“Whoohoo,” the fat man wheezed. “I guess Mrs. Mills didn’t come into town.”
“Hello, Brogan,” said Steve. “This is Neal Carey.”
The man at the end of the bar looked up.
“Steve,” he said, nodding his head.
“Cal,” Steve nodded back. “What are you drinking, Neal?”
“A beer?” Neal asked.
“I guess Brogan’s got one or two. A beer for my friend and I’ll have a beer and shot.”
“You know where it is,” Brogan answered. Neal got the feeling that Brogan didn’t spend a lot of time out of that chair. “Leave the money on the bar first.”
“You don’t trust me, Brogan.”
“I trust myself and my dog and I don’t turn my back on the dog.”
Steve climbed over the bar and reached into an old-fashioned Coca-Cola cooler and pulled out two sweating bottles of beer. Then he took a bottle of Canadian Club out from under the bar, grabbed a shot glass from a rack, and filled it up.
“I wouldn’t either if I had that dog,” Steve said. “It would probably try to screw you in the ass, and it’s big enough to do it.”
Neal saw Cal flinch ever so slightly, then bury his head deeper in his beer. The dog lifted its muzzle with somewhat less interest. Steve Mills knocked the shot back, shook his head, turned red, coughed, and set the glass down.
“I love this country,” he said. He popped the caps off the beer and handed one to Neal.
Neal sat down on a stool and took a tentative sip of the beer. It tasted bitter and cold. It tasted great. He took another sip, then a swallow, and then tipped the bottle back and guzzled the stuff, savoring the feel of it pouring cool and wet down his throat.
Steve pulled a couple of crumbled bills out of his pocket and laid them on the bar.
“Mrs. Mills letting you have a little of your money?” Brogan teased. His voice sounded like a slow leak from a steam pipe.
Steve turned to Neal. “The missus handles the money, which is kinda funny, seeing as I’m the one who’s supposed to have the head for it.”
Cal looked up from his beer again and glanced quickly but sharply at Steve Mills. Nobody seemed to notice but Neal, who took an instant dislike to the guy. That felt almost as invigorating as the beer. Neal hadn’t allowed himself to feel very much in the way of emotion for a while. He swigged down the rest of the bottle and saw Steve Mills watching him.
Steve lit up a cigarette and took a drag. “Why don’t you come out to the place with me? We can feed you and give you a place to sleep and you can sort things out from there.”
“I couldn’t impose on you like that.”
“We are starved for company out there, and I have a teenage daughter who would just love to interrogate you about life in the big city.
He does have a point, Neal thought. I’m hungry and tired, and if I call Friends just now they might send the old van out to haul me back in. And I’m not ready for that just yet.
And after all, I am looking for a ranch near Austin.
“Well, thank you. It’s very kind of you,” Neal said, feeling like a lying hypocrite.
But that’s what undercover work is all about, he thought.
Three more beers met their maker before Steve and Neal got back in the truck and headed out of town. They drove west for a mile or so and then turned south down the dirt road Steve had pointed out earlier. The road ran roughly parallel between the Toiyabe Range to the east and the Shoshones to the west, through pretty flat sagebrush plain broken by deep gullies. It took an occasional dip down into one of the wider gullies but then rose right back up onto the plain.
The terrain was mostly the blue-gray of sagebrush above the yellow-gray of the alkaloid soil, punctuated here and there by a few deep green fields of alfalfa. The mountains in the background, rising as high as twelve thousand feet, were a blend of the darkest-almost black-green, and purple, with patches of gray stone and bright yellow spreads of wildflowers.
Cattle dotted the landscape. Most grazed in small herds far from the road, but a more adventurous few explored the grass along the roadside, stopping to stare indignantly at the truck as it passed by. Steve had to stop once or twice for cows and calves that were standing in the middle of the road.
“Most of what we’re on now is Hansen Cattle Company land,” Steve explained. “Hansen owns most of this part of the valley. In fact, my spread is about the only piece he hasn’t bought up the past few years.”
“Does he want to buy you out?” Neal asked.
“Oh, I suppose he would if I ever left, but he doesn’t seem to mind my puny presence. Bob Hansen’s a good guy, which is a good thing, seeing as how we’re each other’s only neighbors. His son Jory and my daughter Shelly are the hot item at the high school right now.”
The truck lurched down into a particularly bumpy old wash. A jackrabbit, its big ears twitching with anxiety, broke out of the sagebrush and sprang away with long jumps at amazing speed. A skinny coyote appeared at the edge of the road, gave the truck a thanks-a-heap glare, and trotted back into the brush.
They drove for another forty minutes or so before coming to the Mills place. It was a big, two-story log house that sat about two hundred yards east of the road, on the left side of the dirt driveway. An enormous hay bam just to the west almost dwarfed the house. On the side of the barn was an open shed, with two tractors and some other agricultural equipment that Neal didn’t recognize. About fifty yards north of the house was a corral made of metal piping. Three horses pricked up their ears at the sound of the truck, saw the vehicle, and trotted to the edge of the fence. There were two other, smaller livestock pens and then another barn beyond that.
“It’s beautiful,” Neal said as he got out of the truck.
He meant it. The Mills place seemed to stand alone in the sagebrush, the only building within sight in the beautiful valley, framed by the mountains. The stillness was at once soothing and alarming.
“Yeah, well, it has its moments,” Steve said. “Of course, it’s under about two feet of snow from October to April, then you’re knee-deep in mud until sometime in June, then you got your dust until September, and autumn lasts about an hour and a half until it snows again. But goddamn if I don’t love it. Speaking of which, here’s the missus.”
The “missus” was maybe five feet three on tiptoes. Her black hair, cut short just below her ears, framed her strong cheekbones, strong nose, strong jaw, and wide eyebrows. Her face wasn’t pretty. It was handsome, and its beauty wasn’t diminished by the laugh lines and worry lines etched by twenty years of crazy on an isolated ranch twenty miles from nowhere.
She was wearing a red shirt tucked into trim blue jeans over white sneakers. Her sleeves were rolled up and the whole effect was one of energy, efficiency, and strength.
She kissed her husband on the cheek and offered Neal her hand.
“I brought home a stray,” Steve said to her. “This is Neal Carey.
“I’m Peggy Mills. Welcome.”
If she was surprised or annoyed at having a strange guest sprung on her, she didn’t show it. Neal had the feeling that he wasn’t the first stray that Steve had ever brought home.
“Thank you.”
“Has Steve been showing you the sights?”
“Some of them.”
“I’ll bet. Come on in.”
She led them into the kitchen and sat Neal down at a wooden drop-leaf table. The kitchen was small but uncluttered. Pots, pans, and spoons hung from a metal ring above the sink. Checkered contact paper covered the counter.
“Where’s Shelly?” Steve asked her.
“Riding around with Jory Hansen. She should be back soon.”
Steve chuckled. “Jory’s old man won’t like him wasting a Saturday afternoon.” He poured himself a cup of coffee from a pot on the counter and sat down.
“Don’t get too comfortable,” Peggy said. “I think Eleanor’s sick.”
“Oh?”
“She’s been bawling all afternoon.”
Steve sipped his coffee, set his cup down, and headed for the door.