LITMIR.BIZ

      The wise man avoids trouble,

       so as to grow old with grace and dignity.

      —Sir Harry Fulton

      Nobody ever accused us of bein’ smart.

      —Scratch Morton

      CONTENTS

      CHAPTER 1

      CHAPTER 2

      CHAPTER 3

      CHAPTER 4

      CHAPTER 5

      CHAPTER 6

      CHAPTER 7

      CHAPTER 8

      CHAPTER 9

      CHAPTER 10

      CHAPTER 11

      CHAPTER 12

      CHAPTER 13

      CHAPTER 14

      CHAPTER 15

      CHAPTER 16

      CHAPTER 17

      CHAPTER 18

      CHAPTER 19

      CHAPTER 20

      CHAPTER 21

      CHAPTER 22

      CHAPTER 23

      CHAPTER 24

      CHAPTER 25

      CHAPTER 26

      CHAPTER 27

      CHAPTER 28

      CHAPTER 29

      CHAPTER 30

      CHAPTER 31

      CHAPTER 1

      Scratch Morton dug an elbow into Bo Creel’s ribs, nodded toward the building they were passing, and said, “That’s new since the last time we were here, ain’t it?”

      As Bo looked at the building, a nearly naked woman leaned out a second-story window and called to them, “Hey, boys, come on inside and pay me a visit.”

      Bo ticked a finger against the brim of his black, flat-crowned hat, said politely, “Ma’am,” then used his other hand to grasp his trail partner’s arm and drag him on past the whorehouse’s entrance.

      “You’d have to pay, all right, like the lady said,” he told Scratch, “and we’re a mite low on funds right now.”

      “Well, then, let’s find a saloon and a poker game,” Scratch suggested. “There should be plenty of both in El Paso.”

      Bo didn’t doubt that. The border town was famous for its vices. That was the main reason Scratch had insisted on stopping here. They had been on the trail for a long time, and Scratch had a powerful hankering for whiskey and women, not necessarily in that order. They had come home to Texas, and Scratch was of a mind to celebrate.

      For most of the past two score years, the two drifters had been somewhere else other than the state where they were born. Of course, Texas hadn’t been a state when Bo Creel and Scratch Morton entered the world. It was still part of Mexico then. They had been youngsters when the revolution came along, and after that they’d been citizens of the Republic of Texas for a while.

      By the time Texas entered the Union in 1845, Bo and Scratch had pulled up stakes and gone on the drift, due to Scratch’s fiddle-footed nature and Bo’s desire to put the tragedy of losing his wife and family to sickness behind him. They had been back to the Lone Star state a few times since then, but mostly they’d been elsewhere, seeing what was on the other side of the next hill.

      The long years showed in their tanned, weathered faces, as well as in Scratch’s shock of silver hair and the strands of gray shot through Bo’s dark brown hair, but not in their rangy, muscular bodies that still moved with the easy grace of younger men.

      As befitting his deeply held belief that he was God’s gift to women, Scratch was something of a dandy, sporting a big, cream-colored Stetson, a fringed buckskin jacket over a white shirt, and tan whipcord pants tucked into high-topped brown boots. The elaborately tooled leather gunbelt strapped around his hips supported a pair of holstered Remington revolvers with long barrels and ivory grips. People had accused him in the past of looking like a Wild West Show cowboy, and he took that as a compliment.

      Bo, on the other hand, had been mistaken for a preacher more than once with his sober black suit and vest and hat. His gunbelt and holster were as plain as could be, and so was the lone .45 he carried. Not many preachers, though, had strong, long-fingered hands that could handle a gun and a deck of cards with equal deftness.

      Having lived through the chaos of the Runaway Scrape and the Battle of San Jacinto, Bo and Scratch both claimed to want nothing but peace and quiet. Somehow, though, those things had a habit of avoiding them. It seemed that despite their best efforts, wherever they went, trouble soon followed.

      Bo was determined that things would be different here in El Paso, since they were back on Texas soil. They would replenish their funds, have a few good meals, sleep under a roof instead of the stars, stock up on supplies, then ride on to wherever the trail took them next.

      It was a good plan, but it required money. Bo set his eye on the Birdcage Saloon in the next block as a likely source of those funds.

      He recalled the Birdcage from previous visits to the border town. It was run by a big German named August Strittmayer who insisted that all the games of chance there be conducted in an honest fashion. Bo was sure some of the professional gamblers who played at the Birdcage skirted the edge of honesty from time to time, but by and large, Strittmayer’s influence kept the games clean.

      “You can have a beer at the bar in Strittmayer’s place while I see if there’s an empty chair at any of the tables,” he suggested to Scratch.

      “Now you’re talkin’,” Scratch agreed with a grin. “The scenery’s plumb nice in there, too.”

      Bo knew what Scratch was referring to. On a raised platform on one side of the room sat the big cage that gave the place its name. Instead of a bird perching on the swing that hung inside the cage, one of the saloon girls was always there, in the next thing to her birthday suit. The girls took turns rocking back and forth on that swing. They might not sing like birds, but their plumage was mighty nice.

      When Bo and Scratch pushed through the batwings and went inside, they saw that the saloon was doing its usual brisk business. Thirsty cowboys filled most of the places at the bar and occupied all but a few of the tables. A group of men gathered around the birdcage in the corner, calling out lewd comments to the girl on the swing.

      Strittmayer had laid down the law where those girls were concerned: The saloon’s bouncers would deal quickly and harshly with any man who so much as set foot inside the cage. He couldn’t stop the comments, though, and the girls who worked the cage soon learned to ignore them and continue to wear a placid smile.

      The air was full of the usual saloon smells—whiskey, tobacco, sweat, and piss—and the usual sounds—loud talk, raucous laughter, tinny piano music, the click of a roulette wheel, the whisper of cards being shuffled and dealt. Bo nodded toward the bar and told Scratch, “Go grab a beer.”

      “I can handle that job,” Scratch said.

      Bo spotted a dealer he knew at one of the baize-covered tables where poker games were

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