“All you did here was kill an old man and wound an old woman. I’ve had as much of your bungling as I can handle, Clyde. You’re off the force.”

Clyde demanded, “You’re firin’ me?”

“Damn right. And take your quick-triggered brother with you. I’ll be at the courthouse in the morning to pay you off. Then I never want to see either one of you, ever again.”

Buddy argued, “But Captain, I was certain—”

“Git, before I take a notion to shoot you myself.”

Bethel knelt and took her mother’s hand. Elnora squeezed Bethel’s fingers. Her eyelids fluttered open. She turned her head painfully and looked toward her husband. Her voice was barely audible. “Is he—”

“Yes, Mama, he’s gone.”

Elnora closed her eyes against a flow of tears. “I’m sorry I treated him badly. I wish . . .”

She sobbed softly. Bethel laid her arm across her mother and cried.

The police captain growled, “It was so damned unnecessary.” He cut his gaze to Andy. “Who are you? I don’t remember I ever saw you before.”

“Name’s Andy Pickard.”

“What were you doing here?”

Under the circumstances, lying came easy. “I was lookin’ for a job. They asked me to spend the night.”

The captain gave him a critical study “Do you always sleep with your clothes on?”

“Yes sir, most of the time.”

The captain shook his head in disdain. “It’ll take forty years for this part of the country to become civilized.” He looked down at Bethel. “We’ll see what we can do about your mother’s wound, then carry her to town. Can you get one of your hands to hitch a team to your wagon?”

A black woman hesitantly entered the front door, her husband close behind her. “Lord God,” she cried. She rushed to Bethel’s side.

Bethel told the man to fetch a team and hitch up the wagon as the police captain had said.

The captain gave directions as two policemen carried Elnora into her room. He asked Bethel, “About your father. . . you want to bury him here or in town?”

“Here,” she murmured. “Here’s where he belongs.”

The captain turned to his men. “Well, don’t just stand there. Get that old man up from the floor. Carry him into that room yonder. The least we can do is to lay him out like a Christian.”

Andy followed Bethel into the room where the police had carried her mother. She studied Andy as if she Were seeing him for the first time. “What were you doin’ here?”

He made sure none of the rangers could hear him, then explained his mission for Farley. “Your dad was fetchin’ some money for him out of the parlor. It’s probably in his pocket.”

Bethel’s voice went hard. “I almost wish they would catch him. It was him and his wild ways that caused all this.”

“I heard the war turned him thataway”

“A lot of other men went to war without goin’ outlaw. Anyway, it won’t do any good to give him the money now. He won’t leave ‘til he’s evened the score for this.”