“I do,” the voice was accented. Smoke cut his eyes, shaded by the wide brim of his hat. Diego. “That, amigos, is Smoke Jensen.”
Several chair legs hit the boardwalk, the sound sharp in the still morning air.
The trio kept riding.
“Circle C on the west side of the street,” Beans observed.
“Yeah.” Smoke cut his eyes again. “That’s Jason Bright standing by the trough.”
“He is supposed to be very, very fast,” Ring said.
“He’s a punk,” Smoke replied.
“Lanny Ball over at the Hangout,” Beans pointed out.
“The Pussycat and the Hangout,” Ring said with a smile. “Where do they get the names?”
They reined up at the smith’s place; a huge stable and corral and blacksmithing complex. Beans and Ring swung down. Smoke hesitated, then stepped down.
“Changed my mind,” he told them. “No point in disturbing school while it’s in session. We’ll loaf around some; stretch our legs.”
“I’m for some breakfast,” Ring said. “Let’s try the Cafe Eats.”
Smoke told the stable boy to rub their horses down, and to give each a good bait of corn. They’d be back.
They walked across the wide street, spurs jingling, boots kicking up dust in the dry street, and stepped up onto the boardwalk, entering the cafe.
It was a big place for such a tiny town, but clean and bright, and the smells from the kitchen awakened the taste buds in them all.
They sat down at a table covered with a red-and-white checkered cloth and waited. A man stepped out of the kitchen. He wore an apron and carried a sawed-off double-barreled ten gauge express gun. “You are velcome to eat here at anytime ve are open,” he announced, his German accent thick. “My name is Hans, and I own dis establishment. I vill tell you what I have told all the rest: there vill be no trouble in here. None! I operate a nice quiet family restaurant. People come in from twenty, terty miles avay to eat here. Start trouble, und I vill kill you! Understood?”
“We understand, Hans,” Smoke said. “But we are not taking sides with either McCorkle or Hanks. I do not hire my guns and neither does Beans here.” He jerked his thumb toward the Moab Kid. “And Ring doesn’t even carry a short gun.”
“Uummph!” the German grunted. “Den dat vill be a velcome change. You vant breakfast?”
“Please.”
“Good! I vill start you gentlemen vith hot oatmeal vith lots of fresh cream and sugar. Den ham and eggs and fried potatoes and lots of coffee. Olga! Tree oatmeals and tree breakfasts, Liebling.”
“What’d he call her?” Beans whispered. “Darling,” Ring told him.
Smoke looked up. “You speak German, Ring?”
“My parents were German. Born in the old country. My last name is Kruger.”
The oatmeal was placed before them, huge bowls of steaming oatmeal covered with cream and sugar. Ring looked up.
The two men then proceeded to converse in rapid-fire German. To Beans it sounded like a couple of bullfrogs with laryngitis.
Then, to the total amazement of Smoke and Beans, the two big men proceeded to slap each other across the face several times, grinning all the time.
Hans laughed and returned to the kitchen. “Y’all fixin’ to fight, Ring?” Beans asked.
Ring laughed at the expression on their faces. “Oh, no. That is a form of greeting in certain parts of the old country. It means we like each other.”
“That is certainly a good thing to know,” Smoke remarked drily. “In case I ever take a notion to travel to Germany.”
The men fell to eating the delicious oatmeal. When they pushed the empty bowls away, Hans was there with huge platters of food and the contest was on.
“Guten
“What’d he say. ” Beans asked Ring.
“Eat!” He smiled. “More or less.”
Olga stepped out of the kitchen to stand watching the men eat, a smile on her face. She was just as ample as Hans. Between the two of them they’d weigh a good five hundred pounds. Another lady stepped out of the kitchen. Make that seven hundred and fifty pounds.
When they had finished, as full as ticks, Ring looked up and said,
Olga and the other lady giggled.
“I didn’t hear nobody sneeze.” Beans looked around.
Ring stayed in the restaurant, talking with Hans and Olga and Hilda and drinking coffee. Beans sat down in a wooden chair in front of the place, staring across the street at the gunhawks who were staring at him. Smoke walked up to the church that doubled as a schoolhouse. The kids were playing out front so he figured it was recess time.
