La Tulipe would line the bottles up on top of the old wall if it was a still day, or on rocks in front of it if the wind was blowing stiff. Then she would sit and smoke her long pipe and sing little songs in French to Bonaparte, the donkey.

One by one the gunmen would shake off the effects of their hangovers and stroll out to the wall for a little practice.

Billy and Joe and I camped on the Rio Pecos, not far out of town. Katie and los Guajolotes had bedded down nearby—three or four of the caballeros whooped and sang until nearly daybreak.

At breakfast, while Billy snoozed, I sipped bitter coffee and asked Joe how he came to know Katerina Garza.

“I helped her once,” he said. “She rides them spooky horses. I found her hurt up in the white sands—her horse had thrown her and kicked her in the head.”

I waited for more story, but none came just then. As Billy said, Joe was tight with his talk.

A month later Joe let slip another few words of remembrance.

“When Nellie and the baby were dying, Katie came and stayed with us,” he said. “She helped me dig the graves.”

He said no more about it, but it was clear from those few words that his hand would always be there for Katie Garza.

The sound of the gunmen’s morning practice woke Billy, finally. He sat up and hugged his knees and yawned. His hair in a cowlick, he looked very young.

“Let’s go watch,” he said. “It won’t hurt to know which of these fools can shoot.”

“Hill Coe can shoot,” Joe said.

Hill Coe might look like an old saddle bum, but he took his morning practice seriously. They say he shot fifty practice rounds a day, every day of his life. I like to do little calculations. As we strolled over the pistol range I pointed out to Billy and Joe that that added up to 18,250 bullets a year, not counting what he might fire in life-or-death situations.

“Eighteen thousand bullets a year!” Billy said. “Think of the cost! You couldn’t put that many bullets in La Tulipe’s bottle cart.”

More than most, Billy lived in a world of his own. Joe Lovelady seemed to be the only person he was really curious about—at least until Katie came along.

But my little calculation impressed him: eighteen thousand was probably the highest sum he had ever heard mentioned in his life.

“Let’s hurry,” he said, hiding his cowlick under his old hat. “I’d like to see if he’s getting his money’s worth out of them bottles.”