"I'll go get Hamilcar. He knows somethin' 'bout doctorin'," Fowler cut in. "Maybe Doc Matthews ain't here, after all."
"Hey, Sarge, can I see you a minute?" came a hail from without.
"You manage." Muller made it more order than request as he left.
Drew sat alone with Shannon, one hand on the boy's shoulder to steady him. He was aware of movement behind him. If the fellow at the back table had been dozing earlier, he was roused now.
"Where did you git them spurs?"
Drew turned, his lips shaped a name, tried again, and got it out as a hoarse whisper. "Anse! Don't you know me, Anse?"
He saw eyes lift from the floor level, the scarred cheek under a ragged fringe of beard; and then astonishment in the other's expression became a flashing grin.
"Drew—Drew Rennie! Lordy, it's sure enough Drew Rennie!"
Drew was on his feet. His hands on the other's shoulders pulled him forward into a rough half embrace. "Anse!" He swayed to the joyous pounding of a fist between his shoulder blades. "I thought you were dead!" he somehow gasped.
"An' I seen you go down; a slug got you plumb center!" the Texan sputtered. "Rolled 'round a bush an' saw you git it! But for a ghost you're sure lively!"
"Caught me in the belt buckle," Drew recounted that miracle of the war. "Knocked me out; didn't really touch to matter, though."
Anse pushed away a little, still holding Drew tightly by the upper arms. "Anybody told me I'd see Drew Rennie live an' kickin', I'd said straight to his face he was a fork-tongued liar!"
Drew came partly to his senses and the present. Fowler ... Nye ... either one of them could come back on this reunion. "Anse—listen! This is important. I ain't Drew Rennie—not here, not now—"
"Had to draw a new name outta th' deck?" Anse's grin faded; his eyes narrowed. "All right, what's the goin' handle?"
"Kirby, Drew Kirby ... I'll explain later." He had given the warning only just in time. Fowler and Hamilcar were coming from the back room of the cantina, and there was a stir at the table.
Johnny was sitting up, his head swaying from side to side, his eyes on Drew and Anse. But the stare was unfocused; he must still be only half conscious. Drew had a fleeting prick of worry. Had Shannon heard anything he would remember? There was nothing to be done about that now.
7
" ... and that's the way it is." Drew sat on the stool which was the only other furnishing in the bath cubicle while Anse splashed and wallowed in the slab tub.
The Texan swiped soap from his cheek. "An' ain't you gonna tell?"
"I don't know. Would you?"
"Go with m' hat in hand an' say, 'Well, Pa, here's your wanderin' boy'? No, I dunno as how I'd be makin' that kinda play neither. Never was one to unspool th' bedroll till I was sure o' th' brand I was ridin' for. An' you an' me's kinda hide-matched there. Glad you wised me up in time."
"Maybe I didn't," Drew admitted.
"You mean that Shannon? I know you think he's filin' his teeth for you, but I'd say he was too busy countin' stars from that skull beltin' to make sense out of our hurrawin'. I'll give him th' eye though. Lissen now, you're Kirby—so am I called for a rebrandin', too? Seems like two Kirbys turnin' up in a town this size is gonna make a few people ask some questions."
"You're my cousin—Anson Kirby." Drew had already thought that out. "Now, you've some tall talkin' to do your ownself. I saw you roll out of your saddle back in Tennessee. How come you turn up here and now?"
Anse sluiced water over his head and shoulders with cupped hands.
"Do I tell it jus' like it happened, you'll think I'm callin' up mountains outta prairie-dog hills, it's that crazy. But it's range truth. Yeah, I landed outta that saddle on some mighty hard ground. If you'll remember, I had me a hole in the shoulder big enough to let th' wind whistle through. I rolled between th' bushes jus' in time to see you get it—plumb center an' final, so I thought. Then ... well, I don't remember too good for a while. Next time I was able to take a real interest I was lyin' on a bed with about a mountain of quilts on top me, weaker'n a yearlin' what's jus' been dragged outta a bog hole. Seems like them Yankees gathered me up with th' rest of them bushwacker scrubs, but when they got me a mile or so down th' road they decided as how I'd had it good an' there was no use wastin' wagon room on me. So they let me lie....
"Only," the Texan paused and then continued more soberly, "Drew, sometimes—sometimes it seems like a hombre can have a mite more'n his share of luck; or else he's got him Someone as is line ridin' for him. We had us friends in Tennessee, an' it jus' happened as how I was dropped where one of them families found me. They sure was good folks; patched me up an' saw me through like I was their close kin. Hid me out by sayin' as how I had th' cholera.
"An' most of th' time I didn't know a rope from a saddle—outta my head complete. First there was that shoulder hole; then I got me a good case of lung fever. It was two months 'fore I could crawl round better'n a sick calf what lost its ma too early. Then, jus' as I got so I could stamp m' boots on th' ground an' expect to stand straight up in 'em, this here Yankee patrol came 'long an' dogged me right into a bunch o' our boys they had rounded up. I had me some weeks in a prison stockade, which ain't, I'm tellin' you, no way for to spend any livin' time. Then this here war was over, an' I was loose. No hoss, no nothin'. Some of th' boys got to talkin' 'bout trailin' back to Texas, tryin' out some ranchin' in the bush country. A lotta wild stuff down there—nobody's been runnin' brands on anythin' much since '61. We planned to get a herd of mavericks, drive up into Kansas or Missouri, an' sell. A couple of th' boys had run stuff in that way for th' army, even swum 'em across the Mississippi. It would maybe give us a start. An'—well, there weren't nothin' else to do. So we tried it." Anse sat staring down at the water lapping at his lean middle. His was a very thin body, the ribs standing out beneath the skin almost as harshly as did the weal of the scar on his shoulder.
"And it didn't work?"
"Well, it might've. I ain't sayin' it won't for some hombres. Only we run into trouble. Texas ain't Texas no more; it's th' Fifth Military District. Any man what fought for th' Confederacy ain't got any rights. It's worse'n an Injun war. We got us our herd, leastwise th' beginnin' of one. An' that was back-breakin' work—we was feelin' as beat as when we run out of Tennessee after Franklin. Only we kept to it, 'cause it would give us a stake. So we started drivin' north, an' they jumped us."
"Who?"
"Yankees—th' brand what probably set at home an' let others do th' real fightin'—ready to come in an' take over once th' shootin' was done with. They grabbed th' herd. Shot Will Bachus when he stood up to 'em, an' made it all legal 'cause they had a tin-horn deputy ridin' with 'em. Well, we got him anyway an' two or three of th' others. But then they called in th' army, an' we had to ride for it. Scattered so they had more'n one trail to follow. But they posted us as 'wanted' back there. So I come whippin' a mighty tired hoss outta Texas, an' I ain't plannin' on goin' back to any Fifth Military District!"
"Any chance they'll push a star after you here?"
"No. I'm jus' small stuff, not worth botherin' 'bout by their reckonin', now I ain't got anythin' left them buzzards can pick offen m' bones. They's sittin' tight an' gittin' fat right there."
"Then it's all set." Drew tossed Anse a towel. "Climb out and we'll get started!"
"Doin what?"
"You've worked horses, and they can use another wrangler on the Range. Right now they've a lot to be topped—want to gentle 'em some and trade 'em south into Mexico. If you ride for Don Cazar, nobody's goin' to ask too many questions."
"How d'you know he'll sign me on?" Anse studied his own unkempt if now clean reflection in the shaving mirror on the wall. "I sure don't look like no bargain."