Decker looked up and down the street, then holstered his gun and reluctantly agreed. Whoever had taken the shot at him was gone.
“Did you see him at all?” Roman asked as they began walking.
“I didn’t see a thing,” Decker said bitterly. “Not a blessed thing.”
In the doctor’s office, which was above the general store, Decker went over his story again for the sheriff while his shoulder was being patched.
“Dug a nice furrow,” the doctor said, “but all in all I’d say you were damn lucky.”
“I agree,” Roman said. “Tell me again what happened,” and Decker went into his story.
“Sounds like whoever it was was waiting for you to come and expected to hit you with the one shot, otherwise you might have caught them coming down from the roof.”
“That’s what I figure,” Decker said. “They took the shot and immediately left the roof. If I had been a little quicker in reacting—”
“Can’t blame yourself for that,” Roman said. “How were you to know they weren’t waiting to take another shot?”
“I guess you’re right.”
The doctor cleaned the wound, bandaged it, and then told Decker to put his shirt back on.
“What do I owe you, Doc?” Decker said.
The doctor named a figure, and the bounty hunter paid him.
“Going back to your hotel?” Roman asked.
“I think I’ll go over to the Broadus House and see if their whiskey is as good as their beer.”
“If I were you I’d hole up in my room for a while. Whoever it was might decide to make another try to night.”
“I hope they do,” Decker said. “This time I’ll be a little quicker.”
Chapter Twenty
The Broadus House wasn’t even half full, and there was a lone poker game going on in one corner. There was one girl working, and although she was as pretty—or prettier—than the ones across the street, her dress was not as fancy. It was low-cut, but it was plain.
Decker went to the bar, and the bartender smiled, remembering him.
“Beer?” he asked.
“Whiskey first, then a beer.”
The bartender poured him a shot.
“Been across the street?”
“Yep.”
“Like it?”
Decker made a face and said, “It’s too damn noisy.”
“Got some good-looking women over there, though, don’t they?”
Decker glanced at the woman at the end of the bar, who looked back.
“You don’t seem to be doing so bad here,” he said.
“Ah, that’s Martha. They’ve tried to hire her at the Dice Box, but she’s loyal.”
“Really?”
“She doesn’t like the owners. They treat the women who work for them like slaves.”
“And you don’t?”
“I treat a woman like a woman,” the bartender said. He saw the look on Decker’s face and said, “Don’t get me wrong. That ain’t what I mean. I don’t tell Martha she’s got to get ten guys a night into her room or anything like that. She wants to take a guy upstairs, that’s her business. All I want her for down here is to have guys buy her drinks.”
“Sounds like a nice arrangement. What does she drink?”
“Anything.”
“Give her what she wants, on me,” Decker said.
“Sure.”
Decker eyed Martha, who was young and blonde…and alive, just like he was—only he was lucky to be alive.
The bartender poured Martha a shot of whiskey. She raised the glass to Decker in thanks. Decker raised his in return, downed it, then called for his beer.
He took the beer over to the poker game and watched for a while. It was low stakes and slow—paced, and he had no desire to sit in.
“See that feller sitting on the porch at Jo’s today?” one of them asked.
“Oh, yeah. Imagine living off a woman like that, jest sitting around her house while she works,” another man said.
“What about the time he spends away?” someone asked. “Where do you suppose he goes?”
“Who knows?”
“Maybe he’s got hisself a woman in another town,” one of them said. “You know, like living two lives?”
Decker was listening intently.
“Unfriendly cuss, that one. You’d think since he’s been in and out of this town nigh onto a year he’d say hello or something. He ever talk to you boys?”
“He’s been in the store once or twice,” one of them said. “Talks real slow and careful, like. Can’t figure it out. Maybe he’s simple-minded.”
The others laughed at the prospect, although one of them said it was unlikely that a pretty woman like Josephine would take up with a simpleton.
Suddenly they looked up at Decker, as if just real izing that he was watching.
“You wanna play, mister? We got an empty seat.”
Decker turned and looked at Martha, who was standing at the bar. She smiled invitingly at him.
“Maybe just a little while,” he said, taking the seat.
Or at least until he found out where this Josephine lived.
Chapter Twenty-one
Josephine was nervous, but she understood why Brand couldn’t go to the livery stable himself and look at all the horses. If the man who was after him was in town, then he couldn’t afford to be seen.
It was late, but the stable was still open. The liveryman, however, must have gone to have dinner. Josephine wondered why the man didn’t lock up when he left the stable. It would be very easy for someone to steal a horse.
She entered the stable and found it shrouded in darkness. She looked around for a storm lamp, found one, and lit it. Carrying it with her, she went from stall to stall, hoping that she wouldn’t find what she was looking for.
She found it, in a stall all the way in the back. The stall contained a good-looking gelding, and the saddle that went with the horse. Hanging from the saddlehorn was a hangman’s noose.
She shivered when she saw it. She would have hugged herself except that she had the storm lamp in her hand. The gelding gave her a baleful stare, as if wondering who she was and what she was doing there. Then he looked away.
Josephine backed out of the stall hurriedly, then turned to run. As she did, her feet got tangled, and then the heel snapped off one of her shoes, causing her to fall. The storm lamp was jarred from her hand. It landed on a patch of hay, and she saw the flicker of flame as the hay started to catch fire. Moving quickly, she grabbed a nearby blanket and smothered the flame. Luckily, the oil had not leaked from the lantern or there would have been a blaze that she couldn’t have put out with a blanket.
Moving as quickly as she could, Josephine put the lantern back on the wall hook where she had found it and ran out of the stable.
Brand waited at the house. He knew he should have gone to the stable himself, but he couldn’t take the chance of being seen there. If Decker was in town, he was going to have to kill him, and it wouldn’t do to be seen snooping around the man’s horse.
Once he killed Decker, his only problem would be the sheriff. He would be the only one who knew who Brand really was. He could pay the man for his silence, he thought. But once that started it would never stop.
No, he’d have to kill Roman, also, but in such a way that no one would suspect he had done it.
If he could kill both men quickly and without anyone finding out about it, there was a chance he could save his life here in Broadus.
He’d killed for less in the past.
No sooner had he started playing than Decker noticed something. One of the men at the table was a professional gambler. It struck him odd that such a man would be in a low-stakes game instead of across the street for much more money.