“Not much,” Virgil said.

“I’ll bet Wolfson haggled on price,” I said.

Virgil looked after the departing Henry Boyle.

“And lost,” Virgil said.

Bob Redmond walked up the board sidewalk toward the front porch of the Blackfoot.

"Mind if I sit?” he said.

Virgil didn’t respond, and I realized that I had assumed he would. It was funny, me and Virgil these days. Always before, he’d been in charge. Always before, I had worked for him. Now I wasn’t sure if I was in charge, and he didn’t exactly work for me. But things were different.

“Don’t mind,” I said. “This is Virgil Cole.”

“I heard of you,” Redmond said.

Virgil nodded.

“You working for Wolfson now?” Redmond said.

“Visiting Everett,” Virgil said.

“But if there was trouble?”

“You think there’ll be trouble?” Virgil said.

“It’s coming,” Redmond said. “Sure as hell.”

"Wolfson and O’Malley?” I said.

“O’Malley came and talked with us last night,” Redmond said.

“Who’s us?” I said.

“Ranchers, said there was trouble coming. Said we’re either with him or with Wolfson. Tole us if he ran things we’d get a fair shake on the beef prices, and a decent rate at the bank.”

“He want your help?” I said.

“I don’t know,” Redmond said. “My sense is that he just don’t want us, you know, sniping at his flank.”

“How many ranchers,” Virgil said.

“All told maybe fifty.”

“How many at the meetin’?” Virgil said.

Redmond paused and counted in his head.

“Me and six others,” he said.

Virgil didn’t say anything.

“We’re scattered,” Redmond said. “We work hard. Lot of us can’t get to meetin’s.”

“You speak for them all?” I said.

“I don’t know. Yeah, I guess I do. Nobody else does.”

“What do you want out of this?” I said.

“We got to get rid of Wolfson,” Redmond said. “He’s chokin’ us. We can’t make it with Wolfson running things.”

“And you think you can with O’Malley?” I said.

“No.”

“So?”

Redmond was quiet for a minute.

“We got to get rid of Wolfson,” he said.

“So you’re throwin’ in with him,” I said.

“I guess so, ’less you could help us.”

“How we gonna do that?” I said.

Redmond was sitting with his feet flat on the floor, his elbows resting on his thighs, his hands clasped. He stared down at the clasped hands for a time.

“What would work for us,” he said, “would be the two of them fight it out, and after they beat hell out of each other, and one of them finally wins, we take the town away from him.”

Redmond looked up at us. Virgil smiled.

“Nice,” Virgil said.

“Might need more than a few Winchesters for that,” I said.

“I know.”

“Got the balls for it?” Virgil said.

Again, Redmond looked at his hands for a while.

“No, I don’t think we do,” he said.

“Only a fool would have claimed they did,” I said. “It’s sort of special work.”

“But if you could help us, especially with Mr. Cole here. We couldn’t pay you much now, but…”

I put up my hand.

“Same answer as before. I work for Wolfson.”

“Mr. Cole doesn’t,” Redmond said.

“I’m with Everett,” Virgil said.

We all sat silently.

Finally, Redmond said, “Well, we can’t live the way we’re living.”

“You can count on changing that,” Virgil said.

Virgil and I rode out in the morning to visit Fritz Stark at his sawmill. We had some strong coffee with him in the raw-plank shack that served as an office at the mill. The sound of the steam saw and the smell of sawn wood permeated everything.

“Name’s Everett Hitch,” I said. “He’s Virgil Cole.”

Stark was a tall, sharp-edged man with thick eyebrows and no social grace.

“What do you want?” he said.

“Wanted to talk,” I said.

“Go ahead,” Stark said.

"You probably know there’s trouble brewing in town,” I said.

“Never go to town,” Stark said. “Don’t know nothing ’bout it.”

“You know Wolfson?” I said. “Runs the emporium? O’Malley, who owns the copper mine?”

“Know ’em,” Stark said. “Don’t like ’em.”

“Why not?” I said.

“Coupla thievin’ cocksuckers,” Stark said.

“How about a young fella named Redmond?” I said.

“Don’t know him,” Stark said.

“If Wolfson and O’Malley got into some sort of shooting situation, would you back one against the other.”

“No,” Stark said.

He looked at Virgil.

“What’s your name again?” Stark said.

Virgil smiled. I could tell he liked Stark.

“Cole,” he said. “Virgil Cole.”

Stark nodded to himself.

“What I thought,” Stark said. “I know about you.”

“Uh-huh,” Virgil said.

“You’re a lawman,” Stark said.

“Used to be,” Virgil said.

“What are you now?” Stark said.

“Don’t know,” Virgil said.

“You up here working for somebody?” Stark said.

“Nope,” Virgil said.

“So why you here?” Stark said.

“Visiting Everett,” Virgil said.

“How ’bout you,” Stark said. “You a lawman?”

“Used to be,” I said.

“What are you now,” Stark said.

“I keep the peace in Wolfson’s saloon,” I said.

“Wolfson send you up here?”

“Nope.”

“So why you up here talking to me?” Stark said.

“Curious by nature,” I said.

“Well, I ain’t,” Stark said. “I just want to cut my lumber and stack it on the flatbed.”

“And you don’t plan to take sides,” I said, “if there’s trouble between ’em.”

“Hope they kill each other,” Stark said. “Got no use for either one.”

I stood.

“Thanks for your time,” I said.

“Well, I ain’t got much of it,” Stark said. “You want somethin’ to eat ’fore you go?”

I said, “No thanks.”

Virgil grinned.

“Your coffee’s so chewy,” he said. “It’s a full meal by itself.”

We rode slowly down out of the trees toward Resolution, letting the horses pretty well take us. "Might be easier world,” Virgil said, “everybody was like Stark.”

“Might not be much fun,” I said.

“True,” Virgil said. “But he knows what he is. He’s a fella cuts lumber.”

“Yep.”

“I been reading a lot,” Virgil said.

“You do that,” I said.

“Like to try and learn stuff,” Virgil said. “I’m reading this fella Locke. You know, the English fella.”

“They told us about him at the Academy,” I said.

“You sure don’t talk like a fella went to West Point,” Virgil said.

“Been riding with you too long,” I said.

“Been good for you,” Virgil said.

“Maybe,” I said.

“This Locke,” Virgil said. “If I’m readin’ him right, he says that the law is sort of a contract between the people and the government.”

“Uh-huh.”

“So if either side breaks the contract,” Virgil said, “what happens?”

“I don’t know.”

The horses paused hock-deep in a small stream and drank some water.

“What I was wondering,” Virgil said, “when we was marshaling in Appaloosa, was we the government or the people.”

“Virgil,” I said, “mostly what I remember from the Academy is cavalry tactics.”

The horses stopped drinking and moved on.

“Well, I been thinking about that,” Virgil said.

“I know,” I said.

“I broke the contract,” Virgil said.

“You think so?” I said.

“Ain’t that what happened?” Virgil said. “I hired on to be the law, and I wasn’t.”

“Mostly you were,” I said.

“Mostly is okay for sodbusters,” Virgil said, “or miners, but when you’re a gunman…”

The horses plodded out of the tree cover and onto the cleared slope above the town.

“Wouldn’ta been no law,” I said, “in Appaloosa, wasn’t for you.”

Virgil didn’t answer.

Heading toward the town and the livery and maybe some feed, the horses started to move a little faster.