It was one of those days when I went into Maude's to see how everything was going. Maude's is the best and brightest saloon for two hundred miles, and I'm Bart Maverick. Just in case you wondered.
I started out in life as the second son of a professional poker player; one of the very best in the whole western United States, named Beauregard Maverick, or Pappy as we call him. For the first many years of my adult life, my brother Bret and me made our living the same way, playing poker. Honest poker. Eventually, we both got married and settled down, and I took over running my mother-in-law's saloon, Maude's. We raised families and finally went into the horse-ranching business, but I still oversee Maude's and come into town about once a week to spend a day with the old girl and make sure she's 'up to snuff.' The saloon, I mean, not my mother-in-law.
We used to own a house right up the street from Maude's, until it got too small and we built the horse ranch, the B Bar M. Sometimes I miss those days, when all I had to do was walk down the boardwalk for a minute or two and roll in the batwing doors. But when you're raising a whole herd of little ones, both human and equine, you need more room than you can get in town. So now I either had to saddle the horse or hitch up the buggy to go into Little Bend. This morning it was the buggy, and I'd had time to daydream all the way in.
Everything had gone smoothly, just like it always did, and I was finishing up the last of the required paperwork when Dave Parker appeared at my office door. Dave's been sheriff here in Little Bend, Texas for a long time, and remains a good friend. He's a little older than me, but we practically grew up together, and he always comes by when I'm here working. Usually he was whistling or humming, but this morning he was dead quiet. That was not a good sign.
"Morning, sheriff. How goes it this mornin'?"
Dave still didn't speak, just walked into my office and sat down in front of the desk. In just a minute Billy Upshaw hurried in, carrying two steaming cups of coffee. He set one down in front of me and the other in front of Dave, and it was only then that I saw the brandy bottle tucked under Billy's arm. That was the second warning I'd gotten that something wasn't quite right. Billy poured a shot into Dave's coffee and then set the bottle down next to my cup, sign number three that something unusual was going on.
Before I could open my mouth to ask, Dave was pointing at the bottle. "You might wanna consider that this morning."
"Is it that bad?" I had to ask.
"Depends," Dave answered cryptically. "You and Buckley still friends?"
Buckley. Now there was a name I hadn't heard in quite a while. "In a manner of speaking. Why?" I picked up my coffee and took a swallow. Billy made the best coffee.
"Last night I had to haul Old Man Sharp out of the Little Bend Bar. He was too drunk to stand up by himself. Finally started babbling about this letter he got from Ray Ames. Said Ray was happy livin' with his daughter in Colorado and that he'd run into an old friend of yours there – Jim Buckley."
"Where in Colorado, did he say?" I was curious, I will admit.
"Grand Junction. It's almost on the Utah border." I noticed Dave poured another shot of brandy into what was left of his coffee. Kinda early for that, isn't it, Dave?
If he was waiting for me to say anything about Buckley, or ask anything about him, Dave was gonna be disappointed. That didn't appear to be the case, however, as the sheriff kept right on talking. "Bart – Sharp said Ray heard some news about Buckley that he thought you should know."
"What would that be, Dave?" I expected almost anything other than what I heard next.
"Ray said that Buckley . . . well, he heard that somethin's wrong with Buckley, and Buckley's dying."
I heard the words. I heard exactly what Parker said. Every . . . single . . . syllable. Something was wrong with Jim Buckley, and Buckley was dying. I just sat there, not making a sound. It took a minute before I could answer Dave.
"He . . . has something? What is it that he's got, Dave? What's wrong with Buckley?"
Dave looked at me with a mixture of pity, sorrow, and sadness. "I don't know any more than that, Bart. You can wire Ray at General Delivery and see if he knows anything else, but that's all Sharp could tell me."
My mind was trying to process what Dave initially told me. Jim Buckley had 'something,' and he was dying. Forty-five minutes later I was still sittin' at my desk, starin' off into space. Feeling like I was in a trance of some kind, I eventually found myself at the Wells Fargo office, ready to send a telegram to Ray. I hoped he could answer my questions, or at least the important ones.
I did my best to work the rest of the day but found myself thinking about all the trouble we'd gotten into over the years, and all the trouble we'd caused. No matter what I started with, I kept coming back to that last, sad day when I ran Dandy out of town and told him not to come back. If what I'd heard earlier was accurate, did I want the sight of Buckley's horse leaving Little Bend to be the last image I remember seeing?
For the first time in years I spent the whole evening closed up in my office at home. Our babies weren't little anymore; no one needed tucking in, and it was almost midnight before I knew it. There was a soft knock at the door, and I knew it was Doralice before I saw the door swing open. "Kind of late, isn't it, handsome?"
"Sorry, I've got a lot on my mind." Not entirely true. I had but one thing on my mind, and that was Jim and his health. I didn't want to bring him up until I had further word from Ray about what was actually going on in Colorado.
"Something bothering you? Can I help?" There was that look in her eyes, and that tone in her voice, reminding me that this was a partnership, and she was the other partner.
"No, sweetheart. I don't have all the facts on this one yet. I'll let you know when I do."
"Are you coming to bed?"
I shook my head. "Not right now. I'll be along soon." I thought I caught a flash of disappointment on her face, but she smiled at me before closing the door. I still loved her fiercely, but even the thought of my beautiful wife in my arms couldn't wipe the worry from my mind. Sometime not long after that I fell asleep with my head on my desk and spent the rest of the night dreaming about the old days, and Buckley.