‘‘Did you get him, John?’’ Remorse asked. He did not take his eyes off Lance, obviously considering him the more dangerous of the two.
‘‘Missed,’’ McBride said.
‘‘It happens,’’ Remorse said.
‘‘What are you going to do with us?’’ Jared asked. He was speaking to Remorse.
‘‘That depends on you, Jared. Confess, repent, perform the penance I impose and then I’ll consider your case.’’
‘‘You go to hell,’’ Jared said.
Remorse smiled. ‘‘I’ve been there many times.’’ He said to McBride, ‘‘Better cut the girl down, John. She’s dead, but I can’t bear to look at her hanging there.’’ The reverend holstered one of his guns, reached into a pocket and tossed a folding knife to McBride. He drew the gun again. Pinned to the wall like butterflies in a display case, Josephine, father and son, made no move.
McBride slashed the ropes that bound Clare’s wrists and let her body fall into his arms.
‘‘Lay her on the table over there, John,’’ Remorse said. ‘‘Gently, now.’’
McBride did as he was told. He felt ashamed that he was seeing the girl’s nakedness and he pulled up the top of her tattered dress over her breasts. When he stepped back and opened his hands, they were covered in blood.
‘‘Better wash those in the kitchen, John,’’ Remorse said. He smiled. ‘‘Blood does terrible things to the finish of a gun.’’ He saw the big man hesitate and added, ‘‘Go ahead, I’ll be all right until you return.’’
McBride washed his hands at the kitchen pump, dried them on a scrap of towel, then went back to the room. Nothing had changed. The three men looked as if they were frozen in time.
The baby was lying on his back in a corner of the room near the door and incredibly he was still asleep. McBride sincerely hoped the kid would stay that way until his business here was done.
‘‘You, McBride,’’ Jared said, ‘‘you seem like a sensible man. How much to walk away from this like it never happened? Come now, don’t be shy. How much?’’
‘‘Walk away from the murder of Clare O’Neil, you mean?’’
‘‘That was Harlan’s doing, not mine. I told him to be careful with the whip.’’ He shrugged, then nodded in the direction of Clare’s body. ‘‘Why get concerned over the death of a woman like that? Back in town any man can buy her kind for two dollars and a whiskey. I had her for a roast beef dinner.’’
The man’s words stung McBride, but he let it go. ‘‘Who murdered Dora Ryan?’’
‘‘Harlan,’’ Jared said without hesitation. ‘‘Again he went too far. I told him to kidnap the girl, but he didn’t want to leave any witnesses behind.’’
‘‘And Clare’s father?’’
‘‘I killed him, McBride,’’ Lance said. His eyes were alight with defiance. ‘‘The old fool had discovered the mine and wanted it for Clare. I knew he would never part with it at any price. After we had that fight in the canyon, I rode to his place and he stepped out of the cabin to greet me, a big smile on his face. He quit smiling after I put a .44-40 bullet into his belly.’’
‘‘At first you thought you could get your hands on the mine by marrying Clare,’’ McBride said. ‘‘But when that didn’t work out, you killed old Hemp, then tried to get her to sign the mine over to your father.’’
‘‘She was stubborn, McBride, very stubborn,’’ Jared said. ‘‘Clare wanted the mine for her child, and she refused to sign the deed to the ranch over to me. What good would a fortune in silver be to a woman like that? A woman whose appetites of the flesh I can only call vile and unnatural. The mine had to come to me by right. I would put it to a fine purpose, perhaps my ascent to the highest office in this fair land of ours.’’ He glared at McBride. ‘‘Yes, I am talking about the presidency of the United States of America.’’
Jared spread his hands and shrugged. ‘‘I’d made her a good offer, McBride, a fair offer. But she turned me down and that’s why Harlan cut her to ribbons.’’ He spread his hands. ‘‘That was merely an unfortunate mistake. Surely you can’t blame me for her death?’’
McBride was silent for a few moments. Close to him Remorse was ready, his glowing eyes unblinking. McBride thought he looked like a cat stalking a mouse.
‘‘Josephine,’’ the big man said, ‘‘I’m taking you and your son back to Rest and Be Thankful. There are Texas Rangers in town and I’ll see that you are both charged with murder.’’
‘‘Damn you, half the mine,’’ Jared said. ‘‘Any sane man would jump at that offer.’’
McBride shook his head. ‘‘I’ll see you both hang, just like you did the young Mexican sheepherder.’’
Suddenly the baby squirmed and started to cry, a screeching, high-pitched caterwauling that set McBride’s teeth on edge. He turned to Remorse. ‘‘What’s wrong with him?’’
‘‘He’s hungry.’’ Remorse smiled. ‘‘And he’s got a pair of lungs on him.’’
‘‘Can we feed him? Find him some bacon or something?’’
Remorse raised his voice over the racket. ‘‘John, he’s a baby. He needs pap, that’s milk, water and flour mixed together. And we’d need a glass pap boat to feed it to him.’’
‘‘I don’t have any of that. What do we do?’’ McBride was panicked. The baby’s screams were shattering the air around him into a million shrieking shards of pain.
‘‘Pick him up! Maybe you can soothe him!’’ Remorse hollered.
McBride turned toward the child, but Jared Josephine brushed past him. ‘‘No! He’s my son!’’ he yelled. ‘‘I’ll see to him.’’
Distracted as he was by the noise, McBride failed to see the danger until it was too late. Jared grabbed the baby, held him against his chest and retreated back to where Lance was standing. Jared’s hand dropped to his gun and Lance drew at the same time.
Remorse saw, but made no move, a slight, amused smile on his lips.
‘‘You two, stay back,’’ Jared yelled. He shoved the muzzle of his Colt against the baby’s head. ‘‘Drop your guns or I’ll blow this screaming brat’s head clean off its shoulders.’’ Without turning he said to Lance, ‘‘Bring the horses around. I’ll ride Harlan’s Appaloosa.’’
Before Lance could make a move, Remorse spoke. The words were slow and sounded less than human. They were spaced out, each bare as bone and cold as ice. Despite the baby’s screams they echoed across the room. ‘‘The . . . child . . . means . . . nothing . . . to . . . me.’’
A few seconds before Jared Josephine died, he looked into Remorse’s eyes and saw something that terrified him.
The man let out a primitive squeal of horror, as though he had just seen the gates of hell swing open to receive him. ‘‘No!’’ he screeched. ‘‘Not you! Go back, damn you!’’ His gun came up fast but Remorse was faster. Two shots from the Remingtons. Two bullets crashed into Jared Josephine’s skull. The man slammed against the wall, then slid to the floor, his dead eyes fixed on Remorse. The terrible dread he’d felt had not fled them.
Lance had been stunned into immobility. He stared through the drift of gun smoke at his dead father; then his horrified gaze moved to Remorse. He let his gun slip from his fingers and it thudded onto the wood floor. ‘‘I’m done,’’ he said.