Robert Parker - Resolution

“Don’t know,” Virgil said. “Can’t let her old man beat on her.”

“We could let Cato kill him,” I said.

“Can’t do that,” Virgil said.

“Why not?” I said.

“Can’t do that,” Virgil said, as if it was an answer.

The horses eased down the trail toward the homesteads on the flat land. The homesteads weren’t much. Weather-grayed cabin and shed. Sparse-looking kitchen garden. An occasional split-rail corral with one or two horses. Redmond’s was no different. We found him straddling the peak of his cabin, patching the roof. When he saw us ride in he climbed down and went inside. By the time we reached the house, he was back outside with a Winchester.

“What do you want?” he said.

“Need to talk,” Virgil said.

“Got nothing to talk about,” Redmond said.

“You do,” Virgil said.

Redmond gestured with the Winchester.

“I know how to use this,” he said.

“’Course you do,” Virgil said. “You might get off a shot. You might even hit one of us. But ’fore you jacked the second shell up into the chamber you’d be dead.”

“And maybe one of you’d be dead.”

“Maybe,” Virgil said.

There was some silence. Virgil’s horse put his head over and snuffled at mine. Redmond lowered the Winchester slightly.

“What you want to talk about?” he said.

“Your wife and children,” Virgil said.

“Goddamn it,” Redmond said. “Wolfson don’t run my family.”

“This ain’t Wolfson,” Virgil said. “This is me.”

He was relaxed and comfortable in his saddle as he talked. Like he always was. Sometimes people would make a bad mistake and think he wasn’t ready. He was. Virgil was always ready. He just never looked it.

“You fucking her yet?” Redmond said.

“Nope.”

“Probably all of you, fucking her,” Redmond said.

“Nope.”

“Well, I’ll give her that,” Redmond said. “She’s hot enough. Or she used to be.”

“That be before you starting smacking her around?” Virgil said.

“That’s none of your business,” Redmond said.

“True enough,” Virgil said. “But she needs to see the kids.”

“She can’t,” Redmond said.

“Me and Everett,” Virgil said, “think she should visit the children, couple times a week. Cato and Rose agree with us.”

“You threatenin’ me?” Redmond said.

“I am,” Virgil said.

Again, silence. Redmond and Virgil looked at each other. Nobody could hold a stare very long with Virgil Cole. Redmond looked away.

“What if I say no?”

“Four of us will bring her out anyway,” Virgil said.

“Four fucking pistoleros against one farmer?” Redmond said.

“Yup.”

“Don’t seem fair,” Redmond said.

“One of us comes out,” Virgil said. “And you might try to shoot it out, and whoever would have to kill you. Four of us come out, and you won’t be that stupid.”

Redmond looked at Virgil. Then at me. I smiled at him. He looked back at Virgil.

“I already told them she’s a whore,” Redmond said.

“Tell ’em she ain’t,” Virgil said.

My horse tossed his head, and the sound of the bridle hardware was the only sound.

“Kids should probably see their mother,” Redmond said.

“Should,” Virgil said.

“When you want to bring her out?” Redmond said finally.

“Monday and Friday,” Virgil said.

Redmond nodded.

“Lunchtime,” Redmond said.

“Okay.”

“Don’t need all four of you to come.”

“Maybe at first,” Virgil said. “See how it goes.”

Redmond thought about it awhile.

“Why do you people give a fuck about me and Beth?” he said.

“Good to keep busy,” Virgil said.

Redmond nodded slowly. More to himself, I think, than to us.

“Four killers,” he said. “Four fucking gun-shooting killers.”

Virgil nodded.

“And all of a sudden,” Redmond said, “you’re like fucking law and order, for crissake.”

“Peculiar, ain’t it,” Virgil said.

With Cato and Rose at the Excelsior, and me and Virgil at the Blackfoot, things got so peaceful that I stopped sitting in the lookout chair and sat with Virgil at a table near the bar.

“Quiet,” I said to Virgil.

“It is,” he said.

“Makes you wonder if they need us here,” I said.

“They’d need us if we wasn’t here,” Virgil said.

“Same at the Excelsior,” I said.

“Should be,” Virgil said.

“Cute,” I said. “They don’t need us unless we ain’t here; then they do need us.”

“Called keepin’ the peace,” Virgil said.

“That’d be us,” I said.

Two farmers came into the Blackfoot, and looked around, and came to our table.

One of them, a short, chunky guy wearing a pink shirt, said, “Cole and Hitch?”

“He’s Cole,” I said. “I’m Hitch.”

“We got a problem,” the farmer in the pink shirt said.

The man with him was taller and rounder. He was wearing a blue shirt.

“He’s got a problem,” the man in blue said. “Sonovabitch sold me a lame horse.”

“He had a chance to try the horse,” Pink Shirt said. “He didn’t say nothing about her bein’ lame when he bought her.”

“How lame,” Virgil said.

“Lame,” Blue Shirt said, “right front leg’s all swole.”

“Why?”

They both looked at him blankly.

“Why’s it swole?” Virgil said.

“’Cause she’s lame,” Blue Shirt said.

“Wasn’t swole when I sold her,” Pink Shirt said.

Virgil took a long breath through his nose.

“Where’s the horse,” Virgil said.

“Out front,” Blue Shirt said.

“Lemme see her,” Virgil said.

He and I stood, and all of us went outside.

The horse was a sorrel mare and pretty long in the tooth. Virgil sat on his haunches beside her, and looked at her swollen right foreleg without touching it. He nodded to himself.

“Everett,” he said. “Get me a bottle of good whiskey and a clean cloth.”

I went in and got what he ordered and came out with it.

“Gashed her leg on something,” Virgil said. “It’s infected.”

I handed him the cloth and the whiskey.

“Take her head,” Virgil said. “I’m gonna clean her wound.”

I held the horse by the bridle straps. Virgil carefully picked up her foreleg and held it between his legs, his back to the horse.

“Hang on,” Virgil said.

I put my weight on the head straps.

“Easy, darlin’,” Virgil said to the horse. Virgil poured about half the whiskey into a gash on her foreleg. The horse lunged back. I held her head. Virgil rode her foreleg comfortably, murmuring to the horse all the time, and in a moment she stopped lunging. He studied the gash.

“Again,” he said.

I clamped on the harness, and he clamped the foreleg tight between his legs and poured the rest of the whiskey over her wound. She struggled long this time, but we rode it out and she calmed down again. Virgil tore the cloth into strips and bandaged the wound. He continued to murmur to the horse as he had since he started. The horse stayed docile. Virgil stood.

“Whiskey ought to kill the infection,” he said. “Change the bandage every day. Week or so she’ll be fine.”

“I don’t want no damaged horse,” Blue Shirt said.

“Well, you bought her,” Pink Shirt said.

Virgil was standing next to the horse, patting her absently on the shoulder.

“Either she had the gash when you bought her,” Virgil said, “and you were too stupid to see it, or you caused the gash after you bought her and were too stupid to treat it.”

“You’re saying it’s my fault.”