Disclaimer: No part of Maverick belongs to me, and I'm not being compensated for, except as I have enjoyed writing the story.
The Three Young'uns
by tallsunshine12
Chapter 1 The Farm
They came into the saloon single file, each one pushing inward one of the wide swing-doors. They took up their seats directly on the floor, out of the smoke and crowded movement of feet. One of them began to fret, while another, a boy, hushed her and told her to "be still." Then he turned and gazed back around the room, searching for somebody at one of the tables. At last he spied him, a tall man with a dark coat and ruffles at the cuffs of his sleeves. A dark hat sat next to his left elbow on top of the green poker table.
A very sparkling girl stood behind him, her dress studded with lacey bows and shiny sequins, and not very long at the hem. She were black stockings and high-heeled shoes, Tom saw. Two of the fingers of her right hand were toying with a lock of the card-player's curly hair. From regarding his hand of cards, he looked up at her once and smiled. Tom could see the smile, a flash of teeth and ruddy, pinched up cheeks. Tom wondered why he smiled like that.
Jane began to fret again, moving around and crying aloud, "I'm hungry, Tommy."
The tall man, not too far away, glanced over. A frown of consternation passed over his face, though no one in the room would have thought of using that word, consternation. Too big. But consternation it was, or something like it. Most of the other poker players, the shady ladies and the bartender would have just said that the gambler became uneasy all of a sudden.
Maverick looked over at the children. The children, even Janie, who had stopped crying, looked up at him. At his arm, the sequined girl with a feather in her headband looked, too.
"They yours, honey?" she asked. "They're givin' you some powerful stares, like they was."
"Ah, no," said Maverick, suddenly clearing his throat and raising his left hand to his collar to unloosen it a bit. "They're not." Then he sighed. "But I suppose I'm responsible for them. Benton," he nodded to one of the men at the table, the banker, "cash me in, will you? I've got to go deal with some other little matters. I'll be back though."
That was how he made his living, playing cards. Eating, sleeping, feeding his horse, new hats and suits and ruffle-fronted shirts—all of it came out of his poker winnings. He stashed his winnings in a breast pocket and stood up. It had been a long night. Stretching a bit, flexing both back and shoulder muscles, he excused himself from the table and walked over to the children.
He knelt down next to Janie and put a hand on her knee. She still sobbed. He smiled and turned to Billy, the middle child. He looked lost. His eyes had a quizzical gleam in them, like he was looking for a lost penny and the tall man might know where it was. Maverick noticed him, but addressed the older boy.
"Tom, I thought I left you at your aunt's house. What are you doin' here for gosh sake?"
"That wasn't our aunt," piped up Janie, now full of courage for a child barely seven years old. "It wasn't nobody, just a big front door. We don't live there." She gulped.
Maverick frowned again. He patted her knee. "It wasn't?" he asked.
"No," said Tom. "We only told you that because you didn't seem to want us. We've been waiting for you to come out all night, part of the time sleepin' in the stable."
"Then where do you live? You said you three got lost picking berries. Aren't you from around here?"
Tom looked at Billy. Billy dropped his head.
"No, mister," said Janie, the brave one, and now the truthful one, too. "We ain't. We left that place."
"Where?"
"How far we come?" she asked of her brothers.
Tom spoke up again. "Reckon about ten, maybe twenty miles. Been about five or six nights."
"Just the three of you?" Maverick asked. "You ran away from home?" Janie nodded.
"Ain't got no home nohow," said Tom. "Ma left with some man and we been stayin' with a lady at a boarding house all this time. But she makes Janie iron for hours on 'er feet, and Janie's too small. She beats Billy and me sometimes, too. Right harsh."
"She's your legal guardian?"
"What's that?"
"The one the law says ought to have you."
"Maybe, but she's awful mean. Once, I had to hang out the coverlets to air. Well, the pole fell 'nd she beat me with a sticky handy. I felt sore for days after. We ain't agoin' back."
"How've you been eatin'?"
"We ate along the way, tomatoes and cukes."
"Watermelon," said Billy, speaking up for the first time since entering the saloon.
"We had this knife," said Tom, pulling it out of his trouser pocket. "Right good eatin' in the fields now it's summer."
"You've been stealin' from farmers?"
"Yes, sir, I guess."
"May I ask where you're off to?"
"Well, last we heard of it, ma was in some place west of here, called Drinkin' Springs. Reckon we're goin' there."
Maverick laughed, a light chuckle. "It's a good ways for tired feet. About nine or ten miles more. Might be too much for Janie. Remember, she's only little."
"She's got us, and you now. We'll do fine."
"But I'm not going to Drinkin' Springs, only through it. My next real stop is Denver. I'm going there, where I hope to get into a few games."
"Why do you play cards, mister?" asked Tom. "Ma says that's bad. Gamblin' for money."
"This is the same person who left you with that boarding house lady, and ran off with a man?"
Tom looked sheepish. "Reckon so."
Maverick paused for a second, then stood up again, his long legs cramping after bending down for so long.
"I guess you'll need something to eat. And look at Janie's shoes. Yours too, both of you." Billy and Tom dropped their heads.
He extended a hand and Jane readily leapt up and into it. The boys followed one after the other, the shy Billy last. He hung his head but his eyes darted around the crowd on the saloon. Several people raised questions to the man who had charge of leading them out of the swing doors. Billy was too innocent to understand them, but they made him feel very small. Maverick was being chided by the saloon ensemble for having hid his three 'young'uns' all these years. If he could have seen the tall man's face, so far above his own, Billy would have seen him grimace.
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Refreshed with milk, sandwiches and cookies, the three footloose children followed Maverick up the hotel steps as he led them to their own room—which he had paid for. If he kept this up, his recent earnings at the baize tables would be shot. He put the boys on a corner cot together, after making them wash their faces. He himself took a wash cloth to Janie's face, wiping away grime and tears and meeting smiles and giggles. Then he sat her on the edge of the big bed, took off her shoes and stockings, helped her to lie down and pulled the covers over the ragged dress she wore. He gave her a dry towel to hold for a doll, leaned over and kissed her, and she turned over, closed her eyes and nestled down.
The opposite was true with the boys. They arm-wrestled, and leg-wrestled, and foot-wrestled, and tried to strip the covers off one another, until Maverick, the tall, rather stoic gambling man, had to swack at their legs with the palm of his hand, fingers held tight together to make a longer paddle. Finally, they lay still, but he heard cackling from under the covers as he softly closed the door. He locked it and shoved the key back under the door in case of fire or 'potty' in the middle of the night.
When he awoke again, in his own room, it was not yet dawn. The room was still, the moon had set hours ago, but there was a small, light-skinned wraith standing by his bed. He jumped a mile into the air and threw the covers off him.
"What is it!" he exclaimed, sitting up and shaking his head. The wraith had stepped back a few steps, but now came close again.
Suddenly, he saw the dress and the towel doll, and the blond curls held partially back by a cloth band.
"What do you want?" he fairly screeched.
"Where'd you go?" he was asked.
"Why, to bed, Janie! I've been here since I left your room."
"Can't sleep. The room's too dark."
"But it's nighttime," Maverick tried to explain.
"Too dark, and the boys can't hear me. Sound asleep."
"You let yourself out?" Janie nodded, holding up the key. Maverick took it and shook his head. "How did you find me in this room?"
"I tried the door knobs. This one wasn't locked."
"You mean, you'd have walked into anybody's room?"
She gave a toss of her curls. "No, I was lookin' for you. Guess I found you."
"Jane, that's a very bad thing. I left you safe in bed with your brothers in the other bed, and you come walkin' out in the hall? Anybody could have grabbed you."
"Why would they do that?"
Maverick was at a loss to explain why anyone would. He got up, even more stiffly this time, to put the two 'dolls' back into bed, following a drink of water for one of them. He knew he'd have rings around his eyes that next morning, missing his shut-eye, though he did not necessarily or regularly go to bed every night of the week. But, usually, if he was ever up this late, he had more to show for being up, having been winning at cards through the early hours.
Tucking Janie in again, he locked the door and kept the key himself. The two boys never woke up. Then, groggily, he went back to his own covers and tried to go back to sleep.
The next day came too soon, as he had feared and predicted it would. Janie was crying for breakfast and the 'potty.' The boys were still cackling under the covers, while their bed looked like a cyclone in mid-fury had struck it sometime earlier that morning. Maverick knew he needed help, so he collared one of the maids, paid her a sizable tip to take Janie down the hall, then he himself rousted up the boys and got them washed and tidied up in their own rags. He rather sadly regarded his 'earnings' of last night as shot when he looked down at their shoes and their stringy trouser cuffs.
Down at breakfast in the hotel dining room, there were whispers, guffaws and outright laughs to greet his ears as he tried putting toast in his mouth. He watched Janie attempting to make a scrambled egg sandwich with her own toast, while the boys sat and made unwarranted sounds over their apple juice. He tried to save the egg sandwich before it slipped off the plate, but failed, grabbing for it and coming away with only butter on his fingers. Tom splashed milk against his chin and laughed. Billy watched with big eyes everything his older brother did, and then tried to do it, too. Maverick pulled the glass away from Billy's lips as he blew bubbles down into it.
"That's enough of that," he warned. "Just try to drink your milk, not play in it."
"But I always do that," whined billy, perking up now since being fed.
"That's right," said Janie, the know-it-all. "He always gets slapped. You goin' to slap him, mister?"
Two or three nearby breakfasters, men who knew the gambler firsthand, roared aloud.
"Givin' up cards, Maverick, for baby-sittin' duties? Does it pay more?"
He recognized one of the drummers he had taken last night.
"Not when you're in the game," he joked, turning his head slightly that way, but watching Janie's fingers as they made for the next piece of toast. "Janie, that toast is better in your stomach than on the floor. Want more scrambled egg?"
When the bill came, it had been inflated thirty times. Maverick chided the waitress for the obvious error in reckoning up the cost of their meal, but she only caught the eye of the two drummers and said, with rapturous sarcasm, "Any man wins as much as you do, and keeps these poor children out all night starvin', why he ought not to question their breakfast bill."
"I do question it, Sally. Question it a lot. Now march back over to that desk and figure it up right, or else."
"You're going to slap me, too, pa?"
A moment of silence, then there came a surprise entry into the conversation.
"I seen them three kids in the stable, a-lying in the straw. Didn't have no cover on 'em nor nothin', and this man, their pa," chimed up a voice from the corner somewhere, "sittin' in the Golden Bucket and playin' cards, winning a lot, too."
"I didn't know where they were all night!" hollered Maverick over at him in his defense. "If I had, they'd have been turned over to the law."
Tom and Billy stiffened up at that. Janie noticed them, and began to frown, her tiny white hand stopping with the toast halfway raised off the plate.
"What did we do, mister?" asked Tom. Plaintively.
"What—oh, nothing, boys. Nothing at all."
"Then what are we guilty of? Bein' here?"
"Look," said Maverick, trying to choose his words for the softest effect. "You boys know you can't wander around loose like this. What about Janie? How much more walkin' and starvin' do you think she can take before she gets sick or something?"
"We never thought of that, but we ain't broke no law. Are you takin' us to jail?" asked Tom.
"Not to jail, no. But to the sheriff, yes. He'll see you get on home where you should be."
"With ma or with that Mrs. Caldy?"
"Is that her name, and what town did you say she lives in?"
"Ain't telling, 'cause we ain't goin' back there, neither."
Maverick sighed.
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"Three runaways," murmured the sheriff, low, to himself. Then he spoke up. "I got two robbers to go after. I got a drunk in jail this minute who drinks whenever he can get any and shoots up the town with his Colt .45. There's a spat goin' on between old Missis McDougall and Mister Thomas—he owns the hardware store—over some sorry patch of grass in an alley between her dress shop and his store. He wants to stack empty barrels there, but she's more interested in show flowers. They might go to blows any day now—and I also got a headache. Then he brings me three children.
"I'll leave them in your care, sheriff. I'm on my way to Denver."
"You'll let the county feed 'em, is that it?"
"They're not mine."
"They're traveling with you, though I can't guess what kind of influence you are. I heard about how you left them out all night. No food, and Lonnie said he saw them in the stable. He just came and told me."
"Did he also tell you how I paid for their hotel room last night, two dollars with mine?"
"Big spender!"
"Did he neglect to mention how I bought them breakfast?"
"He said you had gotten them something."
Maverick, in long frock coat, black hat, string tie and very white, plain-fronted shirt, his no-frills traveling shirt, began to look impatient as he put both hands, knuckles-down, on the edge of the paper-cluttered desk.
"I want them well taken care of," he said in a dramatic voice.
"They will be, just as soon as you fork over some money."
"Sheriff—!"
"Look, mister, I'm holdin' you responsible for bringing those young'uns into Ellicott City. We don't want some other town's waifs and strays. If you don't take 'em with you or put up their keep, then I'll be obliged to take 'em to the county almshouse in Junctionville. They'll be sure to find some work for them there, 'nd it may not be all pleasant."
"There's a Mrs. Caldy who probably lives in Rock Springs, twenty miles from here. Runs a boarding house. The children were left there by their ma when she ran off."
Each one of them looked up at him with huge wonder in their eyes. Maverick glanced down but tried to avoid their direct gaze. He straightened his shoulders a little.
"How did you say you came by them?" he was asked.
"I found them while I was riding into town. They had gotten lost picking berries. Said they had an aunt. I left them at the door of a certain house, but that night they came looking for me in the saloon where I was playing. Guess they got hungry."
"You guess. You couldn't have knocked on this door and seen if anybody was at home? Just left them there?"
"How was I supposed to know they had no aunt? Now, sheriff, what are you going to do about them?"
"Listen, card player. Drop some money on my desk and I'll see they have a place to stay while I track down Mrs. Caldy."
Maverick looked hostile and ready to fly off the handle again. "All I've got on me now is about forty dollars."
"Twenty-five of that will just about cut it. Food, room and a nursemaid since you're givin' up the job." He laughed, and it was not a kind laugh. Maverick smarted under it, like a whip.
He paid the twenty-five dollars and then turned to leave the sheriff's office. He met three freshly-cleaned, heartily-breakfasted, but doleful faces looking up at him. He nodded at the elder boy and turned to tip his hat to the sheriff. When he left the jail, he breathed a sigh of relief and started for the hotel to collect his saddlebags. Then, on to the stable. He had his horse bedded there, and after paying its feed bill, he threw his saddle on and led the black gelding out into the street. Over there, at the jail's door, he saw three sad-faced children in fresh shoes, trousers and smock (for Janie) regarding him. He had already paid for all that finery.
Janie raised her hand as the gambler mounted his horse and began to ride due east out of town. That was the way to Denver, by way of Drinkin' Springs, and the mountains and tall pines. He waved at all three children, wondering about them, about what the sheriff would do with them. Probably, he'd send them back to the boarding house lady, if he could prize out of Tommy just where she lived. It may not have been the best of all existences, but though very dirty and ragged from their long journey, the children did not look as though they had gone hungry much in her keeping.
But of the milk of human kindness, he was afraid they had not had all that much. He suddenly heard a small piping voice calling from behind him. He pulled up, turned in the saddle and saw Tommy.
"You're supposed to stay with the sheriff," the gambler said. "I gave him good money—"
"Mister, when you get to Drinkin' Springs—you still goin' there?"
"Yeah," said Maverick, nodding.
"Will you look up Katie French? She's our ma. We want to see her real bad. She's purty, and blond like Janie. Will you try?"
"I can't promise anything, boy. How long did you say she's been gone?"
"Nigh on to three years."
"Did she send you anything, any word about herself?"
"No. Just heard from a travelin' preacher that she was living in Drinkin' Springs."
Maverick laughed slightly, though not at the boy. He looked down at the frail-limbed lad and thought how he'd feel if he had been left by his own ma, all this time. No letters. No gifts. No messages sent by friends. Nothing.
He tried to be reassuring. "Before I leave there, I'll ask, Tom. Can't hurt, I guess." He adjusted his arms over his saddle horn, saying, "But what if she's moved on?"
"Where would she go?" asked Tommy.
"Denver. Cheyenne. Back east. Or farther west." Maverick swung down off his horse and came around to the boy. He took the boy's arms. "Tommy, you and the others have got to face it. She's gone."
Tommy hung his head. "I think maybe you're right, mister."
"If I could find her, I'd tell her what three good children she has, and that she ought to come fetch them. But right now, you and Janie and Billy have got to go back to that lady who was keeping you. Do you hear?"
Tommy shook his head. "I ain't never goin' back. I'm goin' along with you."
Maverick sighed. "How old are you?"
"Goin' on thirteen. But I'm small for my age. Other boys are bigger."
"You see, Tommy, that's the point. You and the others can't go traipsing about the countryside looking for someone who might be gone for good. You don't know. She might've got married, changed her name. Why, she even could've changed her hair color, as they do nowadays."
"She'd never change it. She liked the way she looked in the mirror too much."
"People change. They marry, they move. It might have happened."
"Can't I come along with you? I won't be no bother."
The sheriff walked up just then. Standing there, he looked official, so Maverick released the boy and stepped back. Sheriff Leland Hardee put his hands on the boy's shoulders and guided him back. He turned at the last moment and said to Maverick, "I know a couple, east of town, who might be able to take the children in for a while, at least until we find out where this boarding house owner lives. They're nice folks, with no children left at home. Run a farm. Chores are hard, but they feed good."
"You'll see these people get the money for keeping all three of them?"
"Yeah. No worry on that score. I know you didn't have much, so for your sake, I won't find other ways of using it."
"Thanks, sheriff, again." Maverick extended his hand, then remounted his horse while Tommy looked tearfully on. He turned back and said, "Take care of your sister and brother, Tom. You're the man of the family. If you don't, who will?"
Then he galloped off, back on his road. Thinking everything would work out for the children—didn't it always?—he put spurs to his horse and road over the rocky ground with some abandon. He little cared where the horse put his feet, just as long as the rider quickly put a few miles between himself and the three tiny people who had waved good-bye to him in front of the sheriff's office.
A mishap thus shortly occurred. Maverick's horse threw a shoe slipping over a stone in the road. He came up lame and Maverick walked him a little ways, finally stopping to ask for help. A man came out of the barn and took a look at the shoe.
"A nail or two is all it needs. Thrown it a-ways back, did you?"
"Not too far. About a mile. Wasn't being careful enough."
"Same old story. Rocks out there are treacherous. People just don't watch," said the dry, older man in coveralls. He took Maverick's reins and pulled the horse into the barn. "I have a hot fire going now," he called back over his shoulder. "Won't take long." He turned back again. "Stay to a meal?"
Farmers were godsends to a lone traveler who disesteemed his own campfire cooking. He could usually find a place to eat on the road, or bed down for the night when it came time for that. And he'd pay. As he always did. Since it was only early afternoon, he should just make a short visit with these nice folks and then quickly and quietly be on his way again.
But his stomach had a mind of its own.
Hungrily thinking of chicken and dumplings, or maybe roast pork, carrots, onions and potatoes, then a fruit pie, or a cream pie—it made no difference—he said, "If it won't put you out any, sure!"
He and the Jaspers were sitting down to fried ham slices and red-eye gravy, candied sweet potatoes and a mess of greens when a wagon rumbled into the front yard.
"Lemme go see who this is," said Ben Jasper.
"It's probably Clement, bringing your tools back, Ben," said Gerdie Jasper.
"Maybe."
Ben took his hat down from a peg and slapped it on his head. Maverick, his dinner guest, shoved another forkful of greens into his mouth. He turned abruptly at a sudden commotion.
"Gerdie! Come 'were, quick. Look what he's brung us."
Gerdie exited first, wiping her hands on her apron. Maverick pushed out his chair, dabbed at his lips, then threw his napkin on the table and hurriedly followed. He couldn't believe his eyes. There in the wagon—as if goodness gracious had declared they should follow him in all his travels—sat his three old friends, Tom, Billy and the weeping Janie. Not that she was given much to crying, but he supposed some of the shock of the last couple of days had finally caught up with her.
He stepped off the porch and followed Gerdie into the yard. With open arms, she tried to snatch one of the children, Janie as it happened to be, from the back of the wagon once Sheriff Hardee lowered the tailgate. Janie slipped her and fled into the yard. Maverick tried to corner her, but she fled from him, too. Suddenly laughing, she dodged around the yard and the wagon and the other three, stationary grown-ups while Maverick spread his arms wide and dashed from side to side trying to catch the small run-amuck. Soon though the boys and the sheriff and both Jaspers had joined in.
"Stop this!" cried Ben Jasper, lifting his red neckerchief to his forehead. "You'll get me all tuckered out."
Maverick finally swooped down on Janie, then lifted her high in his arms, twirling around with her and laughing. He brought her safely down to face level and held her as they walked back to the wagon, where a general meeting was about to begin. He collared Billy on his way and Tom joined on at his coat-tail, looking glum all of a sudden.
Winded, Maverick set Janie down, giving her head a friendly toss. She looked up at him with shining eyes. Gerdie Jasper saw.
"Mister, it 'pears like the young'uns know you. Are you their pa?"
Maverick laughed again, this time more heartily, and shook his head. "Don't think so. I picked them up on my way into Ellicott City."
"Picked them up, you don't say."
"I do, ma'am. Runaways."
"Maverick, what are you doin' here?" asked the sheriff.
"Horse threw a shoe. I was having it fixed.
"Huh-hunh."
"Well, come on back to the food," said Ben, "before it gets cold. There's enough for you and all them, too, sheriff."
"If it won't put you out any," said Leland Hardee, eying Maverick suspiciously. Maverick flashed him a smile and turned to go inside, steering Janie before him, with the slightly shaken Hardee following. Everyone accommodated themselves around the long table, the children fitting on a long bench beside Maverick's chair.
The minutes passed with quiet eating. Some giggling.
"I don't think I've known a better meal," Bret said, leaning back and stretching a bit. "Right good, too."
Gerdie was pleased.
Maverick looked down at his side. "Had enough, Janie?" Janie nodded, but she seemed to droop. "I think it's time someone goes down for a nap," he told Gerdie, who nodded and pulled herself from the table. She came around and helped Janie off the bench. Together, they went into one of the two bedrooms in the house, while Maverick spoke to the boys.
"It's still light, boys. Will be for a few more hours. Since neither of you probably needs a nap, like Janie, how about both of you going outside for a while? See the chickens. You can feed my horse, too."
Tom spoke up. "You just want to get rid of us so you can talk about where we're gonna stay."
"That's right," said Maverick. "Now trot."
Begrudgingly, Tom pulled himself off the far end of the bench, jerked on Billy's sleeve and shoved him out the door. Billy was like a puppet on a string to Tom.
"You want to leave 'em 'ere," said Jasper, catching on. "Isn't that right, sheriff?"
"Sure, why not? The boys'll be a help. So will that little one—"
"Janie," offered Maverick.
The sheriff grimaced at him from across the table and turned his eyes back to Jasper in his Windsor chair at the head of the board.
"Well, what do you say? I have twenty-five dollars in cash," he looked at Maverick again. "That'll pay you to feed 'em for a while. And they could work—"
"We could use a little help. We're not that young anymore."
"It's settled, then! They've got new clothes, thanks to Bret Maverick here and his generosity." Did the sheriff seem a bit on the snide side when he said that? "And they won't eat much, I'm sure."
"What'll you be doing?" asked Maverick, simply. "Looking for that boarding house lady north of here?"
"In due time, yes, I will. But I have some other things to attend to first, before the children."
He was thinking of the two thieves still on the loose, though he had an inkling he knew who they were. Couple of local characters, traipsing back and forth from town to town. Not much good. Robbed a store of twenty dollars, all that was in the till before the bank opened in the morning.
"We can't keep them forever," said Jasper, picking his teeth with a wooden pick. "'fraid they wouldn't like us old folks much."
"On the contrary," Maverick said, "if you treat them right, you two may be just the people to take care of them. They need a home. You have one. A nice farm, too."
"What if they don't take to farmin'?"
"Given the opportunity to work with the stock and help out about the place, I'm sure they'll eventually like it."
"Farmin's hard work. Day in, day out. Till night, most o' the time."
"The boys need to keep busy. Janie needs a kind soul to look after her. From what Tom tells me, the lady they were living with before was kind of harsh."
"Well, if they don't like work, then you've brung 'em all to the wrong place," Jasper exclaimed, slapping the table with his hand.
Leland Hardee gulped his coffee and stood up suddenly. "I'm sure they'll be just fine here," he said. "Maverick," he began, turning. "Come outside with me, will you?"
Suspecting the worst, Maverick boldly said, "Sure thing!"
They exited together and walked a little ways down to a stream running through some cottonwoods in full leaf.
"Maverick, I have to ask you a favor."
"After taking nearly all my money, you want more?"
Leland looked at him in a baffled way, shaking his head and then saying, "No, but it's just this. That elder boy, Tom, he's been hollerin' up a storm that he wants me to let him go find Katie French, their ma. Or wants that I should do it."
"Yeah, he asked me the same thing."
"I got my sheriffin' duties around here. Wonder if you'd mind makin' the proper inquiries once you get to Denver?"
"Tom said she was last seen in Drinkin' Springs. Why Denver?"
"Asked a friend, familiar with the area. Ain't nobody named Katie anything in Drinkin' Springs. But maybe Denver."
"I'll ask at a few places I know of where she might've ended up. Though maybe she's got respectable and married somebody."
"Wouldn't she send for the young'uns, Maverick, if so?"
"I guess. I'll just do what I can. Only, if I ever get back this way, don't threaten to arrest me like you did that first night in the saloon. I don't cheat at cards."
"You win like you do."
"I understand the game."
Tom and Billy stopped chasing chickens to watch Maverick lead his horse from the barn, check its hoof again, then mount and ride off in the opposite direction from Ellicott City. Tom ran down the road a few yards, but checked himself from calling out. Jasper came up to him, put a long, sinewy arm around his shoulders and turned him back toward the house. Maybe the boys could use a face and arm bath and some shut-eye, too. Billy trudged along behind, as quiet as ever, playing with a ball of string he had found.
For quite a long while, Sheriff Leland Hardee stood in the chicken-infested farmyard and gazed after the vanished gambler on horseback. His eyes were perplexed.