CHAPTER FIVE

It was full dark by the time I passed through the lodge-pole entry to the Diamond D and into the driveway behind the main house. Amber light spilled from the windows and the cloud of smoke that trailed out of the chimney told me someone had recently freshened the logs in the fireplace.

I parked beside Snoose Corcoran’s five-window flatbed, pulled open the back door to the mudroom, and followed the sound of surprisingly lively conversation to where Jesse, Cricket, and Snoose sat at the dining table with a fourth person I hadn’t met before.

“Climb down and cool off your saddle,” Snoose said. “Let me pour you a tipple.”

I leaned in and kissed Jesse on the cheek, and felt the warm flush of her skin.

“Snoose and his nephew were kind enough to bring over cornbread and this jug of wine,” she said.

“My mama, rest her soul, taught me never to show up empty-handed.”

“Very civilized of you, Snoose,” I said.

“Grab you a glass.” He smiled at me, but it didn’t make it all the way to his eyes. “And look here. They make wine bottles that’s got handles on ’em now. Mighty clever, if you ask me. If you hook your fingers in there just right, you can carry ’em out of the store four or five at a time.”

I took off my hat and hooked it on the coatrack in the corner beside Snoose’s. Wyatt curled himself on the floor between Jesse and me and lifted his head for a scratch.

“You’re a good boy, Wyatt,” she said to the dog, but the rest of her message was meant for me. “Some people don’t call to tell us when they’re going to be late.”

Cricket grinned and I saw that her cheeks were flushed pink like her mother’s. I wondered how much wine they’d gotten into before I walked through the door.

“That’s bad manners, isn’t it, boy?” Jesse persisted.

I tried on an apologetic expression, but Jesse had passed beyond the peak of her perceptive abilities.

“Anyone care to introduce me to the extra hand at the table?” I asked, changing the subject.

“This here is my nephew,” Snoose said. “His name’s Tommy Jenkins, my sister’s boy from down in California.”

I reached across the table and received a limp, damp handshake from a boy I judged to be about sixteen or so. He wore the bored, sullen expression of a modern teenager, and his verbal greeting to me was little more than a grunt. His hair looked as though it had gone unattended for some time, and was just long enough that it reached down to his earlobes, one of which was decorated with a tiny silver hoop.

“You studyin’ on becoming a pirate, Tommy?” I asked.

“Dad—” Cricket said.

I winked at her, and Snoose said, “It’s okay, darlin’, Tommy’s aware that he’s got a ring poked through his ear.”

“No, sir, I ain’t no pirate,” Tommy mumbled and went back to work on what remained of his pot roast and peas.

“He don’t go in much for razzin’,” Snoose added. “Just like his mom. You might remember her, Ty. You remember Sallyanne.”

“He favors her,” I said, but I was lying. Snoose’s sister had been fairly attractive in her youth, and this slouch-shouldered, horse-faced child of God did not resemble her in the slightest.

“She finally divorced that useless husband of hers,” Snoose continued. “When they got married and moved down there to southern California, I swear it raised up the average IQ of both places.”

“How long are you visiting for?” I asked the kid.

Tommy shrugged without raising his eyes from his plate, and shoveled a forkful of beef into his mouth.

“He’s stayin’ with me for the summer,” Snoose answered for him. “Sallyanne thought it would be good for him to come up here to get him away from his friends.”

The boy shot Snoose a look that could peel paint off the wall.

“He ain’t much of a talker,” Snoose said. “But I’m sure he’ll make a fine hand by the time autumn rolls back around.”

“I’m sure he will,” I said, lying again.

“How about some dessert?” Jesse offered, and it seemed like her powers of perception might have returned. “I’ve got pineapple upside down cake in the fridge.”

“I’ll help you,” I said.

“Charming kid,” I said to Jesse as we plated dessert in the kitchen.

“It’s an awkward age.”

“If I had behaved that way, my father would’ve taken three layers of hide off my butt.”

“That’s not how it’s done anymore, Ty.”

“This new way seems to be working real well, doesn’t it?”

“You’re in a mood. Bad time in Lewiston?”

“I’m not the most popular man in Meriwether County tonight.”

“Want to tell me about it?”

“Maybe tomorrow,” I said. “Let’s get this thing over with.”

“That’s the spirit.”

My family and the Corcorans had a long history together, sharing a border fence that separated our ranches since Snoose’s father, Eli, and my granddad had carved out their first stakes as amicable competitors in a harsh and unforgiving business. Both had been young men at the time, raising families right here on this land. But the Great War claimed the life of Eli’s eldest son and when the boom finally came at the end of it all, Corcoran missed it, and the calamity that came with the Great Depression nearly drove the last nail home. My grandfather helped keep Eli afloat through those times, but a combination of poor luck and even poorer decision-making had gradually eaten up the Corcoran ranch like a cancer.

Two years had now passed since Jesse and I had discovered old Eli lying dead in the long grass of a pasture at the far western boundary of our property. He had died peacefully in the saddle, exactly the way he had lived.

Snoose always had a contentious relationship with alcohol, but the death of his father had come hard to him, and it seemed he had crawled into a bottle that day two years ago with little intention of climbing back out.

“Why don’t you and Snoose take your desserts and coffee outside on the gallery?” Jesse said. “I’m sure you’d both enjoy some man-talk.”

I saw Cricket wince at Jesse’s use of an expression that was never uttered in our home, but I knew it was Jesse’s way of letting me know that Snoose had something weighing on his mind.

A slow, easy wind pushed through the last blossoms that still clung to the dogwood, and the sweet scent of wisteria hung in the air. The sounds of the stock horses settling in for the night drifted up from the corral a short distance away.

I showed Snoose to a willow chair in a quiet corner of the deck well out of earshot of the kitchen, while I took a seat in the matching one adjacent to his. I snapped a Vulcan match to life with my thumbnail and touched it to the wick of the lantern that rested on the table between us.

“How’d they treat you at the auction this year, Ty?” Snoose asked as he scooped up a forkful of Jesse’s pineapple cake.

“About like everyone else, I suppose. It’s been a rough couple years all around.”

Snoose’s face was half hidden in shadow, but I could see his eyes dart and twitch like a bird looking for a place to land.

“Your granddad was smart breeding them Purples,” he said. “The bottom’s damn near completely dropped out on my cows. No money at all for Herefords or Angus on the hoof or otherwise.”

Crickets chirred from somewhere underneath the house, and I watched his eyes slide away again.

“I’m down to my last three breed bulls, Ty. Likely going to have to sell one of ’em just to pay the property tax bill.”

He picked at the crumbs on his plate while he waited for me to say something. I could see that his hands had acquired a slight tremor, and imagined he had expended a great deal of effort trying to remain as sober as he could for his visit with us. I shook a cigarette loose from the pack in my pocket and offered him one.

“No thanks,” he said. “But I surely could use a postprandial.”

I set my unlit cigarette in the tray and got up to retrieve a bottle of brandy from the cabinet inside. He waved his hand in the air and told me to sit.

“Don’t bother,” he said. “I’m packin’ something of my own right here.”

He drew a stainless-steel flask from the back pocket of his jeans and unscrewed the lid. He tipped it to the edge of his coffee cup, then offered the container to me.

“Thanks, but no, Snoose,” I said and lit up my smoke. “I’m content with this here?”

He nodded, tucked the flask away, and leaned forward out of the shadows. It was the first time he’d made eye contact with me since we’d taken our places on the porch.

“There’s something else, Ty.”

I made a go-ahead gesture, and drew on my cigarette. Snoose took a stiff draught from the china cup in his hand, then placed it carefully back onto its saucer and sighed.

“I got a big favor to ask you.”