“You don’t understand,” Becky said desperately.
Kirby had had just about enough. “No. Streeter doesn’t understand. And one of the things he doesn’t understand is that I’m not a boy.”
“Hey you, old man,” Streeter called to Emmett.
For the entire interplay between Streeter and Kirby, Emmett had done nothing but sip his beer and watch, almost dispassionately. He looked Streeter in the eye. “Are you talking to me?”
“Yeah. Looks like me ’n this boy is about to have us that little dance we was talkin’ about. And you’re in the way.”
“I’m not in the way.” Emmett coughed.
“What do you mean, you’re not in the way? You’re standin’ right there behind the boy, ain’t you?”
“I suppose I am, but it doesn’t matter. You heard what he said. He’s not a boy. And you won’t get a shot off.”
“What? What do you mean I won’t get a shot off, you old fool?”
“Kirby?” Emmett said.
“Yes, Pa?”
“Pa? You mean this is your boy?” Streeter asked, laughing.
Emmett didn’t move. “This bragging fool seems to be pretty proud of what he done to that painting. But it looks to me like there’s room for a couple additions.”
Kirby glanced up at the painting of the nude woman and smiled. “Yes, sir. I know what you mean.”
“Why don’t you finish the job he started?”
In a flash, Kirby pulled his pistol, fired twice, and put the pistol back in its holster. Both breasts in the painting had been punched through by perfectly placed bullet holes.
“What the hell?” someone gasped. “I didn’t even see him draw!”
“That’s impossible!” another said. “There cain’t nobody shoot that good and that fast!”
“Now, Streeter—I believe that’s what you told me your name was—shall we get this over with?” Kirby asked.
Eyes wide and mouth open, Streeter reached out with a shaking hand, picked up the glass of whiskey still on the bar, and drained it. He put the empty glass down, then turned to look at Kirby.
Kirby smiled at him, but absolutely nothing young nor innocent was in the smile. It was old as time and as dangerous as the open mouth of a hissing rattlesnake.
“I . . . uh . . . I,” Streeter stammered. Glancing at the others in the room, his face mirroring his absolute fear, he held an empty hand out toward Kirby. “Don’t shoot. Don’t shoot.” He started toward the door.
“Come back, Streeter. Next time you want to show off!” Becky called to him, and everyone in the saloon laughed.
Streeter pulled his hat down more firmly on his head and pushed through the swinging batwing doors without so much as a look back.
“Lord almighty! I ain’t never seen nothin’ like that!” someone said.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if Streeter don’t never come back here,” another said.
“If he don’t never come back, it’ll be the town’s gain, and we owe this young fella a vote of thanks.” Jake drew two more mugs of beer and set them on the bar. “These are on the house. What brings you two to town?”
Kirby turned back to the bar. “I’m looking for Angus Shardeen.”
The smile left the bartender’s face. It wasn’t only the expression that changed. The tone of his voice changed, as well. “A friend of yours, is he?”
Kirby shook his head. “Believe me, Angus Shardeen is no friend.”
Jake relaxed, and the smile returned. “Good. If he was your friend, I’d be thinkin’ a lot less of you than I am now.”
“Where is he?”
“Nobody knows. He kilt a young cowboy about a month ago, then he skedaddled out of here.”
“Most likely, he went back up to Kansas,” Becky said. “I believe that’s where he come from.”
“Yes ma’am. That is where he came from,” Kirby said.
“Why are you lookin’ for him, if I might ask?” Jake inquired.
“He killed my ma,” Kirby replied.
Jake nodded. “I reckon I can see why you’re lookin’ for him then. How long do you plan to stay in town?”
Emmett answered the question. “Long enough to finish this beer.”
Kirby and his father left Texas and rode north through Indian Territory, following the Washita River. Changing colors, it snaked out across the gently undulating prairie before them—shining gold in the setting sun, sometimes white where it broke over rocks, at other times shimmering a deep blue-green in the swirling eddies and trapped pools, and sometimes running red with clay silt.
Late in the afternoon, a rabbit hopped up and bounded down the trail ahead of him.
“There’s supper,” Emmett said.
Kirby drew his pistol and fired. A puff of fur and spray of blood flew up as the rabbit made a head-first somersault, then lay perfectly still.
They stopped for the day and made camp under a growth of cottonwoods. Emmett started a fire while Kirby skinned and cleaned the rabbit, then skewered it on a green willow branch and suspended it over the fire between two forked limbs.
Except for Emmett’s occasional coughing, they were quiet, staring at the cooking rabbit.
Finally, Kirby broke the silence. “Pa, it’s been five days, ’n you ain’t said nothin’ about what happened back there in Dorena with that Streeter fella.”
“No, I reckon I haven’t,” Emmett replied.
“How come you ain’t said nothin’?”
Emmett coughed again before he answered. “I thought you were handlin’ things pretty well.”
“I figured you musta thought that, else you woulda been tellin’ me what I shoulda done.”
“Kirby, I’m not goin’ to be here forever. Fact is, I ain’t goin’ to be here much longer at all, ’n you’re goin’ to be on your own. A fella with a skill like yours, word’s goin’ to get around. When that happens, people will be comin’ for you, wantin’ to try you out to make a name for killing Kirby Jensen.”
“How can that be, Pa? There ain’t anybody even knows my name.”
“They will know your name, and soon. I pretty much gave you your head back there because you need to know how to handle yourself. And like I said, you did pretty well.”
“I woulda killed him if it hadn’t been for you comin’ up with a way that let me avoid it,” Kirby said.
Emmett coughed again, then reached out to turn the skewer, allowing another side of the rabbit to face the fire. The aroma of the cooking meat permeated the campsite.
“I reckon you might have,” Emmett said. “And truth to tell, you woulda been justified. But, anytime you can find a way to do what needs to be done without killin’, it’s best.”
“Yeah, I can see that. I’m glad you come up with the idea about shootin’ holes in the woman’s . . . you know.”
Emmett laughed.
“Pa, that woman . . . Becky. She wanted me to go upstairs with her.”
“Yes, I heard her ask.”
“I thought about it.”
“Did you?”
“What would you have said if I had done it?”
“I wouldn’ta said nothin’ at all. They’s some things so private that nobody else can tell you one way or the other what to do. Why didn’t you go upstairs with her?”
“I ain’t never been with a woman before,” Kirby said. “Leastwise, I ain’t never been with a woman in . . . that . . . way . . . the way she wanted to be. I sorta figure that if you’re goin’ to do somethin’ like that with a woman, then maybe it ought to mean somethin’.”
“That’s a good way of lookin’ at it. Rabbit’s done.” Emmett lifted the golden brown piece of meat off the fire, seasoned it with their dwindling supply of salt, then lay it on a flat rock and split it right down the middle, head to tail. He gave half of it to Kirby.
Kirby began eating, pulling the meat away with his teeth even when it was almost too hot to hold.
After his supper, he stirred the fire, then lay down alongside it,
using his saddle as a pillow. He stared into the coals, watching the red sparks ride a heated column of air high up into the night sky. Still glowing red and orange, they joined the jewel-like scattering of stars.
“Pa?”
“Yes, son?”
“Just so you know, when I find Shardeen, I won’t be lookin’ for a way to avoid it, no more ’n I reckon you’ll be lookin’ for a way not to kill them men you’re after.”
“I wouldn’t expect you to,” Emmett said.
CHAPTER 13
Three months of dusty cow towns and wide open spaces proved fruitless. The Jensens had not found Shardeen, nor had they located any of the men Emmett was looking for. At the moment, they were in the middle of nowhere, with no particular place to go. Well, it wasn’t actually nowhere. They knew they were somewhere in Kansas. Or at least, they thought they were in Kansas.
It was a cold and very gray day.
“Pa, what’s the date?”
“I don’t rightly know,” Emmett admitted. “Late October, early November, maybe?”
“It’s got to be later than that. I don’t think it would be this cold unless it was at least December.”
“Could be that you’re right,” Emmett agreed. “You know what I’m thinkin’?”
“What’s that?”
“I’m thinkin’ that the next town we see, we might want to put in for the winter.”
Kirby frowned. “You got ’ny idea where that next town might be?”
“Not the slightest. But that fella we run into a couple days ago said the Arkansas River was in front of us, and it can’t be more ’n a day’s ride away. Once we get to the river, all we’ll have to do is follow it. It’s goin’ to eventually take us to a town.”
“All right,” Kirby agreed. “Let’s find the river.”
During the night, snow began to fall. It came down softly, silently. It was quite a surprise when Kirby awoke the next morning to find himself almost completely buried in snow. He looked around for his father but didn’t see him.
“Pa?” Kirby called. “Pa? Where are you?”
“Hrmmph!” Emmett grunted and suddenly sat up from under a blanket of snow. The white stuff was in his hair, his eyebrows, and hanging from his beard.
Kirby laughed.
“What’s so funny?”
“You look like a snowman.”
Emmett looked around. “We had quite a snowfall, didn’t we?”
“Yes, sir, I would say that we did.”
“Have you checked on the horses?”
“No, sir. Seemed like the first thing I should check on was you.”
Emmett chuckled and nodded. “Good idea. Let’s find the horses.”
Both men stood, stomped and shook the snow from themselves, and dug through the snow to find their saddles. They walked to where the horses stood, knee deep in snow. They looked cold and miserable.
“Wow, these are going to feel awfully cold to the horses when we put them on,” Kirby said as he held up the saddle, still dripping with snow.
Emmett laughed. “It’s going to be just as cold on our butts.”
Kirby laughed as well. “Yeah, I hadn’t thought about that.”
Big Ben Conyers’ ranch, Live Oaks, lay just north of Ft. Worth. The gently rolling grassland and scores of year-round streams and creeks made it ideal for cattle ranching. Two dozen cowboys were part-time employees, and another two dozen were full-time employees. Those who weren’t married lived in a couple long, low, bunkhouses, white with red roofs. The married couples lived in small houses adjacent to the bunkhouses, all of them painted green with red roofs. A cookhouse large enough to feed all the single men, a barn, a machine shed, a granary, and a large stable were also on the property.
The most dominating feature of the ranch was what the cowboys called “The Big House.” A stucco-sided example of Spanish Colonial Revival, it had an arcaded portico on the southeast corner, stained-glass windows, and an elaborate arched entryway.
In the parlor, Ben watched as Janey decorated the Christmas tree, adding gaily colored pine cones to the red and green ribbon laced all through it. The many small candles would be lit once all the decorations were in place.
“I do believe that is the prettiest Christmas tree I have ever seen,” Ben said.
Janey turned toward him. “It’s easy for me to say that. This is the first Christmas tree I’ve ever seen, anywhere.”
“Well then, I’m glad that your first tree is so fine. It’ll be even prettier when all the gifts are under it.”
“Ben, please, no gifts for me,” Janey said.
“What do you mean, no gifts for you? Of course there will be gifts for you. Why, what is Christmas without the presents?”
“But, I have no present for you.”
“You know what I want from you. It would be the most wonderful present I can imagine.”
Janey didn’t respond.
“Marry me, Janey. I couldn’t ask for a greater present than to have you as my bride.”
“Ben, I can’t.”
“Why can’t you? You aren’t already married, are you?”
“No, I’m not married. But you know why I can’t. You are a very important man here. Maybe if we lived somewhere else . . . someplace where there is less a chance that I would be recognized, I could consider it. But you know, without a doubt, that there are people who know who I am . . . and what I am . . . was. If word would get around, it would be terribly embarrassing. I couldn’t do that to you.”
“Some may recognize you, that is true. But how would they recognize you unless they, too, had visited the Palace Princess Emporium? If that was the case, it would be just as embarrassing to them as it would be to me. At any rate, I assure you, Janey, nobody will ever dare say anything about it to my face, nor would they even take a chance on me learning that they had spoken of it behind my back.”
“But what if they do? What would you do? Would you kill them?”
“If I had to.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of.”
Ben walked over to Janey and pulled her to him in an embrace. “I don’t want you to ever be afraid of anything. As long as you are with me, you don’t have to be. If you don’t want to get married yet, I’ll just enjoy whatever part of you, you are willing to share. I love you, Janey. I don’t care about your background.”
“Oh, Ben, why couldn’t I have met you before?” Janey asked, her eyes welling with tears.
“Nothing that happened before now matters. Only now matters, and we are together now. So we’ll just enjoy what we have, and we’ll see where it leads. If I’m the luckiest man in the world, it will lead to matrimony.”
As Janey lay in bed that night, she thought of their conversation. Ben had told her that he didn’t want her to ever be afraid of anything, but she was afraid. She was pregnant. Ben had accepted the idea that it was his baby, but she couldn’t be certain. She wasn’t sure exactly how long she had been pregnant, but she had been with at least two other men a few days before she had left Dallas with Ben.
That had been in August. If the baby was born any later than April, she would know that it was Ben’s. If it was born in April, or earlier, it might not be.
January 1866
Emmett and Kirby were wintering in Delphi, Kansas, a small town on the Arkansas River near the border of Kansas and the territory of Colorado. Although they still had most of the bounty money that had been paid for Cox and Haggart, they opted to take jobs through the winter to preserve what money they had.
Emmett worked for the company that operated the ferry across the river, while Kirby had agreed to become a deputy for City Marshal Darrell Wright.
“We don’t have much call for lawin’ here,” Marshal Wright told him when he was hired. “About all we ever have to do is pick up a drunk now ’n then. Most of the time, the onliest reason we pick ’em up is ’cause they sometimes pass out on the street. In the winter time, they could likely freeze if we didn’t bring ’em in.”
“I ain’t so damn feeble that my own son has to take care of me,” Emmett said. “The work ain’t hard, ’n I can wrap up in a buffalo robe that keeps me warm. You don’t be worryin’ about me.”
“I just wish you’d quit, is all.”
“And do what? Sit around with my thumb up my ass all the time?”
Kirby laughed out loud. “Well, I don’t guess I’d want to see you doin’ that, exactly.”
“I would damn sure hope not. Now, you do your work ’n I’ll do mine, if you’ll just let me be.”
“All right, Pa. But if it gets too much for you, remember, it ain’t somethin’ you have to do.”
The boardinghouse where they stayed was the Homestead House, owned and run by Mrs. Pauline Foley, an attractive widow in her mid-forties.
“I made biscuits this morning, Emmett,” she said when Emmett and Kirby came down for breakfast. “I know how you like to sop them through sour cream and sugar.”
“You’re too kind to me, Mrs. Foley.”
“Oh please, won’t you call me Pauline?”
“I would be honored to, Pauline. I just don’t want to be too forward.”
“You could never be too forward,” she said, smiling as she poured coffee into Emmett’s cup.
As they left the boardinghouse to go to their respective jobs, Kirby smiled at his father. “Pa, I think Mrs. Foley likes you.”
“She’s a business woman. She’s just being nice to her customers, that’s all.”
“Uh-huh. But she’s nicer to you than she is to Mrs. Simmons or Mr. Clark.”
“Boy, you know what your problem is?”
“What?”
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