“Intention to abduct Miss Dillon.”

Frelich laughed. “He invented that. It is no law. Not anywhere.”

Simon listened to them wrangle with the law and thoughts about the law, what kind of law should be in force now that the war was over. What was military law as applied to civilians? Garth was eloquent, Whittaker came in repeatedly with allusions to ancient lawmakers, Frelich became bored.

“Be quiet,” Frelich said. “All of you. Mr. Boudlin, continue. He was singing this song, this Hawk-Eye Man song. Miss Dillon comes in to warn you of something, this Pruitt keeps on singing. You tell him to shut up.”

“Yes. Then she came in directly to the saloon, although I called out to her not to. It is not a place for a respectable woman. Then Pruitt grabbed her skirt and called out one of the lines of the song that was a terrible insult. He actually grabbed hold of her skirt and jerked at it as she came near him.” Simon paused to regain his balance, his breath. “I hit him with my fiddle bow and broke it across his face. He came out with a knife and brought it up underhand. I had the sharp broken end of the bow in my hand and I stabbed him with it.”

Silence fell. All talk of the law stopped. This is what the law came down to, this bar fight, this stream of blood spraying from a man’s heart.

“And did he harm you?”

“Yes, sir. He got me in the belly.”

“Let us see the wound.”

They unlocked the manacles. Simon stood carefully and opened his vest, unbuttoned his bloodied shirt. The streak of the wound went from below his drooping belt to his sternum. A line of dried blood and swollen flesh cut straight up his abdominal muscles. Clearly a knife wound.

Frelich considered it a moment with an expert eye. He said, “This was meant to spill the guts. What is the word? I can’t think of it.”

“Eviscerate,” said Whittaker.

“Yes, eviscerate.” He gestured to Simon. “Enough.”

Simon buttoned up and sat down again. A guard came forward with the manacles, but Frelich held up a hand and the guard went back to stand by the door.

Whittaker said, “So you see, he acted in self-defense.”

Captain Garth said, “Perhaps. Perhaps. However, just the day before Mr. Boudlin stated that he intended to kill Mr. Pruitt at a public gathering and if you will not accept the words of the man who overheard him tell Miss Dillon that he intended to strangle Pruitt, then we will have to call Miss Dillon herself as a witness. I am sorry to have to do that. But this leads us to premeditation and I intend to pursue it.”

“Pursue away,” said Whittaker. “You cannot call her. A wife cannot testify against her husband, not by any law.”

Silence.

“Eh?” Frelich leaned forward. “What?”

“They are married,” said Whittaker.

“Since when?” Frelich leaned forward, attentive.

“Since this morning at eight o’clock by the San Fernando bells.”

Simon, now that his hands were free, took up the glass of water and poured it all down his throat. His expression said, Stuff that in your pipe and smoke it. He set the glass down with a click.

“This is irregular,” said Garth.

“In what way?” Whittaker regarded him with a blank face, innocent of all trickery or wrongdoing.

“Who married them?” Garth sounded a bit desperate. “Perhaps he does not have the authority. Was it a duly recognized Justice of the Peace?”

“Appointed by Governor Throckmorton. Or reappointed.”

The officers sat back in their chairs. Whittaker noted arms crossed, shrugs.

“So.” Whittaker pressed down his glasses again. “A wound clearly proving assault with intent on Pruitt’s part and a great many witnesses to the same. All Simon had to fight back with was a broken fiddle bow. He defended Miss Dillon against assault and insult with nothing but a fiddle bow. There will be no testimony regarding prior threats, and I ask not only for acquittal of all charges but adequate compensation from Sheriff Patterson.”

Again, a long, ticking silence. Frelich the judge advocate sat with the final word in his head, his right to pronounce guilt or innocence, his ability to override any vote by those officers inferior to him in rank.

“Compensation for what?” he said.

“His fiddle. The sheriff either broke it up himself or allowed a prisoner to do so.” Whittaker bent down to the U.S. Mail sack and lifted it to the table. He stood, opened it, and lifted out every smashed, ruined piece of Simon’s fiddle.

Frelich’s mouth dropped open. “Gott in Himmel!” He bent forward and picked up the splintered neck with its delicate scroll. He turned it to see the maker’s name on the inner top block. “This is a Markneukirche!”

Whittaker did not smile. He barely moved. He said, “Yes.”

He knew he had won.

“This is a sin against God himself.” Frelich turned a piece of the face in his hands; it had parted at the f hole. “Did the sheriff not have to write down the possessions the prisoner came in with?”

“He didn’t even write down Simon’s name properly,” said Whittaker.

Frelich picked up one of the sprung bouts, moved his fingers across the rich, broken woods. He looked up at Simon.

“I don’t want any compensation,” said Simon. “It would take time.”

Frelich carefully returned the pieces to the U.S. Mail sack. Watching him do it Simon realized that the Markneukirche had saved him one last time. One last time.

“Do you want this?” asked Frelich.

“I would like to keep the scroll.”

Frelich drew the strings out of the hole in the inner rods, dropped them to the floor, and then expertly pushed the pegs in tight with the heel of his hand. He held out the scroll. Simon reached with his broken, discolored hand to take it. Frelich glanced down at his hand and then sat back. He gestured to the two privates to remove the accused. They stepped forward and Simon rose from the chair. They took him by the upper arms.

“Please wait outside,” he said.

Simon sat on a bench out in the hall, leaning back against the wall with his eyes closed. He felt a tap at his shoulder and looked up to see one of the guards holding out a dipper of water. He said thank you and drank it down. It seemed his injured body could never get enough water. Then the guard lit and held out to him a cigarillo; Simon took it with a nod and smoked part of it, and then bent to toss it into a cuspidor. Fell back against the wall again.

Simon was cleared of all charges. Verdict: self-defense. The bells of San Fernando rang out five o’clock. The bird sellers with their caged finches sat on the dirt of Military Plaza offering these captive wild creatures to any passerby. The fires of the evening were lit, the fallen leaves of the mesquites in the campo santo stirred among the graves like rattling minute petitions to the living, and the great shining paddles of Guenther’s mill turned over the waters of the San Antonio River again and again as if searching for some running treasure that flows through our hands and is finally lost to the sea.

Chapter Twenty-seven

He wasn’t sure where he was nor did he have much memory of getting here. He was looking up at the tiles of a roof overhead. No ceiling. Simon lay on a double bed with his eyes closed. What they called a matrimonio. Every hold-fast structure inside him seemed to have given way now that the tribunal was done with, now that evening had fallen. If he could lie very still the pain was held back, did not flood him. In this small room a calico curtain hung on a rope across the far corner, he supposed for clothes or privacy or both. A window with night behind it like the mouth of a deep well. A table beside the bed; on it were a basin of hot water, clean cloths, ointments, a candle. The smell of supper cooking came from the next room over. He opened his eyes when he felt his boots being unlaced and pulled off his feet, socks, then his belt unbuckled.

“Simon,” Doris said. “I’m here.”

“You are so pretty,” he said, and his eyes drifted shut again.

“My dear.”

“Is the door closed?” He spoke carefully, his voice was almost inaudible.

Doris said, “Yes.”

He felt his trousers slipping off under the quilt, his drawers going with them. He lifted his hips and said, “Ow. Ow. God.” She had dragged the belt over the terrible great purple bruise where the big man had kneed him, going for his testicles and hitting his hip instead. She kept the covers tucked around him.

“Oh, Simon, sorry.” She gave that small quick lift of the head that showed how anxious she was and folded the pants over a chair. She sat down again beside him. “I never took off a man’s pants before. You will be glad to know.”

“I am leading you into a life of depravity.”

He had trouble arranging his swollen mouth to make the f sound, trouble smiling.

“Shhh. No joking.”

She kissed him several times on one unmarked place on his forehead. He tried to sit up, but she placed a hand on his chest carefully and pressed him back down. He felt the warmth of her hand through the fabric of his shirt, sank back.