Burkett decided to give his son a head start and then have Conners send some men after him. None of this would be worth the effort if John got killed. He was trying to build a future here for his only son. If the boy would only realize that…
When Sam reached the Miller house no one answered the door. He found each of his brothers in their hotel rooms, which was just as well. He didn’t want Serena to hear about his conversation with Burkett.
He found Evan first, and then they went to Jubal’s room. They stayed there while he told his story.
“I don’t know that I like this, Sam,” Evan said. “It’s not as if you weren’t a big enough target already, but you just about painted a bull’s-eye on your back this time.”
“Well,” he said, “with the two of you to watch my back, I haven’t got much to worry about, have I?”
“That’s for sure,” Jubal said enthusiastically. “You can count on us to watch your back, Sam.”
“Thanks, Jube.” Sam frowned then. “Aren’t one of you supposed to be with Serena?”
“She’s at her father’s store, helping out,” Evan said. “I’m supposed to meet her there soon.”
“Oh.”
“Sam,” Evan said, “you know that the biggest threat to you isn’t going to come from behind you.”
“I know that.”
“You mean Coffin?” Jubal asked.
“That’s right,” Evan said.
“We all could take care of Coffin,” Jubal said to Evan.
“We all could bushwack him the way Burkett’s men tried to bushwack Sam.”
“I don’t like bushwackers,” Sam said, “I don’t care who they’re bushwacking.”
“I don’t mean kill him,” Jubal said. “We can just cut him out of action for a while.”
“Jube may have a point here, Sam,” Evan said.
“No,” Sam said, “I’ll take care of Coffin.”
“Or he’ll take care of you,” Evan said.
Sam looked at his brothers and said, “It’s gonna happen sometime.”
“Are you resigned to that?” Evan asked.
“I am.”
Evan stared at Sam for a few moments and then said, “Maybe I don’t understand you any more than Serena does.”
“Maybe not,” Sam said, “but if you had a big poker game you wouldn’t let me play in your place, would you?”
“That’s not the same,” Evan said. “I wouldn’t be playing for my life.”
Sam shrugged and said, “That’s the nature of the way we both ended up living our lives. The stakes in my life are slightly higher than in yours.”
It was agreed that Evan would go and meet Serena as planned while Sam and Jubal rode out to the section of the ranch where their father had liked to hunt.
As they rode out there Jubal said, “Pa never took me hunting.”
“We took you with us sometimes,” Sam said, “but you were too small to remember.”
“Really? What did you hunt?”
“Jackrabbit, mostly,” Sam said. “Once in a while we’d get us a buck. Once we all came across cougar sign and tracked the animal to its lair.”
“Who got it?”
“Pa did, on the dead run. He was the best shot I ever saw with a rifle.”
“Still?”
“Hell, yes, still.”
“Better than you?”
“He was always a better rifle shot than me.”
“Better than some of your friends?”
“Friends?”
“Hickok, Ben Thompson, Bat Masterson.”
“What makes you think those fellas were friends of mine?”
“I read…guess I shouldn’t believe everything I read, huh?”
“I know those fellas, for sure,” Sam said. “Knew Hickok real well, although we never did like each other all that much. Man shouldn’t die the way he did, though, at the hands of a backshootin’ coward.”
“Is that how you expect to die, Sam?”
Sam looked over at his little brother.
“I expect to die from a bullet, Jube. I prefer that it not come from behind, though. I pray it doesn’t.”
“What’s it like?” Jubal asked.
“What?”
“Not being afraid to die,” Jubal said. “When I was up on that scaffold I was so scared I coulda shit, except they woulda liked that.”
“What makes you think I ain’t afraid to die?”
“The way you talk about it.”
“I expect it, Jube,” Sam said. “I expect there ain’t a whole lot I can do about it. That don’t mean I ain’t afraid of it.”
“I thought you wasn’t afraid of nothing” Jubal said.
Sam laughed.
“It’s no shame bein’ afraid, Jubal,” Sam said. “A man who says he’s never been afraid is either a fool or a liar. If you were afraid up on that scaffold, that’s only natural.
Hell, when I saw you up there with that rope around your neck I was plenty afraid.”
“Why’s that?” Jubal asked.
“You’re my brother.”
“Yeah, but we don’t really know each other, Sam,” Jubal said. “In fact, we’re almost strangers—or we were before this started.”
“That don’t make no never mind, Jube,” Sam said.
“You’re still my brother. Fact that we ain’t seen each other in years don’t change that.”
“Guess I ain’t never had the chance to tell you I was proud to be your brother,” Jubal said. “Anytime I ever heard anyone talking about you I always wanted to tell them you was my brother.”
“You didn’t?”
“Naw. For one thing I didn’t figure they’d believe me. Later, I started to figure that maybe I was proud of you for the wrong reasons. Still, from what I seen of you since you and Evan got me off that scaffold, I’m right proud to call both of you my brothers.”
“Well, we feel the same, Jube,” Sam said, slapping his brother on the back.
“Maybe we should stay in closer touch after this is over,” Jubal said.
“Maybe we should” Sam agreed.
But they both knew that wouldn’t likely happen. When this was over the three of them would go their own ways—at least Sam and Evan would. Sam was over forty, Evan closing in on it, they were set in their ways. Jubal might very well leave Vengeance Creek with one of them, but Sam would make damned sure it wasn’t him. He didn’t need Jubal around when the lead started flying his way. He didn’t want his brother around when that last piece of lead found its way to his heart. He’d be much better off with Evan, maybe even learning to play cards.
There was more money in gambling than there was in gunplay, that was for damned sure.
When they finally reached the part of the ranch Sam wanted he reined in.
“We used to hunt this section here, for a few miles around.”
Jubal looked around. It was mostly flat land, rocks, and clay, some Joshua trees, and black chaparral.
“If he wanted to leave us a note, where would he leave it?” he asked. “We can’t be turning over every rock and looking under every bush.”
“It would be someplace where the sun and the rain couldn’t get at it,” Sam said.
“Also somewhere an animal wouldn’t get at it.”
“A hole, maybe,” Sam said.
“A chuck hole? Nah…” Jubal said.
“Let’s ride,” Sam said. “Maybe somethin’ll come to us.”
So they rode.
After a couple of hours they reined in and dismounted near a water hole. While the horses drank their fill they each took a drink and topped off their canteens, doused their heads, and wet their bandanas, tying them around their necks.
“We likely to run into anybody around here?” Jubal asked.
“No,” Sam said. “Most of this clay is buckshot land, not good for much of anything. Might not even be that many jackrabbits around here any more.”
“What about cougars?”
“Maybe,” Sam said. “The big cats know how to survive.
There’s water, and there’s rattlers, and an occasional rabbit, I guess…”