She planted her hands on her broad hips. “Dammit, Wally, I’m as pissed off at you as I can be at a person, and that’s sayin’ somethin’.”

“What for?”

“What for? I’ll tell you what for. Thanks to you, I got a whore who’s out of commission.”

“You told me to do something that’d guarantee getting Doc Driscoll out to the roadhouse, and that’s what I did. Saw him arrive myself.”

“I told you to rough up the girl a little. You broke her arm, her jaw’s out of whack, and her eye’s all swole up and ain’t sittin’ right.”

“She told me she’d as soon fuck a bat as me. Which I reminded her of, she said.”

Gert gave a snort. “You’ve heard worse.”

He held out his hand, palm up. “Twenty bucks, Gert.”

“I ought to subtract what her ruint appearance will cost me in lost revenue.” She looked over at his stockpile of moonshine. “But, because I’m a forgivin’ person, I’ll take a jar for the road, and we’ll call it even.”

He cursed her under his breath, but went over to a straw-lined crate, lifted out a mason jar of white lightning, and brought it back to her. She screwed off the lid and took a swallow. “You’re one ugly son of a bitch, Wally, but you do make good ’shine.”

“Twenty bucks.” He held out his hand again.

Gert screwed the lid back onto the mason jar and tucked it in her left armpit, then reached into the pocket of her dress, took out a pistol, and shot Wally in the forehead. She bent over his supine form, stuck the bore of the pistol into one of his ears, and fired again.

As she was getting back into her car, she muttered, “Pissant cost me a week’s worth of work out of that girl.”

Sixteen

Shortly after noon the next day, Harold came to Thatcher’s cell.

His looks hadn’t improved since Thatcher had last seen him. He might have explained that he’d mistaken him for a German soldier and apologized for messing up his face, but the deputy radiated so much hostility as he said, “They want to see you” that Thatcher didn’t bother.

After being handcuffed, he was prodded out of the cell block and into the main room.

Mayor Croft was standing in front of a window, a position that cast him in silhouette, obscured his face, and made him the most imposing presence in the room, which Thatcher figured was his intention. If he thought Thatcher would be intimidated by either his public office or his bootlegging, he was wrong. Thatcher looked him square in the eye.

Sheriff Amos motioned Thatcher into a chair. “Coffee?”

Thatcher accepted.

The sheriff filled a mug from a pot simmering on a hot plate, then brought it over. When he bent down to place the mug in Thatcher’s bound hands, he said under his breath, “Don’t volunteer anything.”

Then he straightened up, sat down on the corner of his desk, and commenced another interrogation. Beginning with the fight and Thatcher’s leap from the freight train, they rehashed Thatcher’s account of that day. The sheriff’s questions were straightforward. Following his advice, Thatcher stuck to the facts and didn’t expand on any of his statements.

Bernie Croft didn’t pose any questions, but expressed his skepticism of Thatcher’s truthfulness with snorts and harrumphs and dry coughs covered by his fist.

Thatcher finished with, “I went to bed, fell asleep, woke up with a shotgun in my face and y’all surrounding my bed.”

The sheriff waited a beat, then looked over at Croft, who had remained in his spot by the window, but was now rocking back and forth on his heels like a man trying to keep his temper under control.

Bill said, “We don’t have one iota of evidence implicating him, Bernie.”

“Except that he was with Mrs. Driscoll earlier that day.”

The sheriff dismissed that with a shake of his head. “Circumstantial. The D.A. has declined to indict him based on that alone.”

“Something could still turn up.”

“Mrs. Driscoll could still turn up.”

“Dead.”

“Let’s pray that’s not the case. But if, after further investigation, we discover something that does implicate Mr. Hutton in any wrongdoing, I’ll be on him like a duck on a June bug.”

The mayor scoffed. “He’ll be long gone.”

“He doesn’t plan to leave town immediately.”

“So he says.”

Thatcher said, “Mr. Barker and I shook on me training that stallion before I leave.”

“That’s hardly a binding contract.”

“It is to me.”

Thatcher’s words fell like four bricks into the room. Croft’s face turned red, but he didn’t respond. No one said anything. Then Sheriff Amos broke the taut silence.

“I’ve got to release him, Bernie. But I’ll do so with the provision that he doesn’t leave town. If not a suspect, he’s still a material witness.”

“Fine. But you’re gambling with your reelection.”

“Every damn day I’m in this office.”

Because his warning didn’t have the desired cowing effect on the sheriff, Croft strode across to the door, yanked his hat off the coat tree, and stormed out, pulling the door closed so hard, it rattled windowpanes.

Amos signaled to Harold. “Uncuff him.”

With obvious disgust, the deputy lumbered over and removed the handcuffs.

Sheriff Amos said, “Mr. Hutton, you heard the condition of me letting you go. Don’t run off.”

“What if Mrs. Driscoll never turns up? I can’t stick around here forever. I want to get home. No word from Amarillo?”

“Not yet, but it’s early. It’ll be a round trip for whoever drives out to the ranch, and you said it was a far piece from the city.”

Thatcher acknowledged that, then said, “As much as anybody, I want to know what happened to Mrs. Driscoll. Not just for my sake. I hate to think.”

“Me too,” the sheriff said. “I’ve moved past hoping she’ll turn up unharmed and with a logical explanation for her absence.” Giving Thatcher a keen look, he said, “I’m letting you go. Don’t betray my trust.” Then he glanced over his shoulder at Harold. “You have his bag ready?”