Tulley’s face wadded itself up. “Does sound like somebody needs killin’.”
“Does at that.”
He left the deputy to walk Main and check the alleys and the residential areas on either side, then headed down to the Victory. Music and laughter and talk spilled out the batwing doors, along with the yellow glow of the kerosene chandeliers within.
After stepping inside, he saw perhaps two dozen cowboys and townsmen having a good time, some bellied up to the bar, others dancing with the satin-wrapped girls. A fair number played poker or faro, though none of the other games of chance were going. Honky-tonk piano cut through a haze of cigar and cigarette smoke. Lovely Rita Filley, the hostess, was threading through, giving customers a smile and sometimes a pat on the shoulder.
Whit Murphy was playing poker at dealer Yancy Cole’s table in the company of several of his Bar-O cowpokes, as well as Alver Hollis and his porky sidekick, Landrum. No sign of Trammel. York wandered over and got a look of inquiry from the ruffled-shirt, shuffling-between-hands Cole, who nodded toward an empty chair. York shook his head and instead stood, arms folded, watching, positioned behind Murphy.
As the cards were dealt, the Preacherman — in his usual black, hat and all — said, “Evening, Sheriff.”
“Evening,” York said, then nodded to the pig-faced Landrum, who said nothing but worked so hard at scowling, it was comical. “Where’s your other friend?”
“Lafe Trammel?” Hollis collected his cards with tapering fingers. “Well, that nasty gash you give him this mornin’? Your friend Doc Miller stitched that up some. He took to his bed at the cantina with a bottle of tequila.”
“No gal?”
“No gal. Little rest’ll do the boy good. ‘I will bring health and healing,’ Jeremiah, thirty-three, six.”
The Preacherman looked at his cards, then glanced up, and York’s eyes met his.
York said pleasantly, “ ‘So I turned my mind... to investigate... and to understand the stupidity of wickedness. ’ Believe that’s Ecclesiastes, something, something. Tell him I said howdy.”
Hollis smiled benevolently. “Glad to, my son.”
Whit Murphy tossed in his cards and said, “Goddamn!” He cashed in his chips, got back a buck and a half from Cole, and scooted his chair back to wander over to the bar in his bowlegged way, tugging down his high-beamed Carlsbad hat, muttering.
The Bar-O foreman hadn’t made it to the bar when York was beside him with a hand on his sleeve. “A word, Whit?”
Murphy shrugged and followed York’s lead to a table up front with nobody else nearby.
“Beer?” York asked him.
“Why not?”
The sheriff went over and got a couple of warm beers from bartender Hub Wainwright. He delivered one to Murphy and sat beside him with the other. York sipped some foam off and smiled. Murphy gulped some beer, too.
“Sorry to interrupt your fun,” York said.
Murphy grunted, wiping foam from his droopy mustache with his sleeve. “You didn’t interrupt no fun at all. I lost pert near five dollars. You think that Preacherman’s a cheat or somethin’?”
York had another sip. “Oh, probably. But not likely tonight. He doesn’t want to attract any undue attention.”
“Dressed like a circuit rider? Ha. But... why not?”
“Well, he’s here to kill somebody, Whit.”
“Hell you say!”
“Sometime before he leaves town, he’ll goad somebody into pulling and blow the poor bastard’s guts out. That’s how he does it.”
“Does what?”
“He’s a hired killer. If you think he’s cheatin’ you at the card table, which right now I doubt, you need to do just what you did — throw in your cards and walk away.”
Alarm spiked in the foreman’s eyes. “You don’t think he’s here to kill me, do you, Sheriff?”
“No. Not unless you got depths I ain’t become aware of yet. But I do think he might kill a man who called him a cheat, even if it was just for free.”
Murphy’s Adam’s apple bobbled. “’Preciate the warnin’, Sheriff. What, uh, what’s it you want with me, anyways?”
York had another swig of the warm brew. “This is the first chance we’ve had to talk since this morning.”
“Since Mr. Cullen got killed, you mean.”
“That’s right. You’ve heard that it was a put-up job? Not accidental at all?”
Murphy wiped more beer from his mustache with his sleeve. “I heard. Mr. O’Malley said as much. Miss Cullen knows, too. She’s broke up about it but tries not to show it. Ain’t seen her cry nary a drop.”
“She’s a tough girl.”
Murphy’s humorless half smirk raised one side of the droopy mustache. “She’s tougher than most, but it’ll still get to her. I ain’t ashamed to say I shed a tear or two my own self. He was a fine old fella. Done a lot for me.”
“How far back did you go with him?”
“Oh, ten years or more. I was just another cowhand on the spread. He saw somethin’ in me and kind of took to me and moved me up. When he made me foreman three years ago or so, I couldn’t hardly believe it.”
“Tell me about this morning.”
Murphy shrugged. “Little to tell. It was just after sunup. He was already on that chestnut he was partial to. Said he was goin’ out for a ride, and I said I’d be happy to keep him company. Of course he saw right through that — knew I was just tryin’ to worm in and keep him from ridin’ off by hisself.”
“He do that often? Ride off alone?”
A shrug. “I wouldn’t say often. But now and then, the mood would take him. I get it. I get that a man sometimes want to be by hisself. A proud man like Mr. Cullen, his sight gone, he sometimes has to feel like a whole man, even if he ain’t no more.”
“And that was the last you saw of him?”
“Last I saw him. Last we spoke.”
Murphy sipped beer. So did York.
“Now, Whit. Think carefully. Is there anything else pertinent you can think of?”
“Pert near what?”
“Anything that might be important, considering that we know the old man wasn’t really thrown from that chestnut. That somebody murdered him.”
Murphy’s eyes found the floor. “No. Not really. Only thing, maybe... no. No, nothin’.”
“Started to sound like something, Whit. What did you see?”
“Nothin’ else this mornin’.”
“Another time, then? Something suspicious? Come on, Whit. Any small thing could be important.”
“Might be nothin’.”
“Could be something.”
Murphy took a gulp of beer, swallowed it down, and said, “Mr. O’Malley seems like a fine feller.”
“Yes, he does. But what about Mr. O’Malley?”
“I seen him and Mr. Cullen fighting.”
York straightened. “Fighting? Come to blows?”
“No! No. They was on the front porch, talkin’. And it got right heated. They was yellin’ at each other. Red in the face and shovin’ each other.”
“You said they didn’t come to blows.”
“Well, they didn’t! Shovin’ ain’t blows. Nothin’ hard enough to knock one or the t’other down. But they was riled, very damn riled.”
“What was it about?”
Murphy pawed the air. “Weren’t my business. I felt kind of... embarrassed like. I don’t think they seen me. I was on my way back to the bunkhouse, and I just got there all the faster.”
“But you saw enough to tell that they were arguing. Heatedly.”
“I did.”
“Was Willa around?”
“No, sir. She would’ve been to bed by then. Was midnight or thereabouts.”
“What were you doing up that late, Whit?”
“Headin’ out to the privy. So I was a good distance from the porch at the time. Didn’t hear a word, just the sound of an argument. Couldn’t make out nothin’... but wasn’t tryin’ to.”