“Why?”

“I know them.”

“This a personal grudge?”

“To some degree, but not to such a degree I wouldn’t be wise or cautious. I know two of these men on sight. I might be able to talk the kid into putting down his guns and coming in.”

“He killed a man. You know how that’s going to work out, don’t you, son?”

“I do. If it goes bad, I’ll go bad with it.”

“It does sometimes, and as I said, if you shoot a man in the line of duty—”

“It’s all right.”

“That’s the size of it.”

“The other, I figure he’ll come in dead and stinking.”

The judge leaned back in his chair and pulled at his beard a little.

“Know them on sight, do you?”

“What I said. Now, I’m not saying I won’t do whatever I’m called to do before I get to them, but I’m saying I’d like the chance to deliver their warrant, such as it is. Someone else comes across them, they can have them, but I don’t want anyone else sent for them.”

“I don’t see any problem in that. That way they aren’t being kept from being caught. It’s just you are the prime hunter. But I may not send you after them right away. I’ve had my eye on that gang for a time, and right now the leads have gone dry as a South Texas ditch. Put your hand on this.”

He pushed the big book forward on his desk, and I put my hand on it. He said some words and had me repeat them, ended our talk with, “Show up here tomorrow morning, say, seven sharp.”

“I’ll be here.”

“Wait a minute.” Judge Parker dug in his coat pocket, came up with a silver dollar. “Have you a good meal. Advance on your salary, though. I’ll mark it down. Pay sometimes comes a little slow, but I can give you another dollar or two you need it.”

“I’ll be all right,” I said. “And since this comes out of my pay, I’ll take it.”

I was nearly to the door when the judge said, “By the way, I expect my men to be forthright and God-fearing and honest. I’m taking your word you are just that.”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

“And if you have to shoot a man in the back or sneak up on him and shoot him anywhere, that’s all right if it’s in line with the arrest and, of course, if your target is resisting. Remember, the byword is justice.”

We were back to that again.

“Of course,” I said, and left out of there.

I didn’t look up Ruthie or her family but heard through the grapevine that Luther had started his own church, called Luther’s Church, and somehow it got around it was Lutheran, but it wasn’t. You can see how such confusion could set in.

Far as the job went I delivered a few light warrants, and the worst I had encountered was when I arrested a drunk man for theft and his ten-year-old son showed me he had acquired quite a vocabulary, none of it words to be used politely.

Up to then it was simple work, and I was paid all right, and I got a little extra payment for them that I captured and brought in. One day I was in town and coming out of the store where I used to sweep up, and there was Ruthie, a big brown-paper-wrapped package under her arm. She was wearing a bright blue dress, and her hair was in pigtails. She had on a pair of black shoes that looked new. She looked more beautiful than when I had last seen her.

I was coming up the steps, going in, planning to buy some goods, so I couldn’t hardly dodge her. I took off my hat. “Ruthie. It’s good to see you.”

“Why, you liar. You been in town for a month at least, and you haven’t so much as come by and said hi or ‘Kiss my ass’ to any of us.”

“It wasn’t that I didn’t want to or didn’t mean to.”

“Want to or mean to doesn’t get it done. You’ve forgot us since you left…” And then her face collapsed. “Oh, dear, Nat. I forgot about Win. Forgive me. I keep being selfish, and you’ve already told me how you feel.”

She nearly dropped her package as the memory came over her. I reached out and took it, said, “Let me walk you home.”

“Okay. I…I’m so sorry, Nat. Is she all right?”

“No. She has passed on.”

“I’m so sorry. I mean, you might think I’m not after what I said, but I am sorry. Truly.”

“You shouldn’t be apologizing to me. I should have come by.”

“It’s the other direction, Nat. We aren’t living in the wagon anymore.”

We turned and started in that direction.

“I heard Luther got a church.”

“He did, and it comes with a little house. It’s not much of a house, but it’s better than that wagon. We got a corral there, and we’ve bought some chickens for eggs, and I have started a spring garden. There’s bugs in it, but the corn and potatoes do all right…Dang it, Nat. I really am sorry about Win.”

“You said that.”

“I know, but I said some bad things to you when you were here last time. I know it hurt.”

“Hurt because it was true,” I said.

“About you and me?”

“I assume you have outgrown your fancy by now?”

“I wouldn’t say that. But after Win dying I don’t think you could have an interest in me other than a ricochet. I don’t want anything like that.”

“I understand.”

We walked along without speaking for a while. It was a pretty good walk.

I said, “You still speak to ducks and such?”

“When they want to talk. Frankly, I haven’t seen a duck in a long time.”

“I suppose it’s a limited enterprise, the plans of a duck.”

“I get a sense of things from them and other birds as well. They told me you’d come back.”

“They did, did they? Was you ever dropped on your head as a child?”

“That’s no way to get on my good side.”

“Think that’s what I’m trying to do?”

“Not when you talk like that,” she said. “There’s the church. We got twenty colored families come all the time, couple of Creek Indian families, and even a white couple. No one likes the white couple in town, so they come to us.”

“That’s generous of them,” I said. “Slumming like that with the colored folks.”

“The Lord doesn’t care about color,” she said. “Not even white skin.”

“He might be the only one.”

We walked a little more, and then Ruthie stopped.

“That’s the house.”

It wasn’t far from where the church was and looked to be about twice the size of the room I had lived in before in Fort Smith. There was a little fenced garden and some poor-looking crops inside the fence. I saw a chicken coop and some chickens running about in the yard, which was grown over with weeds.

“You might want to come in and say hello to Pa and Samson.”

“Not today. I really wanted to see you all, but I didn’t know if I was ready. Thing is, Ruthie, I loved Win, and in some ways I always will. But you were right. I was in love with Win as I had known her, not as she had become. That alone made me ashamed of myself.”

“That’s human nature,” Ruthie said. “You didn’t change her.”

“Knowing me led to what happened to her,” I said.

“You can’t go through life worrying about that kind of thing,” she said. “You couldn’t get out of bed in the morning if you did. God wants us to move on. He wants us to thrive.”

“What about the ricochet?”

“Give it some space, Nat. Come see us in a week or so. Come and have dinner. We’ll see how things develop. I have others courting me, you know.”

All of a sudden she was in a good humor and sure of herself again. Sometimes Ruthie was hard to figure.

“I don’t doubt that,” I said. “And I’ll tell you something. That soil you got there, reason your garden has bugs and the crops aren’t growing is the soil is too rocky and acidic. Some ashes from your stove would help with that. Mix it with some cow manure and keep that chicken mess out of it, as it’s too hot unless it’s cured. I can tell you ain’t composting it none.”

“You know about gardens?”

“I do. I had a good teacher. I’ll tell you about the nightshade family next time.”

“Nightshade family?”

“It’s a bit of a story, but I’ll share it later.”

I gave her the package. She came close to me as she took it.