TWENTY-NINE

Clint went back to the cantina and arranged with the bartender-owner to secure two of the empty rooms for himself and Ben Weaver. Then, since he was at the bar, he ordered coffee. If he was going to drink something warm, he preferred it to warm beer.

“Would senor be looking for some company tonight?” the bartender asked him.

Clint looked at the man grinning at him with a couple of gold teeth glinting in his mouth. He wondered if the man had bought the gold with money he made from pimping out his own wife.

“That’s all right,” Clint said. “I think all I’ll want to do tonight is sleep.”

“It does not have to be Angel,” he said. “If she is too fat or ugly for the senor, we can provide . . . other companionship.”

“No, no,” Clint said, “Angel would be fine, if I were looking for a woman, but I am not.”

“A boy, perhaps?”

“I’m not looking for anyone!” Clint said forcefully. “I’m just going to sleep tonight.”

“Sí, senor,” the man said with a shrug. “As you wish.”

He was finishing up his coffee when Ben Weaver walked back in.

“This is a small town,” Clint said. “In fact, it’s a village. Where have you been?”

“Doin’ what you told me to do,” Weaver said. “Talkin’ to people.”

“You want some coffee?”

Weaver made a face.

“I’d rather have warm beer.” He signaled the bartender, who brought one over.

“Did you find out anything?” Clint asked.

“Well, everybody I talked to saw the Dolan Gang ride in and out, but nobody claims to have known any of ’em.”

“Not even the Mexican?”

“Nope.”

“They had to pass through here for a reason,” Clint said. “This is an easy place to bypass.”

“They were only here one day,” Weaver said.

Clint eyed the bartender, who was wiping the bar with a dirty rag at the other end.

“I wonder if they stayed here,” Clint said. “And I wonder if they wanted company for the night.”

“This town got a cathouse?” Weaver asked. He sounded so hopeful Clint took a look at him.

“I don’t know,” Clint said, “but I think for a few pesos more you can get the owner’s wife with your room.”

“His wife?”

“The waitress.”

“She’s a little old, ain’t she?”

“Maybe for you. Look, I’ve got an idea. Talk to the bartender about Dolan and his gang. See if any of them paid for some time with his wife. If they did, then we can talk to her.”

“Why don’t you talk to him?”

“I did,” Clint said, “and I don’t want to talk to him again.”

“Where are you gonna be?”

“Sitting outside.”

Clint pushed away from the bar.

“Hey, we got rooms?” Weaver asked.

“Yeah,” Clint said, “the two at the end of the hall. I think the owner’s wife is making up the beds. You could ask him that, too. Come outside after you ask him.”

 

Clint found a rickety wooden chair and took it out with him, sat on the boardwalk in front of the cantina. The horses were still tied there. They were going to have to find a place to bed them down for the night.

He didn’t want to spend any more time talking to the bartender, because every time he looked at the man’s face he wanted to smash it in. He had no respect, no use, in fact, for a man who pimped out his own wife.

From his vantage point he could see practically the whole village of Los Ninos. At one end he noticed what looked like a small barn where they’d be able to rest the horses for the night. About the only building he couldn’t see was the one Jacinta Rodriguez was set up in to do her doctoring—or her nursing.

Weaver came out and stood next to him.

“What?”

“He says one of the men spent the night with Angel.”

“Well, guess what?” Clint said.

“What?”

He looked up at Weaver. “You’re going to do the same.”