must not find our hospitality wanting.”
I stirred in my hiding place. There was that name again, and again it stirred a faint recollection. Then I remembered. Saloon gossip had it that a gent named Seton had made a name for himself down along the border. Not as much of a name as Hardin or Thompson or Fisher but enough that most hard cases fought shy of him.
I was not the only one who had recognized the handle. Dee and Les swapped glances, and Dee said, “Did we hear right? You wouldn’t happen to be Bart Seton, would you? The same Bart Seton who took part in the Duxton- Rodriguez scrap?”
“I might be.”
“Why, son, you’re plumb famous,” Les said. “They say four Mexicans drew on you in a cantina and when the smoke cleared you were the last man standing.”
“There were five Mexicans,” Seton amended. “But killing greasers doesn’t hardly count for much. They never amount to spit with a six-gun.”
“You’re welcome to your opinion,” Dee said, “but I’ve met a few who could put a hole in the center of a playing card at twenty-five paces.”
“You’ve strayed a far piece from the Rio Grande,” Les commented.
Gertrude spoke before Seton could. “That’s my doing, gentlemen. We’ve had a problem with LT cattle being rustled. I sent for him when it first started.”
“You weren’t fixing to take the law into your own hands, were you, ma’am?” Dee brought up.
“Perish forbid, Ranger. I always abide by the law. Ask anyone. I only wanted to protect what is mine.” Gertrude reined around and gave a little wave. “It was instructive making your acquaintance. Until we meet again.” She smiled and lashed her reins.
The dust had not yet settled when Calista declared, “She was lying. I never set eyes on Seton before today and I’ve been out to the LT more times than I can count.”
“I never saw him, either,” Tom said, “and most everyone hereabouts stops at my store at least once a month.”
Dee shrugged. “It’s not important. He’s not wanted, as near I can recollect.”
It was important to me. I needed to learn exactly when Gertrude had sent for him. Was it before she sent for me? Or after? If before, then why had she bothered to send for me when she had him on her payroll? If after, was Seton supposed to finish the job if I couldn’t? Or was there more involved? Either way, I didn’t like it. I didn’t like it one little bit.
The Texas Rangers were giving Jordy Butcher a second burial. My ears pricked when Dee said, “Tell us more about the preacher who disappeared. We’ll want to question Mrs. Tanner about him, too.”
Calista described me in remarkable detail, down to the small scar on my chin. I never imagined she noticed so much. She ended with, “He was just about the sweetest man I’ve ever known.”
Les had glanced up sharply at the mention of the scar, and Dee and him swapped looks again.
That was a bad sign. I was wanted in Texas. My regulating had taken me to Dallas, El Paso, and San Antonio. Combined, that tallied to eleven less people in the world. After each job I skipped Texas a jump ahead of the Rangers. To say they hankered after my neck in a noose was putting it mildly.
Dee was speaking. “Well, Leslie, I reckon we’re about done here for now. Let’s go nose around elsewhere.”
“I’m always ready for a good nose, Deeter,” Les said.
Webber the butcher was surprised. “What about the rest of the bodies? Aren’t you going to dig them up, too?”
The two Rangers were lowering Jordy into his grave. “You can if you want,” Les answered. “But one a day is my limit.”
“We’ve proven it wasn’t Injuns,” Dee said, “and that was the whole point.”
“But the others were shot to pieces,” Webber said. “If you dig out the bullets, can’t you tell what kind of guns were used?”
Les laughed. “Dig lead out of days-old corpses? That woman was right. Someone here is loco, but it’s not me.”
Dee was also amused, but for a different reason. “The slugs wouldn’t tell us all that much, anyhow. Who ever heard of such a thing?”
“I just thought—” Webber said, but did not finish.
“You will be careful, won’t you?” Calista said to Texas’s finest. “Gerty won’t let you put her behind bars.”
“I doubt she’ll try to bushwhack us, ma’am,” Dee responded. “It would only bring more Rangers down on her head.”
“She’s clever, this one,” Les said. “She’ll try smoke and smiles to keep us off her scent.”
“Then you believe she is behind it?”
Dee and Les began pushing dirt back over the body, and Dee answered, “Let’s just say she’s at the top of our list at the moment. But suspecting someone and proving they are guilty can be a mighty wide river to ford.”
“I hate to admit it,” Les said, “but we don’t always get our man. Or our woman. I hear tell there’s an outfit up in Canada that says it does, but Canadians just like to hear themselves brag.”
“So don’t get your hopes up,” Dee cautioned.
Still, Calista was encouraged. I was not. I did not want the Rangers poking about in what I considered a personal matter. If they arrested Gertrude before I was ready to deal with her, I didn’t know what I would do.
Who was I kidding? Of course I knew. I would not rest until everyone involved suffered the same fate, or worse, as Daisy and her family. I owed it to myself. I had been shot and nearly burned to death. If that didn’t give me the right to bring the LT to its knees, nothing did.
The Texas Rangers and the townsfolk were walking to their mounts. Calista invited the lawdogs to stop by her place later for a meal. “It’s on me. My way of saying thanks for helping us.”
“We’re just doing our jobs, ma’am,” Dee said.
“But I’m never one to pass up free grub,” Lee assured her.
My own meal that evening was roast venison. I shot a doe. I couldn’t carry or drag it to the hollow, so I cut off a haunch and dragged that. Meat, lots of meat, would restore me to my old self, and over the next several weeks I did more to reduce the Dark Sister’s wildlife population than all the predators in Texas.
Three weeks, it took. Three weeks, wishing every second that I was restored to my usual vigor and vim.
Then one morning I woke up, stood, and stretched, and didn’t feel an ache or pain anywhere. To test myself, I decided to climb up the Dark Sister higher than I had ever gone before. I was at it for hours, until I came, quite unexpectedly and much to my amazement, out of the forest into a green meadow.
It was not the meadow that amazed me. It was the ornery four-legged cuss and the Butcher mare he had taken up with. The whole time I was down by the cabin suffering and barely able to move, my not-so-trusty steed was dallying with a filly in their own little high country paradise.
“So this is where you’ve been?” I said as Brisco came up to me. The mare hung back because she did not know me, which was just as well for her. The tart.
I patted Brisco and scratched around his ears and marveled that my saddle was still on. The cinch was loose and the saddle was smeared with dust and dirt and grass, but it was in one piece and none of my effects were missing. “Looks like my luck has turned,” I remarked.
The mare did not want to leave. The hussy shied when I rigged a hackamore, but I threw a loop around her neck and brought her along anyway. It pleased Brisco, but I was thinking that the Apaches claimed horseflesh was downright tasty.
God had been good to me. I was fit again. I had my own revolvers and my rifle and plenty of ammo. I had two horses and my saddlebags with the tools of my profession. Some might take it as a sign the Almighty was on their side, but I was more practical. If there was one thing I had learned from reading Scripture, it was that the Lord was powerful fond of blood. He loved spilling it and loved watching it spilled, and I was about to treat him to a spilling the Angel of Death would envy.
My last day on the mountain started early. I was up at first light. Breakfast waited while I went upstream to a pool. Stripping, I jumped in and swam about for all of a minute. The water was too cold. Teeth chattering, I climbed out and hopped up and down until I felt halfway alive again. I quickly dressed. Once back at the hollow, I
