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And good luck, Kirby. You’ll need all of it you can muster." An hour later Drew followed Topham’s advice, leaving gun belt, carbine, and everything else he could unload in Callie’s keeping before he swung up on Shiloh. The big colt was nervous, tending to dance sideways, tossing his head high.
First foal?" "Yes." Her owner hesitated and then added, "You give me a hand with her?" "You bet, son. She’s a pretty thing, an’ she’s been a far piece, I’d say. Now you looky here, boy—you sure look like you could take some curryin’ an’ corn fodder under your belt too. You git over to th’ Four Jacks. Topham’s got him a Chinee cookin’ there who serves up th’ best danged grub in this here town.
He was Drew Kirby, Texan, not Drew Rennie of Red Springs, Kentucky. "For a man just off the trail, Kirby, the Four Jacks does have a few of the delights of civilization. A bath...." One of Topham’s dark eyebrows, so in contrast to his silvery hair, slid up inquiringly, and he grinned at Drew’s involuntary but emphatic nod. "One of nature’s gifts to our fair city is the hot spring. Hamilcar!"
Topham’s voice cut through the other’s thickened slur. "You soak that rot-gut out of you, and mind your tongue while you do it!" "Sure, sure, Reese—" The voice was pitched lower this time, but to Drew the tone was more mocking than conciliatory. Drunk or sober, that stranger did not hold very kindly thoughts of Topham. But that was none of the Kentuckian’s business. "Yore hat, suh."
Drew dropped his voice. "Do you have a safe here?" Topham’s eyebrows climbed. "Do you foresee a deposit or a withdrawal?" "Deposit. I want to ride light today." "Then I’ll admit possession of a safe, such as it is. Don Lorenzo, por favor, will you act as banker?" He beckoned Drew after him into a small back room which was in sharp contrast to the main part of the Four Jacks.
Topham’s arm went about the shoulders under the black-and-silver jacket, drawing Don Cazar into the light, music, and excitement of the cantina. While Drew watched, the stouter back of Bartolomé cut off his first good look at his father. So ... that was Don Cazar—Hunt Rennie! Drew did not know what he had expected of their first meeting. Now he could not understand why he felt so chilled and lost.
And after that defeat at Glorieta, the retreat to Texas was pure hell with the fires roaring. It seems to have done something to the boy—inside." "Johnny wasn’t the only boy at Glorieta. From what I’ve heard most of them weren’t old enough to grow a good whisker crop." Topham’s voice had lost its detached note. "And he sure wasn’t the only Confederate to surrender.
What was expected of them—that they should have let Helms pour it on—maybe serve as butts for a series of practical jokes without raising a finger in their own defense? On the other hand, the Kentuckian could see the sense behind Topham’s arguments.
For a long time we’ve heard about Johnny Shannon being a young hothead who found it hard to settle down after the war. I think there are two Johnnys and we are just beginning to know the real one. You could be his prime target now." "Fair of you to point that out." Drew thought that at last he had found a real motive for Topham’s services. "I’m likely to be bait, ain’t that the truth of it?"
Topham’s quizzical eyebrows lifted in greeting to the waitress’s loaded tray. "I’d say, young man, that you are facing a full-time job now, getting all that inside of you." Drew ate steadily, consuming eggs and beans, tortillas, and fruit. Topham joined three men at the next table, substantial town citizens, Drew judged. The owner of the cantina raised his glass.
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