“I’ll take you back there and let you in, but I’m going to have to lock the door behind you.”
“I understand.”
Pearlie was lying on the bunk when the three men approached his cell.
“Pearlie, I brought the doctor,” Lenny said.
Pearlie sat up. “Good for you. I appreciate that.”
Wilson put the key in the cell door, but before he turned it, he looked over at Pearlie. “Don’t you get up off that cot till these folks is inside and I’ve locked the door behind ’em.”
Pearlie didn’t answer, but neither did he make an attempt to get up. Wilson opened the cell door, held it for a moment, then slammed it shut behind Lenny and Dr. Urban.
“When you are ready to come out, just let me know,” he said.
“I’m ready to come out,” Pearlie said, and Lenny and Dr. Urban laughed.
“You’re a real funny man, ain’t you?” Wilson said with a sneer as he turned and walked back toward the front of the building.
“Let me take a look at your face,” Dr. Urban said, examining the wounds.
“How do they look?” Pearlie asked.
“Right now, it’s not a face the ladies will fall in love with,” Dr. Urban answered. “But it shouldn’t be all that hard to get the pellets out. And they are going to have to come out before they fester up on you.”
Dr. Urban searched through his bag until he found something that looked like an extended pair of tweezers. “Lenny, grab that plate that his dinner was on, and hold it while I dig these out, will you?”
“Yes, sir,” Lenny replied.
Lenny stood by, holding the plate as Dr. Urban dug each of the little balls of shot out of Pearlie’s face. As he pulled them out, he dropped the pellets into the plate. Pearlie winced with each extraction.
“I’m sorry,” Dr. Urban said.
“It’s all right,” Pearlie replied.
Dr. Urban cleaned the wounds, then poured alcohol on them.
“Ouch!” Pearlie shouted.
“Sorry, but we’ve learned a lot in the last few years,” Dr. Urban said. “And one of the things we’ve learned is that alcohol helps to prevent the wounds from festering.”
“I know, and I appreciate it,” Pearlie said.
“All right, that does it,” the doc said, standing up and cleaning his own hands. “Try and keep your hands away from the wounds if you can.”
“I’ll try,” Pearlie said. Pearlie looked up at Lenny. “Lenny, I’m goin’ to ask you do to a favor for me. A big favor.”
“All right. Whatever you say.”
“I want you to go up to the town of Big Rock. When you get there, ask directions for Sugarloaf Ranch. At Sugarloaf, you’ll find a fella by the name of Smoke Jensen. Tell him where I am, and what kind of a fix I’m in. Also, tell him how much money it cost you to go there. He’ll pay you back.”
“I will if I can get off,” Lenny said.
“If you can get off? Get off what?”
“You don’t know, because I wasn’t working when you were there, but I play piano for Mr. Gibson.”
“Gibson?”
“He’s the man that owns the saloon. He wasn’t there when you were there. In fact, he’s not even in town now. I’ll have to wait until he comes back so I can ask him.”
“There may not be enough time to wait,” Pearlie said. “From the way the marshal was talking, they’re going to try to get this done very fast.”
“You’re right,” Lenny said. He sighed. “All right, I’ll go. It may cost me my job, but I’ll go.”
“It’s not going to cost you your job, Lenny,” Dr. Urban said. “I’m sure you know that Rodney Gibson is a very good friend of mine. I’ll make things right with him.”
“I appreciate that,” Lenny said.
Pearlie reached over to pick up his hat. The silver band flashed once in the sun. “When you get to Sugarloaf, give this hat to a young fella there named Calvin Woods. Tell him I said, ‘Thanks for the loan.’”
“Thanks for the loan?”
“Yeah, he’ll know what that means. And it will prove that you didn’t steal it, that you’re actually carrying a message from me.”
“All right,” Lenny said, taking the hat. “I’ll do that.”
“Don’t let me down, Lenny,” Pearlie said. “And hurry, or my friends might get here just in time to visit my grave.”
“I don’t know, Lenny,” Lloyd Evans said as he stood behind the bar, polishing glasses. “I ain’t your boss. Rodney is. And he’s up in Denver for a few days, you know that.”
“Yeah, I know,” Lenny replied. “But Dr. Urban is a real good friend of Mr. Gibson’s. He said he would take it up with him and make it right.”
“If Dr. Urban offered to do that, you’ll probably be all right then,” Evans said. “They are good friends. Why, you’ve seen yourself how many times they’ve sat at that table back in the corner, playing chess.”
“How soon are you leaving?” Mary Lou asked.
“Pearlie is right. If I don’t go as soon as I can, it may be too late. That’s why I’m takin’ the next train north.”
“Lenny, are you sure you are doing the right thing?” she asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Pogue Quentin is a very powerful man,” she replied. “He may not like it if he thinks you are helping the man who killed his son.”
“Come on, Mary Lou, you saw it just like I did. You know Pearlie didn’t have any choice but to shoot Billy Ray.”
“I know. It was self-defense.”
“I might not get up there and back in time—and even if I do, I don’t know that his friends will be able to do anything. But I have to try.”
“Who are his friends?” Evans asked. “Did Pearlie tell you their names?”
“Well, one of them owns a ranch and Pearlie used to work for him. His name is Smoke Jensen.”
Evans stopped polishing the glasses and looked up in sharp surprise. “Did you say Smoke Jensen?”
“Yes. Why? Do you know him?”
“I can’t exactly say that I know him,” Evans said. “But I’ve seen him in action.”
“Seen him in action? What kind of action?”
“He’s the fella that single-handed cleaned out the town of Bury, Idaho. I’ll tell you this—if there is a man alive who can help this boy, it would be someone like Smoke Jensen.”
“In that case, I have to get back in time,” Lenny said.
“Lenny, if you’d like, I’ll come down to the depot with you and see you off,” Mary Lou offered.
A broad smile spread across Lenny’s face. “Mary Lou, I can’t think of anything I would like more,” he said.
Kathleen York also went down to the depot to see her son off. Lenny was the only passenger leaving at this hour, so the waiting room was empty except for the single ticket clerk, who sat behind the ticket counter reading the newspaper, and the telegrapher, who was at his incessantly clacking key, nosily listening to the messages, even though none of them were being sent to Santa Clara.
“Ma, promise me that you’ll take food down to him while I’m gone,” Lenny said.
“Are you saying you don’t think the marshal will feed him?”
“I don’t know. You know that Marshal Dawson is Pogue Quentin’s man, and if Quentin doesn’t want Pearlie fed, Dawson would more than likely just starve him.”
“I’ll do what I can,” Kathleen said. “But you know yourself that sometimes I get pretty busy in the restaurant. I might not always be able to get away.”
“You’ve got to feed him, Ma.”
“Like I said, I’ll do what I can. I’m not going to let him starve,” Kathleen promised.
“You’ll like Pearlie, Ma. He’s really a very nice person. And he has been just real friendly to me.”
“How nice can he be? He killed Billy Ray Quentin.”
“I told you, he didn’t have any choice,” Lenny said, glancing toward the door. He had been glancing toward the door every minute or so since they had arrived, half an hour ago.
“What are you looking for?” Kathleen asked.