“Yes, I believe so. It’s the transference of the body’s heat which is important. Here. Wait, and I’ll—”
“This sure is a kindness, ma’am. I’m feeling considerable warmer already. But I’m right embarrassed too. What I mean, I’ve never been in the same bed with a female person, of course, but isn’t this how — I mean the way — I mean—”
“Heavens, I don’t know either. Do you think this is all that—”
“Well, I certainly never expected you would know, ma’am, not a respectable unmarried lady like yourself. But what I would guess, it probably has got something to do with — well, not meaning anything, but jest sort of hypothetical, I reckon I would have to adjust my position a trifle, sort of like this — I mean if I were growed up enough and we were married folks and all, which is the only circumstances under which I would give a passing thought to such things…”
“Of course. But hypothetically, yes, if we were, do you imagine it’s anything like—”
“Well, this could be it, maybe. But next I would most likely have to arrange myself like this, and then sort of like…”
“Like that?”
“I reckon so. And then I’d—”
“Oh, dear. Oh, dear me—”
“Don’t you reckon that would be how it—”
“Well, I don’t know, but — but—”
“Oh. Oh, well, hang it now—”
“What is it? What are you doing? Oh, don’t! Please don’t, I—”
“Well, now, I jest can’t help it, ma’am, I truly can’t. Durned if’n that chill ain’t come back over me, worse’n ever. Why, I jest think I’m about to start shivering so I can’t stop for nothing—”
Perhaps he heard her. In any event he dozed only fitfully, vaguely conscious that she was pacing. Moonlight was streaming through a window then, and later he would definitely recall a vision of her standing over him, wringing her hands. “What have we done?” she was wailing. “What have we done!” But then he turned away from the disturbance.
Or perhaps he saw her when she was dressing also, or heard her when she decided, talking only to herself. “I’ll have to ask someone,” she said. “Because there must be a man of the cloth in town, surely. The sheriff would know. Yes, I’ll ask Mr. Birdsill.” But if he heard he gave no sign.
Yet when the pain woke him he seemed to know instinctively, knew even before he became aware that the blankets were coarser now, the bed more lumpy. What told him first was the ache itself, which was in his temple. Then, when he lifted a hand to touch the soreness, he knew without question, since his other hand was jerked upward by the movement, fixed fast to the first by the ancient rusted iron manacles.
He was in his woolens, but he could see his clothing where it lay in a pile on the cell floor. He found the tender lump behind his ear then too, and he moaned once, less in realization of his new predicament than from ineffable, sad resignation. “Oh, Dingus, you jest never ought to have gonter sleep,” he said aloud.
“I don’t reckon you should of,” Hoke Birdsill said indulgendy.
Dingus was on his right side, and he turned his head experimentally, considering Hoke through the bars. The sheriff sat at his all-too-familiar desk, evidently writing something, and a shotgun was situated at his right hand, pointing direct;y into the cell. “Nice to have you back, you double-dealing, women-and-children-terrifying dishonorable skunk,” Hoke said, setting aside the pen.
So Dingus felt it then himself, finally began to taste the beginning of an outrage of his own. He started to sit up, forgetting about his wound, and then had to jerk back quickly as the pain caught him up. Hoke laughed. “You feeling somewhat peaked, are you, you miserable twerp?”
“I feel all right,” Dingus grunted. “No thanks to you, you boudoir-crawling varmint. Goldang it now, every durned time a feller takes off* his pants you — how’d you get me in here? You found me asleep and went and pistol-whipped me, dint you, you—”
“Weren’t nothing,” Hoke said casually. “Although as it happens I were jest writing the facts of it down, on account of the newspapers will no doubt be interested.”
“You gonter tell me, or jest sit there licking that floppy yeller mustache?”
“Why, sure, but like I say, it weren’t nothing. Miss Agnes Pfeffer come rushing in here, oh, maybe half an hour back, all distracted and talking about a preacher or some such, and so first I thought maybe it were a feller in town, name of Brother Rowbottom, raising a small ruckus somewheres like he does. But then she remarked about it being a boy all shot up, and so I dint have to ask what boy, not being a famous peace officer jest because of my handsome good looks alone, nacherly. So anyways I dint let her rave no more, but I told her who you was, and then that poor helpless creature, why, she like to scared me out’n my wits with a heartrending fainting fit. Goes to show you what being confronted with a immoral desperado like yourself will do to a well-bred lady, all right. Which reminds me that Doc has no doubt took her back home by now, and I ought to go on up and reassure her that you’re permanently out’n harm’s way once again in your degenerate career. I already done finished writing that letter, incidentally, asking when I kin get to put a rope around your miserable neck again, and the one to Santa Fe about that nine thousand and five hundred dollars in the new rewards likewise. Meantimes don’t start thinking you’re gonter trick me about escaping no second time, Dingus, not with them handcuffs and—”
“Did I ask you about all that? Did I ask you any blasted thing more than except how you got me in here?”
“Well, that were the all of it, anyways. After I took Miss Pfeffer to Doc’s I jest went on up to her residence and apprehended you.”
Dingus had raised himself to his hands and knees on the cot. “Well, fix your ornery hide — and I were asleep, weren’t I? So what did you have to go and coldcock me for in the process?”
“Why, Dingus, whatever give you the idea you was asleep? You was a mite drunk, I reckon, seeing as how you’d done took your clothes off after the lady ran out, but you was parading around the house with your six-guns all primed and strapped on under your nekked belly-button, sure enough.”
“Huh? Why, my guns wasn’t nowheres near the—”
“ ‘Course they was. And then we drawed on each other, like always happens when a stalwart sheriff meets up with a notorious desperado — but I beat you easy. Had the drop on you afore you could scratch two gnats off’n a whore’s behind. So then you tried to skedaddle, being cowardly at heart like most immoral criminals. I could of kilt you, but I dint see no reason to do that, seeing as how I get the same reward money either way. So I jest calmly shot you on a tangent, like, in a location where you couldn’t run too fast, is all.”
Dingus howled at him, charging to the front of the cell. “Why, you — you — is that what you’re saying done happened?”
“Reckon so, especially seeing as how I jest wrote it that way.”
“Why, you coyote-brained, pussle-gutted, limp-tooled old polecat!” Dingus was sputtering. “Now blast it all, Hoke, I were shot in the ass long afore you ever snuck on into Miss Pfeffer’s, and you know that for a gen-u-ine true fact!”
Hoke pursed his lips, eyeing him. “Now Dingus,” he said. “You think a famous law officer like C. L. Hoke Birdsill has got time to fret over details?”
4
“… the best job that was ever offered to me
was to become a landlord in a brothel.
In my opinion it’s the perfect milieu