known you by sight, but your voice--'
'You didn't forget that Cimarron crossing two years ago, did you?'
'Of course I remember,' Boland said. 'You saved my life.' He tried to show friendship and appreciation at the same time and smiled when he said, 'What are you doing here, Jeffy?'
'You're a regular babe in the woods, aren't you?' His head turned again. 'Red! Dammit!'
He hesitated in the doorway, leaning against the partition, and then came into the room, straining to move his legs and holding his arms tight to his stomach as if his insides would fall out with a heavy step. He was as filthy as the other man, but his grime-streaked, bearded face was sickly white and his jaw muscles clenched as he eased himself down onto the cot which stood against the side wall nearer the two men.
He leaned back until his head and shoulders were against the adobe, then blew his breath out in a low groan. He held his right elbow to his side protectingly, and from under his arm a dark, wet stain reached in a smear almost to the buttons on his shirt.
Boland looked at Jeffy who was leaning against their small table with his arms folded and the pistol pointing up past his shoulder and heard him say, 'Red's sick.'
He glanced at his wife who was holding her hands close to her waist and then he moved closer to the cot. 'How are you, Red?'
The man shook his head wearily, but didn't speak.
Leaning over him, Boland said in subdued surprise, 'That's a gunshot wound!'
Jeffy came off the table now and pushed Boland away from the cot. 'You want to know everything,' he said, and glanced down at Red. 'Keep your eyes open. You're not that bad hurt.'
'What's the matter with you!' Boland flared. 'He's been shot clean through.'
Jeffy shrugged. 'Tell him something he doesn't know.'
Boland turned on him angrily. 'What happened! If you're going to dirty up my house, you're going to tell me what happened!'
'You're forgetting about that Cimarron crossing.' Jeffy smiled. He was near forty with a thin, wizened face made lopsided by a tobacco wad; and now he took off his shapeless hat to show a receding hairline and a high, white forehead that looked obscenely naked because of its whiteness. He looked at Boland's wife, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.
'Honey, he ever tell you how I pulled him out from under the cows? Deep water after a flash flood and they was millin' in the stream--' He grinned at her as if there was a secret between them. 'You'd still be shaking your tail in that Sudan hash-house if it wasn't for me.'
'Saving my life doesn't bless anything you've got to say to my wife.' Boland had felt the temper hot in his face, but he calmed himself. Now his voice was lower, but there was an edge to it still.
'And it doesn't give you leave to walk in my house with your gun out and start pushing everybody around. I know you're in some trouble. With your dirty mind and Red's drinking it could be almost anything. Now I'm telling you, Jeffy, start acting right or move on.'
Jeffy shook his head sadly. 'That's some way to talk after all the time Red and me and you bunked together.'
'What did you do, Jeffy?'
There was a pause and his face became serious. 'Held up a man and Red shot him when he went for his gun.'
'Where'd it happen?'
As suddenly as he had become serious, his face grinned again and he said, 'You always did have a long nose.' He looked over to the cot and said, 'Red!' surprising the man's eyes open.
'I'm not going to tell you again. Keep your eyes open.' He lifted his slicker from the chair and shrugged an arm into it. 'Pull your gun and hold it on them, while I take a look around. I might even go all the way toward town, so don't get jumpy if I'm gone a couple hours.'
He started for the door, buttoning the slicker with one hand, then looked at Virginia. 'Honey, you have some coffee on for when I get back. Like you used to.' He grinned at her showing tobacco-yellowed teeth and shook his head reminiscently. 'You sure used to throw it around in that cafe.'
She looked away from him to her husband. Neither of them spoke.
'Your joining society's changed you, honey. There was a time when we couldn't shut you up.' They heard the rain when he opened the door, then the sound was closed off again and he was gone.
In the room's abrupt silence Red drew his pistol, but his hand fell to the cot and the fingers closed on the handle loosely. He did not cock it.
Looking at him, Boland tried to picture him killing a man. Neither he nor Jeffy were ever good citizens, he thought. But they never robbed or killed before. He had worked with them for a couple of years when he first started riding for the T. & N.M. Cattle Company and he had not particularly liked them then; but his dislikes were based on small, personal things--Jeffy always making dirty remarks, and Red getting sloppy drunk any chance he had. Both had been lazy and never did any more than they had to.
And now--they had to flop themselves right on top of his other troubles.
Virginia moved over to the stove and lighted the fire under the coffeepot. She said to him, 'Are you hungry, Dave?'
He shook his head. 'Not very.' And I've got to worry about Ginny on top of all of it. And then he thought: or, are you feeling sorry for yourself?
'Are you?' Her head nodded to the man on the cot.
'I don't think I'd hold it.'
Boland asked him now, 'When were you shot, Red?'
'Yesterday, in Clovis. Somebody musta recognized me and told the marshal. He hit me by surprise.'
'Right after you killed this man?'
'Hell, that was months ago in Dodge. We been hiding since. Went into Clovis yesterday for grub and somebody seen us.' He was breathing easier and went on, 'We lost them last night. Damn marshal hit me by surprise--'
Boland said, 'I suppose you were drunk in Dodge.'
Red grinned sheepishly. 'Fact is, I don't even remember shootin' the man.'
'But Jeffy told you you did.'
'Yeah, Jeffy said I was actin' mean and--'
'And lost your nerve and shot him when you didn't have to.'
Red looked surprised. 'Yeah. That's just what he said.'
Boland waited, watching the man think it over. Then, 'You starting to get any notions in your head?' It occurred to him then for the first time. He had been thinking Red was a damn fool hiding all that time because of Jeffy--unless his face was plastered all over the country. Otherwise, how would anyone in Clovis have known him? Then it hit him: a reward!
Virginia moved past him holding the coffeepot and a porcelain cup. She handed the cup to Red. 'Try some coffee. Maybe you'll feel better.'
'I don't think I'd hold it.'
'Well, try, anyway.'
He held the cup over his lap in his left hand and she leaned closer to pour the coffee. Suddenly she moved the pot to the side and emptied the scalding coffee on Red's gun hand.
His hand went up as he screamed and the gun flew over the foot of the cot, and in the instant she pushed the palm of her hand over his mouth forcing his head against the wall and muffling his scream.
Boland came up with the gun. He did it without thinking; and now, as he leveled it in Red's face he looked at Virginia with disbelief in his wide-open eyes. They followed her as she moved across the room, replaced the coffeepot on the stove and returned to stand awkwardly near the cot. She bit her lower lip nervously, watching the man.
The violent motion had ripped open his wound and now it was bleeding again. He hugged his arm to his side, groaning, with his scalded hand held limply in front of him.
Virginia's head lowered closer to his and she said, 'I'm sorry,' embarrassedly.
For another moment Boland continued to stare at her, but now with curiosity in place of surprise, as if he
