by Robert Knott
“The sonsabitches.”
“They are,” I said.
“Just because we ruled out Baptiste and that ass Eugene Pritchard,” Virgil said, and then continued walking on toward Allie’s shop, “it don’t mean that somehow, some way, they didn’t have a hand in this.”
“No,” I said. “They have the motive.”
“They do,” Virgil said.
As we walked past the theater, Virgil smiled and nodded to the placard near the front door with the figure of Martha Kathryn striking an elegant pose.
“She’s a lovely lady,” Virgil said.
“She is,” I said.
“You two are getting to be mutually exclusive.”
“You figure?”
“I do.”
“Could be worse.”
“Could,” Virgil said.
“Better than sleeping alone or with whores all the damn time,” I said.
“What happens when the show is over and the curtain closes?”
“Cross that bridge when we get to it,” I said.
When we arrived at Allie’s shop, Virgil flicked what was left of the cigar into the street and I opened the door.
“There you are,” Allie said.
She sat behind her desk toward the rear of the shop. And sitting across from her was Bernice McCormick. She turned, looking at us, then got to her feet. Allie stood up, too.
“Evening,” Virgil said as he removed his hat.
“Allie,” I said. “Mrs. McCormick.”
Bernice’s nose and eyes were red, and it was clear that she had been crying.
“Something is . . .” Allie said. “Well . . . she . . .”
“I’m in fear for my life,” Bernice said.
59
She and the kid were in the rear of a large haberdashery on Seventh Street. He was wearing a new black pin-striped suit and a white shirt and a pair of new boots, too. They were tall, black chaparral boots with Mexican heels. She wanted him to be fitted with a pair of shoes, but he insisted on the boots. They made him feel taller and more at ease.
They were standing in front of a mirror and she fitted a crisp-brim black beaver felt hat on his head. Then she stood back, admiring her creation, and nodded.
There were a few other customers moving about as the owner of the place walked the aisles and called out, “I’ll be closing up here in a few minutes or so. Don’t want to rush you folks, but just letting you know.”
She stared at the kid in the mirror.
“Looks good,” she said.
“I look like a preacher,” he said.
“If you wore shoes you would be more refined even,” she said.
“I ain’t wearing no dandy shoes,” he said. “Next thing you know you’ll want me to carry a goddamn parasol.”
“You look handsome,” she said.
He studied himself in the mirror.
“Pink paint on a pig,” he said with a serious expression.
“I mean it,” she said.
She stepped up behind him and smoothed out the shoulders of his jacket.
“It’s a very good change,” she said. “Makes me see you in a whole different manner.”
“Yeah, whole different manner for sure,” he said. “Like a preacher about to spread the gospel.”
She slid her hand down inside the front of his trousers and whispered, “No,” she said. “Not thinking about you spreading the gospel.”
She stared at him in the mirror.
“I’m thinking about something much more rewarding. Something that gives back.”
She leaned down and bit his neck.
“Ow,” he said.
She continued to stroke him under his pants as she stared at him in the mirror.
“You best stop that ’fore I take you down right here,” he said with a grin. “Or blow a hole in these new Yankee breeches.”
A train whistle called out its wailing cry in the distance as she continued to stroke him. She removed her hand and took a few steps away, studying him.
“You don’t look like a little Mexican anymore.”
He put his hands over the bulge in his pants.
“You want to look good, don’t you? You don’t want your mother to run away when she sees a dark-headed boy with blue eyes and brown skin dressed as a Mexican chico, do you?”
“I ain’t no boy,” the kid said. “No Mexican chico.”
“You are close to it,” she said.
He turned and faced her with a serious expression.
“No,” he said. “I am not.”
His eyes were narrow and intense. He stared hard at her. She took a step back, admiring him, and nodded.
“No . . . You are no boy.”
She placed her hands on his shoulders, appraising him as if he were her creation.
“I would not be here if I thought you were nothing but a simple boy.”
She turned him around slowly to face the mirror again.
The whistle of an inbound locomotive blared loudly as he stared at her. It offered a haunting moan that echoed through haberdashery as the rumbling sound of the train neared the station.
“He is grown,” she said, staring at him.
He shifted his eyes off her to his own reflection.
“Yes. He is grown up right before us. Here he is, in his gentleman clothes.”
He stared at himself for a long time then met her eye.
“You think it’s her you seen?” he said. “You really do?”
60
Bernice spent a good amount of time crying before she told us the source of her fear.
Allie shook her head slowly and said, “Can you believe it?”
Virgil glanced at me and I nodded.
“No reason not to,” I said.
“It’s just too awful,” Allie said. “And you have to do something about it, Virgil.”
“Allie,” Virgil said.
“Well,” Allie said, “you have to help her.”
“We will,” Virgil said.
“This is biblical,” Allie said.
Bernice nodded slightly.
“Not that it makes it any easier,” Bernice said, “but James and Daniel were half-brothers.”
“Still,” Allie said. “My God.”
“Do you have proof?” he said.
“Just what I know. It was no secret that they had different mothers.”
“I mean proof of . . .”
“Oh, of course. No, I have no proof. But with me out of the way . . . well . . .”
She stopped talking and stared at the floor.
“What makes you say this? Seeing how you have no proof?”
She met Virgil’s eyes.
“It would all be his,” she said.
Virgil sat back in his chair.
“There,” Allie said. “There is the proof.”
“That’s motive, Allie, and that is more than understandable, logical,” I said. “No doubt. But there has to be some reason for you to say this, to feel you are . . .”
“In danger,” Allie interjected.
Bernice shook her head and shrugged.
“I’m sorry . . . it’s an overwhelming intuition,” she said. “I’m sorry. Simply a hunch.”
“Maybe more than a hunch?” Virgil said.
“Nothing firm,” she said.
“Did James ever say anything?” I said. “Anything that caused you to worry or be concerned?”
“No, not really,” she said. “James was not the type of person to share his emotions. Well . . . at least he did not share them with me.”
“But with others?” I said.
“Not really. Not that I know of, anyway.”
“What was their relationship like?” I said.
“They were not the best of friends. They argued more than they talked.”
“About?” I said.
“Oh, I don’t know. Everything and nothing.”
“Money?” I said.
She nodded.
“Among other things.”
“Like?” Virgil said.
“Oh . . . I can’t think of anything too specific, really. I think Daniel resented James.”
“Why?” I said.
She shook her head.
“Younger, stronger, smarter, I guess,” she said. “I don’t know, but there seemed to be a good deal of jealousy on Daniel’s part.”
“Why did you not say this to us before?” I said. “At dinner. Or before, after we talked with you in the office?”
“I don’t know. At first these thoughts were just in the back of my mind, only fleeting. I kept disregarding them, but then the thoughts became more and more constant. Then I became . . . I don’t know, just very fearful. But I must say it is instinctual. This . . . This is nothing more than a hunch, I’m afraid. A concern.”
“Why now?” Virgil said.
Bernice did not answer. She turned away slightly.
“Has he threatened you in some way?” I said.
She shook her head.
“No.”
“But there is something?” Virgil said.
She nodded and tipped her head in the direction of her home.
“I awoke this morning. I heard some dogs barking behind the house. Then I thought I heard something. A noise, sounded like a door closing. I looked out and I . . . I don’t know. Perhaps I was seeing things, but I thought I saw someone. I did not go back to sleep. I did not go downstairs. And it was then that my mind began to race. And, I thought it could just be my imagination. Well, then again, it very well might not be my imagination. The following morning, I asked Netta, my housemaid, if she heard anything through the night. She said she heard the dogs for a spell but thought nothing of it.”
“Do you think the gunmen that were hired by James and Daniel had a hand in James’s death?” I said.
“Well . . . yes. Could be, I suppose. I mean, there is a good chance that Daniel did not personally commit the murder and the gunmen did it. But I don’t know.”
“When did you first have this notion,” I said.
“Suspicion?” she said.
“Yes.”
“After the funeral was the first time it truly, completely crossed my mind, but I did not linger on the notion. After the service we all gathered there at Daniel and Irene’s house. Irene and some of the ladies from the Appaloosa social made food. Allie, too, thank you, dear . . . and there was a gathering of mourners, company employees, mostly, and their families. Then some of the men he’d hired, not the office workers, the shop people, or the miners but the gunmen, came to the house.”
“And did something happen?” Virgil said.
She shook her head.
“Nothing, really, but Daniel stepped out. They talked privately on the porch, then he left with them. Later he came in and said something to me about how sorry he was, and then he took off. He might have said where he was going at the time, but my mind was thinking about . . . well, about everything. About what we are discussing and about James and about how much I was going to miss him.”
“Was Edward Hodge one of the men?” I said. “On the porch?”
“I don’t know their names,” she said.
“The big fella that came to your house the night James died,” Virgil said.
“Oh, yes, him,” she said. “He was the main fellow doing the talking on the porch. He seemed angry.”
“Any idea what they talked about?” Virgil said. “You catch anything?”
She shook her head.
“No. Sorry.”
“And you don’t know where they went that day?” Virgil said. “When they left?”
“I do not.”
“Any idea of Daniel’s current whereabouts?” I said.
She shook her head.
“No.” Then she pointed in the direction of his office. “The office, perhaps, home, at the mines or one of the shops . . . I don’t know.”
“And what about Daniel’s wife?” Virgil said. “Irene?”
“What about her?” she said.
“Have you shared this fear with her?” Virgil said.
Bernice shook her head.
“No. And I would not.”
“Because?” Virgil said.
“I don’t know. I guess I’m just . . . I just don’t want to alarm her. If I’m wrong, something like this could have serious repercussions. And I’m sorry to bring this up now, Allie, to you, too. I know tomorrow is the big event, Appaloosa Days, and, well, I’m . . . well, I’m sorry for this.”
“Are you serious?” Allie said. “You just know that you are far more important that any ol’ party. Everything is done, Appaloosa Days will take care of itself at this point in time.”
“Well, regardless, I don’t like to—”
“Stop right there, Bernice,” Allie said, then turned to Virgil. “Now what?”
“We will do what we have to do, Allie,” Virgil said.
“What does that mean?” she said.
“We need to have a word with him,” Virgil said.
“Just a word?” Allie said.
“Allie, we can’t just arrest him without having some reason.”
“Well, you have a reason.”
“Reason, but we have no proof.”
“Well, something has to be done,” Allie said.
Allie reached out and took Bernice’s hand.
“First and foremost, Virgil, taking care of Bernice is of the utmost priority.”
“We have had the deputies keeping watch since James’s passing, Allie.”
Virgil offered a reassuring and serious smile to Bernice.
“But we will see to it that you will have a guard with you now at all times. Night and day till we get to the bottom of this,” he said. “We will keep you safe.”
“Yes,” Allie said. “Yes.”
She squeezed Bernice’s hand.
“I would be mortified. Just mortified if something were to happen to beautiful Bernice.”
61
Virgil stepped out of Allie’s shop with me, and we both turned our attention up Appaloosa Avenue toward McCormick’s office. We said nothing for a few seconds. Then Virgil shook his head and turned a little to see Allie and Bernice through the window. Allie was still holding Bernice’s hand.
“I did not see that coming,” I said.
“No. Me neither.”
“I guess it makes as much sense as anything else,” I said.
“Does,” Virgil said.
“Could be in her head?” I said.
Virgil nodded.
“That, too.”
“A noise at night?” I said. “A barking dog. Nothing unusual about that.”
“No matter,” Virgil said. “Good to have her watched over, just in case.”
“Good, in the simple fact Allie would have your hide and mine otherwise.”
“That, too,” he said.
“Bernice did not come up with anything that seemed too damn firm, though.”
“No, I know.”
“Makes sense, though,” I said.
“Him wanting her gone?” Virgil said.
“Yeah. Like she said, then it’s all his.”
Virgil nodded.
“But he doesn’t seem like the type,” I said.
“Capable of murder?”
“Yeah,” I said with a nod. “He’s not your average.”
“No, but everybody is capable. Everybody, Everett, you know that.”
“No, I know. We’ve damn sure been around e
nough to know all about that.”
“Big motive, though,” Virgil said.
Virgil gave a brief glance into the shop again.
“Go on,” he said. “I’ll wait here with them.”
I left Virgil on the porch of Allie’s shop and walked to the sheriff’s office to procure a deputy watchman for Bernice. When I passed McCormick’s office I could see that the business was still open. I did not see Daniel, but there were lamps burning and a handful of McCormick’s employees were at their desks, busy doing paperwork.
By six-thirty there was still no sign of Deputies Hank and Skeeter when I stopped in the sheriff’s office. Lloyd called out the back door to a big, strapping young deputy named Weldon, who was in the rear corral tending to the horses.
“Got a job for you, Weldon,” Lloyd said.
I explained in detail to Weldon what needed to be done. He nodded at each of my instructions, as if a puppeteer were lifting his big head up and down by a string.
“Don’t let anybody in her house under any circumstances. If she leaves, make sure you are with her at all times.”
“Yes, sir,” Weldon said.
“She goes out to shop, or eat, or goes out to pee, stay with her at all times.”
Weldon glanced to Lloyd.
“She pees outside?” Weldon said. “Thought all them people in them big fancy houses up there had commodes and did all their business indoors.”
“Get your shotgun, Weldon,” Lloyd said, shooing him outside like a wasp. “And saddle your horse, too. You need to keep yourself at the ready for any and everything, son, understand?”
“Understand,” Weldon said.
“All right, then,” Lloyd said. “Carry on.”
“Yes, sir,” Weldon said with a nod, then walked out to saddle his horse.
“Don’t worry. He’s qualified, Everett. Otherwise he would not be part of this outfit. He’s goddamn sure the biggest, most intimidating of the eight deputies we got, but I must confess, he don’t often win at checkers. Never, as a matter of fact, but it’d take a goddamn village to bring him to his knees.”
* * *
• • •
Virgil and I left Weldon standing on the porch in front of Allie’s shop, holding his shotgun like an Army sentry. Then we headed toward McCormick’s office.