long time. I guess I’d know if he was a killer or not, wouldn’t I?”
“People surprise you sometimes.”
“Not this feller. He don’t surprise me.”
“Rex, please, please tell us who you saw,” Karen said. “We won’t hurt him. We’ll just talk to him.”
“And she baked you that bread,” Fargo said, feeling ridiculous. What the hell was he doing, talking about bread when he should have been grabbing this bastard and choking the answer out of him? He steadied himself. “And from the looks of your beard, you seem to be enjoying it.”
“I’ll just get him in trouble and he’s got trouble enough with his farm.”
As soon as he said it, Rex looked shocked, as if somebody else might have said it. But it had popped out and now, even without naming the man, both Fargo and Karen knew who he was talking about.
“You’re saying it was Lenihan.”
“That ain’t what I said, Fargo.”
“Maybe not. But it’s what you meant.”
“Ned,” Karen said, as if she couldn’t believe it. “Ned Lenihan.”
“See, just what I told ya,” Rex said, chawing around a piece of bread. “Now you’ve got him tried and convicted and you don’t even know what he was doin’ with them boys.”
“You saw him only that one time?”
“Yep. Only that one time, Fargo. And you’re makin’ way too much of it.”
“But you don’t have any doubt who you saw.”
“Nope. None at all.”
Fargo watched Karen’s face grow tight with concern. On the one hand, Lenihan was the name most often heard when people talked about the chief suspect. On the other hand, Lenihan’s few defenders were positive that he was innocent.
There was only one way to find out.
“Thanks, Rex.”
“You’re gonna go after him, ain’t you, Fargo?”
“I’m going to find out why he was talking to those boys. That’s all.”
Rex looked genuinely sorry. “He’s a good man. I shouldn’t a said nothing.”
“It’s all right, Rex,” Karen said. “You did the right thing.”
“Make trouble for an innocent man?” Rex scoffed. “You call that doing the right thing?”
But he went right on eating.
The son’s name was George Lenihan. He was an inch or two taller than his father but was stamped with the same small, fine Irish facial features and slight if wiry body. He wore a black seaman’s sweater, in deference to the increasingly chilly day, and a pair of jeans. He stood in front of a white barn and watched Fargo approach. He’d been working and had a pitchfork in his hand.
Fargo dismounted, walked toward him. He’d gotten the name and some background on the son from Karen. The son had lived here since his wife left him two years ago. They’d been childless, the wife suffering three miscarriages in as many years. It was Karen’s impression that this had contributed to the wife’s leaving.
Fargo noted wryly that no angry dogs had yet put in an appearance.
“Afternoon,” Fargo said amiably.
“Who the hell’re you?”
“Name’s Fargo.”
“Oh. My pa told me about you. You’re the one who works for Tom Cain.”
“Not ‘for.’ ‘With.’ I’m just lending him a hand. But I don’t take orders from him if that’s what you’ve got in mind.”
“Right now I’m wondering what
“I was wondering if you’d let me look around the farm.”
Narrow eyes grew narrower. Knuckles whitened on the pitchfork. “For what reason?”
“You want a nice little lie or the truth?”
“The truth.”
“A good share of Cawthorne thinks your father had something to do with the robbery and the killings of those three men.”
“They were boys. Not men. Hell-raisers. And anybody who thinks my pa had anything to do with any of it is wrong.”
“Then you won’t mind if I look around?”
“On whose orders?”
“Mine.”
“Not Cain’s?”
“He doesn’t even know I’m here.”
George Lenihan surveyed the farm outbuildings and the small house. “You won’t find anything.”
“I hope I won’t.”
The son looked even more like the father when concern shadowed his face. “He’s a good man. I worry about him. People will believe anything sometimes. That’s why I stay on the farm here. I’ve had enough of people to last me a lifetime.”
Fargo wondered how much George’s dislike of people came from the woman who’d left him.
“I want to believe your father, George.”
“Why?”
“Maybe because I’m like you. I believe that people will believe anything if they hear it often enough. You start accusing somebody of something and pretty soon everybody around begins to claim it’s true.”
“That’s what’s happening to my pa.”
“Well, then let me look around and we’ll prove that they’re wrong.”
The son shrugged. “There’s a collie roaming around here. She’s very friendly. She won’t give you any trouble.”
“A friendly dog,” Fargo said. “Imagine that.”
“Where do you want to start?”
“In the house.”
“Pa and I ain’t exactly housekeepers.”
“I’ll probably get over the shock.”
“This pisses me off.”
“Figured it would. But maybe it’ll help your father in the long run.”
“Yeah, sure it will.”
The wood-framed house was pretty orderly considering there was no woman living in it. The furniture was old, most likely bought by Lenihan’s wife, running to flowered curtains, doily-covered furniture and numerous framed religious paintings on the wall. The place hadn’t been dusted in a long time and the air was sour with cooking smells. Fargo spent most of his time going through the rolltop desk and six wooden boxes that were stuffed with everything from pans that had been burned through to old clothes that could no longer be patched up. He found nothing.
The collie was waiting for him at the back door. She was a handsome golden girl. Fargo had no doubt that she could rip open a human body anytime she chose to but he enjoyed the fact that when he bent down she let him pet her. She had restored his faith in the canine world.
George Lenihan had gone back to his haying near the fence running in back of the barn. From what Fargo could see, the crops were typical for this part of Colorado—onions, sugar beets, vegetables.
He headed downslope to the barn, the affable collie following him. The haymow door was open, allowing light into the shadowy interior. Smells of hay, horse manure, damp earth greeted him. A buggy stood to one side of the barn while farming tools lined the opposite wall. There were four stalls for horses and a makeshift bench for carpentry. Saws, hammers, a keg of nails surrounded butt ends of lumber that had been sawn.
As with the house, he had no idea what he was looking for, just some vague notion that he needed to find something physical to connect Ned Lenihan with the robbery.
