“No.”
“How ’bout you, Monroe? You got ’ny jerky? Anything to eat?”
“I ain’t got nothin’ a’tall left,” Monroe said.
“Well, son of a bitch, I’m hungry.”
“Yeah, me too,” Casey said. “I could damn near eat this saddle.”
“Quit your bellyachin’, all of you,” Fargo said. “Do you think I ain’t hungry? But you don’t hear me bitchin’ about it, do you?”
“Well, what are you goin’ to do about it?” Dagen asked.
“What do you mean, what am I going to do about it? What am I supposed to do about it?”
“You’re the leader, ain’t you? Leastwise, you been claimin’ to be the leader. You the reason we had to hightail it out of Mesquite. So by my way of thinkin’, that means it’s up to you to find us somethin’ to eat,” Dagen said.
“Yeah,” Casey agreed. “You’re the leader. Do some leadin’. Get us somethin’ to eat.”
“All right, there’s a ranch up ahead,” Fargo said. “We’ll get somethin’ to eat there.”
“How? Are we just going to walk up to the door and say, ‘Excuse me, but we’re awful hungry, and we was won-derin’ iffen maybe you wouldn’t feed us’?” Dagen said.
“Something like that,” Fargo replied.
“Well, I ain’t one for beggin’,” Dagen said. “I like to earn my keep.”
“Earn it?” Casey said with a laugh. “Dagen, what the hell do you mean earn it? You’re a thief, for crying out loud. We’re all thieves.”
“Yeah, well, that’s earnin’ it,” Dagen said. “Sort of.”
The others laughed.
“Don’t make me laugh no more,” Monroe said. “I ain’t got enough spit left to laugh.”
“Where is this here ranch anyhow?” Casey asked. “’Cause, I sure don’t see nothin’ that looks like a ranch.”
“It’s just up ahead a little ways,” Fargo said. “Another couple of miles is all.”
“You sure about that?”
“Yes, I’m sure about that. I told you, I used to live around here. Fact is, I worked on this ranch once. It’s the Double R Ranch.”
“Double R,” Dagen said.
“Double R for Raymond Reynolds,” Fargo said. He tore off a chew of tobacco, settled it in his jaw, then put his plug away.
“How come you quit ranchin’?” Monroe asked.
“’Cause the only thing dumber’n a cow on a cattle ranch is the men who are dumb enough to punch ’em,” Fargo said. “You are either too hot or too cold, too wet or too dry, and you ain’t never got two nickels to rub together in your pocket. I had me a bellyful of it, so I just up and quit.”
“I’ve always thought I’d kind of like to be a cowboy,” Monroe said.
“You’d make a good cowboy,” Fargo said.
“I would?”
Fargo leaned over and spit. “Yep. You’re just exactly what all the ranchers is lookin’ for. Someone who is dumb enough to do it.”
“That ain’t right for you to say,” Monroe said. “I ain’t all that dumb.”
“You ain’t?”
“No.”
“You’re ridin’ with me, ain’t you?” Fargo asked. He spit again, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Anyone who would ride with me is dumber’n shit.”
“Hey,” Dagen said. “When you say that, you’re saying that about all of us.”
“Yep.”
“Includin’ yourself,” Casey pointed out.
Fargo spit the last of his chew. “I’m especially talkin’ about myself,” he said.
They rode on in silence for another few miles; then Fargo pointed toward a ranch house in the distance. “There it is,” he said. “Just like I told you.”
Dagen and the other two riders started sloping down a long hill toward the main house.
“Where you goin’?” Fargo asked.
“Toward the ranch house,” Dagen replied. “Didn’t you say we’d get something to eat here?”
“Yeah, but not there,” Fargo replied. “Come this way.” He cut his horse off to the left, at almost a right angle to the way they had been going.
“What are we goin’ that way for? That’s the house over there, ain’t it?”
“Yeah, but I told you, we’re not goin’ to the house,” Fargo said.
“Well, if we ain’t goin’ to the house, just where the hell are we goin’?”
“You’ll see.”
Fargo led them on for about two more miles, and though Dagen and the others were anxious to know what he had in mind, it seemed clear enough by his determination that he had something in mind. And at this point, there was nothing they could do but follow.
“There it is,” Fargo said after a while. “That’s where we’ll get our next meal.” He pointed to a small adobe cabin that rose, like a clump of dirt, from the desert floor.
“Yeah,” Dagen said, smiling broadly and nodding his head. “Yeah, I see what you’re up to now.”
“Wait a minute! That’s what we come all this way for? A little dirt hut like that? What the hell is it?” Monroe asked.
“Monroe, if you’d ever done one day’s work in your life, you would recognize it,” Dagen said. “It’s a line shack.”
“What’s a line shack?”
“It’s where the cowboys that watch over the herds in the field stay,” Dagen said. “It’s lonely work, but as I recall, most of the time the cowboys in the line shacks eat better’n the boys back in the bunkhouse.”
“I’ve heard that my ownself,” Casey said. “But I ain’t never spent no time in a line shack.”
“I have,” Dagen said. “And believe me, whoever is in there now will have food.”
“What if they do have food?” Monroe asked. “You don’t really think they’ll just share it with us, do you?”
“Oh, I don’t intend to ask them to share it,” Fargo said. “I intend to just take it. Dismount, pull your long guns, and follow me.”
“What do we want with our rifles?” Dagen asked.
“You’ll be needin’ them,” Fargo said without further explanation.
There were four cowboys inside the small adobe line shack. One was asleep on the bunk; the other three were sitting across a small table from each other, playing cards. They were playing for matches only, but that didn’t lessen the intensity of their game. When one of them took the pot with a pair of aces, another one complained.
“Sandy, you son of a bitch! Where’d you get that ace?” His oath, however, was softened by a burst of laughter.
“Don’t you know? I took it from Shorty’s boot while he was asleep.”
“Does Shorty keep an ace in his boot?”
“You think he don’t? I never know’d him to do anythin’ honest when he could cheat.”
“That’s the truth of it,” Shorty admitted from his bunk, proving that he wasn’t actually asleep. “Hell, it’s the only way I can be sure to win. But Arnie is just as bad.”
“I am not,” the dealer replied.
“And so is Curley,” Shorty added.
“Well, now you’re right there,” the third cardplayer said. “I will cheat if I think I can get away with it.”
The others laughed.
The cards were raked in, the deck shuffled, then dealt again.
“Hey, do either one of you know Jennie?” Arnie asked as he dealt the cards.
“Jennie? Jennie who?” Sandy asked as he began picking up cards.
“You know Jennie who,” Arnie insisted. “She’s one of the whores down at the Desert Flower.”
“Oh, yeah, that Jennie. What about her?”
“Well, here’s the thing. Do you fellas think she likes me?” Arnie asked.
The others laughed. “Do we think she likes you? Damn, Arnie, she likes anybody who has enough money to take her upstairs,” Sandy said.
“You’re just talkin’,” Arnie said. “She won’t go upstairs with just anybody.”
“You may be right about that,” Shorty said from the bunk. “She won’t go upstairs with Curley. I mean, he’s so damn ugly he can’t come up with enough money to make any woman go upstairs with him.”