Deets stood up when Call did, ready for work. He hadn't said a word while eating, but it was clear he took much pride in being the one who had seen Jake first.

"Well, it ain't a holiday," Call said. "Work to do. Me and Deets will go see if we can help them boys."

"That Newt surprised me," Jake said. "I had it in mind he was still a spud. Is Maggie still here?"

"Maggie's been dead nine years," Augustus said. "You wasn't hardly over the hill when it happened."

"I swear," Jake said. "You mean you've had little Newt for nine years?"

There was a long silence, in which only Augustus felt comfortable. Deets felt so uncomfortable that he stepped in front of the Captain and went out the door.

"Why, yes, Jake," Gus said. "We've had him since Maggie died."

"I swear," Jake said again.

"It was only the Christian thing," Augustus said. "Taking him in, I mean. After all, one of you boys is more than likely his pa."

Call put on his hat, picked up his rifle and left them to their talk.

7.

JAKE SPOON STOOD in the door of the low house, watching Call and Deets head for the barn. He had been looking forward to being home from the moment he looked out the door of the saloon and saw the dead man laying in the mud across the wide main street of Fort Smith, but now that he was home it came back to him how nervous things could be if Call wasn't in his best mood.

"Deets's pants are a sight, ain't they," he said mildly. "Seems to me he used to dress better."

Augustus chuckled. "He used to dress worse," he said. "Why, he had that sheepskin coat for fifteen years. You couldn't get in five feet of him without the lice jumping on you. It was because of that coat that we made him sleep in the barn. I ain't finicky except when it comes to lice."

"What happened to it?" Jake asked.

"I burned it," Augustus said. "Done it one summer when Deets was off on a trip with Call. I told him a buffalo hunter stole it. Deets was ready to track him and get his coat back, but I talked him out of it."

"Well, it was his coat," Jake said. "I don't blame him."

"Hell, Deets didn't need it," Augustus said. "It ain't cold down here. Deets was just attached to it because he had it so long. You remember when we found it, don't you? You was along?"

"I may have been along but I don't remember," Jake said, lighting a smoke.

"We found that coat in an abandoned cabin up on the Brazos," Augustus said. "I guess the settlers that run out decided it was too heavy to carry. It weighed as much as a good-sized sheep, which is why Call gave it to Deets. He was the only one of us stout enough to carry it all day. Don't you remember that, Jake? It was the time we had that scrape up by Fort Phantom Hill."

"I remember a scrape, but the rest is kinda cloudy," Jake said. "I guess all you boys have got to do is sit around and talk about old times. I'm young yet, Gus. I got a living to make."

In fact, what he did remember was being scared every time they crossed the Brazos, since it would just be ten or twelve of them and no reason not to think they would run into a hundred Comanches or Kiowas. He would have been glad to quit rangering if he could have thought of a way to do it that wouldn't look bad, but there was no way. In the end he came through twelve Indian fights and many scrapes with bandits only to get in real trouble in Fort Smith, Arkansas, as safe a town as you could find.

Now that he had come back, it was just to be reminded of Maggie, who had always threatened to die if he ever left her. Of course, he had thought it just girlish talk, the kind of thing all women said when they were trying to hold a fellow. Jake had heard such talk all the way up the trail, in San Antonio and Fort Worth, Abilene and Dodge, in Ogallala and Miles City-the talk of whores pretending to be in love for one. But Maggie had actually died, when he had only supposed she would just move on to another town. It was a sad memory to come home to, though from what he knew of the situation, Call had done her even worse than he had.

"Jake, I notice you've not answered me about Clara," Augustus said. "If you've been to see her I'd like to hear about it, even though I begrudge you every minute."

"Oh, you ain't got much begrudging to do," Jake said. "I just seen her for a minute, outside a store in Ogallala. That dern Bob was with her, so all I could do was tip my hat and say good morning."

"I swear, Jake, I thought you'd have more gumption than that," Augustus said. "They live up in Nebraska, do they?"

"Yes, on the North Platte," Jake said. "Why, he's the biggest horse trader in the territory. The Army gets most of its horses from him, what Army's in those parts, and the Army wears out a lot of horses. I reckon he's close to rich."

"Any young uns?" Augustus asked.

"Two girls, I believe," Jake said. "I heard her boys died. Bob wasn't too friendly-I wasn't asked to supper."

"Even old dumb Bob's got enough sense to keep the likes of you away from Clara," Augustus said. "How did she look?"

"Clara?" Jake said. "Not as pretty as she once was."

"I guess it's a hard life up in Nebraska," Gus said.

After that, neither of them had any more to say for a few minutes. Jake thought it ill-spoken of Gus to bring Clara up, a woman he no longer had any sympathy for since she had shown him the door and married a big dumb horse trader from Kentucky. Even losing her to Gus wouldn't have been so bitter a blow, since Gus had been her beau before he met her.

Augustus felt his own pangs-irked, mainly, that Jake had had a glimpse of Clara, whereas he himself had to make do with an occasional scrap of gossip. At sixteen she had been so pretty it took your breath, and smart too-a girl with some sand, as she had quickly shown when both her parents had been killed in the big Indian raid of '56, the worst ever to rake that part of the country. Clara had been in school in San Antonio when it happened, but she came right back to Austin and ran the store her parents had started-the Indians had tried to set fire to it but for some reason it didn't catch.

Augustus felt he might have won her that year, but as luck would have it he was married then, to his second wife, and by the time she died Clara had developed such an independent mind that winning her was no longer an easy thing.

In fact, it proved an impossible thing. She wouldn't have him, or Jake either, and yet she married Bob Allen, a man so dumb he could hardly walk through a door without bumping his head. They soon went north; since then, Augustus had kept his ears open for news that she was widowed-he didn't wish Clara any unpleasantness, but horse trading in Indian country was risky business. If Bob should meet an untimely end-as better men had-then he wanted to be the first to offer his assistance to the widow.

"That Bob Allen's lucky," he remarked. "I've known horse traders who didn't last a year."

"Why, hell, you're a horse trader yourself," Jake said. "You boys have let yourselves get stuck. You should have gone north long ago. There's plenty of opportunity left up north."

"That may be, Jake, but all you've done with it is kill a dentist," Augustus said. "At least we ain't committed no ridiculous crimes."

Jake smiled. "Have you got anything to drink around here?" he asked. "Or do you just sit around all day with your throat parched."

"He gets drunk," Bolivar said, waking up suddenly.

Augustus stood up. "Let's go for a stroll," he said, "This man don't like folks idling in his kitchen after a certain hour."

They walked out into the hot morning. The sky was already white. Bolivar followed them out, picking up a rawhide lariat that he kept on a pile of firewood back by the porch. They watched him walk off into the chaparral, the rope in his hand.