“I’m Deputy Creel, Mr. Devery,” Bo said. “This is Deputy Morton.”
“I know who you are,” Devery rumbled. “My brother came crawlin’ up here beggin’ me to let him take those horses back. I asked what you want.”
“We came to talk to your son Luke and your nephew Thad. Are they here?”
“What business is it of yours?”
“Law business,” Scratch snapped. “Better trot ’em out here, Devery.”
The patriarch’s eyes narrowed. “By what authority? You can’t just pin on a badge and call yourself a deputy. Who hired you?”
“Sheriff O’Brien swore us in,” Bo said, dodging the question a little. “It was legal and proper.”
Devery’s upper lip curled. “I’m not sure anything that drunken fool does has any legal standing.”
“He’s the duly elected sheriff,” Bo pointed out. “From what I’ve heard, you even backed him for the position.”
“Well, if he hired a couple of mossbacked saddle tramps for deputies, I’m not sure he’s fit to hold the office. Maybe we need to have ourselves another election around here.”
Bo smiled. “Now that’s not a bad idea,” he said, and saw the frown that the words put on Devery’s hatchet face. “Right now, though, O’Brien’s the sheriff, we’re legally appointed deputies, and we want to talk to Luke and Thad.”
“You don’t want to obstruct justice, now do you, Mr. Devery?” Scratch added in a mocking drawl.
Devery’s already florid face turned an even darker shade of red as blood and fury rushed into it. But he kept a visibly tight rein on his temper and turned his head to shout into the house, “Luke! Thad! Get your sorry asses out here!”
Bo and Scratch kept their hands on their guns, just in case Luke and Thad came out shooting. After a minute, the two younger men shuffled out onto the porch and cast baleful looks at the Texans. Neither of them appeared to be armed.
Jackson Devery waved a knobby-knuckled hand at Bo and Scratch. “These here deputies—” He let scorn drip from the word. “—want to talk to you boys.”
“Why do we have to talk to ’em?” Luke asked in a surly voice. “They’re just a couple of troublemakin’ drifters. They ain’t real deputies.”
“They claim they are,” Devery said. “Just humor ’em…for now.” That last was added with a tone of definite menace.
Luke and Thad stepped to the edge of the porch. “What the hell do you want?” Luke demanded. The big dogs stood up and flanked him, growling low in their throats and looking at Bo and Scratch as if thinking that the Texans would make tasty little snacks.
“All our money and gear back would be a good start,” Scratch said.
Luke sneered and shook his head. “I don’t know what the hell you’re talkin’ about, mister.”
“The two of you and some of your relatives attacked us at the livery stable yesterday,” Bo said.
“No, we didn’t. We went in there to help my Uncle Edgar after you two saddle tramps started tearin’ up the place. That’s what happened.”
“That’s a damned lie,” Scratch said. “You jumped us from behind when we weren’t doin’ anything except talkin’ to Edgar.”
Luke’s face turned almost as red as his beard. “You’d best watch who you’re callin’ a liar, old man. The way I told it is the way it happened, and I got half a dozen witnesses to back it up.”
“The men who helped you try to kill us, you mean? The ones who beat us senseless, stole everything we had, and dumped us in a damn mudhole for the hogs to eat?” Scratch’s voice shook with anger as he spoke, and Bo knew that his old friend was barely holding in the rage he felt.
Luke shook his head. “If that really happened, we didn’t have nothin’ to do with it. We just dragged you outta Uncle Edgar’s barn and left you in the alley beside it.” He laughed coldly. “There’s lots of shady characters in Mankiller these days. Ain’t no tellin’ who did those other things…if they really happened.”
“Yes, you’ve made it plain you don’t believe us,” Bo said.
“And you can’t prove a damned thing otherwise,” Luke gloated.
“Why, you—” Scratch began.
Bo put a hand on his arm. “Take it easy. His word against ours, remember? And we swore to uphold the law.”
Scratch drew in a deep breath and let it out in a sigh of frustration. “All right,” he said. “For now.”
Bo looked at Luke and Thad and went on, “If you boys happen to come across any of our belongings, we’d really appreciate it if they were returned.”
Luke laughed again. “Yeah, sure. We’ll do that, won’t we, Thad?”
Thad just sneered and didn’t say anything.
“In the meantime—and this goes for you, too, Mr. Devery—Deputy Morton and I want you all to know that we’ll be helping Sheriff O’Brien enforce the law and keep the peace around here. If you have any problems, you come to us and let us handle them. Nobody takes the law into their own hands in Mankiller anymore.”
“Is that so?” Jackson Devery demanded. “You know who founded this town, don’t you, Deputy?”
“I do,” Bo said, “but that doesn’t make any difference. The founder of a town isn’t above the law.”
“For a long time, I was the only law in Mankiller!” Devery thundered.
Calmly, but loudly enough that the whole crowd could hear, Bo said, “Well, sir, those days are over.”
Devery glared at the Texans for a moment, then snapped, “Is there anything else you want?”
“Not right now,” Bo replied.
“Then get the hell away from my house. I’m done talkin’.”
With that, Devery turned on his heel and stalked back into the house. Luke and Thad went inside, too, sneering and glowering at Bo and Scratch along the way, slamming the door violently behind them.
“Well, that didn’t do us a damn bit of good,” Scratch said quietly.
“Oh, I don’t know,” Bo said. “We got a look at the old man, and we know now that Luke and Thad aren’t going to tell the truth about what happened yesterday.”
Scratch snorted. “Hell, we knew that anyway.” He paused. “You see those dogs on the porch?”
“It’d be hard to miss them.”
“They’re damn near as big as horses!”
“Bull mastiffs,” Bo said. “They have hungry looks in their eyes, too. I’ll bet they’d come after anybody who walked through that gate. But there are other ways in, if it comes to that.” He smiled. “And who knows, maybe we can make friends with them.”
Scratch just looked doubtful about that idea.
As they turned away from the old house, they saw that the crowd that had followed them up the street was still there, at least for the most part. Folks were lingering, as if they were waiting to see what the Texans would do.
Bo smiled at them and said, “You folks go on about your business now. There’s nothing to see here.”
One man with a balding head and a prominent Adam’s apple stared at them and asked, “Are you fellas really deputies?”
Bo nodded. “Duly appointed and legally sworn.”
“And you’re gonna stand up to the Deverys?”
“We’re going to enforce the law and keep the peace,” Bo said. “That applies to the Deverys the same as it does anyone else.”
The man looked at them for a moment longer, then asked, “Have you met Sam Bradfield?”
“Move along!” Scratch growled. “Or we won’t be the ones needin’ the undertaker.”
The crowd started to break up as Bo and Scratch strode through it, heading back down the hill. They went to the sheriff’s office and found that Biscuits O’Brien had not returned. He was probably in one of the saloons guzzling down rotgut, and he might even be passed out somewhere.
The Texans spent the rest of the afternoon organizing and cleaning up the office, which looked like it hadn’t been swept out in months. There were two cells in the back. Bo took the mattresses from each bunk outside and gave them a good shaking to get rid of as much dust and as many bedbugs as he could. Scratch found a ratty broom in a closet and swept the place, then they both tried to wipe the grime off the windows. By the time they finished, the office and jail didn’t look exactly clean, but at least they weren’t filthy anymore, either.