Both men had reacted to Bo’s sudden, unexpected action. They stiffened in their chairs and started reaching under their coats. The sound of Scratch’s gun being cocked was loud in the smoky silence. Caught between the two weapons, the men froze, then slowly moved their hands back into plain sight.
“On the table,” Bo ordered.
They placed their hands on the ratty green felt and glared up at the Texans with murderous hatred.
“What do they call you?” Bo asked.
“I’m Stansbridge,” said the one who had spoken first.
“Keegan,” the other man added.
“All right,” Bo said. “Were either of you in the game Duke Mayo was playing in last night?”
“We both were,” Stansbridge said.
“How did he do?”
“He cleaned up,” Keegan replied with a sneer.
“Took your dinero, did he?” Scratch drawled.
Stansbridge’s narrow shoulders rose and fell. “You win, you lose. That’s the nature of the game.”
“Did you take it unkindly when you lost?” Bo asked.
“Didn’t bother us a bit,” Keegan said.
“If you’re accusing us of something, Deputy, why don’t you just come right out with it?” Stansbridge said.
“All right, I will. Did you follow Mayo when he left here, cut his throat, and steal back the money he won?”
“Of course not,” Stansbridge said in a cool, unruffled voice. “We’ve been right here. We haven’t set foot out of the place in more than twelve hours.” He raised his voice a little. “Isn’t that right, Mike?”
Ashton ran a filthy rag over the scarred wood of the bar. “That’s right,” he said. “They been sittin’ right there, Deputy.”
Bo glanced over at the Fan-Tan’s proprietor. “I thought you didn’t pay any attention to what was going on in here.”
“Some things I see, some things I don’t,” Ashton said. “But I know those two haven’t left, just like they told you.”
Bo didn’t believe what the three men had said, but he couldn’t disprove it, and he sensed that they wouldn’t budge from their stories. He had a strong hunch that he was looking at the murderers of Duke Mayo. There was a matter of proof, though.
“All right,” he said heavily as he lowered the hammer of his gun and then pouched the iron. “I’m putting you on notice, though, Ashton. If we hear about any trouble in this place, we’ll shut it down. You understand?”
Ashton looked like he wanted to come over the bar and tear into the Texans, but he controlled his anger. “I heard about you two. Comin’ into town and actin’ like you’re runnin’ things now. The Deverys’ll settle your hash. You just hide and watch.”
Bo ignored that. “Don’t forget what I said.”
As he and Scratch turned toward the door, the swamper’s foot suddenly bumped against the bucket and upset it. Dirty, soapy water spilled out on the floor. The old man jumped back, crying out in alarm.
“You damned old fool!” Ashton bellowed at him. “Clean that mess up! Right now, you hear me?” He leaned forward over the bar and spat in disgust at the swamper’s feet. “I don’t know why I keep you around here in the first place.”
“I’m sorry, Mike, I’m sorry! I’ll go get another bucket of water and clean it up right now!”
The swamper grabbed the bucket and headed for the back door. Ashton swatted at him with the bar rag but missed.
Bo could tell that Scratch wanted to go to the old-timer’s defense. He caught his friend’s eye and shook his head. They had more important things to deal with at the moment.
Back out in the street, they paused in front of the Fan-Tan. Scratch said, “Bo, you know damned well those two killed that fella Mayo.”
“I expect you’re right,” Bo admitted. “As long as Ashton backs their story, though—”
The sound of someone hissing at them caught the Texans’ attention. They turned to see the old swamper standing at the corner of the building. He beckoned to them with a palsied hand.
Bo and Scratch looked at each other and frowned. Then Bo shrugged, and they went over to see what the swamper wanted.
“What can we do for you, mister?” Scratch asked.
The old man licked his lips nervously. “Are…you boys really lawmen?”
“Yeah, but I ain’t sure you could call us boys,” Scratch said. “Hell, I’ll bet you ain’t that much older than us.”
The swamper shook his head. “It ain’t the years so much as it is the miles.”
“We’ve put plenty of those behind us, too,” Bo said. “Now, what was it you wanted to tell us?”
The old man’s fingertips rasped on the white beard stubble that poked from his chin. “I heard you askin’ about Duke Mayo. I was in there when he cashed in from that game and left. It was just a couple o’ minutes after that when them other two, Stansbridge and Keegan, left, too. They lied to you about that, and so did Ashton.”
Bo felt his heart beat a little faster in anticipation. “You’d swear to that in court?” he asked.
The swamper hesitated. “I dunno…I knocked that bucket over a’purpose so’s I could come tell you about it, but I don’t like the idea of standin’ up in court and sayin’ the same thing.”
“You don’t have to worry about Ashton and those gamblers,” Scratch told him. “They’d be arrested by then. They couldn’t hurt you.”
“Yeah, but what if they was to get loose for some reason? A jury might set ’em free, even though ever’body would know they was guilty.”
Bo couldn’t dispute that. It wasn’t uncommon for the members of a frontier jury to ignore the facts of a case and just do what they wanted to do, whether it was convicting an innocent man or acquitting a guilty one. He didn’t want to let Stansbridge and Keegan get away with murdering Duke Mayo, though, and he was certain that was what had happened.
“Tell you what,” he said. “We’ll arrest the three of them and tell them we have a witness, but we won’t say anything about who it is. Maybe once they’re behind bars, they’ll go ahead and confess.”
“Maybe…” the swamper said, but he sounded doubtful.
“We’ll do everything we can to protect you,” Bo promised. “Sooner or later, somebody’s got to stand up for what’s right. That’s the only way we can bring law and order to Mankiller.”
The swamper took a deep breath, then nodded his head. “All right. Lemme get back in there before you come in, though, so’s they won’t have as much reason to think it was me you been talkin’ to.”
Bo nodded and said, “Sure, we can do that.”
Scratch added, “How come you want to see them get what’s comin’ to them? They treat you bad?”
“Ashton’s a jackass, and pizen-mean. The other two ain’t much better. But Duke, he always had a kind word for me and slipped me a little dinero now and then. For a tinhorn gambler, he weren’t a bad sort. He had a wife, too, a gal named Janey, and she was pretty nice for a whore.” The swamper shook his head. “Folks go down some wrong trails sometimes—I done it myself, more often than I like to think about—but that don’t mean they’re bad sorts.”
Bo put a hand on the man’s shoulder. “You’re right about that, amigo. Now get back in there with your bucket, and we’ll wait a few minutes before we arrest those varmints.”
The swamper nodded and turned to hurry toward the back of the building. He disappeared behind the Fan-Tan.
“I just thought of somethin’,” Scratch said. “We’ve only got two cells in the jail, and they got prisoners in ’em already. If we arrest Ashton, Stansbridge, and Keegan, where’re we gonna put ’em?”
Bo frowned. “That’s a problem, all right. If we’re going to clean up this town, we’ll need more space for prisoners. I’ll have to talk to Lucinda and some of the others about that. For now, though, I think I saw a smokehouse with a pretty sturdy door on it. We can put them in there and lock it up.”