“No, Curtis, you’re not,” I said. “You even sicced me onto Cox at the pool hall, thinking maybe he’d get sorted out and you and the preacher here would have a bigger payday.”

“No . . .” Curtis said. “I . . .”

“Sit down, Curtis,” I said. “And shut your ass up.”

Curtis sat slowly back in his chair.

“You men have fucked up,” Virgil said.

“God knows,” Ashley said, shaking his head from side to side, “you are mistaken here.”

“Pretty sure God don’t got a goddamn thing to do with this murder and robbery you put together here,” Virgil said.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Ashley said.

“No?” Virgil said.

“What would you like us to do?” Cox said calmly.

“Don’t buy into this,” Ashley said. “They have nothing here that was not part of God’s plan.”

“You might not have intended to do what you did,” Virgil said. “But you did it, and three lawmen lost their lives over what the three of you have done here. You fucked up.”

Curtis started crying.

“No, no, no,” Curtis said hysterically. “This can’t be, it can’t be, it can’t be . . .”

We heard two clicks behind us.

“Don’t turn around,” Jessup said.

I glanced back to see Jessup holding a side-by-side twelve-gauge shotgun pointed at our backs.

“Looks like it was you who fucked up,” Cox said, as he pulled a pistol.

“You don’t want to do this,” Virgil said over his shoulder.

“Oh, but I do,” Jessup said.

I saw out of the corner of my eye as Jessup moved the shotgun off us and onto Cox.

“No!” Cox shouted as he raised his pistol at Jessup, but Jessup let Cox have it with both barrels and Cox’s head exploded, drenching his diplomas and the placards of his achievements with his blood and the last thinking portion of his brain.

“Dear God,” Ashley cried.

“Virgil. Everett,” Chastain called from someplace toward the rear of the house.

Virgil turned to Jessup, who was holding the gun in the same position he’d shot Cox.

Jessup stood frozen, looking at the blood on the wall. He had a single tear running down his cheek.

“We’re here,” I called to Chastain. “Office.”

Sebastian and Chastain hurried from the back hall and into the office.

Virgil reached for Jessup’s shotgun.

“It’s over,” Virgil said to Jessup.

Jessup’s teary eyes slowly looked to Virgil.

“Over,” Virgil said.

Virgil pried the shotgun from Jessup’s hands and sat him down in a chair.

Jessup just stared at the floor.

“. . . it comin’,” Jessup said very quietly. “. . . He had it comin’.”

Virgil just looked at Jessup for a long moment. Then he looked to Curtis and Ashley, then looked slowly around the room, resting his eyes on the model of the bridge.

It was over.

— 75 —

I was sitting in a comfortable chair on the porch of Virgil and Allie’s place with the morning sunshine warming my face. The early snow was all gone now and the temperature was pleasant. The streets were still muddy, but the crops and fields in the area were thankful for the early winter soaking.

Business was back to normal in Appaloosa. The streets were busy with activity. I thought about what Wallis had said, about how many people were in the town now. Appaloosa had changed damn near before our eyes from a little town to a city, a full-grown city. Hocus-goddamn-pocus.

Nell came walking up the boardwalk, spinning her parasol on her shoulder. Her chin was high and her posture was erect. She had a degree of purpose and pride to her step. She waited for a buggy to pass, then crossed the street. She was smiling when she approached the porch.

“Hello,” she said.

“Morning,” I said.

“A nice one,” she said.

“It is,” I said. “And I suspect the warmer conditions we got now, and the fact the tent-show outfit is finally going to get rigged up, that you’re feeling somewhat chipper.”

“How did you know?” she said, as she walked up the steps.

“Well, hell, I could tell it,” I said. “Saw it right off. Watching you coming a block away.”

“Why,” she said with a smile and a spin of the parasol, “are you some kind of officer?”

“I am, as a matter of fact,” I said back with a smile. “Have a seat.”

“Why, thank you,” she said. “You the only one home?”

“I am,” I said. “Virgil’s at the office and Allie’s with her ladies’ social. She’s drumming up ticket sales for your show.”

“She’s something else,” Nell said.

“Yes, she is,” I said.

Nell sat in the center of the hanging bench swing just to the left of me. She was wearing a yellow gingham dress under a long, thin dark green topcoat with brown velvet cuffs and lapels.

“You’re looking better, Everett,” she said.

“Than what?” I said.

“Than before,” she said.

“Before what?” I said.

“When you were at Doc’s.”

“You came?”

She tilted her head and smiled.

“You’re a devil,” she said.

“Am I?”

“Did I come?” Nell said with a slight pull of her chin to her collarbone. “I most certainly did.”

“Doc Crumley had me on double doses of the devil himself there for a while,” I said. “So there was a lot of chasing butterflies, running through fields of flowers, and kissing beautiful women and that sort of thing.”

“Imagine that?” she said with a smile. “And that sort of thing.”

“Only so much time for flowers, butterflies, and beautiful women,” I said.

“Yes, a shame, really,” Nell said. “We all need more of that sort of beauty in our lives, don’t you think?”

“As long as it’s not in a bottle,” I said.

She nodded. Smiled.

“Well,” she said. “I’m very glad to see you’re looking well.”

“Thank you,” I said.

She reached out and grabbed my hand and squeezed it a little as she looked directly at me.

“Scary?” she said.

“Not at the time,” I said.

She just looked at me for an extended moment, then looked to the street. She smiled a little.

“My husband was right,” she said, looking back to me.

“About?” I said.

“Me,” she said.

“What about you?”

“That I have a good eye,” she said.

I had a good idea what she was getting at, but I was in the mood, so I asked anyway.

“What do you mean?”

“When I first saw you,” Nell said. “He was right.”

“About?” I said.

“You, of course,” she said.

“Me?”

“Yes, you,” she said. “Being a man of substance. A man of quick resolve.”

We stood together in silence. She looked off down the street for some time, then looked back to me.

“About what I said,” Nell said. “When we were washing dishes together.”

“It’s okay,” I said. “You don’t have to say anything.”

She smiled.

“Not that I’ve not thought about it,” I said. “I have.”

“Thought of it?” Nell said.

“Yes,” I said, “but another man’s wife is another man’s wife.”

She looked at me, nodding slightly, and a slow smile came to her face.

“Thought about it?” she said.

I nodded.

Nell nodded . . . “Can I ask you a question?” she said.

“Of course,” I said.

“Do you think I’m beautiful?” Nell said.

“I do.”

“Good,” she said. “I needed to make sure.”

“Make sure?” I said.

“Yes,” she said. “I just needed to know it was beautiful me with the flowers and the butterflies.”

“Now that you mention it,” I said. “I’m pretty sure it was you.”

She laughed and looked away.

“What’s funny?”

She looked back to me, that certain look in her eye.

“There’s no pretty sure to it,” Nell said.

— 76 —

Nudge?” Virgil said.

“Sure,” I said.

“Isn’t this exciting,” Allie said, walking up the hall to the parlor.

Allie’s face was covered with a white cream. She was barefoot, wearing just her corset, bloomers, and chemise, when she entered the living room, vigorously rubbing in the cream with her fingertips.