After Billy went in at midnight, I relaxed a little. His calm had an effect on me. Perhaps I was just doing too much speculating. Isinglass sometimes went as far afield as New Orleans—he might not return for weeks. Tully Roebuck hated to leave his blind daughter—perhaps he wasn’t coming at all. The talk of Long Dog Hawkins could have been pure rumor—and no one knew for sure that the Indian boy Billy killed had even been one of Bloody Feathers’s people.

Katie Garza I gave no thought to—of all of us, Katie loved Billy best; I assumed she was merely nursing her bruised heart in San Isidro.

Perhaps it was all worry for nothing; perhaps no one was coming. Billy and Cecily might have a slow trip to Galveston and sail away to live happily ever after in some great Cavendish pile in the gray North. Billy might dispense with his shabby saddle and learn to canter and jump in the English style—though I admit that was hard to imagine.

I suppose I dozed, as the night waned, but it was not a deep sleep, and the sound of a racing horse brought me wide awake. Billy Bone must have heard it too, for he hobbled out of the tent, grimacing at the soreness of his leg. He was using the stock of his shotgun as a crutch.

It was full dawn; I saw it all quite clearly. Billy’s old shirt hung open, as it had during the night. We had not cleared the table after dinner—I was not as well trained a servant as Mahmood. The plates were still on the table, and Cecily had forgotten one of her fine ivory combs. Billy picked up a scrap—a bite of cheese, I think—and awaited the approaching rider with half-awake curiosity; he seemed anything but scared.

Then I saw the white mare come racing out of the long shadow to the south—Katie Garza almost ran past me before she checked her horse. The mare was flecked with sweat. I remember clearly how anxious Katie looked, as if fearful of having arrived too late. She had her gun in her hand.

“Oh, dern!” Billy said, with a horrified glance at Katie. “This is gonna give me a headache.”

Katie swung off the mare, dropped the rein, and shot Billy before he could move. He didn’t fall flat; he gripped the shotgun and slid into a seated position. Katie walked closer to him, her gun cocked; I saw her glance at the ivory comb on the camp table.

There was a spot of blood on Billy’s breast—not much.

“I guess it’s one cure for a headache,” he said, still clinging to the shotgun.