“Buffalo Calf,” Pike said.
“Buffalo Calf,” Virgil said.
Still holding the Indian’s head up, Pike reached behind him and took a knife from his belt.
“No,” Virgil said.
I never did understand how Virgil got that sound in his voice. But when he said “No,” it was like the closing of an iron valve. Everything stopped.
“I want his scalp,” Pike said.
“No,” Virgil said.
Pike stepped back away from Virgil. I eased my eight-gauge out of its scabbard and rested it across my thigh. On Virgil’s left, Pony looped his reins over the horn of his saddle. Pike looked at Virgil and then looked back at his posse.
“Virgil,” he said. “There’s twenty of us.”
Virgil said, “Anybody puts a hand on a weapon, Pike, and I’ll kill you.”
“For a dead fucking red nigger,” Pike said, “stole two women, killed three men, we know of?”
“Four,” Virgil said.
“You’d fight all of us for that?”
“Be my plan,” Virgil said.
Pike looked at me.
“Everett?” he said.
“I’m with Virgil,” I said.
He looked to Virgil’s left.
“You, Pony?” he said.
“Virgil,” Pony said.
Pike backed off another step.
“You think you’re good enough to kill me?” he said.
“Yes,” Virgil said.
The rain was still coming down. Not hard but steady. The horses all had their heads down so it wouldn’t get in their eyes and nostrils.
“You think you can kill us all?” Pike said.
“Be some of you left when we go down,” Virgil said. “But you won’t be one of ’em.”
Virgil scanned the posse.
“Rest of you can try to figure which ones’ll be left,” he said.
We all sat our horses, except Pike, who still stood in front of Virgil. He took off his hat and held it at his side. The rain began to bead on his bald head. It might have been kind of a pleasant rain if I hadn’t been wet since yesterday. Then, very deliberately, Pike put the knife back in his belt. He shook the water off his hat and put it back on. He grinned.
“Just a damn Comanche buck,” Pike said. “No need for white men to die over him.”
Virgil didn’t speak.
“Hell, Virgil,” Pike said. “We’ll all ride back together.”
“We’ll trail along behind you,” Virgil said.
“You don’t trust me, Virgil?”
“Never did,” Virgil said. “You’re too damned jolly for me.”
Pike laughed.
“I don’t think you can beat me anyway,” he said.
“Never know till we’ve tried it,” Virgil said.
Pike laughed again and swung his bulk up onto his horse.
I put the eight-gauge back in its scabbard. Pike turned the posse. We fell in behind it.
And we headed back to Brimstone.
50
IT WAS HARD TO SAY if the Ostermueller girls, mother and daughter, had a reaction to Buffalo Calf’s death. Mary Beth was drunk now, nearly all the time. And Laurel still didn’t speak, except, now and then, in a whisper, to Virgil. Virgil didn’t report what she said.
Laurel did, however, take to hanging around the sheriff’s office, first only when Virgil was there, but after a time, when either of us was there. She’d come in and sweep up, and make fresh coffee, and sit quietly on the old couch and look out the window. She never spoke. But when Virgil was there, she watched him nearly all the time.
Mary Beth, when she was sober enough, was making a living on her back in Pike’s Palace. It wasn’t much of a living because she wasn’t taking very good care of herself, so she was the whore of last resort most of the time. She was often too drunk to perform. What little money she did make went for booze.
Virgil and I were sitting on the front porch in the bright morning, drinking some of Laurel’s fresh coffee, while she swept up inside. The sun was warm after days of rain, and the town was full of energy.
“What’d you do with the Indian’s horse?” I said.
“Gave him to Pony,” Virgil said.
“What’d Pony do with him?” I said. “Damn thing was barely broke.”
“Pony shot him,” Virgil said. “So Buffalo Calf would have something to ride in the spirit world.”
“Pony believe that?”
“Don’t know,” Virgil said.
“But Buffalo Calf probably did,” I said.
“I guess,” Virgil said.
“Pony ain’t so far from the wickiup himself,” I said.
“ ’Pears not,” Virgil said.
We were quiet while we watched a team of red-and-white Ayrshire oxen pull a big freight wagon up Arrow Street.
“Nice-looking team,” I said.
“Me and Allie been talking ’bout Laurel,” Virgil said.
I nodded.
“She ain’t getting no mothering that’s worth anything,” Virgil said. “ ’Cept what she gets from Allie.”
I nodded.
“We want to take her in with us,” he said.
“And put her in my room,” I said.
“Figure you can bunk in one of the cells,” Virgil said.
“Fine with me,” I said. “You talk to Laurel about it yet?”
“No. Thought I better clear it with you first.”
“Girl that age shouldn’t be on her own,” I said. “ ’Specially after the things happened to her.”
“Allie can sort of look after her,” Virgil said. “Might be good for Allie, too.”
“Kid makes good coffee,” I said. “Maybe she can cook.”
“Be like finding gold, if she can,” Virgil said.
“Percival been bothering her?” I said.
Virgil didn’t say anything.
“You promised her you wouldn’t tell nobody what she told you,” I said.
“Yep.”
“You promise anything else?”
“Yep.”
“You promised her you wouldn’t do nothing,” I said.
Virgil shrugged.
“So, if Percival’s been poking her, and she told you about it, you can’t say nothing about it, and you can’t shoot him.”
Virgil shrugged.
“I didn’t make no promise,” I said.
“You give your word,” Virgil said, “you don’t weasel on it.”
“You mean you can’t let me do nothing.”
“I don’t want no one bothering Brother Percival,” Virgil said.
“Okay.”
“Time comes to bother him,” Virgil said, “I’ll do it.”
“You can bother hell out of someone, you really set your mind to it,” I said.
“I know,” Virgil said, and went into the office to talk with Laurel.
51
WE DEVELOPED A ROUTINE. Every morning Allie would drop Laurel off at the office, leave me some biscuits for breakfast, and then hustle away on God’s business. Or Brother Percival’s. Or one and the same. The biscuits would have stopped a bullet. Laurel would make coffee, sweep up the office, and sit on the couch. I would soak the biscuits in the coffee until they had softened up enough to eat. When the weather was good, I took my breakfast outside. Virgil usually saddled up and did a sweep of the town to start the day, so for a while it was just me and Laurel.
The third week we did this, Laurel brought some corn cakes for breakfast. They were still warm. It was worth sleeping in the jail.
“Allie make this?” I said.
She shook her head.
“Virgil?”
She shook her head. She didn’t smile, but I thought for a moment she might. I picked up the corn cakes and a cup of coffee and went out onto the porch. It was early, and the streets were still empty. I sat down. A coyote came out of the alley between the sheriff’s office and the bank next door. He paused in the middle of Arrow Street and looked at me. I looked back. Then he turned and trotted on across the street and into the alley across the street. Always good forage in a growing town. I sipped some coffee. There was a lot of sugar in it. Behind me the office door opened and Laurel came out and sat in the chair beside me.
“Want a corn cake?” I said.
She nodded. I held the plate toward her. She broke off a piece of one cake and held it in her hand. I took a piece and set the plate on the floor of the porch beside my chair. She took a very small bite. I ate some of mine.