His words tapered off, and a tear ran a streak through the dirt on his cheek.
The boy was talking about his brother as if he were still alive.Caleb knew how that went.He’d been there.It took a long time to sort out losing someone.You kept hearing their voice, but when you looked around, it was someone else.You thought you saw them down the road, so you hurried.But when you got there, it was some stranger who turned and stared.
It was a bad feeling.
“We had a plan.Him and me.But we ran out of money.When them other fellas talked to him, they made it sound easy.Cattle just sitting there and waiting to get took.But you stopped ’em.And now he’s gone.”
Caleb heard the pain of the loss in every word.He was sixteen when he ran away from his home.And he’d had nothing.No brother.No plan.There had been so many nights when he was out on the prairie, miles from any other person.And when he was around others, he was too afraid of getting caught.
Sometimes, even now, when he looked up at the flickering stars glowing in a blue-black sky, that lost and empty feeling came trailing back.Like a nightmare that wouldn’t quit.He never forgot being so bone-tired and lonesome and ripped up inside.
Maybe that was why he couldn’t bring himself to cut down the young fella standing here now.Only a scared boy trying hard not to fall apart.
Twelve years old was a mite young to be facing the world on your own.The place was big and cold and as unconcerned as the stars in the night sky.And a frontier town was an especially hard and dangerous place.
“I ain’t gonna ask you the name of your brother.”
“Why not?”
Caleb knew from the way the muzzle of that old Colt Dragoon kept dipping lower and lower that the iron was getting heavy.If he kept Paddy talking, pretty soon that gun was going to be pointed right at the ground between them.He wasn’t worried.He knew men, and he knew there was no way this boy was going to shoot him.If he were going to do it, he’d have opened fire before they exchanged even one word.
But he still wanted Paddy to talk himself down.
“Cuz he and his friends could not be bothered to introduce themselves before trying to put a hole in me.”Caleb tapped his chest in the general proximity of his heart.
“But you killed Billy, and I gotta vengeance him.”
Billy.Caleb heard no names spoken, but he doubted the boy’s brother was the one who’d entrusted him with the letter to his mother.The one he was still carrying.The dying rustler had made no mention of Paddy being in town.
“Getting revenge ain’t something a man jumps into.You got to think it through.”
“I don’t see that there’s no thinking that needs doing.”
“Was he a good brother?”
“He was my kin.My only kin.”
The boy’s eyes were wide and misting, his hand shaking.It was tough enough being alone in the world, but having bad kin didn’t make things any easier.
He wasn’t going sit in judgment on that brother, though.True, he’d shot Billy dead in the act of rustling his cattle.But when he himself was not much older than Paddy, he’d done bad things.Still, Caleb never had any kid brother relying on him.
His instincts already told him that this young fella had better sense than his brother.
“How come he didn’t bring you along with him to my spread when he and his fellas went out there?”
“He wanted me to go.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Cuz…cuz I had things to do.”
“What things?”
He glanced at the boy with the baling hook.The tool was hanging loose as his side.He was more interested in hearing the conversation.
“Just…things.”
Caleb turned his attention back to Paddy.“You knew they were up to no good, didn’t you?”
