“Damn, that was slick,” Sam Worthington complimented him. “You’re the quickest hombre I ever did see.”
“If I had any sense I would shoot them,” Fargo said, more to himself than to the farmer.
“It ain’t in you though, is it?”
Fargo shook his head.
“Didn’t think so. I can usually tell about hardcases. They have a look about them. Or an air, if you want.”
“Do they?” Fargo had met some who would smile and shake a person’s hand while putting a slug into them with the other.
“You agreed to help the marshal. That right there shows me you’re a good man.”
Fargo didn’t tell him about the widow Chatterly.
“What do you want us to do with them? Haul them to Tibbit so he can toss them in the hoosegow?”
“We’ll leave them where they are.” Fargo stepped from one to the other, scooped up their revolvers, and stuck the six-shooters in his saddlebags. Forking leather, he reined toward Haven.
“Yes, sir,” Worthington said, chuckling. “I can’t wait to tell about this. Most everyone will have a good laugh.”
It was at the saloon hitch rail that Fargo drew rein. Worthington, stopped, too.
“I’d best get this horse back to Tibbit and collect my family. It’s a long ride in the buckboard back to our farm and I’d like to get there before sunset.”
The remark pricked Fargo’s recollection. “The marshal said something about your daughter thinking she was being watched.”
“So Melissa claimed. Now mind, she’s my daughter and she’s as honest as the year is long, but I can’t say I entirely believe her.”
“Why not?”
“Melissa came in one day from milking the cows and told us she thought someone had been spying on her. She didn’t see anyone. She just felt as if eyes were on her. That went on for more than two weeks. Not every day, but enough that it began to wear on our nerves.”
“You thought she was making it up?”
“Of course not. But I never saw anyone, and I tried hard to spot whoever it was. When she went to milk or when she went riding, I’d trail after her, and I never saw a soul.”
“Maybe whoever was watching her was too smart for you.”
“Could be, I suppose. Or maybe every girl in Haven knew it was about time for the Ghoul to strike again and they were nervous about it.”
“The Ghoul?”
“Haven’t you heard? That’s what some of us have taken to calling whoever is behind this. Marshal Tibbit hates the name and won’t ever use it. He says it just scares folks more.”
Fargo said, “I’d like to come out to your place and look around for sign.”
“Fine by me. In fact, why don’t we have you over to supper tomorrow? I promise you my Martha will cook a meal you won’t soon forget. And I have cigars if you’re a smoking man.”
“What time?”
“Say about six? Take the north road out of town and follow it about three miles. We’re the last farm you’ll come to. You’ll know it by the swing on the tree out front and the purple curtains in the windows.”
“Six it is.” Fargo watched the big farmer ride off down the street and turned and went up the steps and pushed on the batwings. More men were there than last time. He crossed to the bar and thumped it. “Your best whiskey and I don’t need a glass.”
“I should warn you,” the bartender said as he took a bottle from a shelf. “Harve and his two friends are looking for you.”
“They found me.” Fargo opened the bottle and chugged. He smiled as a familiar burning sensation spread from his throat down to his stomach. “Ahhh,” he said, and smacked his lips in satisfaction. He glanced at the clock on the wall, fished in his pocket for the coins he needed, and paid and walked out. Unwrapping the Ovaro’s reins, he walked down the street, drinking as he went. He hadn’t gone a block when a bowl of pudding in a suit came hustling up.
“I wish you wouldn’t do that right out on Main Street,” Marshal Tibbit said. “It sets a bad example.”
“I’m thirsty.”
“Even so. There is an ordinance against it, too. I must insist or people will think I can’t do my job.”
Fargo noticed a number of townsfolk staring. “Hell,” he said, and slipped the bottle into his saddlebags for the time being.
“Sam Worthington just told me about your latest run-in with those three troublemakers,” Tibbit said. “If you’re willing to press charges, I’ll arrest them for disturbing the peace.”
“No.” Fargo continued walking.
“Why not? Do you like that they constantly harass you?”
“I like beating on them,” Fargo said.
“One of these times it could turn serious.”
“You have an undertaker in this town?”
“As a matter of fact, we do. He also runs the feed and grain and—” Tibbit stopped. “I don’t like talk like that. I don’t like it even a little bit.”
“Then maybe you should put the fear of being stupid into them,” Fargo suggested, and ran his tongue over his dry lips.
“I would just as soon they leave town but they haven’t done anything that would justify me in running them off.”
“Trying to hang a man doesn’t count?”
“They got carried away.”
“You try my patience, Marshal.”
“I don’t mean to. I am just being me.”
“Be you somewhere else.”
“Excuse me?”
“Make a nuisance of your worthless self somewhere I’m not.”
“That’s harsh.” Tibbit sounded hurt. “I try to do what’s right.”
Fargo stopped and stared at him.
The lawman grew red in the face. “Now see here. I invited you to stay and help me, and I won’t put up with this treatment.”
“Yes,” Fargo said. “You will.”
Tibbit’s lips pinched together and he wheeled and stalked off. He was so mad his body jiggled.
Fargo walked on to the boardinghouse. He tied the Ovaro and took the bottle from his saddlebags. After a long swallow he went up the steps and entered without knocking. He ascended to his room, sat in the chair, and tipped the bottle to his mouth. He was on his fourth tip when there came a light rap on the door.
“Mr. Fargo? I thought I heard you come in?”
“You did,” Fargo said.
“Are you decent?”
“I have clothes on.”
Helsa Chatterly was smiling when she opened the door but her smile promptly died. “Is that a bottle I see?”
“ ‘Pure Old Bourbon Whiskey,’” Fargo quoted the label, and held the bottle out to her. “Care for a swig?”
“I thought I made my rules plain. One of them is that there is to be no drinking under my roof. None whatsoever,” she stressed.
Fargo shook the bottle. “You can break your rule this once.”
“No, I can’t. A rule is a rule.”
“And a thirst is a thirst.” Fargo heaved out of the chair and walked over and pressed the bottle to her hand. “I won’t tell anyone.”
