“That your dream, is it?”
“You don’t know the half of it,” he said. “Gambling parlor downstairs, fiddlers and pretty bar maids, poker tables, no one walks in except he’s all dressed up, top hat and tails, boots shined, and a fat purse on him too. And upstairs I got the prettiest girls in the world, all refined, bedsheets washed, the girls bathing at least once a week, and perfumed just fine. Ten dollars a pop, and most of it for me.”
“That’s a dream, all right, Crayfish.”
“Beats ranching in Wyoming,” he said. “And I get to graze wherever I want.”
He sipped. I sipped and coughed.
“This ain’t a social visit,” he said, not quite making a question out of it.
I wasn’t in no hurry. I just wanted to see if he’d sweat a bit if I didn’t come direct to my business.
“Mighty fine stuff here,” I said, swirling the glass. “Just right for company.”
“Brought it up from Utah,” he said. “Them Saints make mighty fine Valley Tan.”
I figured it was something like that. “I imagine you can afford any hooch from anywhere,” I said.
“I could afford a lot more if I had more land,” he said. “These foothills, they’re not half the pasture that Admiral’s got. Now if I had his spread, I’d been sending you a barrel of whiskey once a month.”
I listened real hard to that.
“I guess you would, if I wanted it,” I said. “But I don’t. I’m not a drinkin’ man, and not a dry man neither. Once in a while, I take a little sauce for the kidneys. My ma, she said do whatever you want, but don’t do it often.”
“Smart woman, I’d say.” He downed the rest of his stuff, and built hisself another, with a generous splash of springwater in it. “This a social call?” he asked.
“Oh, I’ve got me a few questions, loose ends, things that didn’t get tidied up,” I said.
“Well, I’ll be glad to help any way I can, Sheriff.”
The social moment had vanished, that’s for sure. He wasn’t one to sit and yarn with a law officer if he could help it.
“Them three got kilt, the ones working here. You know, I need to git ahold of next of kin. I never let their ma and pa and brothers and all know what happened. That’s a part of being a sheriff. A peace officer, he’s got to send along the bad news. I thought maybe you could tell me something about each of them, and I’ll send along a wire or a letter to their folks.”
He seemed almost to deflate. For a while there he was all ballooned up, trying to look six inches taller than he was, but now the gas was leakin’ from his bag, and he just smiled some.
“Oh, that. Well, I don’t know much. The pair of Jonas brothers never did tell me much about themselves.”
“Where’d you meet ’em, Crayfish?”
“Beats me. I think they were from down deep in Texas but I wouldn’t swear to it.”
“Texas, eh? Well, you Texas fellers can spot each other easier than I can.”
“Why do you think I’m from Texas, Sheriff?”
I shrugged. “Just a hunch. If I got her wrong, you can put me straight.”
“I’m from all over the place,” Crayfish said.
“Well, these Jonas boys. Them that got kilt. The county put them in a potter’s field out of town, seeing as how you didn’t feel like buryin’ your own men. Foxy and Weasel was their handles, but I need to know what names they got christened by.”
“Blamed if I know, Sheriff.”
“They had a ma and pa, and probably got named something like Elmer and Harry, and got the Foxy and Weasel names later. If I’m gonna write their kinfolk, I kinda need the names.”
“Funny, Sheriff, but I never asked. Here, it ain’t polite to ask a gent.”
“Well, at least you know where they came from.”
“Waco, maybe. Someone once told me Waco.”
“They was pretty slick with six-guns.”
“That’s what I want, Sheriff. I got crooks and rustlers and land grabbers to deal with. I need men who know cows and guns real good.”
“You reckon if I just shot a wire off to any Jonas in Waco, it’d get to their folks?”
The rancher shrugged, and downed his whiskey.
“Well, tell me why you hired them. They must of got some sort of reputation, carrying names like that. Now why’d the one call himself Weasel?”
“Weasels is mean, Sheriff. You know that. You can figure it as well as I can. Foxy, too, you get the man’s character without any more than the handle.”
“I guess I sort of do,” I said. “Now how about that other, the third that got kilt by King Bragg. What was he doin’ here?”
“Oh, Rocco, poor devil. Just a drifter. I hired him straight off. I need all the hands I can get, and he seemed fit enough.”
