to his skivvies and stretched out on the cot. “Pappy died fighting for what was right,” he said. “What are you doing here? In Stone Creek, I mean?”
“Just looking for a place to be,” Wyatt answered. He didn’t expect the kid to trust him, the way Rowdy did. He and Gideon might have the same blood flowing through their veins, but in every other way, they were strangers. In fact, he kind of admired his younger brother’s caution, figuring it must have come from their ma’s side, since Pappy had never—to Wyatt’s knowledge anyway—exhibited the trait. “Who shot you?”
“Happened at a dance,” Gideon answered. “I’ll tell you about it some other time.” For a few minutes after that, he was quiet, except for some creaking of the old rope springs supporting his mattress as he settled his sizable frame for sleep.
The silence, though blessed to Wyatt’s ears, did not endure. “I saw you walking Sarah Tamlin home today,” Gideon remarked. “And I reckon you know her father owns the Stockman’s Bank.”
Wyatt smiled in the darkness, though a wing of sadness brushed the back of his heart. Most likely, he’d never really know Gideon, or be known by him, since the boy was bound for some far-off place. College. It was a thing Wyatt couldn’t imagine, though he’d read every book he could get his hands on. “You figure I’ve switched from holding up trains to robbing banks?”
“I’m just warning you, that’s all. Rowdy takes his job as marshal seriously. Brother or not, if you break the law, he’ll shut that door on you and turn the key. Don’t think he won’t.”
“I appreciate your concern,” Wyatt said dryly.
Another pause descended, long and awkward. The boy was brimming with questions, Wyatt knew, but asking them required some pride-swallowing.
“Tell me about the others,” Gideon murmured.
“The others?” Wyatt hedged.
“You know who I mean—Nicholas and Ethan and Levi. Pa told me their names, but not much else.”
“It’s late,” Wyatt answered. “If you want to know more about the family history, why don’t you ask Rowdy?”
“He won’t talk about them.”
“Maybe he’s got reason, and you ought to accept that and let the matter rest.”
“I’ve got a right to know about my own brothers, don’t I?”
Again, a sigh escaped Wyatt. He cupped his hands behind his head and closed his eyes, but sleep, the delicious, dreamless refuge he’d been enjoying earlier, eluded him. “Did it ever occur to you that it might be better all around if you didn’t? It isn’t always so, but there’s some truth in that old adage about ignorance being bliss.”
“Tell me.”
“Will you shut up and let me sleep if I do? I’ve got things to do in the morning—like find work.”
“I will,” Gideon agreed staunchly.
“I’m the eldest,” Wyatt recited dutifully. “Nick is a year younger. He’s always been a bit on the delicate side, not much for outlawing. Last I heard, he was living in Boston, writing poems and starving. By now, he’s probably contracted consumption—he’d enjoy a disease like that. Then come the twins—Ethan and Levi. Levi’s a little slow—and Ethan is a born killer. Rowdy is next in line, and I figure you probably know as much about him as he wants you to.”
“What was he like—before?”
“Tough. Fast with a gun. Smart as hell. Not much he was ever scared of, as far as I could tell. That’s how he got the nickname. Ma called him by his given name, Rob—she had a soft spot for him.” Wyatt thought he heard the boy swallow hard, over there on his cot. It struck him—with a brief but hard pang—that he probably knew more about Billy Justice and the members of his gang than he did about Gideon, his own brother.
“Pappy said Ma died having me,” Gideon said quietly, revealing a great deal more about himself in that one statement than he’d probably intended.
“It wasn’t your fault,” Wyatt said.
There was a shrug in Gideon’s voice when he answered. “She’d be alive now, if it hadn’t been for me,” he argued.
“You can’t know that for sure,” Wyatt pointed out, feeling sorry for the kid. It was a rung up the ladder, he reckoned, from feeling sorry for himself—he’d done enough of that in prison.
Gideon was quiet again, but just long enough for Wyatt to start hoping the palavering was over, so he could drift back into oblivion. He slept like a dead man, and rarely remembered his dreams, if he had any, and he considered that a blessing. Other men he’d known, back in Texas, hadn’t been so fortunate.
“There are some things a man just has to let go of,” he told Gideon.
“I reckon,” Gideon agreed, but without much conviction.
Wyatt rolled onto his side, with his back to his brother, and punched down his pillow, though it was already flat, figuring his saddle would have served better. Been cleaner, too. “Good night,” he said, with a yawn.
“What was she like?” Gideon asked. “Ma, I mean.”
Wyatt suppressed another sigh. Stayed on his side, eyes wide-open, staring at the splintery, raw-timbered wall. “She was a fine woman,” he said. “Half again too good for Pappy, that’s for certain. She loved him, though.”
At last, Gideon fell silent, though Wyatt knew there would be more questions, right along. With luck, they’d be ones he could answer.
* * *
THE MORNING AFTER Wyatt Yarbro walked her home from the revival picnic, Sarah overslept. She bolted awake, flustered, and scrambled out of bed, groping for her wrapper, wrenching it on, not bothering to shove her bare feet into house slippers.
“Papa?” she called, from the top of the back stairs leading down into the kitchen. “Papa!”
Dear God, suppose he’d wandered off again? The last time, he’d sneaked out wearing only a striped nightshirt and his best beaver top hat; she’d been lucky then, catching up to him at the corner, but Mrs. Madison, their neighbor, had witnessed the spectacle. Sarah had lied, smiling a brittle smile and explaining, perhaps too quickly, that her father had been sleepwalking lately.
The lying hadn’t been the worst part, though—Sarah lied on a daily basis, to such an extent that she made notes in a ledger book in order to be consistent. No, the terrible thing had been seeing her intelligent, affable father looking so bewildered.
The back door was still locked; Sarah rushed to the front.
Ephriam Tamlin, founder, president and holder of majority shares in the Stockman’s Bank, sat on the porch step, spine straight, a shotgun lying across his knees. He’d stuffed himself into a moth-eaten army uniform, Union blue.
Sarah put a hand to her heart. Drew a deep breath. “Papa,” she said, careful to speak softly, so she wouldn’t startle him.
“They’ve
