“Thank you,” she said. “I’m going to do everything in my power to see to it that their loyalty is rewarded. Now, what are the three of you doing tonight?”
The question surprised Bo a little. “We figured we’d get some supper after a while, then head back out to Chloride’s cabin, I reckon.”
Martha shook her head and said, “Why don’t you stay here in town? You can get rooms at the hotel for the night. I’ll pay for them.”
She was feeling mighty flush right now, Bo realized, and he didn’t blame her. Having any sort of success again was probably a big relief to her. But as much as she still owed, she didn’t need to be spending her money on hotel rooms for the three of them.
“We’ll be fine at Chloride’s,” he said firmly before either of his companions could speak up. “You can find a better use for your money than that.”
Martha looked a little disappointed. “Are you certain?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Scratch said, following Bo’s lead. “Shoot, I reckon old reprobates like us wouldn’t feel comfortable stayin’ in some fancy hotel.”
“The Grand Central isn’t exactly what you’d call fancy,” Martha said with a smile, “but if you’re sure, I suppose that’s all right. Have a good evening, and I’ll see you in the morning before you leave.”
Bo smiled and nodded and ushered his companions outside.
“I notice you didn’t ask me whether I wanted to spend the night in a fancy hotel,” Chloride complained.
“With the kind of digs you’ve got, I didn’t think you’d even consider it,” Bo told him with a grin. “Come on. Let’s get some supper. Unless you’re still full from that pie . . . ?”
“I could eat,” Chloride said.
After they had eaten supper and traded some more pleasant conversation with Sue Beth when she could find the time in the busy café, Chloride once again brought up the idea of having a drink.
“You and Scratch go ahead,” Bo said, trading a quick glance with Scratch to confirm that the silver-haired Texan would look after the old-timer. “I’ve got another errand I want to take care of.”
“What errand’s that?” Chloride wanted to know.
“Don’t waste your breath askin’,” Scratch advised. “I can tell by the look on Bo’s face that he’s got some idea percolatin’ around in his head, but he don’t like to talk about such things until he’s sure he’s got the whole shootin’ match figured out.”
“It’s just something I want to check on, that’s all,” Bo said. “I’ll find you later at the saloon, if you can tell me which one you’re going to.”
“The Bella Union’s the best,” Chloride said. “If we ain’t there, try the Gem.”
Bo nodded and said so long to the two of them.
While Scratch and Chloride headed down Main Street toward the Bella Union Saloon, Bo turned his steps the other way and headed for the sheriff’s office.
He was glad to see a light burning in the window, telling him that someone was there. When he went in, he found Sheriff Henry Manning sitting behind the desk. The lean, hawk-faced lawman looked up and asked, “What can I do for you?”
“My name’s Bo Creel, Sheriff. My partner Scratch Morton and I helped bring in that gold shipment from the Golden Queen mine today.”
Manning nodded. “I heard about that, of course.” He looked more interested now. “I also heard that you shot it out with the Deadwood Devils.”
“That’s right. I was wondering if you’d let me take a look through the wanted posters and reward dodgers you have on hand.”
“You think you recognized one of the outlaws?” Manning asked with a frown.
“I didn’t say that. I’d just like to check on something.”
For a moment Bo thought the sheriff was going to refuse. Manning was curious, and he obviously didn’t like his questions going unanswered. But then he shrugged and said, “All right. Things like that are a matter of public record, after all.” He leaned over, opened a drawer in the desk, and took out a thick stack of papers that he placed on the desk. “Help yourself, Creel.”
Bo nodded. “Much obliged.”
“If you find anything that would help me bring those thieves and murderers to justice, it’s your responsibility to tell me,” Manning added.
“I’ll sure do that, Sheriff,” Bo promised. Of course, that left it open to his own interpretation of what he thought might be helpful, he told himself.
He took the reward posters and sat down in an armchair close to the potbellied stove, where a fire was burning merrily. It promised to be another cold night, and old bones felt the chill more than they used to. As he sat there warming himself, Bo began going through the papers, studying the pictures and descriptions of the wanted men printed on them.
Those posters told a story, too, a sordid tale of lawlessness, death, and desperation. Some of the men whose likenesses adorned the posters had been prodded to their crimes by bad luck. As the outlaw Cole Younger had put it a few years earlier, “We were victims of circumstances. We were drove to it.”
Others, though, had been born bad. Bo had read in a newspaper once about how some doctor back East, or maybe in Europe, had claimed that pure evil didn’t exist, that every lawbreaker had been forced into a life of crime by the way the world treated him. That was complete and utter horse droppings, and Bo knew it. He knew that some hombres were born evil and stayed that way their whole lives. He knew that because he’d had to blow holes in some of them to save his life or Scratch’s or some other innocent person’s.
When he stopped flipping through the reward dodgers to study a particular one, he couldn’t tell by looking at the picture on it if the wanted man was one of the pure evil ones or some fella who’d had a run of bad luck. He was more interested in the name under the drawing of a craggy-faced man with a short, dark beard.
Tom Bardwell.
Wanted for bank robbery, train robbery, murder, and assault in Kansas. Also known as Black Tom or sometimes Four-Finger Tom because the little finger on his left hand was gone, lost in some unknown accident. There was a $2,000 reward on his head, and a $500 reward, minimum, for anybody riding with him in the gang he led.
The date on the poster was two years earlier. It was a good thing Sheriff Manning didn’t clean these out of his desk very often, Bo mused.
He didn’t linger long on the poster before he set it aside with the others he had gone through already. To make it look good—because he could feel Manning’s eyes on him—he continued studying the posters, pausing now and then over one that didn’t mean anything to him. When he was finished, he picked up the whole stack, tapped it on his leg to square it up, and took them back to the desk.
“I appreciate it, Sheriff,” he said as he set the stack of posters on the desk.
“Find what you were looking for?” Manning asked.
“Not really,” Bo said, “but thanks for letting me look anyway.”
Manning leaned back in his chair and regarded his visitor speculatively. “You know,” he said, “a suspicious man might wonder if you were looking through those dodgers to make sure you and that partner of yours weren’t on any of them.”
That hadn’t occurred to Bo. The thought brought a chuckle to his lips. “There’s no paper out on us, Sheriff,” he told Manning. “At least, not that I know of, and if there is, it’s a mistake. We’re peaceable, law-abiding hombres, Scratch and me.”
“Who carry guns and look like you know how to use them.”
“So do a lot of other men.”
“Other men haven’t been able to shoot it out with the Deadwood Devils and stay alive. I think I’m going to be keeping my eyes on you and Morton, Creel.”
“That’s fine,” Bo said. “We won’t be in town for long, though. We’re headed back to the Golden Queen mine tomorrow to pick up another shipment of gold.”