Both Tully’s deputies were in sight of Billy when the killings occurred, but one was helping an old lady into her buggy at the time and the other was sitting on the steps of the saloon where I was having my beefsteak, engaged in trying to pull a horseshoe nail out of his boot. Neither of them were any use at all as witnesses, so, as usual, there’s a muddle of theories about what really happened. Some claim the banker and the cattleman were leaders of the Sante Fe ring, a group that held a lucrative contract to supply cattle to the Mescalero Apaches, and that Isinglass had actually hired Billy to assassinate them so he could get the contract. Of course that’s rubbish, in my view.

The simpler theory is that the banker, whose nickname was Bucketmouth, spat a huge spew of tobacco juice, but aimed it poorly, so that a pint or so splattered on Billy’s leg, whereupon Billy promptly turned his shotgun on the banker and his companion.

By then I was a little numb; it had become irrelevant why Billy killed people. The occasions which might prompt him to murder were so numerous that it wasn’t useful to think about them.

“Why, that little varmint, he’s killed Sam Bradley,” the barkeep said, peeking cautiously out the door. “I think he got Bucketmouth too.”

“I doubt he’ll stop there,” I said, and I did doubt it.

But Billy was at his cockiest just after he’d killed someone. He neglected to reload the shotgun, and before he knew it both deputies had piled on him. I looked out the door and saw Tully come running across the street.

“That little varmint picked a bad day to do this—I guess he don’t keep up with the news,” the barkeep said. His complexion the color of a radish, leading me to believe he had been imbibing his own stock from time to time.

“What is the news?” I inquired. I saw that Tully and the two deputies had Billy handcuffed, but that a crowd was gathering surprisingly fast.

“The judge is coming this week,” the man said. “They’re going to try two train robbers and a Mexican horse thief on Thursday. They can stick the little varmint right in court and hang him with the rest of the rough old crew.”

13.

It was evident to me from a cautious peek out the door that hardly anyone in the rapidly growing crowd was inclined to wait until Thursday to enjoy a hanging. Several cowboys who happened to be in town were soon dispossessed of their ropes, and loud demands were made of Tully Roebuck to yield up the prisoner. Two particularly inspired citizens borrowed axes from a Mexican woodcutter and began to whack at a nearby tree—I suppose they meant to use the trunk to batter in the door of the hardware store.