“Least Maggy’s got a wife,” Siggy put in. “How long’s it been since your Erma left for her vacation, eh?”

“She went to look after her sick mother in Montana,” Otto said.

Bennet smiled. “That why she cleaned out her savings and took everything she owned?”

Otto turned fiercely to him, that simmering bitterness coming back to a boil in his face. Bennet, implacable, stared him down.

Looking for something easier to savage, Otto quickly settled on Goldwin. “What about Ruth, then,” he said, “getting back from New York two nights ago with an Englishman half her age?”

“No!” Siggy raised his sluggish head. “Ruth?”

Goldwin turtled into his hunched body as Otto probed with his gaze. “What was it she told you, Goldy?” He put on a high-pitched woman’s voice. “‘Sorry, Goldy, it’s not you. I just can’t see myself being with any man. Guess I been alone for too long.’” He returned to his own voice, triumphant now, “Week later she’s teaching some Brit bastard how to start fires the old way.”

Incredulous, Siggy cried out, “Not Ruth!”

“Sure, that is one handsome woman,” Finn declared, as if this were enough to defend her.

“And a fine lady,” Magnus seconded, with valiant if slightly fragile ferocity.

Goldwin looked up at last, his moist pathetic eyes appealing to each man in turn. “Took her to Peterson’s in St. Louis. Five goddamned dollars for a lousy steak.”

“Yeah, but this guy’s young,” Otto said. “Stamina.” He pumped his right forefinger in and out of his fisted left hand. “She’s making up for lost time.”

Goldwin stared, bewildered, at his tormentor. “She didn’t even eat hers. Four hours there and back in the truck.”

“Imagine that.” Otto smiled around at the other men. “And she didn’t have the decency to corral your stallion.”

Goldwin shouted, “I’ve been taking her out for months.”

“Showing her a real good time,” Otto said. “What was that last thing you did? Took her to the Kansas City cattle auctions, didn’t you?”

“She liked it. She told me she liked it.”

“Yeah,” Otto said, “nothing like the sight of a few thousand shitty cow rumps to get the juices flowing.”

Magnus stepped out from the wall. “Maud loved me.” He had finally built up enough steam to respond to Otto’s earlier insult to his wife. “She gave up everything for me. She was married to some troglodyte who just wanted her father’s money. She had wealth, she had position. I just worked in her father’s factory. But do you know what I had?”

“A ten-inch tallywhacker?” Siggy ventured.