“Anybody else know that?” Virgil said.
“Sure,” Rose said. “You used to be here. Town’s still ’bout the size of a corncrib.”
“There’s a bounty on them,” I said.
“Didn’t know that,” Rose said. “You know that, Cato?”
“Nope.”
“Make a difference?” Virgil said.
Rose looked at Cato. Cato shrugged.
“Not to us,” Rose said. “Might to some folks.”
“Police chief in Appaloosa probably knows, by now, that they’re here,” I said.
“He gonna come after them?”
“Probably will,” Virgil said.
“He’s the law in Appaloosa,” Rose said.
Virgil said, “Yep.”
“We the law here,” Cato said.
Virgil nodded.
“Bounty hunters out?” Rose said.
Virgil nodded again.
“Might be some Pinkertons, too,” he said.
“Might have to hire us couple of deputies,” Rose said. “Fellas with experience, say, like you boys.”
“Could arrest them,” Cato said.
“Cole’s Indian?” Rose said.
“Can’t make us give up our prisoners,” Cato said.
“’Course they can’t,” Rose said.
Virgil shook his head.
“Indian won’t go for it,” he said.
“The breed’s brother?” Rose said.
Virgil nodded.
“He won’t go to jail,” Rose said.
Virgil shook his head.
“We leave the cell unlocked,” Cato said.
“He won’t,” Virgil said.
“Don’t make no sense,” Rose said. “You think Virgil’s right, Everett?”
“Might be,” I said. “Often is.”
“Well,” Rose said. “Let’s go talk to them. They don’t want to come in, least we can give them a running start.”
“Maybe they don’t want to run,” Virgil said.
Rose looked at Cato again, and leaned back a little in his chair and smiled.
“They want to stay and fight,” Rose said. “The least we can do is offer them some high-priced backup.”
31
VIRGIL HAD BROUGHT some whiskey in his saddlebags, and we sat on a plank bench outside of the small barn and passed the bottle. Kah-to-nay declined to drink. A few dark red chickens scratched in the barnyard. A sow with a litter wallowed in a pen beside the barn. Two big-footed farm horses stood placidly in a corral, their heads hanging over the top rail. Our own horses were gathered at the watering trough.
“How long you think before Callico come here?” Pony said.
“Dunno,” Virgil said. “All I’m sure is that his wife knows you’re here.”
“Chiquita warned you,” Pony said.
“Yes.”
Pony smiled.
“Chiquita doesn’t want anything to happen to Pony Flores,” he said.
“True,” Virgil said.
Pony said something in Apache to Kah-to-nay. Kah-to-nay made a faint shrug.
“If wife don’t gossip to him,” Pony said. “He maybe not come for weeks.”
“Maybe,” Virgil said. “Or maybe he’s waiting for us at the jail when we get back to town.”
“We can arrest you,” Rose said. “Put you in the jail. We wouldn’t lock the cell. That way, we can say you our prisoner and we won’t release you to him.”
Kah-to-nay shook his head sharply and spoke in Apache. Pony nodded and held his hand up at his brother.
“How many people Callico bring?” Pony said.
“Gotta leave some people to watch the town,” Virgil said. “Figure six or eight, plus himself.”
“He any good?” Pony said.
“Amos Callico?” Cato said. “Very good.”
Pony nodded.
“You are very good?” Pony said.
“Yes,” Cato said.
Pony nodded.
“You and Everett stay, too, Virgil?”
“Long as we need to,” Virgil said.
Kah-to-nay spoke again in Apache. Pony nodded.
“So, we all stay here maybe one, maybe two, three weeks, wait for Callico to come arrest me and Kah-to-nay. Maybe big fight.”
“Pretty much,” Rose said.
Pony nodded.
“Kah-to-nay not go to white jail,” Pony said.
All of us nodded.
“Better we go away,” Pony said.
“Where?” Virgil said.
“Apache places,” Pony said.
“That’s where they’ll be looking for you,” I said.
Pony smiled.
“Some Apache places white-eyes don’t go,” he said.
“Might depend a little on the white-eye,” Virgil said.
Pony grinned wider.
“Yes, Virgil, you go, maybe Everett go with you,” he said. “But mostly not.”
Virgil nodded.
“You gonna stay on the run all your life?” I said.
“See tomorrow,” Pony said. “Don’t do Chiricahua good, think about long time from now.”
“No,” Virgil said. “I’d guess it don’t. You need anything.”
Pony shook his head.
“You know where me and Everett are,” Virgil said.
Pony nodded.
“Speak for Pony to Chiquita,” he said.
We all stood up.
“Thank you for help,” Pony said to Cato and Rose. “Kahto-nay know he should say thank you, but he not.”
“We know ’bout Kah-to-nay,” Rose said.
They shook hands.
Virgil handed the bottle to Pony.
“Take the rest of this with you,” he said.
Pony took the bottle. We swung up into our saddles and rode away from them, back toward town.
32
AS WE CAME INTO TOWN, I could see a group of riders gathered at the far end of Main Street in front of the jail, where Cato and Rose kept office.
“Callico,” Virgil said.
“Gossip travels fast,” Rose said.
“Might be good,” Virgil said, “if me ’n Everett drift over and settle in across from the jail.”
“Have them between us,” Cato said.
Virgil nodded and pulled his horse left. We’d been riding together so long that my horse went with him without prompting. Virgil noticed.
“Smart animal,” he said.
“You figure to have trouble with Callico?” I said.
“He ain’t gonna be happy,” Virgil said, “that Pony and his brother flew the coop.”
“True.”
Virgil grinned.
“And Frank Rose will annoy him,” he said.
“Pretty sure,” I said.
“Besides,” Virgil said. “Better prepare for what your enemy can do, not what you think he’s gonna do.”
“True,” I said.
“Who was it said that? German fella?”
“Carl von Clausewitz,” I said. “Book called On War.”
“That’s a good one,” Virgil said. “Best book you ever give me.”
We turned down past the laundry and on past the buildings that lined Main Street. Past the slop barrels, and the privies, the busted wagon wheels and rusting leaf springs, the middens of trash and garbage where coyotes scavenged. We faced Main Street, where the buildings had false fronts. From here you could see that most had been made of green lumber that had split and warped as it dried in the sun. Most towns looked like this from the back side.
“Long way for the police chief of Appaloosa to come chasing a couple of Indians,” I said.
“Wants to be the man brought them fearsome savages to justice,” Virgil said.
“Like Custer,” I said.
Virgil grinned.
“Just like him,” he said.
We turned up the alley between the Excelsior saloon and the feed store and came out on Main Street in back of Callico, where he and his men sat their horses. Cato and Rose had dismounted and spread out in front of the jail to the width of the building.
Rose was talking.
“Got no idea, Chief, where them Indians went,” Rose said.
“How long they been gone?” Callico said.
Rose shook his head slowly. “Hard to say. You know how it is. You notice when you see something. But if you don’t see something, you don’t notice you’re not seeing it.”