Tabor Evans (30 page)

Beside him, Jessibee exhaled in a long, contented groan. She said, "You're a randy woman's dream, Custis. I don't often meet a man who's built like you are, or one who can outlast me."

"I like to pleasure ladies," Longarm replied. "Most of all, ladies like you, who make it so plain you enjoy a man."

"I'm going to hate to leave you. If it weren't that this is Belle Starr's place now that Sam's dead, I'd stay and keep you company for a while. If you'd want me to, that is."

"Oh, I'd want you to, Jessibee. You've got whatever it is that grabs a man and makes him want to stay with you. I don't guess it'd work out, though, the way things are.

"No. It's too bad you're tied up with Belle."

"I ain't tied up with Belle Starr, not in any way, shape, or form. My business brought me here, and when it's finished, I'll go on my way and forget I ever seen her."

"I wish I could believe that, Custis. But from what the family tells me, Belle's got a way of holding men to her. Look at poor Sam. And everybody knows what her business is." Jessibee paused and then added reflectively, "Not that our people have much respect for white man's law. We've seen it change too many times, in ways that always seem to hurt us."

"Well, Belle's got no strings on me, Jessibee. And she never will have."

"You say that like you really mean it."

"I do."

"Where will you go when your business with Belle is finished?"

"That's something I can't rightly say, but only because I don't know myself right now."

"If you travel north, I live up by Talequah. That's just a little way from Fort Gibson."

"Are you inviting me?"

"If you're close by, it'd be unfriendly if you didn't stop in."

Jessibee stirred. "I guess I've got enough strength left to walk back up to the house. They'll be waking up before too long. The first rooster that crows will bring Robert and Aunt Sarah out. It'll save talk if I'm back before then."

Jessibee stood up and found her dress, where she'd draped it over the back of a chair. She drew it on over her head and came back to the bedroll. Longarm had risen to his feet. She kissed him quickly on the lips, then bent to give him still another fleeting kiss.

"Goodbye for now, Custis. I still wish I could stay."

Longarm watched her shadowy form as Jessibee went to the door, then outside into the gray false sunrise. He walked to the table and took a swallow of rye from the bottle, then he went back to the bedroll and stretched out and slept.

Whatever noise the visitors made when they left didn't disturb Longarm. He blinked awake in the sunrise and rolled to his feet. The woman-scent of Jessibee still clung to him. The smile brought on by the memory of the night stayed on Longarm's face while he took a whore's bath, moistening his palms with whiskey and rubbing them over his face and body.

Fully dressed, his weapons checked, another wake-up drink glowing in his stomach like the coal of the morning's first cheroot that he held clamped between his teeth, Longarm walked up to the house.

All the others were sitting at the table. Used plates in front of them showed that they were just finishing breakfast. The room was cool, and Longarm glanced at the stove. It had not been lighted. Judging from the food left on the plates, and that remaining on the platters that were in the center of the table, breakfast had consisted of leftovers from the funeral meats brought by Sam's relatives the day before. The platters held a few pieces of fried squirrel and the drumstick of a chicken, two small venison chops, and a little heap of drying biscuits.

Only Yazoo spoke. The old man said, "Morning, Windy. You look like you didn't get much sleep last night." Then he cackled in a brief burst of laughter.

"I had all the sleep I wanted," Longarm said.

Belle smirked. "I told them not to rouse you, Windy. I saw that draggletail Cherokee chippy sneaking back up to the house from your place this morning before daylight. I thought you'd need all the rest you could get."

Longarm needed no interpreter to translate the jealousy in Belle's words; he'd seen enough jealous women. He said, "What I do is my own affair, Belle." He picked up one of the venison chops and a biscuit and began to eat, still standing.

"How was she?" Floyd asked. "Hot, like I hear these redskin wenches all are?"

"That's my affair too, Floyd," Longarm said levelly. He finished the little chop and reached for the other one.

"Don't get riled, damn it," Floyd said. "Hell, we're all friends together. You might've called us, though. She could've took on me and Steed and then give Bobby a turn, after you got through with her."

"Find your own women," Longarm told Floyd curtly. He faced Belle. "I guess Floyd and Steed said something to you about the talk we had yesterday?"

"About your expecting me to take Sam's place, and ride with you on the bank job?" she asked. Longarm's mouth was full, so he merely nodded.

Belle said, "They mentioned it to me."

"She ain't said she'd do it, though," Steed told Longarm.

Longarm asked Belle, "Well? What'd you decide to do?"

"I haven't decided yet. I'm still thinking it over."

"Looks to me like you better make your mind up in a hurry, Belle," he said. "This is the day we're supposed to leave, if we still figure on pulling the job tomorrow." He bit into a squirrel-leg without waiting for Belle's reply.

In the silence that followed Longarm's words, Yazoo stood up. He stretched and said, "You're getting ready to talk business, I guess, and it's business I got no part of. I'll be going. There's plenty for me to do up at the stillhouse."

For several minutes after the old man had left no one spoke. Belle sat, her lips compressed angrily, a frown on her face. The others waited for her to reply to Longarm.

Finally Steed spoke up. He turned to Longarm and said, "Belle don't think it'll hurt if we put off the job for another day, or even two. Leastwise that's what she was saying to me and Bobby and Floyd, while we was eating breakfast."

Longarm looked at Belle while he finished chewing the mouthful he'd taken. When he'd swallowed it and she had still said nothing, he remarked casually, "Maybe, maybe not. The way I look at it, if Belle can't make up her mind, we'll be better off going ahead without her, or forgetting all about the damn job."

He was taking another risk, Longarm knew, but he counted on the greediness of Floyd and Steed to keep the risk marginal. Instead, it was Belle who objected.

"What do you mean, call it off?" she asked quickly.

"Just what I said." Inwardly Longarm breathed a sigh of relief.

"It's not your job to call off, Windy!" Belle said hotly. "I set everything up! Floyd and Steed and those two other fellows who had bad luck were supposed to fill out the gang, along with Bobby. Or did you forget that? You came tagging in at the last minute."

"You asked me to come in. I didn't offer or push in," he reminded her. "I've told all of you more than once, I just said I'd help out, and I didn't give a damn whether the job went off or not."

"That's right, Belle, he did," Floyd agreed. "And even with Windy in on it, we're still a man short, if you don't go with us."

Bobby spoke up unexpectedly. "Don't I have anything to say about all this?"

"Sure you do, Bobby," Longarm replied. "Just as much as anybody else does."

"Well, I think we ought to either pull it off or call it off," the youth said. "I don't know about the rest of you, but the longer we sit on our butts-"

Steed snapped, "That's enough, Bobby." Then he said to Belle, "I feel about like Windy does. We better go on and take that bank, just like we planned to. Hell, you said the other day you was sending word to them lawmen you're paying off, telling them when to expect us. What happens if we don't show up?"

Longarm welcomed the support Steed was giving him, but he didn't let it show. He told Belle, "You see, I ain't the only one that wants to go ahead the way we planned to. What's the matter, Belle? Don't tell me the Bandit Queen's getting cold feet."

"You know better than that!" she shot back. "I was hoping you men would be reasonable and let me have a few days to get over losing Sam, but-" Longarm broke in, "Like you said coming back from town the other day, Sam wasn't the first man you ever lost."

"Well he wasn't!" Belle retorted. "And he might not be the last! But that's no sign I can pick up and go about my business like nothing happened at all!"

"It'll be good for you to go, Belle," Floyd said. "Doing something ought to take your mind off your troubles."

They fell silent. Longarm started to say something, then thought better of it. He'd said enough, he told himself. The others had picked up what he'd started and made an issue of it. Belle was finding herself backed into a corner, and as far as he could see, she had only one way out. Before the silence grew too tense, Belle proved that his judgment to keep quiet had been good.

"All right," she said. "We'll go ahead with the job, just the way we planned to. I still don't think it'd do any harm to put it off a day or two, but it looks like you're all dead set on rushing along. We'll leave as soon as we get everything ready, and pull off the bank job tomorrow."

CHAPTER 18

Longarm didn't want to seem too eager, now that the decision had been made. He asked Belle, "You sure we can get to where we're supposed to camp tonight, if we start this late?"

Before Belle could reply, Floyd said, "Hell, it ain't all that late, Windy. And we won't need to do much but spread out our soogans when we get to where we'll be stopping." Belle said sarcastically, "Maybe he's too tired to ride today, Floyd. Too much time in the saddle last night." Longarm said, trying not to sound too cheerful, "Give me five minutes to throw my gear in my saddlebags, and I'll be ready to pull out."

"It'll take us a little bit longer than that," Belle told him. "If I'm going on this job with you, I'll have to change my clothes."

She was still wearing the black velvet dress she'd had on the day before. She'd taken off her gunbelt, though.

"We might as well settle one more thing right now," Steed put in. "Something we never did get around to talking about before. I'll put in what I think right now. As soon as it's safe to stop after we've done the job tomorrow, we split up the take and part company."

"We can talk about that after we camp tonight," Belle said.

"No." Steed's voice was firm. "We'll settle it right now. I don't aim to lose my sleep or get all nerved up arguing tonight in camp. Let's get it done with before we leave, Belle."

"I'll go along with Steed." Bobby chimed in.

"Me too," Floyd said. "He's right, Belle. When we settle down tonight, it better be to rest up so we'll be fresh tomorrow. We don't want a lot of jawing."

"That suits me," Longarm told the others. "Makes pretty good sense, I'd say."

Belle could see that none of them was going to listen to her, but she battled to the finish. "Suppose there's a slip-up? What if a posse takes after us and we have to break up before we can stop to split the take?"

"Then we'll all meet back here," Longarm suggested. "But you're suppose to have things fixed so that won't happen, Belle."

"it won't. Or shouldn't." Belle was on the defensive now. "You can't control everything all the time, though. Something could go wrong."

"All right," Floyd agreed. "We'll do like Windy said, meet back here and wait until we're all together before we divvy up. But provided your setup holds good, and we ride away from the job free and clear, it's going to be one hell of a long time before you'll see me at Younger's Bend again. It's been too damned unlucky a place for me."

"Amen to that," Steed said. "I'll be riding on when the job's finished, too. How about you, Windy?"

"I didn't aim to stay this long when I headed here. Just a night or two."

"It's all settled, then?" Belle asked. She spoke tautly, and they could all see she was holding her anger in check. "If it is, we'd better get ready and go."

"All that's left is for you to tell us where to ride if we get separated after the job," Floyd told her. "You said you knew trails we could use to get to other hideouts, places where we'll be safe."

"I'll tell you all that tonight, after we're in camp," Belle replied. "There's no use wasting time on it now. We'll be getting a later start than we ought to, as it is. I'll be ready in ten minutes. I suppose all of you can be ready then?"

They broke up at once, to make their individual Preparations for departure. Longarm took fewer than the five minutes he'd told Belle he would require. All he had to do was roll up his bedroll, toss loose items into his saddlebags, and pick up his rifle. Carrying the bedroll and saddlebags balancing one another on opposite shoulders, his rifle in his hand, he returned to the barn. He was saddling the hammerhead bay when Belle came in.

"It looks like you'll be the first one saddled up, Windy," she said.

Longarm turned to look at her, and his jaw dropped. Belle was wearing men's clothes, denim jeans tucked into boots, a flannel shirt, and a linsey-woolsey jacket that fitted loosely over her torso. She'd pulled her hair up under the low-crowned, wide-brimmed Stetson she had on, and her face under the brim might have been that of a callow youth, except for the age-lines it bore and loose flesh of her neck that showed above the loose shirt collar. She hadn't abandoned her pearl-handled, silver-plated revolvers, though. She still wore them as she had when she'd been in a dress, in front, ahead of her hips, as was necessary when she roed sidesaddle.