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It was stated that the next morning Bohannon’s posse followed Valdez’s sign till they caught up with him about noon near the Mescalero reservation line. Valdez’s horse had lamed and left Bobby out in the open, as Bohannon said, “with his pants down, so to speak.”

Judge Metairie called a man who was referred to as a character witness and this man described seeing Bobby Valdez shoot two men during the White Sands bank holdup last Christmastime. Another character witness was on the Butterfield stage that was held up last June between Lordsburg and Continental. Surer’n hell it was Bobby Valdez who’d opened the door with that .41 Colt gun in his hand, and no polka-dot bandanna over his nose was going to argue it wasn’t. Two more men sat down on the Douglas-chair witness stand with like stories.

Judge Metairie looked at his watch and asked what time was the stage back to Las Cruces, and when somebody told him not till three o’clock, he said that they might as well adjourn for dinner then and let the jury reach their verdict over a nice meal—though he didn’t see where they’d have much thinking to do.

Court reconvened at one-thirty. The jury foreman stood up, waited for the talking to die, then said how they allowed Bobby Valdez sure couldn’t be anything else but guilty.

Judge Metairie nodded, gaveled the register desk to restore order, waited until the quiet could be felt, then in the voice of doom sentenced Roberto Eladio Viscarra y Valdez, on the morning one week from this day, to be hanged by the neck until dead.

Criminal Sessions Court was closed and most people felt Judge Metairie had turned in a better-than-usual performance.

Saturday evening Lyall Quinlan went on duty at the Tularosa Jail.

It came about because Bohannon was scheduled to play poker and Quinlan arrived just at the right time. He came looking for the job; still, he was taken by surprise when Bohannon offered it to him, “temporarily, you understand,” because he’d been turned down so many times before. Lyall Quinlan wanted to be a lawman, but Bohannon always put him off with the excuse that he a1ready had an assistant, Barney Groom, and Barney served the purpose even if he was an old man.

But Bohannon was thinking maybe an extra night man ought to be on with Valdez upstairs, a man to sit up there and watch him. He was supposed to play cards tonight, which disallowed him. Then, lo and behold, there was young Lyall Quinlan coming in the door!

“Lyall, you musta heard me wishin’ for you.” Then, seeing the astonishment come over the boy’s face—a thin face with big, self-conscious eyes—he thought: Hell, Lyall’s all right. Even if he doesn’t pack much weight, he’s honest. And he rode in the posse that brought in Valdez. An eager boy like him’d make a good deputy! For what he considered would be a temporary period, Bohannon convinced himself that Quinlan would do just fine. Tomorrow he could always kick him the hell out….

“Barney, give Lyall here a scattergun and tell him what to do,” and Bohannon was gone.

Lyall Quinlan sat up all night watching Bobby Valdez. That is, most of the time he sat in the cane-bottom chair—it was in the hallway facing the one cell they had upstairs—he was keeping his eyes on Valdez, who hardly paid him any attention. Whenever Lyall would start to get sleepy, he’d get up, crook the sawed-off scattergun under his arm, and pace up and down in the short hallway.

The first time he did it, Bobby Valdez, who was lying on his back with his eyes closed, opened them, turned his head enough to see Lyall, and told him to shut up. It was his boots making the noise. But Lyall went right on walking up and down. Valdez called on one of the men saints then and asked him why did all keepers of jails wear squeaky boots? The lamp hanging out in the hall didn’t seem to bother him, only Lyall’s boots.

When Lyall kept on walking, the Mexican said something else, half smiling—a low-voiced string of soft-spoken Spanish.

Lyall edged closer to the cell and said through the heavy iron bars,