Barney felt cold sweat breaking on him. There stood Leah and Charlie both damning him with their eyes. And there was Tyne Conover looking ready to lick his chops. And here was Josie not believing he’d killed Bobo, but knowing that her belief wasn’t worth a plugged nickel.
“No need of wasting any more time,” Conover said. “I’ll let you cool your heels in my jail. It’ll go easier with you if you tell me where the money is.”
“I didn’t kill Bobo and I wasn’t looking for the money!”
“That’s your tale?”
Barney nodded. “And I’ll keep right on telling it.”
Conover helped him to his feet, snapped handcuffs on his wrists. Barney looked at the cuffs and a coldness seeped into the bottom of his stomach. Josie was looking at the handcuffs too. She pressed herself against Barney. She was very slim, warm — and trembling. Conover said, “Stand aside girl.”
“If I had pa’s rifle, you’d never take him, Sheriff.”
“I don’t like that kind of talk! You get yourself along home!”
Charlie fidgeted from one foot to the other. Barney looked at him, said hoarsely, “Get me a lawyer, Charlie!”
“Sure,” Charlie said. “A lawyer for the guy who steals my dough?”
Barney looked at him and Charlie backed up a step, even if Barney was wearing handcuffs. “Okay,” Charlie said, “I’ll get a lawyer. I’ll help you out of this jam if I can. But I won’t forget it, Barney!”
The next day Leah came to jail to visit Barney. Tyne Conover came to the cell to announce her presence. The jail was in the rear of a rambling frame building; there were two other cells, though Barney was the only occupant at the moment.
Conover’s eyes wanned as he watched Leah walk into the cell. Conover licked his lips and his gaze didn’t miss a movement of Leah’s body. She was wearing a sun-backed yellow dress today, and it added humidity to an already hot day.
Conover stood in the cell doorway a moment, just looking at her. She turned, gave him a smile, and he hitched his pants and his chest swelled a trifle. “You need anything, just call out,” he requested.
“I’ll do that,” Leah said.
Conover closed the iron-barred door. Leah looked about the barren cell, at its single lumpy bunk and scabby walls. She crinkled her nose, lighted a cigarette. “How goes it, Barney?”
“Lousy.” Barney stood looking at the sinking sun through the single window; he turned back to Leah. “This Conover yegg ain’t going to strain himself working. He found a body. He found a fall guy on the scene with — he thinks — a twenty-thousand dollar motive. He found a gun and sent it over to the county seat, and it has my fingerprints on it, naturally, since I picked it up when I watched Bobo die. It’s neat, cut and dried, and Conover is patting himself on the back.”
Leah sat on the edge of the bunk, crossed her legs, and rested her elbow on her knee. “What can be done for you, Barney?”
“I dunno. But I know one thing. I’m going to keep screaming. I’m going to yell my head off. I know my rights. I’ll make Conover keep looking, one way or another. There were other visitors at that cabin last night, Leah. Just wait until I get a lawyer. Where in blazes is the lawyer anyhow?”
She shrugged. “Charlie went into the county seat this morning. Conover got there ahead of him. Nobody much seems to want the case.”
“They can’t do it to me!” Barney was aware of panic slipping into his voice. Down here in these hills, the native populace determined what could or could not be done. He felt as if a web were tightening about his chest.
Leah glanced at the corridor outside the cell door. She turned her gaze back to Barney. “Too bad you’re not out of here.”
“Yeah. What do I do? Dissolve the bars with spit?”
“There might be a way.”
“You tell me.”
She smiled. “And make myself a party to a jail break? You’re not too dumb to grab your opportunities, Barney, without having everything put to you in spades.”
She moved to the cell door, called, “Sheriff Conover...”
He appeared in the corridor, walked back to the cell, opened the door. He had a pistol in his hand to cover Barney. Leah gave Barney just one flick of her eyes, and he felt the hackles rise on his neck as she looked at Conover. Barney guessed what she’d meant when she spoke of opportunities.
She gave Conover a strong dose of come-on with those green eyes and he began to grin. She moved to the cell doorway, worried the button on his open shirt collar between her fingers, and slugged him with her smile.
“Barney is very good friend, Sheriff. You wouldn’t mind if I brought him something to eat?”
“Course not.”
“And maybe you and I — just the two of us — could talk over Barney’s case?” “Yeah, and there might be even more interesting conversation,” Conover suggested with a leer.
“How you do talk!” Leah laughed. It was a warm sound, and Conover responded to it and her warm nearness. He couldn’t help looking at her, and his gun shifted a little, and Barney moved. Conover just had time to start swinging the gun up and get a shout formed in his throat when Barney buried a left in the soft midsection. Conover doubled over, dropping the gun and grabbing his paunch. Barney straightened him with a right to the jaw that laid him on the floor in a state of utter unconsciousness.
“Cripes,” Leah breathed. “You didn’t need to try to break his neck!”
“I haven’t hurt him. He’ll come around in a few minutes. You’d better stick here and let him think you brought him to.”
Leah stared at Conover as if she believed it impossible for a man to be so immobilized by two punches. Barney shook her shoulder until the dazed, blank expression faded from her face. He bent, took Conover’s gun.
“Give me ten minutes,” Barney said. “When he comes around, tell him what a tough time you had bringing him out of it. Just stroke his cheek a time or two and he’ll forget to consider you might have had anything to do with it.”
He left her standing there looking at Conover with a certain distaste on her face.
The rear door of the jail building opened on an alley. It was deserted. Barney slipped outside. The alley joined a dirt road that wandered up the mountainside, the village lying below. He ducked back in the alley when he heard the rattle of a pickup truck. The truck passed, leaving a heavy dust pall. Barney moved in the midst of the dust, crossed the road, and gained the brush above the road.
Under a tree, he paused long enough to let a breath out of his lungs and take his bearings. Below him the jail, a few stores, houses, and a movie theater where pictures were shown twice a week. Above him the silence of the mountains, still a trifle frightening to Barney. Off yonder in the distance, the sparkling jewel of the lake. But this Cold Slough that Bobo had mentioned — Barney hadn’t any idea where it was.
He moved like he was doing road work, with a tireless, mile-eating gait, along a path that led toward the upper reaches of the mountain. Right now he wanted only to put distance between himself and Conover.
He tried to keep his thoughts away from Conover. The sheriff might even shoot him on sight, now. The thought of bloodhounds occurred to him. He’d never seen a bloodhound, but he’d read plenty of stories about them. It gave a guy the creeps to think of being chased by those big, hungry creatures. They didn’t give up, but kept coming, on and on, their baying like a trumpet note of doom. Then they ran a man until he was crazy with fear and exhaustion. And finally they closed in on him.
Escaped cons always chose streams to shake bloodhounds, and just on the chance that Conover would use dogs, Barney found a creek and waded it until he was limp with exhaustion.