Stagg stood beside his cherry red El Dorado, the shadow of the metal hull of Frontier Village looming behind them. The trees blocked the view of Highway 45, cars and semis blowing past the bright white light of the grand Tibbehah Cross. Ole Man Skinner’s legacy to the wretched of this world before kicking the bucket last year.

“I got to be getting home,” Stagg said. “You got something to say, go ahead and say it. Or else just hold on to your peter till the morning.”

“The Nixes ain’t like people you normally deal with,” Chester Pratt said, a little out of breath, his hand shaking while trying to light a cigarette up under his umbrella. “These men don’t have any honor. They couldn’t spell honor if they tried. They’re both more like animals. I got took by ’em. I paid them for a job and then they tried to shake me down. Trust me now. They’ll do the same to you.”

Stagg stood, car door open, rain tapping down his pompadour. He grinned big and wide at Chester and told him how much he appreciated his concern.

“Why’d you send them?”

“Didn’t they ask you nothing?” Stagg said.

“They want me to set up a meeting with TJ Byrd.”

“Well, all right, then.”

Stagg had on a cowboy slicker bought at a Western wear shop over in Calhoun City, stiff and waxed, water pebbling off the canvas. Chester Pratt looking at him, holding that umbrella, like a child who’d lost his way.

“Don’t know what you want me to say,” Stagg said.

“You gonna kill her, too?”

“No,” he said. “That’s not the plan.”

“What is the plan, then?” Chester said. Goddamn crying now. “Do you know what those boys did to Gina? Just for trying to fight back? They cut her up like a side of meat, stuck her over in that trash barrel in Parsham. Good Lord, Mr. Stagg. Ain’t none of this shit worth it.”

“That business ain’t none of my concern.”

“Thought we were partners.”

“This ain’t about liquor,” Stagg said. “Now is it?”

“And what about your boy Bishop?” he asked. “What became of him? He’s deader than hell, ain’t he?”

The thought of it brought to mind that bloody sack of sausage the Nixes delivered. The smell of Cajun spices and jalapeños still hot in Stagg’s nose. He looked at Chester, wetter than a duck’s dingaling, feet ankle-deep in water with half his sniveling face in shadow.