Blood Wedding

“That’s mighty kind of you,” Lem said. “We could use some help around here, now that Jed’s gone.”

“She’s not worried so much about help as she is about what the Murray gang might do.”

“They’ve killed Jed,” Tabor said. “What else could they want around here?”

“More revenge,” Fargo told him. “It looks like somebody killed Paul Murray tonight.”

“Shit,” Ellis said.

“That seems to be pretty much the general opinion,” Fargo said.

“Murray’ll come after his boy,” Tabor said. “He won’t want him lying buried in some marsh with no marker. What’re you gonna do, Lem?”

“Bury Jed,” Lem said. “Then we’ll see.”

Murray’ll burn your house and barn,” Ellis said. “Kill you if he gets the chance.”

“We’ll just have to see that he doesn’t get the chance,” Fargo said. “That’s one reason I’m staying around.”

“What’s the other reason?” Lem asked.

“To find out who killed Jed.”

“Hell, we all know who did it. It was Murray’s gang.”

“I’m not so sure about that,” Fargo said.

Fargo had had a rough night. First there had been the fighting and then the grave digging. It was well after midnight, and he was bone tired when he lay down on the feather bed to try to get some sleep. He sank into the mattress and was just about to drift off when he heard soft footsteps outside his door, which then slowly swung open.

Fargo looked over in that direction and saw Abby’s dark silhouette outlined by the faint lantern light from the kitchen. She entered the room and closed the door behind her.

“Fargo?” she said. “Are you sleeping?”

“Well, I was trying. But I hadn’t quite made it yet.”

“I didn’t mean to bother you, but I wanted to talk a minute. If you don’t mind.”

Fargo sighed, but not loud enough for her to hear him. She probably needed to talk about Jed, and he could understand that.

“I don’t mind,” he said. “Let me get up and light the lantern.”

It was quite dark in the room, which had only a small window through which the chalky moon shone faintly.

“We don’t need the lantern,” Abby said. “I’ll just sit over here in the chair.”

There was a hard-backed wooden chair near the wash-stand, and Fargo watched as Abby walked over and sat down. He couldn’t see her very well, but her blond hair shone palely in the dim light. Fargo couldn’t think of anything to say that would soothe her, so he just lay in the bed and waited for her to have her say.

After a few seconds she said, “I guess you think I need to talk about Jed.”

“I don’t blame you,” Fargo said. “You must want to know a little about him, maybe, things a man wouldn’t tell you himself. He was a good man, and a brave one. There was a time once when we were on the trail together . . .”

“I didn’t come here for that. I didn’t really need to talk. That was just an excuse.”

If she hadn’t come to hear about Jed, there must be something else that was worrying her, Fargo thought, and then he remembered that he hadn’t told her for sure that he’d stay around for a while.

“I’ve decided to stay here for a few days if that’s what you came to find out,” he said. He didn’t mention his suspicions about Jed’s death.

“Good. I was hoping you’d stay. But that’s not why I came, either.”

Fargo couldn’t think of anything else left unsettled between them, so he said, “Why did you come, then?”

“I don’t want to say.”

Fargo thought, not for the first time, and, he was sure, not for the last, that he would never understand women. He liked them. He enjoyed their company, and over the years he had enjoyed the company of more of them than he could count without using a paper and pencil to keep track. But he could never figure out how their minds worked. Abby had come to his room for a reason, but now that she was there, she wouldn’t tell him what it was. He wasn’t surprised. A man would have come right out and said what it was that he wanted, but a woman wouldn’t always do that. Sometimes she had to be coaxed.

“You can go ahead and tell me,” Fargo said. If it’s a secret, I can keep one about as well as anybody I know.”

“That’s right. It’s a secret. Nobody must ever know.”

“Except me.”

“Except you. And me, of course. We’ll both know.”

Her voice wasn’t quite right. It had a skittish, trembly quality to it that Fargo hadn’t heard before.

“Are you afraid of something?” he asked.

“Just of myself.”

Fargo didn’t know what she meant by that, and he didn’t ask. He wasn’t sure she could explain even if she tried. But she surprised him.

“I’m afraid of myself because of what I want,” she said.

“We all want things. Nothing to be afraid of there.”

“You don’t understand, do you?”

She was right about that. Fargo couldn’t figure it out, though he was beginning to get a pretty good idea. However, he didn’t want to tell her what it was. If she wanted what he thought, she was going to have to say it herself.

“You’ll have to tell me,” he said.