George thought about saddling a horse from the sheriff’s barn to ride over to Lee Hunt’s house, but he decided not to bother. He walked. It wasn’t far, and besides that, he wanted the time to think about how he would approach her. He was being silly, he knew. He was on official business. He was not going on a social call. He knew what questions needed to be asked, so there was really no reason to worry about what he would say, how he would present himself to Miss Hunt. He would present himself as Go-Ahead Rider’s deputy, explain the purpose of the visit, and ask the questions that needed to be answered. Then he would thank her for her cooperation and take his leave.
But would that make him seem to her to be cold and indifferent? He certainly did not want to leave her with that impression. He wanted badly to get better acquainted with her. He wanted an excuse to call on her, and Rider had given him one. Must he be all business on this occasion?
He had not managed to resolve these questions by the time he had reached her house, and he stepped up to her door nervously. He lifted his fist, hesitated, then knocked. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other. He turned his head and looked off down the street in the direction from which he had come, then looked back at the door. He raised his hand to knock again, and while it hovered there almost beside his head, the door was opened. Miss Hunt’s expression betrayed pleasant surprise.
“Why, Mr. Tanner,” she said.
“I’m sorry to just drop in on you like this unannounced,” said George. “It’s, uh, it’s official business.”
“It’s perfectly all right, Mr. Tanner. Please come in.”
Lee Hunt stepped aside to allow George room to walk through the doorway. After he was inside, she shut the door behind him and motioned to a chair.
“Please sit down,” she said.
George moved to the chair a bit awkwardly, then sat.
“Thank you,” he said.
“Would you like a cup of tea?”
“Oh, no, thank you. Don’t go to any trouble. I won’t take much of your time.”
“I just made myself a pot of tea,” she said. “It’s no trouble at all.”
“Well, then, yes. Thank you.”
Lee Hunt moved to get the teacups and fill them. As she brought George a cup, she spoke again.
“What possible official business could the sheriff’s office have with me?”
“We’re trying to trace the movements of Mix Hail when he was last seen,” said George. “The day he disappeared, he was seen down on the avenue, but not beyond where it intersects with your street. As far as we’ve been able to determine, no one except his killer saw him after that. We’ve talked to all your neighbors, and none of them saw him either. You’re the last one on this street. I have to ask you if you saw Mr. Hail out here on the street at any time that day.”
“What day was that, Mr. Tanner? I don’t know—I mean, I didn’t know Mr. Hail. I knew his name, of course. He was a councilman, but as far as I know, I never saw him.”
“Well, it, uh, it would have been the day before yesterday, Miss Hunt, in the late afternoon or early evening.”
“I did see something out there that was unusual that day. I don’t know if it was Mr. Hail or not. I heard the sound of a horse and buggy out in the street, and I looked out the window. The buggy stopped just down the hill, almost in front of the next house, my neighbors’, the Thompsons’ house. Mr. Riley stepped out of the buggy and walked back down toward Muskogee Avenue. I suppose it was none of my business, but I kept watching, because it seemed curious to me that he would drive up here, then walk back down the hill. The Thompsons were not at home. I already knew that.”
“You said Mr. Riley. Would that be—”
“Bean, I believe is his first name. Mr. Bean Riley. The owner of the Capital Hotel.”
“Thank you,” said George. “Did you see him come back to the buggy?”
“He came back in a few minutes with another man. They seemed to be in a heated discussion over something. I couldn’t hear anything they said. Then they both got into the buggy and drove off.”
“Which direction did they go?”
“West.”
“So they didn’t go back down to the avenue.”
“No.”
George tipped up his teacup and emptied it.
“Would you like some more?” asked Lee.
“Well, uh, yes, please.”
Lee stood up and got the teapot. She refilled George’s cup, then her own, put the teapot back on the table, then sat back down.
“Can you describe the man who got into the buggy with Mr. Riley?” said George.
“Not very well, I’m afraid,” said Lee. “He was, I would say, middle-aged. He was well dressed, wearing a suit. I think it was a black suit. He was a bit portly, I’d say. Not fat. Portly. He had a beard. Not long, but full. And—he was wearing a hat.”
“What kind of a hat?”
“Well, it was a wide-brimmed hat. No, not really wide. Medium, I guess, and flat, and it had a short, round crown. It was light colored. Not white. Tan or beige, I guess. I’m sorry I can’t be more specific, but, of course, I had no idea that I’d ever be asked to describe the man, and I did feel just a bit nosy for even watching as much as I did.”
“I’m glad you did, Miss Hunt,” said George, “and I think that your description was very good. In fact, I think you’ve just described Mix Hail. The only thing is, I’ve not seen the hat.”
George was suddenly nervous again. He realized all at once that he had no more official questions for Lee Hunt, and that meant that his excuse for remaining in her company was gone. He had a little more tea in his cup. He looked down at it, then he lifted the cup and drank the tea. He stood nervously and looked for a place to put the cup. Lee stood up and took it from him.
“Well,” he said, “I guess that’s it. Thank you very much. You’ve been a big help, I think. I, uh, I guess I’d better be going.”
He stepped to the door, and as he grasped the handle to open it, Lee spoke again.
“Mr. Tanner?”
He turned his head too quickly to face her, too anxiously, he thought.
“Yes?”
“Please come back when you have more time—just for a visit.”
Her face turned just a bit red, and George could see that she had embarrassed herself by being too forward. He was ashamed of himself. He should have made that move, not forced her to do it. He felt his own face flush, and he looked down at the floor.
“I’d like that,” he said. “I’d like that very much. Thank you.”
“Good night, Mr. Tanner.”
“Good night, Miss Hunt.”
Outside George took deep breaths of fresh night air, and he walked back to the office in long, quick strides. He felt a tremendous sense of relief. In her house he had felt nervous, anxious, ill at ease. Outside he felt as if he had been released from a cage. Yet he was sorry to have left her company. The next visit, he told himself, would be better. The next time he would know that he was welcome. She had actually asked him to return. He would handle himself better the next time. He would be more relaxed.
He was back at the office almost before he knew it, and he found it dark. Rider had said that they would be gone before he got back. He tried the door anyway, and it was locked. He started walking toward Rider’s house.
Rider was sitting alone in the dog run smoking his pipe when George came up to the house. It was dark already, and Rider heard the footsteps before he could see the form that came with them.
“That you, George?”
“Yeah.”
George moved on into the dog run and found the other chair. He sat down.
“Kids in bed already?” he asked.
“Yeah. I’m just having another smoke before I turn in. Coffee’s still hot. You want some?”
“Yeah,” said George. “Thanks. I can get it.”
“No. You just set there.”
Rider went into the house and soon reemerged with two cups of coffee. He handed one to George and sat back down.
“How was your visit?” he said.
“What?”
“You did go see Miss Hunt, didn’t you?”
“Oh,” said George. “Yeah. It was real nice. She’s, uh, she’s a real nice lady, Miss Hunt. She has a nice little house over there. Real nice. She gave me some tea.”
Rider puffed his pipe, then removed it from his mouth and took a sip of hot coffee.
“That sounds nice,” he said.
“Yeah,” said George. “It was. It was real nice. She invited me back, too.”
“Good,” said Rider. “I’m glad to hear that your social life is picking up.”
“Yeah,” said George, and he gave a short, nervous laugh. “I guess it is. I, uh, I guess I ought to thank you for sending me over there tonight. I might not ever have gotten around to it on my own. I’m glad you sent me. Thanks, Rider.”
“Yeah, I did send you over there, didn’t I?”
“Yeah.”
“George?”
“Yeah?”
Rider puffed at his pipe, but the fire had gone out. He tapped it on the side of his chair to knock out the dead ashes.
“George,” he said, “what did I send you over there for?”
“Oh,” said George, suddenly glad of the darkness, for he felt his face flush hot. “Oh, yeah. Well. She saw him, Rider. I mean, she said she never knew Mix Hail, but from her description, I feel pretty sure that she saw him. Bean Riley drove a buggy up there and stopped it just below her house. In front of her neighbor’s place. Then Bean walked back down to Muskogee Avenue, and pretty soon he came back up to the buggy with another man. She described the other man, and I think it was Mix Hail. Both men got into the buggy and drove off west.”
“Bean Riley, huh?”
“Yes, sir. Bean Riley.”
“I’ll bet,” said Rider, “that Lyons has got ole Bean on the railroad lobby’s payroll.”
“You seem pretty sure that the railroad’s behind all this,” said George.
“It’s the only thing that makes any sense, George. The only thing.”
“Rider?”
“Yeah?”
“This might not be important. I don’t know. But Mix Hail—if that’s who Miss Hunt saw get into the buggy—Mix Hail was wearing a hat. We never found a hat.”
“She describe the hat to you?”?
“Light colored. Tan or beige, she said. Medium width, flat brim, and a low, round crown.”
“That’s Mix’s hat. Sounds like.”
George took a sip of his coffee. It was still hot, almost too hot to drink. He put the cup down on the table, stood up, and paced away from Rider, toward the street. He rested his right hand on the butt of the Starr revolver hanging at his side and stared off into the darkness beyond.
“So what do we do now?” he asked. “We going to arrest Mr. Riley?”
“What’s the charge, George?” asked Rider.
“Well, suspicion of murder, I guess.”
Rider finished his coffee and put the cup down. Then he pulled a tobacco pouch out of his vest pocket and started to refill his pipe.
“I do suspicion him,” he said, “but that’s all we got. We can’t arrest him for driving ole Mix somewhere in his buggy.”
George walked back to his chair and sat down.
“What then?” he said.
Rider struck a match, and the flame burst out in the darkness. He lit his pipe and took several puffs to make sure it was going well.
“I think we’ll just let it rest awhile, George,” he said. “Go back to the whiskey case. Work on that.”
“What?”
“Sleep on it. Think about it. We’ll talk about it some more in the morning.”
George tossed in his bed that night. Why would Rider abandon a murder case—one that Chief Ross was particularly concerned about—to chase down a whiskey seller? That didn’t make any sense. If it had been anyone besides Rider, George would have thought him a fool or an incompetent, but he couldn’t think either of those things about Go-Ahead Rider. No. Rider knew what he was doing. But George didn’t know, and that frustrated George. The selling of illegal whiskey was a serious crime; George knew that. And in the absence of a murder, it would make perfect sense to concentrate on that problem. But George couldn’t help but think that the murder should take precedence. What was Rider thinking? “Go back to the whiskey case,” he had said. That had been Rider’s top priority before the disappearance of Mix Hail. George had accompanied Rider on his visit to the Capital Hotel when Rider questioned Riley about that, and—wait a minute, thought George. What had Rider said? “Bean is the man we’re after.” He’d said that just after they had left the hotel. Bean Riley was the whiskey seller. At least that’s what Rider believed. And now they knew that Bean Riley was the last man seen with Mix Hail. It began to make sense.
George was awake early the next morning. He hadn’t slept much the night before, but he wasn’t sleepy, and he wasn’t tired. He was wide awake and anxious to start the day.
He looked across the dog run to the other cabin and saw no evidence that anyone was up yet over there. He dressed, strapped on the Starr revolver, and went out to sit in the dog run. In less than a minute he was up and pacing out to the road. He pulled the Illinois Railroad watch out of his vest pocket and checked the time. Damn, he said to himself. He was up too early. It would be an hour before breakfast, at least a half hour before Rider would stir. He paced back to the chair, but he knew that he wouldn’t be able to stand the wait. He took a little notebook and a pencil out of his pocket, and he penciled a note to Rider.
Going downtown for breakfast. See you at the office.
George
He put the note on the table in the dog run, knowing that Rider would be out there with his first cup of coffee and weighed it down with a small rock, then he began walking down the hill. He walked past the jail and on down to Muskogee Avenue as far as Al’s Eats. He went inside, sat down, and when Al came over to his table, ordered himself a big breakfast of eggs, sausage, biscuits, and gravy. He drank three cups of coffee while he was waiting for the breakfast, another with the meal, and two more after he had finished eating.
He pulled the watch out of his pocket and checked the time. In another fifteen minutes, Rider would be at the office. He thought about having one more cup of coffee to pass the time, but his stomach was already sloshing from the previous six cups. He decided against it, got up, paid for his breakfast, and turned to walk out the door. Just then the door opened, and Omer Lyons and Bean Riley walked in together. George gave them a nod as he left. Outside he hesitated. He looked back through the window and saw them sit down together. He wanted to be sure. Yes. They sat down together. He walked on to the office.
The office was still locked up when George got there, so he started walking back up the hill, back toward Rider’s house. About halfway up the hill, he saw Rider coming down. He hurried to meet him.
“You got out early this morning, George,” said Rider.
“Yeah,” said George, turning to walk alongside Rider. “I’ve been thinking. I know what you’re up to. At least I think I do.”
“All right,” said Rider. “Tell me about it.”
“You think that Bean Riley is the man who’s been selling whiskey around here. Right?”
“Right.”
“But you also think that Bean is guilty of Mix Hail’s murder—or at the least, he’s involved in it. Right?”
“Right again.”
“Well, we’ve got nothing to go on with the murder case. I mean, we’ve got a lot of evidence, but nothing that really points to anyone. We don’t have any real strong evidence against Riley or anyone else—just suspicions. Am I right there?”
“You’re right there,” said Rider.
“So we’ll arrest Riley on the whiskey charge. Get him in jail. Once we’ve got him, maybe we can get something more out of him. Maybe he’ll break down in jail and tell us what we need to know.”
They had reached the bottom of the hill, and the jail was just ahead. George was puffing from talking so much and walking at the same time.
“Or maybe,” said Rider, “someone else will get excited about Bean being in jail and be afraid that ole Bean might have said something out of turn.”
“You mean Omer Lyons. You think that Riley is working for Lyons. Right?”
“You’re right with me, George,” said Rider. “So far.”
“I just saw Riley and Lyons go into Al’s Eats together. They sat down together. Just as I was leaving. Just now.”
“That ain’t no crime,” said Rider, “but it is interesting.”
They had reached the jail, and Rider unlocked the front door. They went inside the building and into the office. Rider started messing with the wood stove to build up the fire for the coffeepot. George took the pot and went for water. He felt good about himself. He was thinking the same way Rider was thinking. Maybe he would make it in this police business after all. He brought the pot back in and set it on the stove. Rider had the fire going, and he took a handful of coffee grounds and dropped them into the pot of water. He moved over to his desk, sat down behind it, placed his big pistols on the desk before him, pulled out his pipe and tobacco, and began filling his pipe. Still standing by the stove, George followed Rider with his gaze.
“Rider?” he said.
“Yeah?”
“Before we heard about Mix Hail, you were tracking the whiskey sales.”
“Yeah.”
“You said that Riley was the one you were after, but you didn’t arrest him. You didn’t have any evidence.”
“That’s right.”
Rider struck a match on the side of his desk and began puffing at his pipe.
“So how are we going to arrest him now?”
“George,” said Rider, talking between puffs, “the boys ought to start gathering right about now down around the capitol. Go on down there and send them down to see me one at a time. And keep your ears open. Listen to the talk.”
George looked at Rider, puzzled. He hesitated.
“Go on now,” said Rider.
At the capitol, George found all of the special deputies except Beehunter. He approached Delbert Swim first.
“Delbert,” he said, “run over to the office. Rider wants to talk to you.”
“What about?” said Swim.
“I don’t know,” said George, “but it’s not just you. He wants to talk to each of you—one at a time.”
“Oh,” said Swim, and he looked somewhat relieved. “Right now?”
“Yeah,” said George. “Go ahead. I’ll spell you here.”
Swim took off at a trot toward the jail, and George began working his way toward the front door of the building. “Keep your ears open,” Rider had said. If there was anything to be heard around the capitol at this time of morning, it would be around the front door. Two men were walking side by side toward the building. George thought that they were council members. He didn’t really know all the councilmen, so he wasn’t sure, but he thought they were. Elmer Lee walked around the corner of the building and up to George.
“Morning, George,” he said.
“Hi, Elmer. Say. These two coming here. They council members?”
“Yeah. You send Delbert off somewhere?”
“Yeah,” said George. “Rider wants to see each of you alone. When Delbert gets back, you run on down there next. Okay?”
“Okay. You know what it’s about?”
“I sure don’t,” said George. The two council members were getting close, and George stopped talking. He put a hand on Elmer’s shoulder and turned his back on the approaching legislators. He thought that they were talking Cherokee. “Listen,” he whispered to Elmer Lee.
They came closer, passed by, and walked into the building.
“Did you hear what they were saying?” said George.
“Some of it,” said Elmer. “It sounds like they’re fixing to vote on the railroad thing this morning. They’re going to vote against it. They think the railroad killed Mix.”
Over Elmer Lee’s shoulder, George could see Beehunter trotting up toward the square. He was late to work, so he was in a hurry. George glanced back toward the jail and saw Delbert Swim coming back. He gestured toward Swim and told Elmer Lee to go on. Swim took off, and Beehunter came trotting up. George nodded to Beehunter, then turned to wait for Swim.
“What did he want?” he asked when Swim came close.
“I don’t know,” said Swim. “He give me some coffee and then bullshit. That’s all. I sure don’t know.”
George was puzzled and slightly irritated. Why couldn’t Rider let him in on his little secrets? After all, he was Rider’s chief deputy.
“Tell Beehunter to go on down there as soon as Elmer Lee gets back, will you?”
Swim walked over to Beehunter and started talking in Cherokee. George stared off toward the jail, an ambiguous furrow in his brow.