“I don’t know. You sure can’t tell from out here that there’s anybody inside.”
Matt lifted a hand. “Let’s find out.” He rapped sharply on the rear door.
For a long moment, there was no response. Then the blood brothers heard somebody fumbling with a latch inside the door. The panel swung back a couple of inches.
“Yeah?” a man’s gruff voice asked.
“Ike Loomis from the livery stable at the other end of town told us we could get a drink here,” Matt said bluntly.
“He did, did he?” The door swung open farther. “Well, why didn’t you say so? Come on in!”
Darkness loomed inside the barn. Matt and Sam glanced at each other, then warily stepped forward into the shadows. If this was some sort of trick, whoever was trying to pull it was going to be mighty sorry.
The door whispered shut behind them. Then another door opened, and as light flooded in, Matt and Sam realized that they had been admitted to some sort of small anteroom. When both doors were closed at the same time, they wouldn’t let any light out. The little chamber probably hadn’t been in the barn when it was being used as a livery stable. It must have been added on later.
As Matt and Sam walked into the barn, they looked around in surprise. Even though Ike Loomis had told them they could get a drink here, they hadn’t really expected to find a full-fledged saloon in operation, complete with a hardwood bar with a brass foot rail, tables and chairs, including a poker table, and shelves full of liquor bottles behind the bar. There was even a tasteful painting of a nude hung on the wall, much like the one in the hotel’s card room, only the gal in this one had blond hair and if anything was even more lushly built than the other. More than a dozen men stood at the bar, drinking, and several of the tables were occupied, as well.
The only real differences between this establishment and a real saloon were that the floor was dirt here, instead of wood, there were big sections of black cloth hung up over the front doors like curtains to prevent any light from seeping around them, there was no piano player or music of any sort, and the customers were talking quietly, without any loud, raucous conversation or laughter.
The man who had let them in was huge, with brawny arms, massive shoulders, a pugnacious jaw, and a red handlebar mustache to go with a shock of rusty hair. He told Matt and Sam, “You fellas go on in and have a good time. Just be quiet about it. We can’t afford to have any ruckuses in here. My pa and Marshal Coleman are old friends, and it’d be mighty awkward if the marshal had to arrest Pa and me for runnin’ an illegal saloon.”
“Ike Loomis is your father?” Matt asked.
The big young man nodded. “Yep. My name’s Mike. Red Mike, they sometimes call me, on account of my hair. I take care of this place for Pa.”
“Well, we won’t cause any trouble,” Sam assured him. “My friend here just wants to get a drink.”
“What about you?” Mike Loomis asked.
“I don’t use the stuff that much.”
“Good. You look like a half-breed to me, and Injuns don’t handle booze too well.”
Sam stiffened in anger, but Matt put a hand on his arm and said, “Come on, Sam.”
“Wait a minute,” Mike Loomis said. “I recognize you fellas now. You’re the hombres who helped Marshal Coleman arrest those troublemakers who attacked old Pete Hilliard.” He held a hand out to Sam. “I’m sorry about what I just said, mister. I didn’t mean no offense.”
Sam wasn’t sure he wanted to be that quick to accept the man’s apology, but his natural grace came to the fore and he gripped Mike Loomis’s hand. “That’s fine.”
“Enjoy yourselves, and if there’s anything I can do for you, just let me know.”
The blood brothers went over to the bar, where Matt ordered a shot of whiskey and a beer from the apron-clad bartender. He threw back the whiskey the man placed in front of him and licked his lips appreciatively.
“That’s good stuff.”
“It ought to be,” the man said. “The boss pays plenty for it. It’s the best that’s brewed in these parts.”
“That whiskey’s made around here, not brought in from some other state?” Sam asked.
“Shoot, the boss couldn’t afford to do that, and anyway, those special marshals would make it too hard to transport that far without gettin’ caught. It’s hard enough just gettin’ the home-brewed stuff into town without anybody findin’ out about it.”
Matt pushed the empty glass across the hardwood. “I’ll have another. Who brews those fine corn squeezin’s, anyway?”
The bartender tipped the unlabeled bottle in his hand and splashed more whiskey into Matt’s glass. Then, as he corked the bottle, he looked over Matt’s shoulder and nodded.
“There she is right now. That girl.”
Chapter 9
“Girl?” Matt and Sam exclaimed at the same time, both of them surprised by the bartender’s statement. They turned to look in the direction he had indicated.
The person he was talking about was a girl, all right. Or a young woman, rather. There was no doubt about that, despite the fact that she wore boots, jeans, and a man’s shirt with the sleeves rolled up over tanned, smoothly rounded forearms. Her hat hung behind her head by its chin strap, allowing thick masses of curly brown hair to fall free around her shoulders. She moved with an easy grace across the room, nodding and speaking to several of the men she passed. Then she said something to Red Mike Loomis and went out through the rear door.
Matt let out a low whistle of surprise and admiration, then turned to the bartender and said, “She’s a moonshiner?”
“Well, her family is,” the man replied. “I don’t know for sure who does what. I just sell the stuff she brings into town for us. There’s a bunch of those Harlows. The pa, the girl, and four or five brothers.”
“I notice that she packs iron,” Sam commented.
“Yeah,” the bartender said. “I reckon that’s in case she runs into trouble while she’s making her deliveries.”
Matt had seen the ivory-handled revolver holstered on the young woman’s trim hip, but the fact that it was there hadn’t really penetrated his brain until now. He had been too taken in by her beauty. He turned to the bartender and repeated, “Deliveries?”
The drink juggler nodded. “Yeah, from what I hear, the Harlow family supplies most of the county with booze. Them who want it have to pay a pretty price these days, too, what with those special marshals roaming around and all.”
Matt supposed that was true. And it meant that the young woman and her family would be in danger from the governor’s gun-toting special agents. He recalled the bomb blast he and Sam had witnessed earlier that day, and a little shiver went through him at the thought of the young woman getting caught in an explosion like that. Somebody as pretty as she was shouldn’t be running such risks, he thought.
“Hello, Matt.”
The man’s voice came from behind Matt. He turned and saw Linus Grady, the gambler who’d killed Seward Stone in the hotel. Grady smiled and went on. “I see you found the other place where folks can play a hand of poker in Cottonwood.”
“Yeah, we heard about it from Ike Loomis,” Matt replied. He inclined his head toward his blood brother. “This is Sam Two Wolves, by the way. I don’t recall if you fellas were ever introduced this afternoon or not.”
Grady nodded. “I’m pleased to meet you, Sam. Care to sit in on a game?”
“Thanks, but I don’t play poker that often,” Sam said. “That’s Matt’s game.”
Grady turned back to Matt and asked, “How about it? I don’t think we’ll have the same problems here that we did earlier. Red Mike makes sure everyone stays in line.”
Matt thought it over for a second, then shook his head. “No, thanks. It’s been a long day, and I’m a mite tired. Reckon we’ll go back to the hotel and turn in.”