not producing wood, I thought. You had to hand it to Scruples. He could turn life into a contract you never knew you signed. Sort of a handshake contract.

  “Are we clear?” Scruples asked.

  “’Bout what?”

  “About your duties and your rewards. Oh, yes, the reports. At sundown each day, you will appear in the Miner’s Rest Saloon, and if I choose, I will have you report in person. If not, you’ll have a word with The Apocalypse—what a fine name, eh? He has a keen mind and will convey to me exactly what you tell him; a daily report on everything—everything. If you should fail to report any single thing, Cotton, our agreement will come to an abrupt end.”

  “I didn’t know I agreed to anything.”

  He smiled. “You’re agreeing right now.”

  “You sure you want to cut a deal with riffraff?”

  “Oh, you’ve learned a new word, Cotton. You’re making progress.”

  I sort of wanted to strangle the son of a bitch.

  “Mr. Apocalypse will show you to the door. Until tomorrow evening then.”

  That there train car door got opened and I got eased out, and I got to walkin’ down that hill wondering what the hell to do with myself, since I wasn’t gonna snitch on Cletus Carboy. Maybe I could just get onto Critter and flee the country, start somewhere else, get out before a bullet went in one ear and out the other.

  I hardly got to the bottom of the hill, in the quiet of the night, when I knew there was something that needed doin’. I headed back to Carboy’s place on the creek below town, wishing I didn’t have to do what had to be done. But there wasn’t no one else to do it. I knew where a spade was in Carboy’s barn, and I knew where I could find an old blanket to wrap her in. There wasn’t no one else to bury Amanda proper, so it was up to me. I thought maybe it’d be good to get her off that porch before dawn, and spare Cletus Carboy the sight of her when he got up in the morning or someone else found her.

  So I hiked back there, thinkin’ how I’d miss Amanda. She’d come around to being a different person, or maybe it was just a way of growin’ some, but she was a fine woman by the time her life got taken away. If there was one thing for me to do, after burying her, it would be to get that two-bit murderer and give him back his own medicine. But that was for later. For now, there was just one thing workin’ in me, and that was to carry Amanda’s body away into the slopes somewhere, and put her to rest proper. It’d be a blanket around her, not wood, but it was the best I could do. It wasn’t any job I wanted, but someone needed to do it, and that meant me.

  So I walked all the way back there, and got a blanket and some rope, and a spade, and then went to fetch Amanda, dreading every step. Only one thing was wrong with the whole idea. She wasn’t there.

  Chapter Thirty

  I turned away, but a voice stopped me.

  “Come in, Cotton.”

  Carboy was standing in the dark doorway. I slipped in, and discovered he had a revolver in hand. He led me to his dining room and lit a lamp.

  Stretched out on the table was Amanda carefully wrapped in a winding sheet.

  “She came here to tell me she was looking for a way to leave Scruples,” Carboy said. “Then she left. Later, I heard a shot, and lit no lamps, for safety. Then I saw them drop her on my porch and lead you away.”

  I stared at Amanda.

  “We wrapped her in linen, the traditional cloth for a burial sheet,” Carboy said. “I happened to have a coverlet. My people washed her carefully and then we wrapped her and tied the sheet tight. When it’s light, we’ll bury her. I’ve set aside a family plot, even if there’s no one in it now. I planned to stay after the mines were exhausted. This is one of the most beautiful corners of the world, this cheerful valley. It would be a good place for Amanda to lie in eternity.”

  I couldn’t think of nothing to say, not then. All I could think of was Carboy, making this place his home, and Scruples, perched in a railroad car ready to be hauled away the minute he sold out.

  “Amanda found me in the bunkhouse,” I said, leaving out a few details. “She wanted to go, and she hoped I would help her. I said I would. Then them two, Arnold and the little one with the big name, they come in, beat me, and take her off. They made me watch it, and I guess watching them shoot her is never gonna leave my mind.”

  “They took you with them?”

  “Up there to the railroad car. Scruples himself, well, he laid it out for me.” I hesitated a moment and then made my decision. “He offered me a deal. My life if I snitch on you, death if I don’t, torture and death if I tell you about it. It wasn’t pretty-sounding, talkin’ about cutting me up piece by piece.”

  He stared at me quietly. “You’ve crossed the bridge.”

  “Guess I had to.”

  “I’m the only thing in his way now.”

  “That’s what he said. He said the whole district’s up for sale, the brokers have it, and there’s been lots of advertising, and he thinks he’ll make a fortune real fast. He said the only trouble might come from Doo Diligence, and I thought that was some kind of shooter you’d hired somewhere, but he said it wasn’t nothing like that, it was bein’ careful.”

  “Due diligence is the process of making sure a property is up and up,” Carboy said. “And if a buyer were to check with me, he might learn some things that Scruples isn’t talking about.”

  “He come after you yet?”

  “So far, no. He’s got Glan keeping the woodcutters in line, and the others haven’t had much of a chance at me because my own people are alert.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure he’s got Glan on them woodcutters. You’re his target.”

  “That’s good advice, Cotton. Thank you.”

  “Like at the buryin’.”

  We stared at that wrapped form, so silent and sad. I was wonderin’ how we’d even get her into the ground, with Scruples’ wolves circling around out there. I wanted Amanda to have a fine funeral, a funeral that said she was a fine lady that come far with her life.

  “It’ll take my people most of a day to dig the grave,” Carboy said. “I was thinking of twilight. That’s a fitting time, isn’t it?”

  “I’m going up after him,” I said. “Ain’t no other way. There’s usually some good spot, some place to shoot from, and I’m going to find it.”

  “You sure you want to?”

  “I never been so sure of anything. And the deal is, I want to get up there now, while it’s still dark, and that means leavin’ real quick. If your people could put some food together for me, I’d like to head out and start prowlin’ and stay out all day, and maybe if Glan shows up, have a little surprise for him.”

  Carboy nodded. He vanished into a darkened kitchen and returned. “You’ll have something in a moment.”

  “I’m gonna do this on foot, not with Critter. With him around, that’d be like announcing the show. Hope you can have a man hay and water him.”

  “Consider it done, Cotton.”

  “Where’s the burial plot?” I asked.

  He took me to a window opening on the night. “Back there, at the base of the foothills, maybe a quarter of a mile. It’s a fenced half acre.”

  “Who knows about it?”

  “Amanda did. That means Scruples probably does. And if Glan is now stalking me, chances are he does.”

  “I’ll start there.”

  “Cotton—go with God.”

  No one ever said stuff like that to me before. I nodded.

  That Chinese lady, My Ling, she gave me some grub in a sack, and I slid into the night. I wasn’t sure how to get to that burial plot, but I could make out the foothills, and just headed that way through a whispering night with a cool breeze lifting my hair. I made sure Celia Argo’s revolver snugged into the holster at my waist. I could handle long guns all right, but felt better with a short one, even if I had to get in closer. Maybe, if me and Glan were both out there, we’d see who was who and what was what.