Boon Ed Kurtz (the little red hen read aloud txt) 📖

Boon still had her Colt trained on Willocks, so I turned the rifle at the aldermen.

“I don’t much care which of you I shoot first,” I told them. “I ain’t fussy.”

“We got an agreement,” Boon said to Willocks.

“We don’t have shit,” he said.

“We got an agreement,” she repeated. “You got your man. He’s lashed to my mount right outside. I’d’ve brung him in but he’s starting to stink. That’s my part of the agreement took care of, Marshal.”

“You don’t listen too good. That was an unlawful killing. I don’t owe you a thing.”

“Point of fact,” I said, “you owe her two hundred dollars and some information.”

“Information?” said the first alderman. “What information?”

“About her mama,” I said.

“Shut up, Edward,” Boon said.

“I was just saying.”

“Well, don’t.”

The first alderman said, “What’s this all about, Willocks?”

The marshal was beginning to sweat a little. The fat men had been sweating the whole time, but Tom Willocks’ sweat was different.

He said, “I told her I had good intelligence about the whereabouts of her mother.”

“Do you?” said the alderman.

“No,” Willocks said. “That was just to get her out of town. Both of them, her and the Dutchman. I didn’t figure on them surviving a meet-up with Bartholomew Dejasu.”

“He preferred Barry,” I said. Boon threw me another look.

The alderman said, “It was not the truth.”

“No, it was not,” said the marshal.

“We’ll see,” Boon said. “First you’re going to pay me what you owe. We’ll go down to the bank and you’ll withdraw two hundred dollars in double eagles from the town coffers. Then you, me, and Edward here are going to ride together out of Darling so as we can have a little privacy for what we’re going to do later.”

“Later?” Willocks said. He was really sweating now. “What are you going to do later?”

“Get to the truth,” Boon said. “I know a couple ways to be sure.”

We took the first alderman with Willocks. Boon said she didn’t think the bank would give up the two hundred dollars on just the marshal’s say-so. That struck me funny and I laughed a little, but she just looked sour and said, “We ain’t robbing them, Edward.”

The other two aldermen went into one of the two cells in the back of the office, which she locked. Then the four of us walked quietly and quickly up the street to the bank, where the first alderman calmly explained to the clerk in a soft voice that he was withdrawing two hundred from the town funds to pay a contractor. If he was doing anything that could be interpreted as a signal, I didn’t notice it. If Boon noticed anything, she made so sign.

After the bank, we returned to the marshal’s office. Boon unlocked the cell and shoved the last alderman into it with his cohorts. To Willocks, she said, “Got a horse?”

He didn’t answer, so she slapped him across the face. His cheek turned bright red and there was hate in his eyes.

“At the livery stable,” he said.

“All right.”

We all three went back outside, where she directed me and Willocks to carry Dejasu’s corpse inside. We dumped it on the floor. On the way out again, I heard the aldermen complaining about the smell.

The livery stable was on the far opposite side of Darling, pretty much the only part of town we hadn’t seen yet. Boon rode her palomino with the .44 in her right hand, rested against the saddle horn. I walked the nag and Willocks walked in front of me. When we reached the stable, I said, “I’m trading this’un for something better.”

“Be quick about it,” Boon said.

The marshal identified a bay gelding as his mount. It was a good-looking animal, strong and sharp-eyed. I stabled the nag and selected a spotted Appaloosa as well as decent saddle tack and some sundries for the horse. Boon paid for them out of the money we’d gotten at the bank.

Willocks scoffed about that.

“You reckon not stealing is going to save your neck?”

“Ain’t a thief,” was all she had to say about that.

“No,” said Willocks. “Just a killer.”

“Some folks need killing.”

“I don’t think you’ll ever make it to any trial,” he said. “I ’spect you’ll get cut down before it comes to that. I know your kind. You’ll go to hell with a gun in your hand.”

“Last man tried to judge me in a court of law didn’t send me to hell,” she said. “But sure, I’ll go with a gun in my hand when I do.”

Chapter Fifteen

We rode south, past the few homesteaders and hopeful ranchers scattered about the land outside of town. Nobody said much for the first three or four hours. Willocks sighed a lot. I rolled cigarettes and smoked to pass the time. In the late afternoon, we stopped and picketed the horses and nooned with some victuals. It wasn’t much, because we didn’t have much. Just some pemmican and a little briny water from Boon’s canteen. Willocks acted as though he didn’t want any of it at first, but his belly overruled him. He chewed like he was mad about it.

“That all the riding we going to do?” I asked.

Boon thought it over.

“Depends,” she said after a while.

She was looking out over the prairie, back in the direction of Darling. Searching for sign of us being followed, I reckoned. We both knew it wouldn’t take too long.

While she watched the horizon, I dozed a little. It was still light when I snapped awake again, by which time Boon was stepping back up into her saddle.

“We’ll go a little farther,” she said.

I squinted at the horizon but I didn’t see anything. I figured she had, and her eyes were a damn sight better than mine.

“Abduction is one thing,” Willocks said. “Murder is another. Best you quit while you’re ahead.”

He wasn’t looking at either of us, so I supposed he was speaking to both of us. He stood beside his gelding and made no move to mount it.

“We ain’t square yet,” Boon said. “Get on your horse.”

“I