“Boys, this here is Marshal Jake Harkner and Deputy Marshal Lloyd Harkner—his kid, as if you couldn’t tell. Jake, this is Hal and Clay. Don’t know their last names and don’t care. They’re new in the territory—fresh in from the last land rush.”
Lloyd urged Jeff to sit down at the table, but Jake remained standing. “How new?” he asked, eyeing them carefully.
“New enough, but a person don’t have to be from around here to know who you are, Marshal,” the one called Hal answered. He was a medium-built man with sandy hair and several missing teeth. Jake noticed neither man wore a gun. Because Hash Bryant was gathering men, who apparently were still scattered throughout the area, he had trouble trusting any stranger he came across.
“How’s that?” he asked Hal.
The man shrugged. “Hell, you’ve been in newspaper headlines and dime novels.” The man put out his hand. “I never expected to meet you. This is a real pleasure.”
Jake didn’t shake his hand. “A pleasure?”
“Sure. Hell, you’re famous.” His hand was still out. Jake shook it warily.
“Whatever you think,” he answered. He looked over at Dixie. “While your girls serve Lloyd and Jeff, I want to talk to you, Dixie—in your room.”
“Pa—”
“I’m all right, Lloyd.” Jake lit a cigarette. “Bring me some coffee, will you?” he asked Dixie. “I’d appreciate it.”
“Sure, honey. You know where my room is.”
Jeff looked at Lloyd.
“Don’t ask,” Lloyd told him. He glanced at Jake. “Just don’t drink, Pa.”
“Just coffee. I need to talk to someone who’s not close to your mother.” Jake sobered, eyeing the other two men again. “Either one of you ever heard of a man named Hash Bryant? Or Marty Bryant?” He could tell by their reaction that they hadn’t. One thing he’d learned over the years was how to read a man’s eyes.
“Don’t know him,” the one called Clay told him.
“Me neither,” Hal added.
Jake glanced at Lloyd. “I’ll eat later.” He turned to Jeff then. “Kid, this is your chance to learn something. Take advantage of it.”
Jake walked out of the room, and Dixie set a steak in front of Lloyd. “What’s wrong with your father? He looks thinner than when he was here last time.”
“He got hit in a shoot-out in Guthrie. Lost a ton of blood and came close to losing his life.”
“Damn,” Dixie muttered. “Is there more?”
“Yeah. My mother might have cancer. It’s eating him up something awful, Dixie. He’s pretending he’s okay with it, but you’ve got your hands full once you get him alone.”
Dixie sighed, walking over to pour some coffee. “That’s terrible. Just terrible. Your mother is a kind, beautiful woman. It’s not fair. I’ll see if I can calm him down.”
She started out and Lloyd called to her. “Dixie.”
“Yeah?”
“Be good, will you?”
She grinned. “Ain’t I always?”
“You know what I mean. He’s hurting. Don’t let him drink. And don’t let him think he needs to prove he can handle it if my mother…doesn’t make it. He’s in a really bad state right now. My mother is on her way to Oklahoma City for surgery, and he can’t be with her. It’s killing him.”
Dixie sobered. “I’ve been a shoulder to cry on more than once, kid. I’ll be good.” She looked him over. “But I gotta say, it’s too damn bad you got married. You’re too easy on the eyes.”
Lloyd just grinned and turned to Jeff, then nodded toward a pretty young woman of perhaps twenty or twenty-five. “That dark-haired beauty there, she’s real sweet. You ought to get to know her, Jeff. Her name is Rosie O’Toole. You could have a pretty enjoyable night with that one.”
“You should know, Lloyd Harkner,” the woman answered suggestively. She cast him a fetching smile and brought a beer over for Jeff.
“Really, Lloyd, I don’t want to do this,” Jeff objected.
Lloyd shook his head. “You’ll change your mind.”
Jeff drank a little beer. “You sure your mother won’t be upset with Jake alone in that woman’s room?”
Lloyd cut some of his steak. “It’s all part of being married to somebody like Jake, Jeff. He was brought up by women like that. They’re the only mother figure he ever had after his own mother was killed. When he needs to talk to somebody like a man might talk to his ma, that’s the kind he talks to. I just don’t like the state he’s in, that’s all.”