Chapter 2

"Come on, friend," the sheriff was saying as Medlar got up on shaky legs. "You come sleep it off in my little hotel."

Jarrod stopped with them. "Got a client for me, Fred?" Jarrod asked.

Medlar looked over at Jarrod. Whether he really saw him or not was another matter.

"No, this guy will be out of my care by morning," the sheriff said.

Jarrod had heard every bit of what Medlar had said to his brothers after he left the table. Now, looking at the man's blithered face, thinking about the words, Jarrod felt like maybe he had some of his own attitude adjusting to do. He thought about Nick and Heath, and whether he had said enough to them – right now he couldn't remember whether he'd said anything at all at the time it happened. Then suddenly Jarrod began to wonder what Medlar's brother might have felt like. What was it he should have said, that maybe he never said? What was it Medlar maybe should have said to him?

The thoughts were whiskey generated and making Jarrod's head spin, but then they began to steady it. He began to get a little focus.

"Mind if I come have a talk with Mr. Medlar here?" Jarrod asked.

"Medlar? You know him?" the sheriff asked.

"Just over whiskey and poker at Harry's," Jarrod said.

"He might just pass out as soon as I get him into a cell," the sheriff said.

"Well, if he does, he does," Jarrod said. He put an arm around the drunk man.

Medlar said, "You're one of them Barkleys."

"Yeah, the one who got up from the table," Jarrod said. "Let's go get you settled and you and I will talk about your brother."

"No," Medlar said, trying to pull away but too shaky to do it.

"Come on," the sheriff said.

Jarrod said, "Maybe I can help you out, Medlar."

"No," Medlar said again, but the sheriff and Jarrod were already moving him toward the jail.

Once they got Medlar inside, the sheriff put him in a cell and Medlar collapsed onto a bunk. There was no one else in the jail, and Jarrod just went into the adjoining cell and sat down on the cot there that abutted the one Medlar was on, while Sheriff Madden locked Medlar in. Jarrod pushed his hat back out of his face, sighing, feeling a little sick from the liquor, but not as bad as some times in the past. He tried harder to focus.

"I don't know what you're doing," the sheriff said. "He's out cold now."

"I don't think so," Jarrod said. "Go on, Fred. Finish your rounds. I'll stay here with our friend for a while and leave him nice and locked up when I go."

"Just keep your gun out of his reach," the sheriff said and left.

Jarrod lifted his gun out of its holster and moved it off to the floor in the middle of the cell he was in, where Medlar couldn't reach it. Having done that, Jarrod just looked down at the man. When Medlar opened his eyes for a moment then closed them again, Jarrod knew he was still awake.

"You know, I think I owe you something for that chat you had with my brothers over at Harry's," Jarrod said.

Medlar didn't say anything, but shifted his position a little.

Jarrod went on, the words just tumbling out. The liquor that had loosened his tongue was still doing its work, but his focus was improving. "When you told them to imagine what it was like protecting a man you hate from someone you love – that got to me. It really did."

Medlar still didn't react.

"Why, you might ask?" Jarrod said. "Maybe for the rest of it. Maybe because your brother is dead and you and he never came to terms. I never came to terms with my brothers about something like that but only because I never even acknowledged that it happened, at least that I remember. I didn't give them enough thought."

Medlar opened his eyes again, and this time he left them open and looked.

"Tell me," Jarrod said, quieter now. "What did it feel like, having to pull your own brother off a man to keep him from killing him? Tell me the truth."

"Why?" Medlar asked.

Jarrod sat up, looking at the man more closely. "Because they had to do it to me once. I figured they had to be mad at me about it, but to tell you the truth, I don't remember whether we talked it out or not. I wasn't worth much at the time. I don't know how they feel about it now."

Medlar choked an ugly laugh. "You? Killing a man? I don't believe it." He rolled over and turned his back on Jarrod.

"Believe it," Jarrod said. "A man killed my wife and I was determined to kill him. I was doing it, too. My brothers pulled me off, and I pulled my gun on them."

Medlar rolled back over and looked at Jarrod.

"How did it feel to put yourself in harm's way, between your brother and the man he tried to kill?" Jarrod asked, his sincerity coming out. "I'd like to know. Maybe you can't tell your brother, but you can tell me."

Medlar thought about it, breathing heavily, looking like he was trying to remember, or maybe he was deciding whether he wanted to remember or not. But he ended up saying, "I pitied him. I pitied my brother. I was mad as hell at him for putting me on the spot but most of all I pitied him because he was so damned stupid as to want to kill a man who wasn't worth the killing. He didn't pull a gun on me, so maybe I wasn't as mad as your brothers probably were at you – but I pitied him. And that ate at him and ate at him until the day he died, and I never – " Medlar stopped. Being drunk had loosened those inhibitions that kept him from crying. He lost his words in his tears.

Jarrod tried to picture his brothers pitying him, back when Rimfire had happened, and he could picture it. Back when it happened and for weeks afterward, he was too wrapped up in himself to even consider the question, but now – yes, as he remembered it, they were mad, but maybe they did pity him, too, for being so stupid as to want to kill a man who wasn't worth the killing. And that ate at Jarrod, the way it had probably eaten at Medlar's brother. To be pitied was the worst –

Jarrod tried to deal with it. He closed his eyes against it, but it kept creeping in. His brothers probably pitied him. He hated that more than the shame. Then he thought that Medlar's brother probably did, too, so what now? Jarrod wondered what he would say now if it were Nick and Heath saying to him that they pitied him for what he had become, for having to pull him off a man he was killing. To be pitied was the worst –

"I'm sorry," Jarrod ended up saying. "I'm sorry for what you had to do. I'm sorry I made you have to do it. And I'm sorry I made you pity me."

Medlar turned over and looked at Jarrod again.

Jarrod knew where he was and who he was looking at, and he knew what he was saying. He knew how he was saying it. "I'm sorry for what you had to do. I'm grateful you did it, but I'm sorry for making you have to do it. I never gave you a thought and I should have. All I could see was myself, my anger. I didn't even know you were there until you grabbed me away, and even then I didn't know who I was looking at. I was as blind as a man can get, and at the time, I was too – " He struggled for the word. "Stupid - to even know it. Too lost in myself to care about you. If I were your brother – that's what I would have said. I deserved your anger, I deserved your pity, and I'm sorry."

Jarrod waited for whatever Medlar might say.

Medlar said, "Thanks," and that was all he said.

Jarrod picked his handgun up off the floor without looking at Medlar again and went out of the cell, then out of the jail. Medlar watched him go, and then he lay down and went to sleep.

XXXXXXXX

It was very late when Jarrod got home, but everyone was still up. The family was having coffee together in the library, Nick and Heath were into a game of pool. Jarrod gave kisses to his mother and sister, saying, "Sorry I'm late. I had some unexpected business come up in town."

Victoria handed him a cup of coffee.

"Ready for a game?" Heath asked.

"Sorry, too tired tonight," Jarrod said. "I'll play the winner tomorrow night."

"I hope you haven't brought work home," Victoria said.

"I was going to, but I got too busy," Jarrod said. He downed the coffee and left. He still had the cup in his hand and decided he'd carry it to the kitchen.

Nick and Heath exchanged looks that were not lost on Victoria.