“Hell,” Lucas said, “there ain’t a brand I can’t change and make look real legal, and I got more bills of sales than I need. I guess the warden, he figured them bars was right cute—like the bars of a cell. I can make them into a HW if that suits you—ya know, Hiram an’ Will.”
“Sounds real good, Lucas. Thanks. Even as kids me an’ Hiram planned on the H an’ W brand. I guess maybe it was an omen or something—but a piss-poor omen.”
“Only thing is, I can’t do no brandin’ ’less you run over to the saloon an’ fetch us a bucket of cold beer. Fair deal?”
Will didn’t waste a minute getting through the batwings. The bartender was a black man, huge, sweaty, and alone in the joint except for a few cowhands slugging down shots of whiskey.
“Lord, Lord,” he said, chuckling. “Ain’t you the fella tried suckin’ my trough dry not long ago?”
“That was me,” Will said. “Me an’ my horse, we always been partial to trough water—’specially when it’s nice an’ warm with lots of horse slobber in it.”
The ’tender laughed, the sound deep and rich. “You want somethin’ from here or you gonna go back out to the trough?”
“I need me a big bucket of the coldest beer you got for me an’ Lucas, the smith. And maybe I’ll try a taste of decent whiskey while I’m here.”
“I can do that,” the black man said. He put a generous double shot glass in front of Will, topped it from a bottle he took from under the bar, and turned away to draw the beer. The booze went down like liquid fire, but it felt good to Will, pushing what Lucas told him back a tiny bit in his mind. Will put a five-dollar piece on the bar as the ’tender set down the beer bucket.
“Lemme fetch your change,” he said.
“Ain’t no change comin’,” Will said. “ ’Cept maybe another taste of that whiskey.” The coin disappeared into the bartender’s left hand as he filled Will’s shot glass with his right.
Will trudged back to the livery, walking carefully, sloshing not a single cold, precious drop from the bucket.
Slick was in crossties, with his right front leg jacked up and lashed in a V position by a long, thick leather strap that immobilized him. The acrid stink of burned hair and flesh was heavy in the air. Slick’s ears were laid back tight to his head, and his eyes were mere slits, behind which a feral fury seethed. His muzzle was drawn back over his teeth, which clattered like castanets.
“He’d sure love to take a bite outta your ass, Lucas,” Will said.
“Madder’n a pissed-on hornet,” Lucas said. He smiled. “Gimme that bucket.”
Will noticed an inch gash over Lucas’s left eye. The cut was held closed tight with a glob of hoof dressing. The dried blood was pretty much the same color as his beard.
“Little tussle?” Will asked.
“Sumbitch caught me soon’s as I put the iron to him. That’s why I got him rigged like that.” Lucas grabbed the beer bucket with a hand on either side and drank it dry in four long, gargantuan glugs.
Will moved to his horse’s flank. The new brand was covered with udder balm, but the livid pink-red flesh showed through. It was a fine piece of work: the IIII had been transformed into a neat HW.
“You done real good, Lucas. I’d be mighty proud to buy us beefsteaks an’ maybe another beer or two.”
“Lemme put your horse in a stall an’ dump some laudanum in his yap ’fore he busts up all his teeth.”
Will watched as the smith put his shoulder against Slick’s right shoulder and took a good grab on the horse’s pastern. Will shook his head in awe. Lucas was damned near carrying a twelve-hundred-pound horse into a stall.
The tincture of laudanum was in a brown glass bottle with a capacity of a pint or so. Lucas took a hard twist on Slick’s nose. The teeth chattering stopped. The smith poured half the bottle and maybe a bit more into Slick’s gullet. Three minutes later Lucas unfastened the rig. Slick stood on all fours for a bit of time and then nuzzled Lucas like a foal begging for a piece of apple.
The few folks at the rickety tables in the hotel dining room barely looked at Lucas and Will as they walked in and sat at a table. Lucas took over the ordering when the waitress—a hefty lass with a sweet smile that’d make Satan head for the nearest church to repent—walked up.
“What we need is this, Millie: two of the biggest beefsteaks ya got, barely cooked, a heap of mashed taters, maybe some of the carrots you do up with butter on ’em, an’ six schooners of cold beer.”
Millie brought the tray of beer first. The men lit into it.
Lucas set an empty schooner down and caught Will’s eyes, holding them.
“Somethin’s been itchin’ me, Will, an’ I’m tryin’ to figger her out. Not much more’n a hour ago I tol’ you your bro an’ his family was killed an’ his place burned to the ground. You took you a little walk and then come back an’ that was it. See? Now here we are gnawing beef an’ suckin’ beer, like nothin’ bad never happened. Why’s that, Will?”
Will Lewis held the blacksmith’s eyes.
“I don’t know that it’s your business, Lucas, but you been real good to me—busted a couple of heavy laws with your runnin’ iron an’ your papers—an’ you deserve a answer.”
Will hesitated for a time. “I took a floggin’ in Folsom—thirty strokes—for killin’ another con in a fight. I’d seen other men under the lash screaming an’ cryin’ and beggin’, an’ it made me sick. When it was my turn I made me a promise: there wasn’t nothin’ I couldn’t take—but what I could do was find a way to make things even.”
Will took the last beer from the tray and drank half of it. “After I stole the warden’s horse, I went to the cabin of the man who laid the whip to me an’ hung the sumbitch from a tree by his wrists an’ put an even thirty on him. See, Lucas, what I done was mark that bill as paid. That’s what I’m gonna do with this One Dog an’ his crew—mark their bills paid in full.”
“We need more beer,” Lucas said. “You want some red-eye, too?”
“Beer’s fine. I already got me half a stumbler on.”
“Ya know, tryin’ to do what you plan is pure crazy. Some more men . . .”
“I’m more’n likely gonna get killed doin’ this, right? That’s OK. But if I brought friends in, the whole mess wouldn’t be all right. ’Cause those boys’d be killed, too. I’ll hire me some guns when an’ if I think I need ’em. Nobody cares if those types get killed, not even their own selves.”
The steaks came—an honest two inches thick and dropping off all the way around the big dinner platters. They were singed outside but bleeding inside—cooked perfect. The mashed potatoes were as white as a new snowfall, and the serving spoon stood up like a soldier at attention in the middle of the bowl. The carrots were soaked with melted butter with a touch of garlic, an’ they tasted just fine.
Lucas wiped his mouth with his sleeve and chuckled.
“What?”
“Ain’t real hard seein’ you et in stir.”
Will was confused for a moment and then looked down at the table and at his right hand. His left arm was wrapped protectively around his plate, his hand in a tight fist. When he used the knife to cut his steak, Lucas saw that the handle was tucked into Will’s palm and that the blade was between his thumb and forefinger, ready to attack in any position.
Will chuckled softly. “Ol’ habits die hard. In Folsom, a man who doesn’t guard his plate is gonna go hungry.”
“You have much trouble inside—’sides killin’ that fella?” Lucas asked.
“Everybody has trouble in a prison like Folsom,” Will said. “Some real bad boys in there. Show some weakness an’ you’ll end up bent over a barrel with your drawers down.”