“Are you threatening me?”
“Not unless you try to stop me.” Preston walked out, leaving Colonel Hatch standing in the jail alone and walked up to the eatery.
There was a CLOSED sign on the door. He banged on the door until Julie opened it.
“What you want?” she asked, wrapping her housecoat tighter around her waist. “You got me out of bed.”
Preston stepped in the doorway.
“I just quit, gave Hatch my badge. But I’m still going after Allison and the Indian. I need to know where they’re headed.”
“I told you, I don’t know.”
“You’re lyin’ to me,” Preston said.
“I don’t have to answer you. You’re not the marshal anymore.”
The kitchen door swung open and Fannie came in carrying a small boy with wavy black hair and black eyes. “Everything okay, Julie?” she asked.
“Boy’s a dead ringer for Allison, with those eyes,” Preston said. “That his kid?”
A tear rolled down Julie’s cheek.
A slight grin crossed his face and he looked at the boy. “He don’t know ‘bout the kid, does he?”
“Fannie, take Mitchell back to bed,” Julie said.
Fannie nodded and disappeared through the kitchen door.
“Leave me alone. I don’t know where Rance is and I wouldn’t tell you if I did.”
“Charlie said he heard him say they were going to Texas. I’ll find him and I’ll make sure I tell him he’s got a kid he don’t know about.”
“Please, don’t.”
“Then it is his kid?”
“Go away!” She started pushing him out of the door.
“I’ll find him,” he said and stepped back out on the street.
Julie locked the door and sat down on a chair and began to sob.
11
It was long into the night when Rance pulled up Buck and motioned for B.W. and Tommy to stop and they rode up beside him.
“Think they’ll come after us?” Tommy asked.
“You can count on it,” Rance said. “The man’s a professional or they wouldn’t have hired him. If he lets us get away his marshaling days are over. He’s going to keep comin’ for us.”
“You think he would chase us all the way to Texas?”
“Depends on how bad he wants us,” B.W. said. “He’s a federal marshal, he has the authority to follow us anywhere. Guess we’ll have to kill him if he does.”
“Hope not,” Rance said. “Think we’re a ways ahead. Might stop for a while, rest the horses.”
“I got some biscuits Miss Julie gave me,” Tommy said.
“I do love those biscuits,” B.W. said. “I’m goin’ to have to get better acquainted with Miss Fannie.”
They dismounted, Tommy got the biscuits and B.W. got a whiskey bottle out of Tommy’s saddle bags.
“Don’t say nothin,’ Major. I need a drink.”
B.W. sat down, took a bite of biscuit and a swig of whiskey.
Rance and Tommy looked at each other and shook their shoulders like they had a chill.
“How can you do that?” Rance asked B.W.
“Do what?”
“Eat biscuits and drink whiskey.”
“Won’t that make you sick?” Tommy asked.
“Naw, it’s good together,” B.W. said. “Want some?”
Tommy and Rance shook their head no.
“Remember your promise,” Rance said.
“I know,” B.W. said. “Tommy, put the bottle back in my saddle bags for me.”
“Gladly,” Tommy said. “You’re making me sick watchin’ you.”
“We can bed down here till daylight,” Rance said. “B.W., you take the first watch, I’ll relieve you. Tommy, loosen the girth on the horses, leave the saddles on. It will be your job to tighten them if we have to leave in a hurry. And Put Julie’s Colt in your saddle bags before you blow your pecker off.”
“He likes givin’ orders, don’t he, B.W.?” Tommy said.
“Yes he does. Makes him feel useful.”
“Quit talking and bed down,” Rance said. “We’re goin’ to be movin’ into your part of the country soon, B.W.”
“He’s giving orders again,” Tommy said.
“Comes natural,” B.W. said. “Don’t want to stay round here very long, could wind up getting scalped by my own people.”
“Be moving into Arkansas in a day or two,” Rance said. “They won’t like you either.”
“Kinda that way for the rest of the journey,” B.W. said. “But I think they’ll think I’m a confederate from my tribe’s actions. If you don’t tell them different.”
“We’re not goin’ to say anything,” Rance said. “Let’s get some rest.”
They were up at the crack of dawn, riding through a field with thick morning dew, the horse’s legs wet past their hocks. They spotted a log cabin in an open field with a corral and small barn nearby and rode in slow.
“Might see if we can get some food and water here,” Rance said.
“Don’t see any animals in the corral and no smoke from the chimney,” B.W. said.
They stopped their horses at a water trough by the corral to let them drink. Th windows were boarded up. Two arrows were stuck in the side of a well curb. B.W. rode by the well, reached down and broke an arrow off the well and looked at it.
“Creek, stay on your horses,” he said. “I’ll see if I can raise anyone. He dismounted, took the shotgun off the saddle and walked up on the porch and knocked on the door. “Hello in there,” he said. No answer. “Anybody in there?” He pounded on the door again. The door exploded, fragments flying everywhere, just missing his arm. He hit the ground and slid up against the cabin.
“Get,” Rance yelled at Tommy and they rode their horses to the side of the cabin and dismounted.
Tommy retrieved the Colt from his saddle bags and moved up beside Rance.
“Stay down,” Rance said. “B.W., you alright?”
“Yeah,” B.W. said. “Hey, in the cabin, I’m an Indian but we’re not here to hurt you.”
“Don’t come no closer,” they heard a female voice say from inside. “I’ll shoot you.”
“Ma’am, we mean you no harm. I’m not a hostile,” B.W. said.
“Go away,” she said.
“I’m goin’ to lay my guns down and walk out where you can see me. I’m an Indian but not one of them. Don’t shoot, we mean you
