The lawman-turned-bounty-hunter walked into my house like he owned it. I nearly said something to him about it, then let it go. There were more important things to talk about. But it grated on me to see him stride into my house, drop his hat over a door-peg, and stand in the middle of the room surveying everything.
Toby held himself well going in, but I saw the strain underneath. He was far from being a well man. Still, I said nothing. If he wanted to make Loggins think he was healthy, I’d not interfere.
Trouble was, Loggins didn’t miss much. He looked at Toby, then at me, and smiled.
“Wouldn’t take much for me to get the upper hand, here, would it? Saying I was a Barstow, which I’m not.” He shook his head. “A sick boy and a half-grown girl.”
“Don’t risk your silver on it,” Toby said quietly. “Lonnie and I have the guns, and that old hound would light into you real quick if you tried anything.”
“Maybe so,” Loggins answered, scratching at his mustache, “but I reckon I still might come out ahead. Training and all.”
“As a lawman?” I asked mockingly
He nodded. “I was one of the best.”
“So why’d you quit?”
His face was grim. “Barstow trouble, miss. If you’ll invite me to sit a spell, I’ll gladly explain it all to you.”
I considered it a moment, then nodded. “Find yourself a seat.”
Loggins did so, pulling up a chair and seating himself carefully as Tracker eyed him suspiciously. Poor hound, he’d had his fill of strangers lately.
Toby returned my rifle to its pegs by the door and took his place in the rocker. He did it smoothly, easing himself down as if he weren’t troubled, but the pallor of his face and shadowed eyes gave him away. And Loggins knew it.
I sat down on the bench by the table and set the borrowed rifle next to me, in easy reach. I wasn’t quite sure I trusted him yet.
“I’m hunting the Barstows,” Dan Michael Loggins said quietly. “First I did it because I was a sheriff sworn to do it as a duty for Missouri, all legal like. It’s still legal, for all that; I’m just not part of the law anymore. But I first started tracking them with a posse.”
“This is Kansas,” I pointed out. “What’s a Missouri sheriff doing here?”
He looked affronted. “Kansas isn’t the only state with Barstow trouble. Once or twice they’ve crossed the line, and they’ve killed honest folk from Missouri. But you’re right in part—my jurisdiction quit at the line.” He shrugged. “As a sheriff I couldn’t devote all my time to them, there were other things to do, so I put off my badge and came after them.”
“For the money?” Toby asked.
Loggins rubbed at his mustache. “Partly. The reward’s more than my yearly salary. I’d sure like to be the one who got it. But it’s also a matter of pride. No one has caught them before, save for Ben, and I’d like to do it.”
“You make it sound easy,” I told him.
He shook his head. “I don’t mean to. It ain’t. They’re hard men, miss, and need killing.”
“And you’re the man to do it?”
He grinned widely, green eyes glinting with amusement. “You don’t think much of me, do you? Well, it don’t matter. I reckon I’ll find out when I catch up to them.”
“You intend to just shoot them down, do you?” I asked scathingly. “Like animals?”
His good humor faded and the eyes were level and hard. “It’s what they are, girl. Animals. They need culling from the herd, like a renegade steer in a bunch of prime beef.”
I shivered in response to his tone. “But they’re not around here. Why should they be?”
Loggins stared across at Toby. “You’ve got the witness who testified against Ben hidden here, girl. Where else do you think they’d be?”
I swallowed. “Those tracks you say you followed. They led here?”
“Near enough,” Loggins answered. “I couldn’t be certain, but after you were so defensive at the river I decided to swing back and check things out. Thought there might be a possibility you were hiding one of the Barstows.”
Toby smiled wanly. “No. She’s just hiding me.”
I met Toby’s eyes across the room and saw the tired smile in them. “You belong in bed, Toby,” I said. “You’ll not heal if you keep wearing yourself out.”
“Caught yourself a bullet, did you?” Loggins asked with interest. Toby nodded. “Matt Barstow’s got a powerful calling card. Even from a distance.”
I walked to Toby and gestured. “Come on. Time to change your bandages.”
Loggins rose. “Let me do it. I’ve had more experience at it than you.”
I stared at him defiantly. “This is my house, mister. I’ll do the tending. You just stay put where Tracker can keep an eye on you.”
“Still don’t trust me, do you?”
“Why should I? You could be lying to me. You could have made the whole story up.” I smiled humorlessly at him. “Toby says you’re not a Barstow, but has he really seen them close enough to be certain?”
Toby struggled to his feet. “I said he wasn’t Lonnie. He isn’t. Not him.”
He reeled suddenly and Loggins caught him before he fell. I flashed the man a furious glance and grabbed hold of Toby’s arm, bur Loggins merely brushed me aside and half-carried a protesting Toby into the bedroom. I followed sullenly, angry at the man’s actions, but also worried about Toby.
He hadn’t fainted again, but he was close to it. The strain of getting up and coming after Loggins outside had taken its toll on him. He was half-awake, mumbling something I couldn’t understand. Loggins settled him on the bed, stripped his boots off and dropped them to the floor. He shot a hard glance at me.
“I reckon you got bandages. Get them.”
I did, white-faced with resentment, and watched as the man gently tended Toby’s wounded shoulder. It already looked better, clean, with reduced festering and swelling. Loggins nodded and tied off the bandage efficiently.
“You’ll do,” he told Toby, whose eyes were half-lidded and dazed. “You need rest and solid food, but you’ll do.”
“Lonnie?” Toby whispered.
“I’m here. Go to sleep.”
“He’ll be all right,” Loggins said confidently, rising to tower over me.
I shrugged, ill-humored. “It’s nothing to me. I don’t rightly want him to die in my house, but he’s nothing more than a stranger I’m tending to.”
“I see.” He grinned. “You got some coffee? I could sure use some.”
I followed him from the bedroom into the front room again, disliking his familiarity. “You’re not a guest, mister. Just a stranger who forced his way in here. I owe no hospitality to you.”
“Then I’ll help myself.” He went to the cupboards and began searching through them.
I picked up his rifle, “You’d best go now, mister. You’ve worn out any welcome you might have gotten from me.”
Loggins paused, staring at me. “Miss, I hate to do this to you, but if you keep on that way I’ll have to. Gun or no, I’d still be able to stop you from doing me violence. I’ve never known a woman yet who could shoot a man face on.”
“Would you like to try it from the receiving end?”
He grinned, then laughed aloud. Tracker, at my side, growled and took a step forward. Loggins held out a big hand, displaying strong fingers and a wide palm.
“I could stop that hound if it came to it, missy. He might take a hunk of hide off me, but I’d still choke him down. I’ve done it before.”
“My name is Lonnie,” I said between gritted teeth, realizing he spoke the truth, “and if you hurt that dog I’ll shoot you down for certain.”
Loggins nodded. “Fair deal, Lonnie. Now, can I have some coffee?”
I gave up. There was something about the man that diminished another person. He was big and strong, but it wasn’t just physical presence. He had a force in his character as well, and even I had to answer it. I hated it, but I answered it.
Once he had his cup of coffee, he settled down in the rocker. Patch came in the open front door, took one look at him, then headed for the bedroom like a shot. Loggins stared after the cat quizzically.
“He likes Toby,” I explained.
The big man sipped at his coffee and slid his eyes over the room. He saw the faded photographs of my family on the wall and the little round table with the lacy white cloth holding some of my ma’s trinkets. The fancy Frenchified clock on the mantle ticked loudly in the silence, and then he looked back at me.
“You alone here?”
I sat at the table and nursed my own coffee. “I am. You got something to say about it?”
“I reckon not. What happened?”
“Nothing of your concern,” I said.
He grinned crookedly beneath the mustache. “I reckon it isn’t. Just curious.”
I said nothing, and he continued staring at me over the rim of his cup. “How long?”
“Two years.”
He nodded. “I see it in your eyes. Long enough to make it work, barely. Long enough to make you realize the folly in it.”
“Folly!” I slammed my cup clown on the table, slopping coffee across the wood. “It ain’t a folly!”
Loggins jerked his head toward the bedroom. “Maybe he’ll stay on with you awhile. Make the place run better.”
“He’ll be gone soon enough, I’ll see to that. I don’t need help, mister. I do fine by myself.”
“Lonnie,” he said sorrowfully, “working a farm alone is hard enough for a man. For a woman—well, it can’t go on forever. One day, you’ll need help.”
“Not me.”
“You will, you know.”
“Not me.”
He finished the coffee and rose, retrieving his hat and setting the empty cup on the table next to mine. “Fair enough.” He walked out of the house.
I sat stunned for a moment, staring after him, then ran to the door with his gun. “You forgot your rifle!”
He turned. “Oh, I’m not leaving yet. Just seeing to my horse.”
I gaped at him in astonishment. “You’re not staying here!”
“For a spell. Just long enough to see if the Barstows plan on showing up.”
“It’s my house!”
He grinned and tipped his hat. “Thank you kindly for the invite, ma’am. I accept with pleasure.”
I stared after him, shaking with frustration, then turned and went back in the house. There was no arguing with that man.
Toby was sleeping deeply when I looked in on him, and I almost envied him his chance to lose worries and concerns in sleep. Only three days before I’d had nothing more pressing to do than routine chores; now I had a sick man on my hands and another man I heartily wished was sick.
Dan Michael Loggins, whose name fascinated me for its oddity, was a puzzle. He’d told me a part of his past but his future was left unclear. Nothing he said set my mind at rest. He was here, he said, to wait for the Barstows.
I asked him what he’d do if they never came. He grinned and said he’d just ride on, as I undoubtedly longed for him to do, and when I agreed he laughed.
“But they’ll come, Lonnie,” he said to me as he sat at the table and cleaned his rifle.
“How can you be so sure?
He worked carefully, oiling the bits and pieces of the machinery that made the weapon work. “Men like them don’t give up. I’m not saying they know he’s here, but they won’t leave it to chance. They’ll come.”
I stood at the stove, baking biscuits for supper. “I’m not afraid of them.”
Loggins smiled oddly at me over his gun. “You must be the only soul who isn’t. And you’re just a bit of a girl, too.”
My teeth clenched. “I’m neither ignorant nor stupid, girl or not. I know it means danger, mister, but it’s something I’ll face. Wouldn’t you in my place?”
“I’d never let myself be in your place, Lonnie, were I a girl.”
I stirred at the dough viciously. “Just goes to show you’ve got no grit.”
“You’ll have me believing you’ve got enough for the both of us.”
“Maybe I do. Listen, I know Matt Barstow won’t give up until he finds Toby. But I’ll make certain he doesn’t find him here.”
“Matt Barstow will beat the grass for him, Lonnie. Better yet, he’ll burn it. Will you give Toby up to him?”
“I won’t turn a sick man out. Not to anyone.”
“I’m not saying you should. And I’d be mighty grateful to you for tending me, in his place. What I’m saying is—you’d be better off in town.”
“I’m staying.”
Loggins set aside his tools and looked at me levelly. “Lonnie, these are outlaws I’m speaking of. Not dandified, glorified heroes out of those dime novels. These are dangerous men.”
I smiled grimly at him. “You sound like you know them.”
“Enough of them, I know. I’ve spent a year tracking them. I know their habits. I know what kind of men they are.”
I left my biscuits to bake and walked to the rocker, settling down in it with my legs tucked under me. Loggins watched me silently, pensively, puzzled by my actions. I lifted my head and smiled.
“What kind of men are they, then? Tell me what you know.”
“Why do you want to hear this?”
“So I know what to expect if they come.”
He sighed and returned to his rifle, shaking his head. “It’s no glory-tale, girl. Matt Barstow’s a man with intelligence, and he uses it to fatten his pockets with stolen money. He and his brother started raiding and robbing and did it on their own for a few years, then met up with Wes Lacklander. He’s probably the worst of the bunch.”
“I’d have thought Matt was. Smarts and outlawry sound dangerous.”
His eyes flicked to me, hard and cold. “Matt Barstow, for all his killing and thieving, is still a man with normal appetites. Lacklander isn’t.”
I felt oddly chilled. “What do you mean?”
“You’d be better off not knowing.”
“Why?” I tugged reflectively at my braid. “I want to know it all.”
His face was stiff, distant. “Then I’ll lay it all out so you can look at it. You won’t like it. Wes Lacklander isn’t right in the head. He craves killing and women, and often they go hand in hand.”
“I—I don’t understand.”
“He likes to have a woman before he kills, and after, and sometimes he kills the woman when he’s done with her.” He stared at me expressionlessly. “Now, are you satisfied?”
I swallowed convulsively, bitter gall souring my mouth. The idea sickened me, but I refused to show my revulsion to Loggins. Instead I nodded.
“Go on. There’s more, ain’t there?”
He sighed. “There’s Jordy Macklin.”
“I know a little about him.” I shrugged at his glance of surprise. “Jordy’s pa founded this county. News of Jordy travels fast.”
“He left home still wet behind the ears, bound and determined to cause trouble for his father. He’s done it, too.”
“Who’s the fourth man?”
“Rooster Gibbs. Carries a knife. He’s older than them all, and he’s been in this business a long time. It’s said he’s a match for any gunman with his blade.”
I stared blankly across the room. “And now they want to kill Toby.”
“He got Ben hanged, Lonnie.”
I sighed and rubbed at my jaw, feeling the knurled scar curving up my chin. “It must be hard for him, knowing what he faces. He’s twenty years old, and already nearly killed by a murdering bunch of white men.”
“So, it was white men who killed your folks.”
I jerked upright. “How would you know that?”
“Your voice. You show no surprise at what the Barstows are capable of. Sounds like you’ve suffered at the hands of men very like them. Not Indians.”
“It might be easier if it had been,” I told him bluntly. “Easier to explain away than knowing white men murdered folk of their own kind.”
He snapped the last piece of his rifle into place. “Lonnie, dead is dead.” He smiled grimly. “Regardless who does the killing.”
I looked into his green eyes and silently admitted he was right. I said nothing to him, keeping it to myself. But he knew all the same.
“You’d best go into town and tell the sheriff.”
“I can’t.”
“Too stubborn?”
“Ridgely hasn’t got a sheriff. It’s too small. There’s no railroad spur, no beef ranches. Just a place farmers go for supplies.”
“I went through there,” he said, nodding. “I recall there’s not much to occupy a man. Two saloons, though.”
“There’s no need for a sheriff. If a farmer gets drunk and gets too rowdy, he gets heaved into a shed and locked in overnight. That’s our jail.” I shrugged. “There’s never been a murder…except for my folks.”
“There might be another one now.”
I met his look. “No. Not here. Not Toby.”
Slowly he smiled. “I admire your confidence.”
I rose and left the room, seeing to Toby.