Chapter Forty-five

I was in my office with my feet up on my antique mahogany desk, careful of the gold-tooled leather top, re-reading Nietzsche's Thus Spake Zarathustra, when two things happened simultaneously: Jarred appeared in my office doorway pointing a rifle at my forehead, and my desk phone started ringing.

I did what any rational human being would in the presence of a ringing phone. I answered it.

Sherbet was on the other line. "We're outside Jarred's condo. He never showed."

"No shit," I said.

Jarred kicked the door shut behind him and stepped deeper into my office. He quickly scanned the office, keeping the rifle on me. It was an old fashioned Colt .22. The kind one would find in a place like Rawhide, which is probably where Jarred got it.

Sherbet asked, "Any idea where he might be?"

"A fairly good one," I said.

"Then where is he?"

"Take a guess."

Jarred was walking around the desk, keeping the rifle on my face.

"He's with you," Sherbet said.

"Good guess."

"You need help?"

"Probably not."

"But it wouldn't be a bad idea."

"If you insist," I said.

"I'll send a car around."

At that moment, Jarred yanked the phone cord out of the wall. The line went dead. "Have a good day," I said, and hung up.

"Who the fuck was that?"

"Grandma," I said. "She tends to worry about me."

"She should worry about you, because you are fucked, Knighthorse. Fucked. Do you understand me? Fucked!"

"If I'm hearing you correctly," I said, "I appear to be fucked."

"Put your hands flat on the desk where I can see them."

He caught me. I was inching toward my desk drawer, where I kept my Browning. I sighed, rested both hands on the tooled leather top of the desk.

"The oils from my palms might stain the tooled leather top of my desk."

"Fuck your desk."

Jarred had a sort of wild-eyed look about him. The sort of look my teammates had before big games, a look fueled by a lot of adrenaline and nerves and the certainty that you were going to hurt a lot of people in a few hours. Or be hurt. Jarred was still wearing his Rawhide-issued red cowboy shirt and jeans. He was sweating through his cowboy shirt. Must have gotten himself pretty worked up on the drive out here. His thinning hair was disheveled and his glasses had slid to the tip of his sweating nose. He didn't push them back up.

"They were waiting for me outside my condo," he said, spitting the words at me.

"They?"

He shoved the gun in my face, just inches from my nose. I could smell the gun oil, could see faint scratches along the steel barrel. "Don't fuck with me, Knighthorse. The cops. The cops were waiting for me." He snapped the gun away and started pacing in front of my desk, keeping the gun loosely on me. Jarred looked insane. He was sweating profusely now. Swallowing repeatedly. "Patty told me you spoke to her the other day. She must have told you something."

"She told me you went back to the truck for water."

"Nothing wrong with that."

"Except we have your prints on the gas cap, Jarred."

"What do you mean?"

"We know you sabotaged the truck."

He looked at me from over his glasses. Sweat dripped from the tip of his nose, landed on my tooled leather. I would have to wipe that clean later. For now, I had bigger fish to fry.

"Give me the gun, Jarred."

"I can't."

"If you shoot me, you get the death penalty."

"Maybe that wouldn't be so bad."

I shrugged. "Where you stand now, a good lawyer talks the D.A. down to second degree murder."

Jarred was shaking. I could literally see the sweat spreading from under his armpits.

"I didn't kill anyone."

"Say that to Willie Clarke."

Jarred dropped into the client chair opposite me. The gun was pointed away from me. If I wanted to, I could lunge across the desk and wrestle it away from him. I wasn't in the lunging mood. Besides, I didn't think it would come to that.

"I didn't mean to kill him."

I said nothing.

"I just did it to scare him away, you know?" He paused, ran his hand through his hair. "I gambled on Rawhide. I visited there as a kid and fell in love with it. It stayed with me all these years."

"Maybe it's the cowboy in you."

He ignored me. I was used to being ignored. He continued. "So when I was casting around for a theme for my masters, Rawhide naturally came to mind. It was a good fit. I had a true love for American history, in particular Western history. I did some research and discovered nothing of any significance had been done on the town, and I knew I had found my purpose. I sold my condo in Boston, moved out west. I've poured my heart and soul into that little town."

"And then in waltzes Willie Clarke."

Jarred instinctively gripped the weapon in his lap. "He was fresh out of graduate school, but there was a sort of - "

"Cockiness?" I offered.

"Yes. A cockiness to him that I found infuriating. Which is probably why I don't like you."

"Sometimes I don't like me, either."

"Seriously?"

"No; I love me."

Jarred rolled his eyes. I think he might have thought about swinging his gun up to my face again, but decided against it. "Willie sounded so confident, so fucking sure of himself. As if he really thought he could unearth Sly's identity."

"Can't have that."

"Sly was mine," he hissed.

"If anyone was going to discover Sly's identity," I said, helping, "it would be you."

His eyes sparkled. "Yes! Exactly. Sly's one of the West's most intriguing mysteries."

"So you removed the threat. The threat being Willie."

"Hell, what the fuck was I supposed to do?"

"Not kill him. Work together. Share the glory."

Jarred was shaking his head. "I worked too hard and long to do that. Still, I didn't mean to kill him. I just wanted to scare him. I didn't want him to come back."

"Sure," I said. "You scared him to death."

A shadow crossed under my doorway. The cavalry was here. Any minute now, they were going to barge in here, probably knock my door off its newly restored hinges. I couldn't let that happen.

"Give me the gun, Jarred."

He pushed his glasses up higher on his nose; they promptly slipped back down. He looked at me. His eyes were wide and reddish, perhaps irritated by his sweat. "I can't go to jail. Father would be very disappointed in me."

More shadows. It was going to get ugly in here. And I was still scrubbing the last of the bloodstains out of my carpet.

"He's very renowned, you know. Teaches at Princeton. He didn't approve of me coming out to Rawhide. Thought it was beneath us. Thought it was a mistake."

"Boy was he wrong," I said.

Jarred gave me a half smile and pushed his glasses up. "They're coming for me, aren't they?"

I kept my eyes on him and nodded my head slowly. I didn't like the tone his voice had suddenly taken on. Somber and distant, a voice empty of hope.

"You were talking to the police earlier, weren't you?" he asked.

"Just give me the gun, Jarred."

"I think...not."

"They'll shoot you."

"Now there's a thought," he said. "Would make things a lot easier, wouldn't it? My parents would be disgraced, sure. But at least the matter will be done with short and quick."

"Don't do this, Jarred. It's not worth it."

"Not worth it? Oh, I think it is." He looked at me, smiled. Pushed his glasses up. His eyes weren't right. His lower lip trembled. "Tell my dad to fuck off for me."

"Tell him yourself."

"Later, Knighthorse."

He swung the rifle around and, in a practiced motion, stuck the muzzle in his mouth and pulled the trigger.

Chapter Forty-six

It was a week later. Cindy and I were in bed together, where we belonged, watching the local nightly news. Ginger the dog was burrowed under the covers between my ankles. Now, after twenty-five minutes of grisly murders, missing kids and reports of unsafe foods and medicines, came the feel-good story of the day - wrapped around, of course, another murder.

There, on Cindy's 19" TV screen in her cozy bedroom was Jones T. Jones's hawkish face and gold hoop earrings.

Jones was standing in front of Ye Olde Curiosity Shoppe, before a crowd of reporters. For the cameras, Jones ditched the cheesy used car salesman facade and adopted a more somber expression and tone. Peppering his speech liberally with references to his store, Jones announced that with the help of private investigator Jim Knighthorse - yes that Jim Knighthorse of football fame - they had not only uncovered the name of the mummy, but his original murderer.

The camera cut to a young male Asian field reporter, who then went on to explain, in a butchered and confusing summary, the role that Tafford Barron's ancestor, yes that Tafford Barron who is currently running for a House seat, had had in the murder of Boonie Adams.

"You were mentioned on the news!" Cindy squealed, turning off the TV. "And in a non-football capacity. I'm so impressed."

"Impressed enough to sleep with me?"

"What the hell do you call what we just did thirty minutes ago?"

"Not sleeping."

Ginger shifted positions and pressed her cold nose into my anklebones. I shivered involuntarily.

"I don't like this Jones T. Jones chap," said Cindy. "He reminds me of a used car salesman."

"He's worse than that," I said. "He's selling dead men. So to speak."

"Oh, yuck."

Ginger raised her head. I knew this because a section of the comforter between my feet rose up. It dropped back down a moment later.

"Business is already picking up," I said. "And I just received my final check from Jones. Want to go to Sir Winston's?"

She shook her head. "Too snooty."

I hugged her tightly. "My kind of gal."

"So what are you going to do with the bonus?"

"Take you to dinner. Buy you pearls and diamonds."

"Or get caught up on your bills."

"Or that," I said. "Or I could always use it to start a new life in the Bahamas. Maybe run a juice bar on the beach."

"Can I come?"

"Only if I can refer to you as my bikini babe."

"Deal," she said, then frowned.

"Something I said?"

"No. It's this Jones T. Jones character. Just doesn't seem right that he's still profiting from Boonie's murder."

"I agree," I said. "Which is why I took the liberty to research Boonie's kin."

"You didn't."

"I did."

"Judging by that smug grin on your face, I would say that you found them."

"I did. Or some of them who still happen to live in Barstow. I suggested to them that Boonie should receive a decent burial with his family present. And they agreed. One old lady, a great great granddaughter, actually cried."

"And what does Jones T. Jones think of this?"

"Oh, he won't like it at first, but he'll cave in, and work the funeral into a huge propaganda stunt. Believe me, in the end, Jones will have profited very well from Boonie's murder."

"Speaking of which, explain to me again what happened to Boonie's killer. The news sort of jumbled it."

"A hundred and twenty years ago, young Johanson Barron gets in a barroom fight with Boonie Adams, stabbing Boonie in the shoulder. A week later Johanson somehow lures Boonie out into the desert, shoots him and leaves him to die. A month later, the Barron family, perhaps aware of this killing, quietly ships Johanson out of Rawhide, where he eventually winds up in Dodge City. Where, I might add, he eventually hangs for a different murder two years later. So justice was served, so to speak."

"How do you know all this?"

"I happen to be an ace detective," I said. "That, and I had the help of Rawhide's newest curator, one Patricia McGovern."

"Will this somewhat scandalous news hurt Tafford Barron's chances of running for Congress?"

"One can only hope," I said. "A good spin doctor can probably get him out of this scrap, but we'll see."

"Did you eventually find Jarred's father?"

"I did."

"Did you relay the message?"

"It was a dying man's last request," I said. "What else could I do?"

"Was it hard for his father to hear?"

"He broke down crying, so I think so."

"Like pouring salt in the wound," said Cindy.

"Yes," I said.

"But you had to do it," she said.

"Yes."

Street sounds came from below, especially the sound of a loud muffler. In fact, I heard it pass on several occasions. As it was coming again, I got up out of bed, padded across her hardwood floor, and glanced out her third story window in time to see an older model white BMW chug slowly down the street. Black exhaust spewed from the muffler. I frowned.

"You okay?" Cindy asked.

"Yes."

"What is it?"

"Nothing," I said, and came back to bed.

"So tell me," said Cindy, snuggling against me, her breath hot on my neck. "Was it Jarred who shot at you in the desert?"

"We'll never know for sure, but I think it's a safe bet. A Rawhide maintenance truck was getting serviced not too far from where we had met for lunch. He could have easily swapped vehicles."

"Why bother swapping vehicles if his intent was killing you?" Cindy asked. "With you dead, there would be no witnesses."

I shrugged. "In case he didn't kill me; in case there was a witness."

"I've never had anyone shoot at me," she said, shuddering under the covers. "I would be terrified."

"At first, but then survival supercedes fear."

We were silent some more. Ginger snored contentedly between my ankles. A helluva heating pad.

"Do you think you'll coach again next year?" Cindy asked.

Our team had played its final game tonight. We finished the season on a high note, winning by a huge margin, the biggest in quite some time. In fact, we had won four of the last five games, which, coincidentally, was when I was hired on as an assistant coach. Coach Swanson had asked me back next year.

"I told him I would think about it," I said.

"But I thought you really enjoyed it."

"Oh, I do. But a coach needs to give more of himself. Hell, most coaches commit their lives to their teams."

"You were busy with the mummy, and with my stalker."

"Of which, one is still on the loose," I said.

"What's his name?"

"Chad Schwendinger," I said. "No wonder he turned out bad."

"I'm not worried," she said. "I have my big strong man to protect me."

I was quiet, thinking about the stalker, about coaching, about the mummy, about my mommy. And through it all, I mostly thought about having a beer.

"Maybe next year I can take some time off from detecting to coach."

"You look like a coach. Did I ever tell you that? The kids look up to you. I was watching them tonight. They were hanging onto your every word down there on the sideline."

"I think everyone should hang onto my every word."

"I know you do," said Cindy. "Speaking of your word, are you ever going to ask me to marry you?"

"Yes."

"When?"

"When I'm out of debt."

She was silent, meditative. She stroked my bicep. "I would also want you to stop drinking before we're married."

I nodded, but said nothing. Damn, I wanted a drink. Now.

"Maybe you need help," she offered.

"Probably."

"But you don't want to get it."

"I like drinking," I said.

"So you would rather get drunk than marry me?"

"I want both."

"You can't have both, Jim. You need to make a decision."

I turned and faced her, our noses touching. I inhaled deeply. She was staring up at me, the whites of her eyes luminescent. "There is no decision to make. I won't lose you again. But can we give this a little time?"

She burrowed her face into the crook of my neck and kissed me softly.

"Yes," she said sleepily. "We can give it a little time."