Outlaw in Paradise

  "I asked Glen to marry me. And she turned me down flat. Said she likes me well enough, but she'd rather be friends. Friends." He threw his lit cigarette at the spittoon. It missed. Jesse knew he was drunk when he didn't get up and drop it neatly into the receptacle. This was the tidiest jailhouse he'd ever been in, and Sheriff Tom was the cleanest man he'd ever met.

  "Well, then she's dumber than she looks and she doesn't deserve you," he said stoutly.

  "Glen's not dumb." He swung off the bunk and stood up, swaying. "Take that back."

  "Okay."

  He staggered out of his cell and into Jesse's. "You take that back."

  "I said I took it back."

  "Oh." He collapsed on the bunk; Jesse had to jerk his legs out of the way fast or he'd have sat on them. "Okay, then. 'Cause Glen's not dumb, she's just young. Doesn't know what she wants."

  "Isn't that what I said? Isn't that exactly what I said? Women don't know what the hell they want."

  "That is the God's honest truth."

  They toasted each other with so much feeling, they almost shattered their whiskey bottles. Jesse slugged down a big shot without choking, but the fire in his stomach afterward burned like a son of a bitch. Too bad he wasn't much of a drinking man. Still, compared to his new best friend, he was a regular Doc Holliday.

  He wished he'd realized sooner what a swell fellow Tommy was. Seemed like they could talk about anything. Already they'd been through horses, state politics, dirty jokes, the meaning of life. Now they were starting on women. "Good thing there's no crime tonight," Jesse noted. Otherwise they'd have to give up their beds and drink sitting up.

  Tom grunted, took a drink, belched. "Know the real reason she won't have me, Mr. Gault?"

  "Jesse."

  "She thinks..." He leaned back against the cool brick wall and shut his eyes. His pale skin and scrawny chin-beard reminded Jesse of pictures of

  Jesus, right after the Crucifixion. "She thinks..." He bared his teeth, fighting back tears.

  "Hey now," Jesse started, sitting up.

  "She thinks I'm a coward." He whispered it, scrunching his face up, but by some miracle he didn't cry. He took another sip of whiskey to clear his head. "I feel better for getting that out. Funny how I can admit it to you, of all people. You ever been scared of anything, Mr. Gault? Jesse?"

  "I'm scared of dying." Like Tom, he felt better for getting it out.

  "You?"

  "Well, hell. What do you think? I go around trying to commit suicide?"

  "No. No, I guess not. But why do you do it, then? Why'd you pick your line of work?"

  "Why did you?" he countered, cagey.

  "Because I believe in law 'n' order."

  "Hah."

  "And I thought I'd be good at it. I didn't know... I wasn't prepared for the danger." He faced Jesse but didn't look at him. "I know what people call me behind my back. You think Glen's right? You think I'm yellow, Mr. Gault?"

  "Hell, no. Hell, no. What's brave about getting yourself killed? Listen here," he said, leaning forward, getting intense. His elbow slipped off his knee; he caught himself just before hitting his teeth on the bottle. Hm, drunker than he thought. Good; finally. "If you face off with Merle or Turley, they'll kill you where you stand. Where's the sense in that? People'll say nice things at your funeral, but inside they'll be thinking, What an idiot that Tommy Leaver was. And a month later, they won't remember your name."

  "You're right. Abs'lutely right." He hauled himself up and started for the door.

  "Where you going?"

  "Gotta piss."

  "I'll go with you."

  A fog had rolled in sometime; everything looked white and ghostly, not real. In the alley behind Main Street, they relieved themselves against the brick wall of the jailhouse. "Still," said Tom, "I got to do something. This thing with the snakes, thass the last straw. That boy coulda died. And if it hadn't been him it woulda been Cady. That's murder, thass what that is."

  "Can't you—"

  "I been sending wires and letters to the U.S. Marshal's for a month. They say they'll send somebody, but they don't."

  They finished their business and wandered back around to the front. "Quiet tonight," Jesse observed. He could hear soft piano music coming from the Rogue, though, and that big, aching hole opened up in his chest again. God, lonesomeness hurt like hell. If he felt this bad, he wasn't that drunk after all.

  Tom was, though. It hit him all of a sudden— must've been the fresh air. He wheeled around to go back in his office and almost fell off the boardwalk. Jesse had to catch him. Their arms got tangled up, and they went crashing against the side of the building. "Shh," the sheriff hissed, missing his lips with his index finger and almost poking his eye out. "Shh—shh! Don't let 'em see me."

  "Who?"

  "Folks. I'm the sher'ff." He collapsed in hoarse, wheezing gales of laughter.

  Jesse got him into his old cell and settled him down on the cot. "You okay? Maybe you had enough."

  Tom took a swallow from his bottle, shuddered, and spat it out on the floor. "Aw, no," he mourned, eyeing the mess he'd made. "Now I gotta clean that up."

  "I'll do it."

  "You will?"

  "Sure."

  "You're the best, Mr. Gault."

  "J-"

  "Jesse. Been meaning to tell you," he slurred, stretching out on his back. "That day I asked you to help me? Outa line. Desp'rate. Wit's end. You... you're a stranger, could be gone tomorrow. Not your fight," he mumbled, eyes closed. "Gonna do something. Dunno what yet. Something..." He passed out with his mouth open.

  Jesse found a blanket and covered him up, pulled his boots off for him. Lying there snoring, he looked like an overgrown boy with his wispy beard and pale, freckled cheeks. What could a man who looked like that do against Merle Wylie? Jesse had a powerful urge to save him. The only trouble with that was, Sheriff Lily Leaver was probably a better shot and a faster draw than he was.

  "Shit," he mumbled, weaving his way out of Tom's cell and back into his to get the whiskey. "What the hell am I gonna do?" he asked the bottle. No answer. "Gak." Booze tasted like kerosene to him now, but he slugged some more down anyway.

  He wandered outside. The thick, swirling fog reminded him of the inside of his own head. Pretty soon he was weaving down Main Street, pulled by the high, sad notes of Chico's piano. Not many folks out tonight, and the few that were got out of his way fast, he noticed vaguely. Rogue's Tavern came up on him all at once, looming out of the mist like a ship in a gray harbor. Yellow light from the windows looked warm and friendly and inviting. He quickened his stride—which was why he tripped on the step to the sidewalk and smacked his knee on the edge. It didn't hurt, because he was pretty numb by now, but afterward he walked with a limp.

  He stopped at the swinging doors and hung on them, peering inside. Hardly anybody here. Chico finished a song, and the sound of Cady's voice, low and sweet, saying, "You're busted, Curly," was another kind of music in the smoky hush. Right about then, it hit Jesse that he loved her. He really loved her.

  Welp, no time like the present to tell her. In his eagerness, he shoved the doors open a little too hard. They smashed back against the walls, crash. Everybody in the bar jumped, and Levi dropped the glass he was drying. "Miss Cady McGill," Jesse said purposefully, weaving toward the blackjack table. Curly Boggs and a couple of the Witter ranch boys shot out of their chairs like Cady had dealt them all rattle- snakes. The closer he came, the farther they backed up. What the hell? By the time he got to her, stood swaying in front of her, they were all gone. Vanished, disappeared. Maybe he'd imagined them?

  "McGill," he repeated hoarsely—too many cigarettes, too much kerosene. But he could still see straight, and she looked good. A sight for sore eyes. For a little thing, she sure had a lot of hair. Piled up all neat and shiny on top of her pretty head. She had a gold dress on tonight, mmmmm, sexy as hell, with long sleeves but no shoulders. How did it do that? He couldn't tell; he was distracted by the hint of a wing, or
maybe a beak, in her cleavage.

  He scowled. He'd tried to like that bird, God knew he had, but he couldn't. It irritated him. He hoped her sailor boy was feeding the fish at the bottom of some ocean.

  "Well, that's just great. Thank you very, very much."

  "Don't mention it." He smiled at her, then noticed she wasn't smiling back. "What'd I do?"

  "Damn you, Jesse Gault." She came out from behind the blackjack table with her hands on her hips. The term "wet hen" drifted through the haze of his mind. "First you won't lift one selfish little finger to help me, and now you drive away what few customers I've got left. Are you sure you don't work for Wylie? You might as well!" She was steaming, mad as a bull; he'd have let her alone and waited till she cooled off, except for one thing. She kept blinking because she had tears in her eyes. That just did him in.

  "Aw, Cady girl. C'mere, honey—"

  "Don't call me Cady girl, and don't you touch me." When she pushed him in the chest, he fell over the chair behind him and landed butt-first on a table. Cady's brown eyes went wide. "You're drunk."

  "No, I'm not." To prove it, he got up and came toward her again. "Got something to tell you."

  "What? You're going to go down to Wylie's right now and tell him to stop?"

  "No, this is something—"

  "Then I don't want to hear it. I want you out of my place. Why won't you go?" The tears started again.

  "Aw, Cady, will you just let me talk?"

  "No. Out, Jesse. Out. Levi, make him go," she pleaded, swishing out of his reach in a whirl of gold skirts and rhinestone jewelry. He started to go after her, but he stumbled over another damn chair. He sat down in it hard and watched her stalk off, high heels clacking, bustle sashaying.

  "Shit," he sighed mournfully. Levi appeared out of nowhere, holding out a glass of vanilla soda. Jesse shuddered away from it, his insides quivering. "Say something good, Levi. Gimme some o' that Buddhist wisdom."

  The bartender sucked in his cheeks, thinking. "Want nothing. Be nothing. Go nowhere."

  Jesse peered at him, bleary-eyed. "That's it?"

  Levi shrugged. "What you expect on short notice?"

  Twelve

  Cady couldn't sleep. Nothing new there: ever since she'd kicked Jesse out of her bed, she'd slept badly. Tonight, though, she couldn't even keep her eyes closed.

  Everything was a mess, her whole life, and everything she didn't want to happen had happened. She tossed the covers off, pulled them back up, threw them off again, thinking about her sorry history with men. Was it her fault? Something she was doing? She'd been so proud of herself lately. She hadn't been in love, meaning in trouble, for years. Men: trouble. She gave Glen that brilliant piece of advice all the time, and now look at her. Ha ha. Another one of life's hilarious jokes on her.

  Had she suffered like this when Jamie left her? It was getting hard to remember, but she didn't think so. She definitely hadn't when the Monterey schoolteacher's wife turned up. Really, only Mr. Shlegel's death had hurt this bad, and that had been a clean, clear ache, just ordinary grief over losing somebody she'd dearly loved. But this thing with Jesse Gault was worse, and that made no sense at all. How had it happened? He was a hired killer! She'd known him for less than a month!

  Oh, she'd gone over it a hundred times, there was no point in telling herself again how completely impossible he was. Anyway, she'd managed to get over the hired killer part pretty easily, hadn't she? That had stopped bothering her, sort of, a long time ago. But this new wrinkle—the fact that he wouldn't do anything about Wylie even after what happened to Ham—would not go away. She couldn't set it aside, let Jesse be her lover again and pretend nothing was wrong. It eliminated him. She'd been stupid in the past about who she gave herself to, but this was a flaw in a man even she couldn't overlook.

  Too bad it had to show up in the one man she wanted for her own, for life. She'd really done it this time.

  The next morning, red-eyed and exhausted, she paid a visit to Ham. He still looked a little gray around the gills, as Levi put it, but his spirits were high and he was itching to get back to his busy, little-boy life. "I get to get out o' bed today," he chattered, "Doc say so. Hey, Cady, lookit what Mr. Gault give me." He pulled a bullet from a little cloth pouch in his pajama pocket. A bullet! Let this be a lesson to you, Cady chided herself. You're in love with a man who gives out bullets to sick children.

  Lia Chang came in. Cady kissed Ham and gave up her place by the bed so Lia could give him his lunch, a bowl of ginseng and lotus seed soup—to improve circulation and reduce internal heat, Lia claimed. Ham ate it, which Cady decided must mean he really liked his father's new girlfriend.

  And how did she feel about that? Jealous? Resentful? Abandoned? Standing beside Lia, watching Ham dutifully open his mouth and swallow the soup she spooned into it, Cady had to admit she felt all three. She'd gotten used to thinking of him as the next best thing to her very own child. She loved him so much; when he'd almost died, she had honestly and truly wanted to trade places—save him with her own life. Now, though, just as much, she wanted him to have his own happy, loving family. A real mother, who could look after him and take care of him all day, every day, not just in her spare time. She sighed, sending him a gentle smile over Lia's shoulder. She guessed she had the best kind of love for Ham. She loved him enough to give him up.

  "Lookin' peaked," Levi pronounced as she was leaving. "You feel all right?"

  "Fine. I'm not sick, if that's what you mean."

  He scrutinized her, squinting his eyes to see her better—Levi needed glasses. With anybody else she'd have taken offense or been embarrassed or tried to cover up. But Levi, her best friend, never judged or criticized, so there was never any point in getting defensive. "Saw Mr. Gault this mornin'," he mentioned. "He look even worse than you."

  "I'm not surprised," she said with a sniff, as if she didn't care. "I expect he's lying in some alley right now, holding his head."

  "Nope. Saw him walkin' outa town."

  "Well, he can keep going for all I care."

  Levi smiled sweetly. "You still mad at him."

  His placidity needled her. "Why aren't you mad at him? That's what I can't figure out. It was your son who almost died," she pointed out, but she felt hopeless and silly even as she said it. "I thought—everybody thought Jesse was becoming a friend, somebody we could trust. And now this." Levi just kept smiling. "Don't you think it puts him in a new light? Don't you think it shows what he really is?"

  "Could be. But what if he trying to go straight?"

  "What?"

  "What if he through with killin'. What if he trying to get shut o' that life."

  She blinked at him. "Oh, Levi," she breathed. "Do you think that's it?"

  He shrugged his shoulders. "Might be. He never seem like a killer to me much. Some, but not much." He rubbed the side of his nose with his index finger, squinting again. "Maybe he tryin' to change for you."

  "For me." She sighed it, thunderstruck.

  She left Levi's in a daze. It was Friday; by rote, she walked over to Nestor's and rented her usual buggy and mare. All the way out to River Farm, she thought about Levi's theory. Could it be true? Was Jesse trying to give up gunfighting for her? It scared her, how much she wanted to believe it.

  But if it was true, why hadn't he just said so? Because he was too proud? Oh, the things she'd said to him, the names she'd called him! She wanted to shrivel up in a ball when she thought of how mean she'd been to him. And last night he'd gotten drunk on account of her—she saw it clearly now. She had wounded him to the quick. He wasn't even that much of a drinking man, and because of her he'd drunk himself silly. Fool! She could've been helping him, encouraging him to stay on the straight and narrow, and what had she done? Chided him for being selfish. Taunted him. Urged him to take bloodthirsty revenge on an enemy of hers, not even his.

  "Oh, Jess, I'm sorry," she said out loud, "I'm so sorry! If I could see you now, I'd tell you." She thought of turning the buggy around and
looking for him in town, but Levi said he'd gone for a walk. To try to get over the hateful things she'd said to him, she didn't doubt. Her skin crawled. She was so ashamed.

  She heard a noise, a gunshot, just as she was guiding the gray mare through the worn stone gateposts to River Farm. "Whoa, horse," she said softly, pulling on the reins. They stopped. She listened. More shots.

  Somebody hunting? This far from town? It sounded like a pistol, though, not a rifle. That probably meant one thing: somebody was having a high old time shooting out the last few panes of window glass in Le Coeur au Coquin.

  "Oh, no, you're not," Cady vowed, smacking the mare's rump with the reins and making her jump. "Not if I have anything to say about it."

  She slowed down before the house came into view, though. Guns made her nervous. Jumping down, she tied the reins to a tree branch and crept around the bend in the carriageway on foot.

  The house appeared, as ramshackle as ever, and as beautiful to her. The shots were coming from the back, toward the orchard, in intermittent bursts: six shots, silence; six shots, silence. Not a window breaker, then. A target shooter.

  She still didn't like it. Wasn't this private property? Anyway, in her heart, River Farm was hers, and she didn't like the idea of people with guns traipsing over it. Picking up her skirts, she started down the stony path around the house..

  ****

  Jesse had been a tad optimistic. He'd brought a sack full of beer bottles, seven of them, but one would've been enough. No, more than enough. What he should've brought was the broad side of a barn.

  "Shit," he cursed for the sixty-sixth time, once after each bullet that flew above, below, to the right, or to the left of the goddamn bottle on the fence post. He'd never been any good at this, but you'd think one bullet would've hit the goddamn target by now, if only accidentally. His hands were steady, so was it something with his eyesight? Damned if he knew. Some brain path wasn't working right, that's all he could figure.

  The damn gun was heating up again, burning his fingers. He slid his last six rounds into the chambers and slapped the cylinder closed. This was it. He braced his legs and took aim, closing one eye and sighting down the barrel with the other. Bam. Nothing. Bam. Nothing. He changed his stance, changed eyes. Bam. Nothing. Bam. Nothing. He held the gun with both hands and didn't close either eye. Bam. Nothing. "Shit." He closed both eyes. Bam.