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“Get up, Albie.”

“I can’t move.” The words came out in short grunts.

“You’re going to move one more time,” Brady said.

He took Albie’s gun then went quickly across to the house and called the girl’s name. The door opened and he saw the relief in her eyes and saw her about to speak, but he said, “Albie’s not going to last.”

“Oh—” He saw her bite her lower lip.

“Listen—but maybe we can still use him.” Brady spoke hurriedly, but quietly, telling her what to do: to hold Albie’s gun on him and not move it even though he was doubled over with a bullet through his middle. And after that Brady ran to the barn. He went through it seeing only the cow, then out the rear door and across the wagon ruts into the trees. A dozen yards back in the pines he found their horses picketed with Albie’s. He led them back to the barn and came out the front leading only Albie’s.

The girl’s eyes were open wide. “He’s hurt terribly bad.”

Brady said nothing. Albie screamed as Brady stooped and pulled him to his feet and made him mount the horse. Brady said then, “Listen to me. We’re giving you a chance. Go get some help. You hear me, go get Ed to take care of you.” He slapped the horse’s rump, jumped after it and slapped again and the horse broke into a gallop—with Albie doubled over, his hands gripping the saddle horn—and rounded the corner of the stable.

Taking the girl’s hand, Brady led her through the house, opened the front door then stood in the doorway, his hand holding her arm.

“I don’t understand,” she said.

“Listen a minute.” They could still hear Albie’s horse, though faintly now in the distance. “Going straight across,” Brady said. “Telling us where Mr. Moak’s waiting.”

Chapter Six

Two to One Odds

NOW THINK about it some more, Brady thought. He was by the window again staring out at the masked, unmoving shapes in the darkness and hearing the small sounds of the girl who was in the kitchen, beyond the blanket that draped the doorway. Kitty. No—Catherine Mary. Brady said Catherine Mary again to himself, listening to the sound of it in his mind.

All right, and what’re the odds on calling her that tomorrow?

Two to one now. Getting better. But now what will they do? You know what you’ll do, but what about them? Was Albie on his own? Maybe. Or part of a plan. Maybe. One of them is back in the trees and the other one’s in front, across the meadow. Maybe. Could you run for it now, both of you? Maybe. Or will Ed Moak run for it? Hell no. One, two, three, four maybe’s and a hell no—so the changing of the odds doesn’t change your situation any. You still sit and wait. But now he knows you’re not asleep.

He moved around the table to the side of the window and looked diagonally out across the yard. The aspen stand showed ghostly gray lines and a mass of branches and beyond it, in the smoked light of part of a moon, the meadow was mist gray and had no end as it stretched to nothing.

“Will he die?” the girl asked. She had made no sound coming to stand close to him.

“I think he will,” Brady said. The girl did not speak and he said then, “I didn’t want to kill him. I wanted to shoot him. I mean I was trying to shoot him because I had to, but killing him or seeing him dead wasn’t in my mind.”

His eyes moved to her face. She was staring out at the night and Brady said, “You feel sorry for him now.”

“I can’t help it.” Her voice was low and with little tone.

“Listen, I felt sorry for him when I put him on the horse. He was just a poor kid going to die and I didn’t like it one bit—but all the time I kept thinking, we’re still in it. There’s no time out for burying the dead and saying Our Fathers because Ed Moak is still here and knowing it is the only thing in the whole world that’s important.”

“Unless he’s gone,” the girl said.

“I just finished adding up the maybe’s,” Brady said. “You want to know how many there are?”

“I’m sorry.”

“No, I shouldn’t have said that.”

She turned to him. “You remind me a lot of my older brother.”

“I hope that’s good.”

She smiled.