“No,” Dovie said, “you won’t.”

“We’ll see about that,” Gaines retorted, his toothless leer spreading across his narrow face. “And please tell your husband, like you, I sincerely hope he gets to feelin’ better.”

“Go to hell,” Dovie said.

“Yes, ma’am,” Gaines said through his infected grin.

“Shut up, Gaines,” Sheriff Foster said. “Let’s go see Burnell.”

Dovie left the lawmen on the steps of the hotel and walked through the suffocating Missouri heat across the street, past the Sidewinder, and into Shipley’s Mercantile and General Store.

The establishment had expanded, along with Atherton, into a booming retail enterprise that added even more money to Burnell Shipley’s sprawling empire. Mr. Manning, who’d run the facility since it opened its doors, was an old skinflint employed by Shipley for his miserly ways and cowardly demeanor. Everyone knew Manning was too frightened to skim from Shipley.

When Dovie entered, Manning, whose bespectacled eyes never missed anything occurring inside his store, wordlessly left the customer he was helping and greeted her.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Shipley,” the old shopkeeper said in his oily voice.

“Did my package arrive yet?” she asked.

“It did. Came on the train with yesterday’s delivery. I would have sent it over to you at the hotel, with your regular order, but you told me not to.”

“That’s right,” Dovie said. “It’s a Christmas present for Burnell, so I want to keep it a secret. It’s also why I’m paying cash, instead of having it charged. You understand?”

“Of course,” Manning said. “Christmas presents are one of the few secrets a wife is allowed to keep from her husband. You want me to stash it here until then?”

“That won’t be necessary,” she said.

“Here it is,” Manning said, producing a polished wooden box from under the counter and opening it for Dovie’s examination. “All the way from Connecticut.”

Inside the case was a pair of ornately engraved Colt Cloverleaf pocket pistols. Chambered in .41 rimfire and featuring a four-shot cylinder, the weapons were compact, powerful, and designed to be concealed rather than worn openly in a belt holster. There were twenty cartridges for the weapons in the felt-lined box.

“Beautiful, ain’t they?” Manning said. “A real thoughtful gift, if I may say so. Just the thing for a well-dressed, traveling gentleman. I’m sure your husband will find them useful during his trips to Kansas City.”

Whenever Dovie patronized the store, Manning couldn’t resist revealing that he knew about Burnell’s extracurricular activities, as if he were in her husband’s intimate confidence. As far as she was concerned, few in town didn’t know. Like the many other indignities she endured as Burnell Shipley’s wife, she endured this one with silent indifference.

“They’ll certainly come in handy,” was all she said as she paid the shopkeeper.