"They won't serve you."
"I'll get roaring drunk, then go on down the Line and raise hell till they throw me in the juzgado."
"Gillom."
"Well? Mind your own business."
In the entry, a clock ticked.
"Don't speak to me that way," she said. "If your father were here, he'd—"
Gillom banged his chair down and braced his hands against the table as though to tip it over. "I've told you, Ma," he warned. "Don't talk to me about him. Don't ever. I won't have it."
"I am not to use his name in your presence."
"That's what I said."
It was a boyish call to battle she must accept. If she stood her ground, told him the truth, she might gain an enemy, but if she permitted him to bully her into retreat, she lost more than a skirmish: she lost a son. So she mustered herself. She met his scowl with a composure seventeen could never match.
"I love you," she said. "You know that, and take advantage of it. But the truth is, I loved him more. I always did, I always will."
He let go of the table, then did not know what to do with his hands.
"If it grieves you, I will never mention your father again. But I will speak of my husband whenever I wish."
She won, temporarily at least, and at what cost she could not estimate. He saucered his coffee, blew to cool, then attacked again, as the young do, this time from the flank.
"School. It don't amount to a hill of beans. I can learn more around town."
"I hope so."
"I know so. Who do you think moved in with us yesterday?"
"His name is Hickok. William Hickok."
"Hah."
"He's the U. S. Marshal in Abilene, Kansas. He told me."
Gillom drank a noisy triumph. "Are you dumb, Ma. Wild Bill Hickok was shot dead in Deadwood twenty-five years ago."
"I don't believe you."
"In the back. He was playing poker. The cards he held— they call it the 'Dead Man's Hand.' A pair of—"
"Gillom."
"I saw his guns, when he got off his horse yesterday. A pair of nickel-plated Remingtons. He carries 'em in holsters sewed to his vest."
"Who?"
He could not saucer his excitement. "Ma, we've got the most famous gun man in the world nowadays! Living with us, right here on Overland Street! Oh, he's mean. He's killed thirty men!"
"Gillom, you tell me!"
"Hold your hat. J.B. Books!"
Bond Rogers' cheeks flamed. She rose, turned, steadied herself with the chair back. She stared at her son, then swept from the room.
"Come in."
She entered, but couldn't decide whether or not to close the door behind her. If she left it ajar, Gillom might overhear. If she shut it, she put herself at the mercy of a violent man, perhaps a depraved. She left it open but set her back to it and clutched the knob.
"Mr. Books."
"Mrs. Rogers."
"You are J. B. Books."
"Yes, ma'am."
"You have rented my room under false pretenses."
"Sometimes I advertise, sometimes I don't."
"I will not have anyone of your stamp under my roof. I demand that you pack up and leave."
"I'm sorry."
"This is my room, I remind you. I want you out of it within the hour."
"I am sorry. I can't."
"Why not?"
"I don't propose to say."
"You will not go!"
"No."
"That is your last word."
He considered her, a rag of amusement at the corners of his mouth. "You have a fine color, ma'am," he said, "when you are on the scrap."
Confused, angered by the compliment, Bond Rogers whirled, stumbled against the door, and slammed it shut after her, only to confront her son. He stood in the hall, eavesdropping as she had suspected, but his expression stunned her. He regarded her with the same acuity, the same deliberation, the same glimmer of amusement she had just fled from, and the discovery that she might be mistaken, that he might be a man after all, not a boy, that she might in fact be alone with two strangers, both of whom had gained admission to her house under false pretenses, terrified her. Gillom did not move. She fled from him to the telephone on the wall, lifted the receiver from the hook, spun the crank, and adjusted the mouthpiece to her height.
"Central? Will you please connect me with the City Marshal's office? I don't know the number, I haven't time to look it up. Marshal Thibido. Thank you."
Moses Tarrant, who owned a livery stable on Oregon Street, stopped in the Acme Saloon. The place was almost deserted, since the gambling rooms were upstairs. A penurious man, Tarrant drank little and, when he did, held it well, but on this day he could no longer hold the news he had to tell. During the osmosis of a nickel beer he informed the barkeep that J. B. Books was in El Paso. He knew Books was, he said, because he had the man-killer's horse in his stable. To Tarrant's surprise, the barkeep heard him with indifference, continuing to polish glasses with his apron and to rack them. Disgruntled, the liveryman drained his glass and departed. The instant he had gone, however, the barkeep left his bar unattended, climbed the stairs with unusual celerity, and announced to a table of five men playing draw that J. B. Books was in town. Among the players was a man named Shoup and one named Norton.
"I'm the City Marshal. Walter Thibido."
"How do you do."
"I'm told you are John Bernard Books."
"You are told right."
"I've seen your face in the papers, but I wouldn't recognize you. Must of been a young picture."
"I'm handsomer now."
The marshal was not of a mind to banter. He appeared to have dressed in his best bib and tucker for what was to him a momentous, possibly a historical, occasion—in a serge suit and a clean shirt and a brass badge and, on his right hip, in a new holster, the Peacemaker he carried only on Sundays.
"Have a seat," Books offered.
"Don't think I will."
Books noted that he held his hat in his left hand and kept his right free, his collar crimped him, his shoes squeaked, and most important, that he was breathing hard with responsibility. This signified he had nerved himself to make the supreme civic sacrifice if necessary, which made him unpredictable, which made him dangerous.
"Breathe easy, Marshal. You are closer to your gun than I am to mine. Besides, I seldom kill anybody before noon. How did you know I was here?"
"Mrs. Rogers' boy spotted you, and told her. She telephoned me."
"So you welcome me to El Paso."
Thibido was more interested in mortality than irony. "I sure as hell do not. She claims you told her you were Wild Bill Hickok or she'd never of rented you a room. She wants you out of it. I don't blame her."
"Neither do I."
"So do I want you out, Books. I checked my bulletins before I came over, and didn't find anything I could hold you for. I wish I had of. But I want you out of town. We've got five railroads here and they'll be glad to sell you a ticket to any damn where."
"I won't be hurrahed."
"I'm not trying to. I'll buy the ticket."
"For purely personal reasons."
"Purely personal."
"Such as?"
"Such as I've been marshal a year now and I like it. I sleep at home and my wife is a good cook. I've got six deputies in uniform and we draw city pay the end of every month. I don't have to depend on fines. Such as about all we have to handle is drunks and cardsharks and a robbery and a knifing now and then and what I don't need is a genuine rough customer like you. You dally here and you'll draw trouble like an outhouse draws flies. So I want you on your way far away. Directly. Today."
"I might not be inclined."
"Then I will by God incline you. I told you, I have six deputies and I can badge as many men as I need. We will smoke you out or carry you out feet first, and the Council will back me up. So you say which, Mr. Gun Man. It's your funeral."