Part 13 (1/2)
”Wonderful,” Potete growled. ”I'll make all the arrangements. And I have to say, your demonstration was impressive in every regard. And playing Judge Grout that way-brilliant!”
”I am going straight to h.e.l.l.”
”As your lawyer, I advise you that we can beat the charge.”
”You'll have to find a new s.h.i.+ll for the billet reading,” I said. ”We can't use Timothy again, but I have other work for him. I'll need him tomorrow night.”
”No problem,” Potete said. ”Any special instructions?”
”Tell him that I am depending upon him for my safety, so he needs to stick close by. But no guns. I don't like guns and can't stand to have them around me.”
”Understood.”
”Any news from Counselor Sutton?” I asked.
”He has been unusually quiet,” Potete said. ”If he has a strategy for Monday's hearing, I can't imagine what it might be. Are you still sure we can't contact anybody from Chicago to-”
”I'm sure.”
”What about that Sylvestre fellow?”
”I said I was sure.”
”All right, Professor, don't bite my head off.” Sulking, Potete did an overhand shuffle.
”What can you tell me about Jack Calder?”
”Nothing that will surprise you,” Potete said. ”With Jack, what you see is what you get. Sure, he's brighter than your average Texan, and good with that Russian on his hip. He's reading the law with Hunnicutt, hoping to go from bounty hunter to barrister. But the law would be a poor choice for Calder, because he may be the only honest man in Dodge City.”
”Then what's he doing here?”
”Unlike the rest of us-who came because we were bored, or we didn't fit in back where we came from, or we were just looking to make a quick dollar-Calder came here to make a home. Built one, too, five years back. But somebody else lives in it now.”
”Why?”
”Calder said he couldn't stand living in the house, and he couldn't burn it down, so he just walked away from it and began living in a shed back of the law office.”
”Why couldn't he live in it?”
”After he built it, he went back to Presidio County in Texas to fetch his wife and child, but they died somewhere along the trail.”
”How?”
”Don't know. Jack doesn't talk about it.”
”Did he marry again?”
Potete looked at me.
”Forget I asked.”
”No, he is not married,” Potete said. ”Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”
”I don't know.”
He placed the deck in front of me. ”Cut the cards for drinks?”
”You first.”
The king of spades.
”Can you beat that?”
”No,” I said.
I ordered two mezcals.
We clinked our shot gla.s.ses together.
”Arriba, abajo, al centor, al dento!” Potete said, and moved his shot gla.s.s in a curious way, up and down, as if making a blessing. Then he drank down the liquor and grimaced. ”Para todo mal mezcal, para todo bien tambien.”
For everything bad, there's mezcal.
And for everything good, there's mezcal.
19.
By the time Jim Murdock came back with his homework, it was near dark and the Saratoga was roaring. I wasn't feeling too badly myself, having had three or five more mezcals in the interval. Maybe that's why I gave all of Diamond Jim's money back, except five dollars for overhead.
Jim had folded the letter neatly, in that old-fas.h.i.+oned way that people did before envelopes became common, and had put his sister's name on the outside in a painfully neat hand: KATIE.
”You get it all down?”
He nodded.
I slipped the letter into my vest.
”What now?”
”I will summon the spirits tonight,” I said. ”Then I will send this letter, through a sort of spiritual postal service.”
”Don't you need an address?”
”Summerland has no street numbers.”
He nodded. ”How will I know that she received it?”