* * * *
Jim waited until dawn to take the table down. There were four bullet holes in the flat top. He ran his finger over one. He and David had spent hours planing that top smooth and level.
Waste of a good table. But better than one of us catching a bullet.
He moved the table to the center of the room and righted it.
“Might as well eat at the table this morning,” he said.
“You’re sure it’s safe?” Ellen said from near the stove.
“No, but I reckon we’ll see them coming in the daylight. Should be plenty of time to get the table back up if we need it.”
“Father is sleeping,” she said. “He and Mother both.”
“They’ve had a hard time of it,” Jim said from around his coffee cup.
“We all have.”
Jim blew on the scalding coffee and stood at the half-open door. As bad as the table had suffered, the door was far worse. It bore at least twenty holes. There were more holes in the walls—he was certain—but none of those had punched through.
Good thing we built them thick.
He eyed the open space around the cabin with suspicion. There weren’t too many places to hide. He knew most of those. He didn’t see any signs of a rifleman and none were large enough to hide more than a single man lying on his stomach.
“I’m going to check the horses,” he said.
One of the heavy pans clattered to the floor behind him, and Jim spun on his heel, gun drawn.
“What is it?” Jim said. His eyes scanned the room for trouble.
“Nothing,” Ellen said. “I just dropped the pan, is all.”
Jim holstered the gun. Tension eased out of his shoulders.
“Only I wish you wouldn’t go out…not yet, anyway.”
“The horses need to be checked,” Jim answered.
“What if they’re out there waiting for you?”
“Then I guess I’ll go out and meet them.”
Ellen frowned at him. “I wish you wouldn’t joke about this.”
Jim rubbed his boot toe against the floor. “Well, if it makes you feel better, you can stand at the door with a rifle.”
“It doesn’t,” Ellen said. “But I’ll do it.”
She picked up her rifle and moved to the door. Jim leaned down and kissed her, then took her by the shoulders and shifted Ellen to her right. This put her slightly out of the open door and behind the thick wooden walls.
“Stand here,” he said. “I’ll be right back.”
Jim stepped out into the open and immediately felt a lot less confident. He turned back for a second and gave Ellen a smile he didn’t completely feel. Outside the cabin, the air was clean and crisp. He’d become accustomed to the cabin’s cramped stuffiness. The fresh air smelled good. He took a deep breath and set out for the barn. He leaned around the corner of the barn, spending several minutes studying the area behind it. Nothing. No sign of Bannen or his men all the way up to the tree line.
The ground was stained red at the barn’s corner. He rubbed his boot into it.
Where are the bodies? We killed at least three, maybe four, but there’s nothing here except their blood.
He’d never heard of an outlaw band carrying off their dead. Why would they do that?
The horses were relieved to see him.
Jim brushed each in turn, starting with Ellen’s and finishing up with the Appaloosa. He slung his saddle over the big black, then led him out of the barn and to the house.
In the doorway, Ellen had been replaced by her father. David looked at Jim and the horse in turn.
“Going for a ride?” David said.
“They took their fallen,” Jim said. “I know where I put my bullets and several could not have lived, but there aren’t any bodies.”
“Why would they do that?”
“No idea. But I doubt they hauled them far.”
“You’re riding out?” Ellen said, and the pain and fear in her tone wounded Jim as deep as a bullet.
“I am.”
