“Or for you,” Meagan added.

  “Aye, lass, or for me.”

  * * *

  Rudy York owned the café, and he had named it Tacky Mack, after his son, Mack. Tacky Mack’s Café used a black-and-white color scheme. The walls were black, halfway up, and white the rest of the way. Even the wooden floor was painted in checkerboard squares of black and white. York was a large man with white hair and a gregarious smile. He greeted all his customers by name if he knew them, and he did so now, as Duff and Meagan stepped into his place of business.

  “Duff MacCallister and Miss Meagan Parker,” York greeted effusively. “Welcome, welcome, come with me, I’ll find a nice table by the window for you.”

  “Thank you, Rudy,” Duff said.

  “Duff, I know how much you like lamb,” York said. “I got some in fresh today.”

  “Great! ’Tis lamb chops I’ll be havin’, then.”

  “And I, as well,” Meagan said.

  “Good, two lamb chop dinners it shall be,” York said, leaving to see to their orders.

  “Lamb chops? Did I hear you say that you want lamb chops? No self-respecting cattleman would ever eat lamb.” The speaker was a large man, bald, but with a full, and bushy, black beard. He was sitting at a table very near to the one where Duff and Meagan had been seated.

  “Merlin Goodman, sure now, ’n the best o’ the mornin’ to ye,” Duff replied to the loudmouthed gentlemen who had made the derisive comment about lamb chops.

  Goodman’s Mountain Shadows Ranch was one of the eight very large ranches in the Valley of the Chugwater, but it was considerably smaller than Sky Meadow.

  “You can keep your greetin’. I want you to answer me,” Goodman said. “Do you, the largest cattleman in the valley, actually intend to sit here, in front of God and ever’ body else, ’n eat lamb?”

  “I like lamb,” Duff said.

  Goodman turned to address the other diners in the café. “Now, I ask you folks, what kind of man would eat lamb? Ever’ one knows that anybody who would eat lamb ain’t fittin’ to be around.”

  “Why, Mr. Goodman,” Meagan said sweetly. “Didn’t the Lord Himself eat lamb?”

  “Ha! She’s got you there, Merlin,” one of the other diners said.

  “Give me m’ bill, York,” Goodman said in a blustering voice. “Maybe the Scotsman is goin’ to eat it, but I sure as hell don’t have to stay here ’n watch it. Pardon the language, ma’am,” he added quickly to Meagan.

  “Merlin, ’n would that be meanin’ I’m to take you off the guest list for m’ lamb supper next Easter?” Duff called to him as he left the café in a huff. The others in the café laughed.

  “I tell you the truth, Duff,” Bob Guthrie said. Guthrie owned the lumber and building supply company. “I probably like lamb as much as you do, but I’d never eat it out in public. Why, I’d more ’n likely lose half my customers if I did that.”

  “We’ve nae such problems as this back in Scotland,” Duff said. “We have sheep and cattle raised right next to each other. Some farmers grow both and turn them out to graze in the same field. ’Tisn’t true what the ranchers believe about sheep destroying the grass.”

  “I doubt we’ll ever see anything like that here,” Guthrie replied. “You folks enjoy your meal now,” he added as he stepped over to the counter to pay for his lunch.

  During their lunch, Charley Blanton, editor of the Chugwater Defender, came into the café.

  “Hello, Rudy,” Charley said. He held up a stack of papers. “Here’s today’s issue.”

  “I hope you leave me enough today. We were sold out by two o’clock yesterday,” York replied as he took money from the cash box to pay for the papers that had been sold the previous day.

  “If they’re selling that well, you might want to consider increasing your ad space,” Charley suggested.

  Rudy chuckled. “That’s what I like about you, Charley. You’re always selling.”

  Charley saw Duff and Meagan at a nearby table.

  “Good morning to you, Duff, and to you, Miss Meagan,” Charley greeted.

  “Hello, Charley,” Duff replied. “Tell me, lad, how goes the continuing fight of the free press for truth, justice, and dare I say it, Scotsman that I am, the American way?”

  “It is good that you would make such an inquiry, my friend,” Charley replied. “With the newspaper as our mighty shield, we move forth with resolute valor and absolute determination!” Delivering his response in oratory fashion, Charley held up his finger to make a point.

  “More honor to ye,” Duff said.

  “Miss Meagan, if you would like, I can just give you your paper here and tell the boy not to drop one off at your dress shop. That way, you can have a look at your ad.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Blanton, that would be nice.”

  Charley took a paper from the stack he had set by the cash box and handed it to her.

  Meagan separated the pages of the newspaper then leafed through the pages in search.

  “Ah, this is what I was looking for,” Meagan said a moment later. She turned the newspaper around so that Duff could see the page she was speaking of. It featured an advertisement for her store.

  LADIES’ APPAREL

  FINEST garments made according to latest fashion

  MEAGAN’S DRESS EMPORIUM

  “I see nae need for ye to be advertising, lass, since you are the only dressmaking store in town,” Duff said.

  “When you’re in business, it never hurts to toot your own horn,” Meagan replied with a broad smile. “And it also supports the local paper. You do agree with that, don’t you?”

  “Aye, lass, that I can agree with.”

  Chapter Nine

  Newman, Texas

  The tiny town of Newman, Texas, was on both sides of a single street. It had a general store, a drugstore, a leather goods store, a school, a church, and two saloons.

  It had cost Sid Shamrock $2,000 to avoid going to jail in Elam and he had survived the last few weeks on the $100 he had gotten from Rosemary Woods. Now that money was almost gone, and he was here, in Newman, with barely enough money to buy drink and food for himself.

  Glancing up toward the bar, Shamrock saw a man about five feet eight inches tall, with a narrow face, sunken cheeks, a nose rather like the beak of a hawk, and deep-set very dark eyes. This was someone who he knew, someone with whom he had once done a job.

  Shamrock had very little money left, but what money he did have was worth investing in an idea he just had. This was someone he might be able to do business with.

  Shamrock stepped up to the bar alongside the man, just as the bartender was pouring him a whiskey.

  “I’m buying,” Shamrock said.

  The man looked toward him, and though no smile ameliorated his almost skeletal face, he did nod.

  “Hello, Bodine,” Shamrock said.

  “Jefferson,” Bodine replied.

  “I’m using the name Shamrock now. How ’bout joining me at my table?”

  Bodine picked up the glass and followed Shamrock back to his table, which was now occupied by a young cowboy and one of the saloon girls.

  “That’s my table,” Shamrock said.

  “You wasn’t here, so now it’s mine.”

  “Get up,” Shamrock ordered, letting his hand rest on the butt of his pistol.

  The cowboy looked at him for no more than a moment, then he stood up and reached for his drink.

  “Leave the drink.”

  “The hell I will. I just . . .”

  “I said leave it.”

  “Come on, honey, we can find another table,” the bar girl said with a frightened glance at the two men who were standing there.

  “What do you want?” Lucien Bodine asked.

  “I want to do something that’ll make us a little money,” Shamrock replied.

  “You got something in mind?”

  “No. I was hopin’ maybe you would.”

  “Yeah, I got an idea,” Bodine replied.

  * * *

  Two days later the two men waited behind some rocks that shielded them from the road leading into Wayland, Texas.

  “His name is Crites, Garrison J. Crites,” Bodine said. “He’s goin’ into Wayland to buy a prize bull, ’n he’ll have the cash money with him.”

  “How much do you think he’ll have?” Shamrock asked.

  “I don’t figure he’ll have any less than a thousand dollars on ’im,” Bodine replied. “We’ll split the money fifty, fifty.”

  “Five hundred dollars apiece,” Shamrock said. He thought of the $14,000 he had just gone through, and by comparison, $500 was minuscule. On the other hand, compared to the $12 he had now, $500 was a fortune.

  “Here he comes,” Bodine said. “Wait till he gets close. We don’t want him runnin’ away. If he’s well mounted, he could get away from us.”

  “What if he starts to ride off soon as we call out to ’im?” Shamrock asked.

  “We won’t be callin’ out to ’im,” Bodine replied, pulling his pistol.

  Crites was well dressed, and riding a golden palomino with a Mexican saddle liberally decorated with silver. As soon as he drew even with them, both Shamrock and Bodine moved out into the road, right in front of him.

  “My word, where did you two . . . ?” That was as far as he got before Bodine shot him.

  “Twelve hundred ’n eighteen dollars,” Bodine said a bit later, after counting out the money.

  “I want his horse and saddle, too, unless you want it.”

  “You can have the horse, but leave the saddle.”

  “You’re wantin’ the saddle? All right, long as I’m gettin’ the horse. ’N I don’t blame you none, this is a damn fine-lookin’ saddle,” Shamrock said.

  “Yes, ’n that’s the problem. It’s too fine-lookin’. It’s the kind of saddle that people might recognize. We’ll leave it here.”

  “Oh yeah, that’s most likely right, ain’t it?”

  Bodine stuck his $609 down in his pocket, then remounted.

  “Where you goin’?” Shamrock asked.

  “Not sure,” Bodine replied. “But wherever it is, we’ll not be goin’ together.”

  “Yeah,” Shamrock replied. “Yeah, that’s probably right.”

  * * *

  Three weeks later, in the little town of Duxbury, Texas, Shamrock found himself in the Trail Dust saloon, sitting across the table from Jeb Jaco. Running into Jaco had been by chance, just as it had been when he had encountered Lucien Bodine a little earlier. And like Lucien Bodine, Jaco was a man Shamrock knew from his past, for the two had once joined together to rob a store.

  Although Shamrock was more careful with the $600 than he had been with the $14,000 he had netted from the bank robbery in Sulphur Springs, he had managed to spend most of it, and once more, he was in need of cash. Meeting up with Jaco might just be the opportunity he was looking for.

  “What are you doin’ now, Jaco? How are you makin’ a livin’?” Shamrock asked.

  “I’m ridin’ for the Duxbury brand,” Jaco said.

  “Duxbury?”

  “J. F. Duxbury. He’s a big rancher here in Fisher County, ’n he’s the feller this town is named after.”

  “You like cowboyin’, do you?” Shamrock asked.

  “Twenty-one dollars a month and found? What the hell is there to like about that? Hell no, I don’t like it, but it’s three hots ’n a cot.”

  “How would like to do a job with me?”

  “What kind of job? ’Cause to tell you the truth, that last job we done only got us about forty dollars, ’n it warn’t hardly worth it.”

  “That’s because we robbed a store,” Bodine said. “This time we’ll rob a bank.”

  “A bank? I don’t know, that seems like a pretty big job for just two men. I figure a job like that would call for at least six men,” Jaco said.

  “Do you know where to get four others?” Shamrock asked.

  Jaco smiled. “Yeah, come to think of it, I do,” he said.

  “Then get ’em.”

  Twin Peaks Ranch

  After supper one evening Brad Houser sent word to Dooley Carson and Slim Hastings, telling them that he wanted to see them in the ranch office. He had a plan in mind, and of all his hands, he believed that these two were best suited to carry it out.

  Houser got out a bottle of whiskey, then put three glasses on his desk as he waited. A moment later, there was a knock on his door.

  “Come in!” he called.

  It was very unusual for anyone to be summoned to the ranch office for any reason, but it was particularly unusual for someone to be summoned this late in the day. As Dooley and Slim came in, they exchanged nervous glances with each other.

  “You . . . uh . . . wanted to see us, Mr. Houser?” Dooley asked, speaking for both of them.

  “Yes, I do,” Houser said. He poured whiskey into the three glasses, then picked two of them up and handed one to each of the two men.

  “Have a drink,” he invited.

  “Yes, sir!” Dooley and Slim replied, a big smile spreading across their faces. They still didn’t know what this about, but if they were about to be fired, they didn’t think Houser would offer them a drink first.

  “Salute,” Houser said, holding his glass out toward them.

  “Uh, yes, sir, here’s to you,” Dooley replied as he and Slim lifted their glasses as well.

  “Gentlemen, I have a task I would like the two of you to perform for me.”

  “Yes, sir, whatever it is you want me ’n Slim to do, why, you can count on us a-doin’ it,” Dooley said.

  “Tonight,” Houser added.

  “Tonight?”

  “At midnight.”

  “This job you got for us has to be done at midnight?”

  “Or shortly thereafter,” Houser said. He refilled the glasses. “It’s a very special job that needs to be done in the middle of the night, so that no one sees you. It will require men of courage and intelligence. Do I have the right men for the job?”

  “Yes, sir,” Dooley said, smiling as his glass was refilled. “You got the right men, all right.”

  Houser took out two twenty-dollar bills.

  “I forgot to tell you that it’s worth twenty dollars apiece for you to do it, but you must tell no one else what you are doing.”

  “What about Turley? I mean, him bein’ the foreman ’n all,” Slim said. “He might figure out that me ’n Dooley left in the middle of the night. Oughten we to tell him?”

  “Absolutely not. When I say I don’t want anyone to know, then I mean I don’t want anyone to know, and that includes Turley.”

  “All right, we won’t tell ’im nothin’, even if he was to ask,” Dooley said hesitantly, wondering now what this was all about.

  “And, if you handle this job well enough, there will be more jobs exactly like it for you to do, and more money for you.”

  Dooley and Slim smiled at each other.

  “We’ll do whatever it is you’re a-wantin’ us to do,” Dooley said, “’N we won’t tell nobody nothin’ about it.”

  “Yes, sir, you can count on us,” Slim added.

  “Good, very good.”

  Houser began to give his instructions, and as the two men listened, they thought they had never heard anything so bizarre, even though that word wasn’t in their vocabulary.

  The two men discussed the task that had been given them as they walked back to the bunkhouse.

  “Why is it you reckon he’s a-wantin’ to do somethin’ like that?” Dooley asked. “Why, that don’t make no sense at all.”

  “I don’t know, but he give us twenty dollars to do it, so what I think we ought to do is, just do it.”

  Except for taking off their boots, neither Slim nor Dooley undressed for bed that night. Then, when they were sure everyone else was asleep, they left the bunkhouse as quietly as they could, went straight to the barn, and saddled their horses.

  “Maybe we should lead them away instead of ridin’ them,” Dooley suggested. “That way we’ll have a better chance of not bein’ seen.”

  “Yeah, good idea,” Slim agreed.

  Five minutes later, with the horses saddled, Dooley and Slim led them away from the barn on the way to performing the task Houser had set for them.

  * * *

  The next morning Louie Patterson, who was one of the small ranchers recently arrived in the valley, was checking up on his small herd. Louie was a lean, lanky cowboy who seemed overpowered by the ten-gallon hat he wore. As he came to the top of a slight rise, he saw six cows cropping grass on the open range.

  “Hello, cows,” he said, speaking aloud. “Where did you critters come from?”

  Louie was riding alone because his ranch was so small that he couldn’t afford any hands. At the moment he didn’t really need anyone as he had less than fifty head of cattle and one man could easily tend to a herd that small.

  But now he was about to add ten additional cows. These were mavericks, cows that had been born, then wandered away before they were castrated and branded. Because there was no way of knowing who such cattle belonged to, they belonged to anyone who claimed them. Louie was a very active cow hunter, and more than half of his herd consisted of mavericks he had found and branded.

  Particularly skilled in being able to approach isolated cattle without alarming them, he rode slowly up to the ten cows who, content with their grazing, paid no attention to the horse and rider who was coming near them.

  “Well, now, it looks like you ten are about to get a new home. What do you say we . . .” Louie paused in midsentence. None of the ten cows were actually mavericks; all ten were wearing the Twin Peaks brand.

  “Ahh, I see that you aren’t mavericks,” Louie said. “But since you have gone to all the trouble to come over here, I hate to have to send you back home. Besides, Twin Peaks has so many cattle that they won’t be missing ten cows. I think I’ll just take all of you.”

  Louie got the cows moving, and soon they were with the rest of his herd. Using a running iron, he turned the Twin Peaks brand into his own. The adjusted brand could pass a cursory glance, but not a close examination. He was taking a chance that there would be no close examination.