“You never insulted the South,” Abe Haslett said.
“There you have it,” Crooked Creek Sam said. “So we’ll have no more talk of Yankees and noses and such. You can’t blame me for wanting you to control your tempers while you are under my roof.”
“I reckon not,” Cordial Larn said. Where the rest of the Larn brothers had hair as black as a raven’s wings, Cordial’s was the same tawny hue as the pelt of a mountain lion. His eyes were different from theirs, too, blue where theirs were brown.
“Good. Now that that’s settled, let me ask you. When do you propose to hold your lead-fest?”
“Our what?” Quince Haslett asked. He had the dubious distinction of having not only a big Adam’s apple, but a big nose as well, so big that his face was more nose than anything else.
“Your lead chucking,” Sam said. “Or are you aiming to fight it out in Coffin Varnish with knives?”
“Knives are too messy,” Abe said. “You get blood all over the place. Plus, you can’t always be sure. You stick a man in the gizzard and expect him to fall, but he keeps on fightin’.”
“I never have put my trust in knives,” Stern Larn said.
“Pistols will suit us.” From Jefferson Haslett. He sported a bushy mane of hair and a jaw like an anvil.
“When?” Crooked Creek Sam said.
“We haven’t gotten around to that yet,” Cordial Larn said. “We have to work out the details.”
Happy Larn laughed. “Our kin back home will be powerful upset they missed the frolic.”
“Are there many in your family?” Sam asked.
“About one hundred and eighty, give or take a few,” Stern Larn said.
“Two hundred and forty on our side,” Abe Haslett revealed, and grinned. “We are better at breedin’ than they are.”
“There have always been more of you Hasletts,” Stern Larn said.
“We are rabbits and you are gophers,” Josephus Haslett boasted. He was the shortest of the brood, which was not saying much since it was only by a few inches.
Happy Larn lost some of his happiness. “I do not like being called a gopher. You will take that back.”
“I will not,” Josephus said.
“You will take that back or else,” Happy said.
Crooked Creek Sam swore. “Here we go again. If you can’t flap your gums without arguing, maybe none of you should talk except for Abe and Stern.”
“I will talk when I please,” Happy informed him.
“Me too,” Josephus said.
That was when Sam made his mistake. It slipped out of his mouth as smoothly as a slick grape and had the same effect as waving a rattler under someone’s nose. “Stupid Southerners. How many times must I tell you before you will listen?”
Silence fell, except for the ticking of the clock on a shelf. No one moved except for Verve Larn, who never could stand still for more than two seconds.
“What did you call us?” Abe Haslett broke the quiet.
“Not a thing,” Sam said. He was aware he had blundered, but he was confident he could soothe any hard feelings.
“Like hell,” Stern Larn said. “I heard you, too, as clear as day. You called us stupid Southerners.”
“Not you,” Crooked Creek Sam said, smiling. “Not any of you.”
“Then who?” Cordial Larn asked.
Sam made his second mistake. He answered without thinking. “I meant Southerners in general.”
Another silence, but shorter than before.
“Anyone born south of the Mason-Dixon Line is naturally stupid, is that how it goes?” Jefferson Haslett asked.
“Don’t be putting words in my mouth,” Crooked Creek Sam said. He was beginning to lose his temper.
“It was your word,” Jefferson said. “Stupid.”
“Look,” Sam reasoned. “You take things much too serious. I could just as well have said stupid Northerners.”
“It was stupid Southerners,” Verve Larn said. “My ears hear just fine.”
Abe Haslett nodded. “Could be you are one of them who looks down their nose at us. Could be we don’t take kindly to that. We don’t take kindly at all.”
Crooked Creek Sam placed a hand on his Colt Dragoon. “Don’t threaten me. You have treed a cougar when you threaten me.”
“I ain’t seen one of those percussion Colts in a coon’s age,” Abe Haslett commented. “They were prone to misfire.”
“Not mine,” Sam said.
“Big and heavy, those old models,” Stern Larn said. “Even us stupid Southerners know enough not to rely on one.”
“Takes a real gun shark to handle one halfway decent,” Jefferson Haslett said.
“And you don’t strike us as a gun shark,” Happy Larn threw in.
Crooked Creek Sam broke out in a cold sweat. He recognized the signs: the hard stares, the pinched mouths, the tense bodies. “Now, you just hold on! Every last one of you, hold on!”
“He sounds scared to me,” Stern Larn said.
“To me too,” Abe Haslett agreed. “Usually when someone is scared they have done something they shouldn’t.”
“He shouldn’t ought to call people stupid,” Cordial Larn said.
Sam had put up with all he was going to. “I want you out of my saloon! Every last one of you coon-eating sons of bitches!”
The next moment Abe and Stern and Cordial had their six-shooters out, and the others were unlimbering theirs.
“Didn’t you hear me?” Crooked Creek Sam screeched.
“What do you say?” Abe Haslett asked. It was hard to tell who he was asking since he was staring at the Dragoon.
“I say the North has insulted us enough,” Stern Larn said. “I say for once the Larns and the Hasletts have common cause.”
“Twice,” Abe said. “We wore the gray together.”
“It is a shame we are enemies,” Stern said. Then, to Sam, “Any last words, you stinkin’ Yankee?”
Crooked Creek Sam could not believe what was happening. “I will give you more than a word, you lousy Reb.” He started to level the Dragoon but could not make up his mind who to point it at. The moment’s indecision was costly. The last sound he heard was the crashing boom of revolvers. The last sight was a roiling cloud of gun smoke.
The shooting went on and on. It stopped only when every cylinder was empty.
“We done shot him to pieces,” Verve Larn said, grinning.
“It is too bad we have to do the same to us,” Abe Haslett said. “Coffin Varnish, here we come.”
Chapter 19
It was a warm night. The breeze that had picked up from out of the northwest did little to alleviate the heat of the day. The sky was clear, the stars a sparkling host shining benignly down on Kansas.
“It is a night made for romance,” Adolphina Luce remarked.
Chester Luce was so shocked he nearly tripped over his own feet. They were taking a rare stroll down Coffin Varnish’s dusty street. He had been watching out for horse, pig, and chicken droppings, and glanced up in bewilderment. “Did I hear you right, my dear?” He could not remember the last time his wife had been in a romantic mood. There had been their wedding night, of course, and five or six times after that. It got so that he wearied of waiting for her to say yes, and stopped hinting.
“Romance,” Adolphina confirmed, her usual hard tones softened. “A girl thinks of romance when she is happy.”
The shocks kept coming. Chester never thought of her as a girl. Not as old and as big as she was. A woman, yes, a bear, often, but she had given up any pretense at girlish ways long before she met him. And to hear her say she was happy was enough to convince him he must be dreaming. But no, a pile of horse droppings made his nose want to curl in on itself, and no dream ever did that. “I am glad you are happy,” he said. “Was it Gemma’s meal?” They had been invited to supper at the Giorgios’, another first. Gemma had cooked traditional Italian fare, with lots of pasta and thick sauce and meat rolled into balls, and it had been delicious. Much more so than anything his wife ever cooked. Her food tended to be bland and unappetizing. Some nights, he had to force himself to have three helpings.