But Bret did come out, and his mood seemed to have changed. It made me want to call Cassidy. I exchanged a glance with Frank, who picked up the phone.
“I’m sorry,” Bret said to him.
Frank put the phone back, waited.
“I wish I could give your own clothes back to you,” Bret went on, “but they had blood on them and Samuel was afraid I would….” He lowered his eyes. “I’m sorry. I don’t think mine will fit you or I’d offer—”
“It’s okay,” Frank said. “Don’t worry about it, all right?”
Bret hesitated, then nodded. Frank picked up the phone again. Bret made no objection, but seemed uneasy. Frank watched him carefully as he walked away, moved closer to me.
“What book are you reading, Ms. Kelly?” Bret asked politely.
“Call me Irene,” I said. I reached into my back pocket — removed the forgotten paperback.
“Bret Harte,” he said. “Read the title story sometime. About a group of misfits trapped in a snowstorm. The outcasts aren’t saints — definitely sinners — but not really any worse than the people who kicked them out of town — better in some ways, I suppose. They’re imperfect, in an imperfect world. But they do what they can in the face of adversity.”
“It’s the story with John Oakhurst in it?”
He smiled. “Yes. John Oakhurst. He pins the deuce of clubs to a tree — ‘at once the strongest and yet the weakest of the outcasts of Poker Flat.’ ”
I didn’t understand the quote and was about to ask him what it meant, but Frank was calling him to the phone.
“They can leave at any time,” Bret said to Cassidy.
“I’ll disarm the doors. But I’m staying here with Samuel.”
“We aren’t leaving without you,” Frank said, beginning a standoff.
Cassidy talked to Bret for a long time, while Frank and I sat next to one another, waiting silently for the negotiator to coax Bret into leaving the dead — all of them — behind.
We heard Bret’s side of the conversation change. Yes, he could always take his life later, so he didn’t mind talking to Cassidy. And Cassidy, working his own magic, got Bret to talk about getting to know Frank and the Szals again and of dreams other than revenge. About how life might be different now and how there were some projects he’d like to see finished. The theater, for example.
“Do you think,” Bret asked Frank at one point, “that we could really get to know one another?”
“Yes,” Frank answered. “I enjoy talking to you, Bret.”
“You aren’t just saying that, are you?”
“No,” Frank said. “I mean it.”
He said, “I’m scared.”
“I know,” Frank said. “I was scared over the last few days, and you tried to help me. I’ll try to help you, too. You won’t have to go through anything alone.”
“Okay,” he said simply, and told Cassidy we would be coming out through the front doors in a few minutes.
He put on his white cape as we stood in the lobby, near the door. “How do I look?” he asked Frank.
“Great,” he said. “Merlin would be proud.”
“I’m scared,” he said again, glancing over at Samuel’s body.
“We’re right here with you,” Frank said, and put his arm around Bret’s shoulders.
We pushed open the door. I stepped through first. Bright lights were shining. I put up a hand to shield my eyes, but Bret balked completely.
I could hear Cassidy telling them to cut some of the lights. We tried again.
It wasn’t so bad the next time. I could see Cassidy waiting for us on the other side of the street. We walked out onto the sidewalk. We were free, I told myself. Frank was coming home. But with each step I was aware that guns were pointed at us, and I felt Bret’s fear.
“What’s wrong?” I heard Frank ask, and realized they had stopped walking. I waited, too.
“Chains,” Bret said.
We saw what had halted his progress then: an officer holding a set of manacles.
“Get those goddamned chains the hell out of here,” Frank yelled, obviously shocking everyone who knew him as quiet Frank Harriman.
Cassidy seemed equally impatient, and the chains were quickly removed from sight.
“Don’t be afraid, you’re safe now,” Frank said.
Bret looked at Frank and smiled. “You said that the first time we met you. You really were our hero, you know,” he said, and reached into his cape.
“Hold your fire!” Frank shouted, but the shot rang out before he finished the sentence. Bret’s knees buckled. Frank clutched clumsily at him as he slumped, then gathered him into his arms. “Bret? Bret?”
People began to move toward us, but Frank fell to his knees and I moved with him, watching helplessly as he