CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
After I finished having breakfast heaped on me, I said thank
you to Ma Schnieder and her grand-daughter and rode back to Dodge with Kitty.
“You old liar,” said Kitty as soon as we were away from the
house. She was smiling at me out of the corner of her eye.
“What does that mean?”
“You didn’t ride all the way out here to check on me,” she
said. “You wanted to pick at Ma, see if she knew anything about the Richards.”
“Well, I did learn something I didn’t know before,” I said.
“Yeah,” said Kitty. “I hadn’t heard that either. Until last
night.”
“Last night?” I said.
“Yeah,” said Kitty. “After I got to Ma’s place, we settled in
to talking and I asked her about your friend Francie. She told me about the
pregnancy. I figured that’s what Clay was celebrating at the Texas Trail the
night you saw him.”
“Yeah,” I said.
“But it doesn’t make sense, does it?” said Kitty.
“No,” I said. “No, it doesn’t.”
“I mean, why would he be so happy about it, then try to make
her lose it?”
“And don’t forget, the next day he tried to rob the bank.”
“Well,” said Kitty after a moment, “that makes more sense
than the middle bit. If he was worried about money and the baby, he might rob
the bank.”
“He wasn’t doing so poorly,” I said. “Besides, why rob the
bank in broad daylight, with a dozen witnesses outside?”
“Yeah, I suppose that’s pretty queer too,” said Kitty. “It’s
too bad about Francie, though. I mean, her losing her husband and her baby like
that.”
I looked at her. “Tell me,” I said. “Why were you asking Ma
Schnieder about Francie?”
“You asked me about it the other night, at the Texas Trail. I
thought I could help.”
“I appreciate it,” I said.
“Yeah, well, you spoiled things by coming out here this morning,”
she said. “I was looking forward to walking into your office and laying the
whole story out on you.”
“Sorry,” I said.
“You should be,” said Kitty.
We rode along for awhile, looking at the morning. The heat
was getting bad again, but I didn’t think about taking off my coat. I’d sewn up
the bullet hole in the pocket, though not very well, and I’d brushed it until
it was pretty decent looking. I realized that, more than what the townspeople
thought of me, it matter what Kitty thought of me. And somehow that didn’t
bother me at all.
“Kitty,” I said.
“Yeah, Matt?”
“I’m not a liar.”
She gave me a confused, searching look. “What does that
mean?”
“It means that, even if I wanted to ask Ma Schnieder some
questions… I mean, well… I could’ve sent Chester, couldn’t I?”
The skin around her eyes crinkled as she smiled. She started
nodding. “Yeah,” she said. “I guess you could’ve at that.”
We rode along for another mile or so in silence.
“I was going to ask you to breakfast,” I said.
“But that was before Ma Schnieder started stuffing you with a
whole suckling pig.”
“Yeah,” I said.
She thought for a minute. “How about tomorrow?”
“I’d like that, Kitty,” I said.
She frowned, and I saw that, unlike a lot of her expressions,
this one wasn’t playful.
“What about the regular folks?” she asked. “I mean, you just
got them on your side, Matt. Do you really think it’s a good idea – I mean,
don’t you think it’ll look bad for you to be seen outside the saloon, with a –
”
I cut her off. “People’ll just have to get used to it. I do
things my own way.” I waited a moment before adding, “And my way includes being
friends with you, Miss Kitty.”
She blinked a couple of times. If she wasn’t as tough a woman
as I’d ever met, I could have sworn those were tears in her eye.
“It’d be my pleasure, Marshal Dillon.”
