“Tend to be out front,” Virgil said. “While the booze is working.”
Teagarden grinned.
“Tell who’s sobering up the quickest,” he said. “By who’s dropping back the fastest.”
“If they’re lucky,” Virgil said. “Otherwise they the first ones killed when the balloon goes up.”
“Virgil,” Teagarden said. “You and me’ve made a good living shooting fellas like that.”
“When I had to,” Virgil said.
“Why else,” Teagarden said. “Ain’t much glory in it.”
“Here he comes,” Virgil said.
Callico stepped out of Peloquin’s office and looked down at the crowd from the top step. He waited. Someone shouted, “We’re with you, Amos.” Someone else shouted, “Kill the heathen bastards.” Callico waited.
Teagarden looked at us and grinned.
“You notice nobody has shouted, ‘How’s the woman?’” he said.
“They don’t care,” Virgil said.
“Nope,” Teagarden said. “They don’t. She’s served her purpose.”
From the crowd in front of Callico, someone started to chant, “Posse, posse.”
Others took it up. Callico waited a little longer as the chant built. Then he put a hand up like he was going to turn stones into loaves of bread. The crowd quieted.
“Dr. Peloquin,” he said, “tells me she won’t die.”
The crowd cheered. Callico waited for them to quiet.
“Though surely she must have wished to die, these last hours. Her husband is dead. Her father-in-law, her brother-in-law. All murdered by the red niggers,” Callico said. “She herself abused in extent and manner I cannot speak of in a public forum.”
The crowd’s sound was indecipherable. It was now simply massive communal noise. Callico let it subside.
“I have been warned,” Callico said, “that to pursue these heathen beast is to put the town at risk.”
The crowd was suddenly silent. Something real was about to be discussed.
“Are we men?” Callico said softly.
The crowd listened. I could almost feel it lean forward.
“Are we white Christian men?” Callico roared.
The crowd screamed that we were.
“Is there a man among us who will not join us?” Callico shouted.
The crowd screamed that, no, there were no men who would not join him.
“Even the great Virgil Cole,” Callico said. “I can see him from here, in front of the Boston House.”
He raised his voice as if he had to make himself heard that far away.
“Will you be joining us, Virgil?”
Virgil stood as he had during the entire performance, hat down, arms folded. He gave no sign that he had heard Callico.
“Of course he will,” Callico said. “And his friends.”
The mob cheered.
“I’ll have my full police force armed and ready for the field,” Callico said. “Right here, in the street, mounted and ready to ride, in one hour. I want every man jack of you that owns a gun to join us here with it and lots of bullets, ready to ride.”
The mob made its guttural scream. Callico came down the stairs and pushed through the idolatrous crowd toward the police station. Some of the crowd followed him a ways and then began to break up and go home to get ready.
Chauncey Teagarden watched them move away.
“Be like bossing a fucking cattle drive,” he said.
“It will,” I said.
“He won’t get within ten miles of the Indians.”
“’Less they let him,” I said.
“In which case they massacre his posse,” Teagarden said.
“Half of them haven’t shot anything bigger than a jackrabbit in their life. They’ll probably be drunk. If he does catch them, what’s he gonna do, trample ’em to death?”
“He knows all that,” Virgil said.
“And he’s gonna do it anyway?”
“Ain’t about the Indians,” Virgil said. “Or the posse. Or the dead men. Or the woman got hurt.”
“He wants to be president of the United States of America,” I said.
“It’s about Callico,” Virgil said.
41
WE SAT OUR HORSES with Pony Flores behind Red Castle Rock. Chauncey Teagarden was with us. Pony raised his hand and then put his finger on his lips. The horses stood quietly. There was no wind. We listened.
Then Virgil said, “Callico.”
Pony nodded. The sound was very faint. A low murmur of hoofbeats. Virgil scanned the horizon.
Then he said, “From the northeast.”
And there it was, a faint drift of dust, kicked up by the faint beat of hooves.
“Kah-to-nay leave big trail toward river,” Pony said.
“Over there.”
We looked west, where, in the distance, the river ran straight north to south in the deep trench it had dug itself.
“Square Stone River,” I said. “Hard river to get across. Deep, ten-foot banks straight up and down.”
“Kah-to-nay lead them to ford,” Pony said.
“And across?” Virgil said.
“Sí.”
Virgil nodded to himself. There were things Virgil didn’t get. But none of them had to do with his profession. And the things he did get, he got right away.
“Everett,” Virgil said. “You done a lotta Indian fighting when you was soldierin’.”
“I did.”
“You know the ford?”
“I do,” I said.
“How many men would it take to hold the ford?” Virgil said.
Pony smiled. I thought about the ford for a bit.
Then I said, “Depends how bad the enemy wants to cross, but probably ’bout four with Winchesters.”
“So,” Virgil said. “Kah-to-nay makes it look like he and his men crossed. Which they didn’t. Callico goes hell for leather across the ford, ’cause he don’t want to get caught in the water. Kah-to-nay puts, say, four riflemen in the rocks to hold the ford and takes the rest of his bucks hell-bent for Appaloosa. Where the only gun in town is the derringer Pony gave Laurel.”
Teagarden looked at Pony.
“That right?” he said.
Pony smiled.
“Sí,” he said.
“Smart Indian,” Teagarden said.
“Younger brother,” Pony said.
“That how he learned stuff like this?” Teagarden said.
“Sí,” Pony said.
“He tell you he was gonna do this?” Teagarden said.
“No,” Pony said.
“But you know,” Teagarden said.
“Sí.”
“Because that’s what you’d do,” he said.
Pony nodded.
“What I would do,” Pony said.
Teagarden looked silently at Pony for a moment.
“Me, too,” he said.
We sat and watched the barely discernible dust cloud move ahead of the barely audible sound of the horses.
Then I said, “Time to head back to Appaloosa?”
“I believe it is,” Virgil said, and turned his horse northeast.
42
WE PUT Allie and Laurel in the Boston House, on the second floor in front.
“Lock the door, stay inside,” Virgil said, “until me or Everett tells you to come out.”
“Do you think they’ll come soon?” Allie said.
“Yes,” Virgil said. “You got a gun?”
“Yes.”
“Laurel, too,” Virgil said.
“The one Pony gave her. She always has it,” Allie said.
Laurel took the derringer out of her skirt pocket and showed it to Virgil. He nodded. She stepped close to him and whispered. Teagarden and I stood at the front windows, looking down.
“Pony’s on watch,” Virgil said.
Laurel nodded. Her face was pale and very tight. She swallowed hard. And her movements were stiff.
“Ain’t gonna let them near you,” Virgil said.
Laurel nodded stiffly.
“Somehow they get in here,” Virgil said quietly to Allie, “you know what to do.”
Allie nodded.
“How many will come?” she said.
“Pony says between fifteen and twenty.”
“And there’s only four of you,” Allie said.
“More like three and a half,” Virgil said. “Pony said he won’t shoot no Indians.”