She straightened up. “Well, I don’t see where you got any right to get on your high and mighty. You liked it well enough before.”
He said, looking up at her, “Yeah, but that was before I knew where it had been. No thanks, miss, I don’t reckon I’ll have any more of your pie. The first few pieces didn’t altogether agree with me.”
As she stalked off, Carl Lowe came to the table with a small skillet full of bacon and beans accompanied by a hunk of stale bread and a pitcher of water. He set to work eating the beans. As he shoveled in the food he said, “This is mighty good, Marshal. A man learns to appreciate the good things when he’s done without.”
Longarm had announced that he would not be cooking for anyone else, and after hearing Rita talk about poison, he was not about to let her near the food. As a consequence he had said that everyone was on their own so far as vittles went. “Eat what you can find.”
But while he was frying bacon it had seemed just as simple to fry up some extra, and Carl Lowe had taken advantage of it. Longarm had come to feel friendly toward the little man. He seemed so innocuous, so innocent, it was hard to believe he was a robber and a thief.
Longarm said, “Carl, I hate like hell to bind you hand and foot like I done last night.”
Carl paused with his spoon in the air. “I don’t mind, Marshal. I know you got to do your job.”
“I got the bridles and saddles hidden away, but as good a horseman as you appear to be, you might mount one of those animals out there and use a piece of rope for a bridle and make a clean getaway.”
Carl stared at him blankly. “Horseman? What gives you the idea I’m any kind of horseman, Marshal? I don’t know much about horses. I’m city-bred.”
Longarm said, “Hell, Carl, I saw you break off from the main bunch and head north. I read your sign. You were pulling a packhorse. I damn near got within rifle range of you before my horse broke a leg.”
Carl chuckled. “Marshal, that there is good one on you. That wasn’t me a-horseback. And they wasn’t no packhorse. I was the pack on the horse. That was Johnny Jimbuck, one of the prisoners as broke out with me. His job was to get me loose and up to Buckeye. To meet Mr. Hanks.”
“Johnny Jimbuck?”
“Yessir. He is a Comanche Indian. They say he could ride a wildcat without a saddle if you could grow one big enough.” He took a bite of beans. “So he wuz the one got me out.” He chuckled. “I ‘ppreciate the compliment, Marshal, but I was hangin’ on was all I was doin’.”
Longarm said, “Well, if I took into account all the bother you’ve caused me, Carl, I’d take you out and hang you to a tree. Save me the trouble of taking you back to prison.”
Carl chuckled. “Ain’t no trees around here, Marshal. Besides, me and you is professionals. I reckon the trouble I caused you you just chalked up to a day’s work. And I don’t mind so much going back to prison. The warden there give me a good job and I got treated pretty good. Didn’t have to work out in all that heat breakin’ rocks.”
“What were you doing?”
Carl swallowed and tore off a piece of bread. “I worked on the locks and the keys. They was always gettin’ broke. The warden had me a little workshop set up with a steam-powered metal lathe. Wasn’t all that bad.”
Longarm laughed. When he could stop he said, “You telling me the warden turned you loose on the locks and the keys?”
Carl looked sheepish. “Yeah. I reckon I kind of took advantage of the situation.”
“That how you broke yourself and the others out?”
Carl Lowe blushed and put his head down. “Yeah, I reckon.”
A little later, when they were having coffee, Carl said, “You know, Marshal, I reckon it’s right that I’m going back to Yuma.” He looked down. “I been gettin’ tired of all this robbery. I didn’t mind openin’ the safes, you understand, but they always seemed to be killing and hard stuff went with it. I don’t like all that hard stuff. Fact is, I don’t like guns. Scared me to death all them guns goin’ off yesterday when you showed up.”
Longarm gave him a glance. “Looked to me like you were trying to get your hands on mine.”
Carl Lowe nodded. “Yessir. And I know you ain’t never goin’ to believe me, but I was gettin’ your gun to make that feller let go of your neck before he hurt you bad.”
Longarm stared at him for a long moment. Strangely enough, he did believe him. He finally said, “Well, I thank you for the thought, Carl. I reckon I’m sorry I kicked you in the chin.”
Carl Lowe reached up and rubbed his bruised chin. “Wasn’t the worst lick I ever got.” He sighed. “And probably won’t be the last. Reckon that stage will get here tomorrow?”
Longarm shrugged. “According to the way I calculate it. Ought to be in here early morning. At least I hope so.”
“But it will be southbound.”
Longarm said dryly, “We’ll find a way to turn it around. Trust me on that.”
That night he took Carl into the stationkeeper’s quarters to sleep. When he was blocking the door with a chair under the knob Carl Lowe said, “Marshal, if you are aimin’ to keep me in with that chair agin the door, you got it on the wrong side.”
“It’s to keep her out,” Longarm said.
“You ain’t scairt of that nice lady, are you?”
Longarm looked at him grimly. “Yes.”
“Why, I think she is just a sweetheart.”
“You didn’t shoot her lover and you ain’t standing in her way.”
