“That’ll be an extra two cents for the water,” Upward said.
Plug got pretty tickled about that, and started watching me sip.
“You hear the old one about the feller who was dining, and he says to the waiter, ‘There’s a fly in my soup.’ And the waiter, he says, ‘That’s an extra nickel for the meat, sir.’”
“You got a real sense of humor, Sheriff,” Plug said.
“Yep, that’s a knee-slapper,” Upward said.
I studied Plug some. “I guess you fellers are gonna stick around for a few days,” I said. “Well, that’s fine.”
“We’re making sure that little bastard gets strung up proper,” Plug said.
“Oh, he will be,” I said. “But you know, he sort of did a favor around here, plugging a pair of outlaws like the Jonas brothers.”
“They was outlaws, all right,” Plug said.
“There are warrants out of Colorado on that pair,” I said. “They were a pair of bad boys, for sure.”
“What were the warrants for?” Plug asked.
I sipped a little, now that I had their attention.
“Oh, a mess of stuff. Rustling. Bank robbery. Train robbery. And they was wanted for questioning in the death of a rancher down there. Seems the rancher caught someone making off with his cows, so maybe them two kilt him. Stuff like that.”
“Ain’t that interesting,” Plug said. “I didn’t know that part. Crayfish, he thought he was hiring a pair of gunslicks to keep the lid on around here, with Admiral Bragg pushing and shoving the way he did.”
“I ain’t got anything on Rocco, except he was palled up with the Jonas boys,” I said. “Maybe the boy did the world a favor.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, King Bragg wiped out two real bad fellers and maybe one more, fellers that would have turned on their boss, and maybe were fixing to get real mean with Crayfish.”
Plug, he suddenly turned real quiet. “No, nothing like that,” he said. “Crayfish, he can take care of himself.”
Upward smiled and nodded.
I sometimes ain’t the brightest candle in the lamp, but I got some instinct, and I knew from how this was going that I was poking into places where them two didn’t want me to travel. So I let it lay a minute.
“Them dodgers that come in the mail, half of them are so blurry they don’t help none. I get them all the time. The good ones, they got a photograph, but most just got a sketch and some information that don’t help at all. Like, the wanted man’s medium, and light haired, and got a scar over the left eyebrow and shifty eyes. How am I supposed to do something with that? You got any notions, Plug?”
“I’m not a lawman, Cotton. Me, I like to hear about reputations. Someone wants me to hire them on the T-Bar, half the time someone else knows something about the man. The boss keeps his ear to the ground too. He knows who he wants on the place.”
“I guess maybe he’s plumb glad them three got shot,” I said.
“Wouldn’t know about that,” Plug said swiftly.
Upward hastened to tell me how wrong I was. “Crayfish felt real bad about it, good men down, shot in cold blood by that punk kid. Crayfish, he paid for the burying and declared a day of mourning on the ranch, and I served free beer all that day of mourning. Sort of like a wake, Sheriff. Lots of T-Bar men in here, and a few tears. We hated to say good-bye to some T-Bar riders.”
“That so?” I asked. “I sort of thought them three were about as rotten as they come.”
“It don’t matter,” Plug said. “They was with the outfit, and we’re loyal to the brand, every last one of us. When anyone in the outfit goes down, we all pull together. Crayfish started a widow and orphan fund for them, put in ten dollars for starters, but no one claimed it. Them two Jonas brothers were loners, I guess.”
“They’d have to be loners, rustling their boss blind,” I said.
“Who says that?” Plug asked.
“It’s on the dodgers from Colorado,” I said. “They were makin’ a dime or two on the side, and not telling anyone about it. But they got caught, and then escaped.”
“You don’t say,” Plug said. “That’s sure news to me. You sorta wonder about people sometimes.”
“Was them two moving a few beeves out of the T-Bar?” I asked. That was sort of the jackpot question.
Upward and Parsons, they just glanced at each other. “Not as I know of,” Plug said. “I’d have heard of it. Mr. Ruble, he never asked me to look into it.”
“How come King Bragg put bullets into those two? Were they rustling beef from the Anchor Ranch?”
Plug, he just shrugged. “He just walked in, got himself a drink, and started pumping bullets. That’s what he had in mind before he set foot in here. He just walked in and pretty soon there was three dead T-Bar men, good hands, bleeding on the sawdust.”
“I don’t get it. How did he know them three were here?”
“Someone must have told him.”
“Who?”
