Appearances

Four Corners, 1877

Matthew McCormick studied the jail cell with a careful eye for the details.  Plank flooring, with gaps that might let a blade through and might not, but a man shouldn't have leverage under the building for any blade long enough to threaten a sleeper.  A stab in the foot was a possibility, but that would only be annoying, not fatal.  The bars on the windows could be pulled out by a couple of horses at most, but with the telegraph office two doors to the left and the mercantile and the bank immediately to the right, it would be hard to go unnoticed.  The lock on the cell door was decent.  Nothing that couldn't be opened with a strong pick and a few uninterrupted minutes, but the sheriff's desk had a good line of sight to the lock and, for that matter, the bunk.

No matter how he looked at the matter, it didn't seem a cell a man would get out of without both help and luck.

Damn it.

He sighed and sprawled onto the bunk, abandoning worries about posture, appearance, or anything else.  Sooner or later, even Larabee would have to admit what he'd been arrested for.  It might even be the truth, though Matthew rather doubted it would start with such.

The tall, solidly-built preacher who was also one of the local lawmen -- Josiah Sanchez, Matthew's memory provided after a moment -- unlocked the cell door with an economical motion.  "Sorry about all this.  You made Chris a mite uneasy."

Matthew raised an eyebrow.  "I did get that impression, yes.  Dreadfully sorry," he said, and watched the other man grin at his complete lack of sincerity.

"So how do you feel about the spirit?"

Matthew eyed him sidelong, coming up to his feet and out the open door before Sanchez could change his mind.  "That would depend on what kind of spirit we were discussing, and in whom.  And I'll just have my guns back, thank you."

Sanchez shrugged, unlocked the desk drawer, and handed over Matthew's gun belt.  "I don't see any reason to keep them.  And I was thinking the spirits that move a man."

Matthew chuckled.  "I'm afraid I've heard one sermon this week, so unless you mean bourbon--"

"I was thinking whiskey," Sanchez admitted.  "A man can work up a powerful thirst watching you decide not to break out of jail."

"I'll remember to be less obvious next time," Matthew drawled, adjusting his holster and hoping that they hadn't found his sword among the bed slats during the afternoon he'd been behind bars.  "Must admit, I'm wondering why I'm loose again."

Josiah's smile explained why Matthew's eye and brain refused to agree on whether he was homely.  "But not why you were behind bars?"

"You did say I made Mr. Larabee nervous.  Speaking of whom...."  Chris Larabee only leaned his chair farther back and watched Matthew cross the street to the saloon, his hat tilted down as sharply as his chair was back on two legs.  Matthew smiled slowly, eyes flicking to the tall, mustachioed man standing beside him.  Buck Wilmington.  Interesting.  This morning it was Vin Turner, no, Tanner standing so close.  Hmm.  So is Mr. Tanner on patrol?  Or out of the way?  What did I worry them about, I wonder?  It surely wasn't Cory, from what little I heard.

Matthew nodded to both of them.  "Gentlemen," and watched Wilmington stifle a grin as he nodded back.  Larabee restrained a growl, and Matthew chuckled softly.

"Like playing with fire?" Josiah asked curiously.

"A man can get burned doing that," Matthew answered, drawl more pronounced than usual to buy him time to look the saloon over.  The lanterns hadn't been lit yet, but his eyes adjusted quickly to the dimmer light... and Matthew frowned, eyebrows drawing together as he studied the man shuffling a deck of cards.  Even in this light, he was clearly the best-dressed person Matthew had seen in the town so far; the cards poured between his hands as smoothly as water pouring over the lip of a new pitcher.

The town cardsharp was also the man who'd brought Matthew his lunch earlier, and Matthew cursed himself silently and inventively for not having noticed the incongruity of well-kept hands with too-worn clothes.  So this was Ezra Standish.  Definitely not Cory.  Damn.  Another false lead.  A false lead worried enough to come and look him over unnoticed, though.  Hmm.

"Game, Josiah? Mr. ...?"

"McCormick, sir.  Matthew McCormick.  And a game might be pleasant, after a drink and some dinner."  Matthew glanced at Josiah.  "You did say you were buying me a drink, after all."

Standish smiled at them both, a cocky, toothy expression, but Matthew caught a flicker of expression, barely there before it was gone again, and wondered what had just surprised the man.  Surely not his release?

"I just suggested it," Josiah rumbled, but he grinned.  "I suppose we owe you a drink after all."

Matthew followed him the few steps to the bar, eyes flickering as he appraised the room by daylight instead of oil lamps.  Not up to the standards back East, but clean enough for a frontier bar.  The glasses didn't sparkle, but neither were they fly-speckled.  The food last night had been good and his room clean.  Daylight didn't change his impression that it was a good place, particularly for a frontier town where survival didn't leave much time for trivialities.

Once he had a glass in hand, Matthew pointed out, "Loitering was a rather thin excuse.  Especially given that I paid for my room in advance and am clearly not indigent."

Josiah shrugged, sipped half his whiskey, and sighed, shoulders relaxing.  " 'Looking for a friend' was a mighty skimpy answer."

"Well, I am," Matthew said mildly.  "He simply doesn't seem to be here."

Standish kept dealing out a game of solitaire while they ordered dinner, but he was clearly listening to the conversation.  "Might we know some distinguishing characteristics of this 'friend?'  Perhaps we could assist you in your quest."

"I doubt there are fair maidens involved, or dragons," Matthew said as he returned from the bar with a plate of surprisingly fragrant chicken and dumplings.  The whiskey even smelled like it might be drinkable, but the aroma of the beer told him it was only a day or two from going off.  He'd have to mention that to Señorita Recillos tomorrow.

Standish played the jack of diamonds, meditating on the cards as if the pattern could tell him the future.  Perhaps he knew the art.  Or just had a dangerous way of thinking.  "No knights either, I suppose?"

Matthew swallowed his whiskey, resisting the sudden urge to exhale it over the table.  "Don't believe one's been seen in years, no."

"Some reason this friend of yours doesn't have a name?"  Larabee's appearance wasn't a surprise; Matthew had heard his rowels clink when he came in from the porch.  Watching the man settle across the table near Standish, wary as a cat near a rocking chair, was more of a surprise for some reason.  Surely having three of his own nearby should make Larabee more relaxed than this?  And, for that matter, Standish shouldn't be so tense either.

And why do I associate 'Standish' with barratry, not cards?  Must admit, though, it's hardly outside the realms of possibility for Cory to protect a town that needs it....  Matthew finished his bite of dinner, sipped at his whiskey, and nodded to Josiah.  "Not bad at all, sir.  Thank you."  He sorted idly through his memories, trying to find the last association for Standish and (not coincidentally) wait until Larabee's patience looked thin to add, "This is the West, Mr. Larabee.  Not everyone who comes here keeps to the name his parents had placed in the church register.  I'd as soon not annoy the man before I can find him if he has changed his."

"Some reason he'd need to?"  Larabee pulled out a nickel and put it on the table.  "I'm in, Ez."

Standish sighed.  "Ezra, Mr. Larabee.  It has two syllables as well as a distinguished history.  And certainly, once the plates are clear.  No point in insulting Inez's cooking by applying it to pasteboard."

Matthew chuckled.  "Her cooking surely doesn't involve paste.  The dumplings are quite good."  He added lazily, "No reason that I know of, but a man who's traveled more than a thousand miles doesn't try to make his trip longer."

"He gonna want to see you?" Wilmington asked, sitting down with dinner for himself and Larabee.

Matthew chuckled again.  "Some reason he wouldn't, Mr. Wilmington?  Hardly as if I've had him thrown into a cell for loitering."

Larabee touched a finger to the brim of his hat in lazy salute, but he was more interested in his food than in conversation.  Understandable, given the quality of the cooking, but Matthew's attention caught the incongruity of three locals eating dinner at the table while a fourth sat there without his.  Something looked wrong and Matthew began to pay more attention to their body language.

Larabee relaxed when he talked to Wilmington, listened to what Sanchez said, but only addressed Standish directly.  Interesting.  Wilmington either didn't like the tension or had innate tendencies towards peace-making; he sat between Larabee and Standish and talked to both.  Sanchez directed his comments to everyone evenly and ignored the tension, which might or might not force it to dissipate.

Time I stirred this a bit.  I don't like being in hot water and not knowing what else may be in the pot.  Matthew finished his last bite, savoring the taste, and then finished his whiskey before asking, "Not eating, Mr. Standish?"

"I ate earlier, thank you, sir."  His hands shifted cards around almost idly, clearing cards into precise patterns, laying the queen of spades on the king of hearts.  The jack of diamonds was next and Standish played it on the queen with a raised eyebrow, as if he hadn't expected to see the card show up.

"Are all Southerners so goldurn polite?"  The blunt, almost breathless question came from the much younger man who dropped gracelessly into the last seat at the table.  His hat and long sideburns were meant to add age, Matthew suspected.  They were as much assistance as an outsized pink bow on a donkey.

"Manners keep civilization moving smoothly, Mr. Dunne.  They can be essential on a crowded city street for example."  Standish's voice was patient as he gathered the cards, shuffling them again as he appraised the men.  "Will five card draw suit, Mr. McCormick?"

"That'd be fine, sir, although I must admit I prefer chess.  Nickel ante, I believe?"  Matthew glanced over at the youngster as he stood up, empty plate in hand.  "It's not that long that duels have been illegal in the South, Mr. Dunne, and a much shorter time than that since those laws have been well-regarded or obeyed.  The prospect of a ball of lead or three feet of steel in a man's gut can make manners nearly reflexive."

"Unless of course you're good with a blade," Standish drawled lazily, not looking up.  "We've one or two here in town who are, for that matter.  And I've a chess set upstairs, sir.  I understand you've had a long day, but if you'd care to play after the poker, I'd dearly enjoy a game."

Matthew took his plate back to the bar and smiled.  "The food was excellent, ma'am, thank you."

The bartender and cook scowled at him, but it felt friendly nonetheless.  "Two of you in my bar?  Go, go," and she waved him away with both hands.  "Play cards, don't get arrested again.  Off with you.  I have work to do, not compliments to listen to."  She was smiling by the end of it though, and Matthew just grinned at her.

Behind him, Dunne was asking excitedly, "Well, yeah, Ez, I knew you and Nathan could fight, and Buck didn't get himself killed that time, but how often did duels really happen?"

"More often when I was younger, Mr. Dunne, and usually with pistols rather than swords.  I rarely hear so much as the rumor of duels now.  Perhaps the War finished persuading men that there were enough other ways to die."

"What about knives?"

Matthew said dryly, "It's harder to look both elegant and a gentleman in a knife fight.  The gypsies can make a knife fight beautiful, but it's not the same."  He kept his attention on the present with an effort, memories of knife fights by mortals and immortals both crowding across his memories.  They flattened his voice somewhat as he added, "And true fights draw breath at the least, blood and other fouler things at the worst.  Hard to make that beautiful."

Standish said thoughtfully, "True sword fights aren't precisely elegant either.  I was... aware of a... gentleman once who practiced quite hard with a blade.  His bouts may not have been for true insult, however I assure you, at twelve, the spectacle was sufficiently sanguinary to be a caution."

"It was what?"

Standish kept shuffling the cards with an absent-minded grace.  "Bloody, Mr. Dunne.  Very bloody at times, but I was never sure if he and his... partner were fighting for practice or something more serious."  Standish shrugged as Matthew took his seat again, and added lazily, "Not something I saw often, certainly.  And there were matters that needed tending, so I'm afraid I couldn't stay so long as I'd have liked in the afternoons to watch."

Wilmington whistled as Larabee moved their plates out of the way.  "What, Ez, you were sneaking off from chores?  Who'd practice that hard with a sword, anyway?"

"A man who didn't care to run out of ammunition, perhaps?"  Standish began dealing out the cards while he talked, hands moving almost independently and white cuffs flashing in the fading daylight.  "A sword surely doesn't require reloading."

"Got to be awful close to use one," Larabee said flatly, pushing his hat back as he straightened from his slouch to take his cards.  "Not as bad as a knife, but still.  Apache with a knife's a fast way to get killed."

"Perhaps he didn't care to spend the money on powder and shot, then, Mr. Larabee.  Is Mr. Jackson on patrol tonight?"

"He's got the first sweep," Larabee said.  "JD, you in?"

"Sure, after I finish this."  Dunne wiped up the gravy with the last dumpling, and Matthew restrained a chuckle.  Young, enthusiastic, and saddled with several older brothers, willingly or no, from the way the others treated him.

Matthew pulled a nickel out and set it on the table before picking up his own hand.  He eyed the cards and added lazily, "And for a good chess game, Mr. Standish, do believe I'll manage to stay awake."

"Good night, Señor Standish."

"We'll turn the lamps down when we go up, Inez," Standish promised her before contemplating the chessboard again.  He eventually moved a rook up the board to threaten Matthew's knight and asked quietly, "So who are you looking for, Matthew?"

They'd shifted to first names after the first chess game, when Ezra had been forced to return the dollar he'd won from Matthew at poker.  Chris had rolled his eyes at their shared amusement and general rapport and gone out to take the watch, after keeping his too-sharp eye on the poker game.  Josiah had left halfway through the first chess match, chatting amiably with Wilmington about some roof repair job; Matthew had carefully not volunteered to help.  With the bartender gone at last, it was finally quiet, and Matthew glanced over, wondering where this discussion was about to go.

"Truth be told, the gentleman in question is a friend of mine."  Matthew chuckled quietly.  "I'm here because I'd heard about a well-dressed conman with green eyes in Four Corners."

"And this friend's name?  I do hear names dropped over poker games, after all.  Unless you'd rather he were unaware of your approach...?"

"I'm not after any bounty he might have on his head, Mr. Standish," Matthew answered quietly and took the rook with his bishop.

The reversion to formality made Ezra wonder how tender the nerve actually was, or if Matthew were just issuing an early warning.  "And if I were?" Ezra asked, gaze on the chessboard again.

"Wiser if you weren't," Matthew said lightly.  "I said he's a friend, not a fool.  Nor safe, if someone gets in his way."

"Survival in this profession doesn't allow folly, Mr. McCormick," Ezra agreed, moving his bishop out of the way of an impending trap.  "He dresses well, I take it?"

Matthew moved a pawn to force the bishop into a different pin.  "Tolerably so, when he can.  He generally finds other uses for his money."  He leaned back and added, "Mind, stopping to protect a town is exactly the sort of thing he'd do.  Doing so on the side of the law is the detail that would surprise me."

Ezra glanced up at him, barely moving his head as he did.  "You do have a gift for noticing traps, Matthew."

"Mm.  The instinct can be developed, surely."  Matthew leaned back, attention seemingly on the shadows of the room; Ezra didn't believe for a moment that it was.  "My queen's vulnerability, you mean?"

"No, Mr. McCormick."  Ezra shifted his bishop back three spaces, threatening the rook again.  "I meant the story of your sword practices with Carl Hobart."

Matthew's hand never hesitated in its movement, brushing lightly over a bishop, a rook, a knight, before moving a pawn to take Ezra's knight.  "Do feel free to take that rook, sir."

Ezra kept his right hand under the table.  With his left hand he advanced the other bishop, angling to pin Matthew's queen away from retaliatory measures.  "Not just yet, thank you."

Matthew sat upright to look the board over more closely, a raking glance that took in the pieces, their alignments to each side, and the play at hand.  Ezra suspected he was reevaluating precisely what game was afoot... and what strategies.  What he asked, however, concerned another topic altogether.

"Why was I arrested, Mr. Standish?  Surely not for loitering; I'm hardly indigent."

"I'm afraid I don't pretend to claim prescience as to Mr. Larabee's motives."

Matthew only smiled, slow and dangerous.  "I daresay you do know this much, however.  I worried someone about something.  If it wasn't that I'm looking for Corwin -- I'll give you that much of his name -- then what is it?  Who, precisely, is Mr. Larabee worried I'm here for?  And is he worried about unofficial action, Mr. Standish, or official?"

Ezra settled back into his chair, right hand -- and holstered derringer -- still resting on his thigh, under the lip of the table.  "That's a great many questions, Mr. McCormick.  Information has always been a commodity, as I'm sure you're aware."

"I've heard that suggested once or twice."  Matthew shifted a pawn forward another space, watched imperturbably as Ezra captured it immediately, and shifted the next pawn forward.  "However, so is peace.  I've rather gotten the impression that researching those questions would not be appreciated."  He smiled slowly.  "I don't require appreciation, Mr. Standish."

Ezra frowned.  "Mr. Larabee's reputation is well-deserved."  He took the rook with his bishop.  "You've already disturbed the serenity of Four Corners."

"By asking questions about a man who's not here?" Matthew drawled.  "A fragile quiet, then -- so fragile I daresay it's not my questions that are the problem."  He advanced his queen to threaten Ezra's second bishop then glanced up, his expression so indecipherable that Ezra had no doubt he was thinking very swiftly indeed.  "Someone's past, perhaps.  Or several people's.  Do have to wonder why I'm considered such a danger, though."

"Perhaps because you are," Ezra drawled.  "And none of this, however interesting, touches the matter of you, Carl Hobart, and two swords which were quite real, sir, and quite assuredly not cavalry sabers."

"Cavalry, Mr. Standish?  The war's over, and has been for a number of years now."  Matthew indicated the board.  "Your move, sir."

Ezra shifted his bishop out of harm's way.  "Yours now.  About Carl Hobart?  And, for that matter, sir, your own appearance."

Matthew shifted his pawn forward and Ezra suddenly saw just how badly he'd lost this game.  A second queen was going to be behind his king in two moves and he had nothing he could shift to stop that; he'd been busy harrying Matthew's queen out of the king's line of defense.

When Ezra looked up from the board, Matthew was studying him again, and something about his eyes was most unsettling.  It wasn't simply that he was evaluating how much of a threat Ezra might be, although that was surely part of it.  Something in the man's gaze spoke of far too much experience to match his apparent age, of a refusal to take surface appearances for granted, and of an implacable will that would be pushed only so far.  The best profits undoubtedly lay along that line of resistance, but so did most of the danger.  Pushing a man too far, derringer to hand or no, was a good way to end up dodging bullets.  In this case, he might be dodging a blade, as well.

Ezra had been concerned with one major question:  If the man who'd used the name Matthew McCormick in Belle Chassee, Louisiana was also the man sitting here -- and Ezra had no doubts he was -- then how had he managed to avoid aging over the last eighteen years?  Now, watching that steady appraisal, Ezra realized there was another question:  How long had McCormick kept himself from aging... and what had he learned over the years?

I never thought his secret was one to be given to all and sundry, but I believe I've overplayed the hand.  Ezra tipped his king over.  "My congratulations, sir.  I failed to anticipate that."

Matthew McCormick only nodded, still watching him, still expressionless.  "So did I, Mr. Standish."  He waited while Ezra handed over another faded bank note, folded it neatly, and stood, bill still in his hand.  "A most enlightening pair of games, sir; I do appreciate them.  Good night."

McCormick slipped through the tables without a sound, made his way up the stairs (stepping on the edge of the fifth step that tended to creak), and vanished down the hall without taking a light with him.  Ezra watched him go, smiling slightly and appreciative of the man's almost feline ease of movement.  He always had liked a dangerous game, and the pot on this one was almost incalculable.  So was the level of risk, but that was no small part of the fun.

Ezra packed the chess pieces away again before he leaned back in his chair and reached into his pocket for a deck of cards.  The familiar feel and motion of cards in his hand, of solitaire patterns on the table, would help him think, and he had a great deal to think about. Such as the levels of risk in asking a man how not to age (or simply age more slowly), and how he was going to ask, and what risks he was willing to take to gain that secret.

Money, however, seemed unlikely to work, certainly in the amounts Ezra had freely available, and honor didn't suggest any obvious handles on the man.  McCormick hid his interest well, but it was there, if controlled.  That had possibilities.  Men and women did tend to talk more after sex, Ezra had noticed, and if McCormick still refused to tell him, it would let the man think he had something on Ezra.  Perhaps he would.  Perhaps not.  The problem with small towns, to Ezra's mind, lay in everyone's interest in every other person's doings.  In a city, a night in another man's rooms could be easily concealed.  It would be more difficult in Four Corners.

No.  Carl Hobart was McCormick's vulnerability.  A slave who'd run away -- no, not run away, but what?  Ezra felt a memory try, and fail, to surface.  He shifted more of his attention to his cards, refusing to pressure himself and lose whatever it might be.

Four of diamonds on five of spades.  Nine of hearts on ten of clubs.  Jack of clubs on queen of hearts, and he had it.  Carl Hobart, rumor said, had come back from the dead to kill Seth and Silas Hobart.  The court of gossip had also found him guilty of getting Melissa Hobart in a family way, now that Ezra thought about it.  The court of gossip was very likely wrong.  A field hand spending too much time at the house, or a daughter of the house spending too much time at the field, would have been noticed.  And, rumors of voodoo aside, men did not come back from the dead.  The War had taught Ezra that even before the West had.

Beyond the claims of the court of gossip, however, lay facts.  Matthew McCormick, Seth Hobart's son-in-law, had spent hours every afternoon teaching one of Hobart's slaves to use a sword.  Treating a slave as a student and a human was an act that in those days could have had McCormick ostracized from Louisiana society at best, if not flogged half to death; teaching a slave to use a weapon might have gotten him hung.  Even today it would be difficult at best to explain away.

Why?  Word had it that the marriage had been as much a love match as an alliance of money with money.  Why would McCormick risk all that for a slave?

Ezra studied his game, noting idly that the jack of hearts was trapped and his game with it.  He sighed, suddenly weary, and gathered up his cards.  There was a great deal of risk in taking on a man who fought the way McCormick had, a man whose presence in town disturbed Chris Larabee so thoroughly, and worst, a man whose motives were so opaque to Ezra.  Swift healing and a chance at more decades in which to see and learn the world were surely worth the risk, but he'd consider how to approach this in his bed.  Possibly after sleep.

Matthew McCormick had already stepped into his room and closed the door behind him before he realized that the shadows didn't look as they should.  A voice he hadn't heard before suggested, "Might not want to go for your gun."

Matthew shook his head, almost amused at himself.  However much of a threat Standish might be, he'd let himself get too distracted.  "Planning on shooting me?"

"Only if I have to."

The voice came from the deepest shadow of his room.  Unfortunately, that shadow lay over his bed -- and his sword.  Matthew could smell sweat, damp leather, and gun oil, and he hadn't heard the voice before.  So he shrugged and said, "Mind if I sit down, then?"

"Go ahead."  He couldn't see the man yet, his eyes not completely adjusted to the darkness of the room.  "Chair's just past your right hand, 'bout half a step forward."

"And you'd rather I not light the lantern?"  Matthew took the half-step, however, and settled himself onto the chair.  He extended his legs, crossing them at the ankles, and let the tips of his boots brush the sword still sheathed under the bed.

"'Preciate if you didn't."  Same light, husky voice, and a rustle of leather followed by the quiet creak of the bed.  "Need to ask you a couple questions, and then I'll go away, let you sleep."

"Kind of you," Matthew drawled, amused despite himself.  Dawn wasn't far off, and his day had begun before the previous dawn, but this whole town had been full of surprises, and he was starting to enjoy the way they kept rocking him off balance.  "I suppose you'd like me to keep my hands where you can see them while you ask?"

"'Preciate that, too, yeah."  Matthew's eyes had adjusted to what little light the moon gave as it set; he could see a profile, tanned skin, a silver line along a long gun held lightly but without motion.  Dangerous, whoever this man was.  "Need to ask who you're looking for."

"And if I choose not to tell you?" Matthew asked steadily, ignoring memories of dying gutshot during the War.

"Don't rightly know.  Can't see shootin' you for it, but I got to know."

"So you can look for him?"  Matthew tilted his head, trying to sort out this puzzle.  The man's stillness was impressive; that was not a small-caliber gun.

"Got other responsibilities," came the response, equally surprised and surprising.

Matthew raised an eyebrow, all too aware the moonlight was falling mostly on him.  "As I told Mr. Standish, it'd take a fool to hunt Corwin for any bounty that might be on his head."

"Corwin, huh?  Corwin. " The man rolled the name on his tongue as if to taste something of Cory's nature in it.  Much luck he was likely to have of it, and Matthew wished him none.  The man cocked his head, changing the flow of silver across cheek and eye, the shadow cast by nose and brow.  That shift was enough to let Matthew finally identify him as Larabee's morning shadow, Vin Tanner.

"Don't s'pose I could have your word that's the name of the fellow you're huntin'?"

"Hunting implies I mean him harm when I find him," Matthew said mildly.  "I don't.  Other than that, sir, you have my word:  I'm looking for a man named Corwin."  On a hunch, Matthew added, "Not you.  And no, your visit tonight won't prompt me to go hunting you."

His visitor tensed, then relaxed again, slowly.  "You're as bad as Ez for words and usin' 'em.  Corwin, huh?"  He shook his head and stood up.  "Tomorrow you might tell Chris who you're looking for.  Ease his mind."

Matthew found himself grinning despite the gun still pointed at him.  "Easing Mr. Larabee's mind is the least of my concerns, despite my precipitate detainment.  Will you answer a question for me, then?  On your own oath?"

That got a soft laugh out of the darkness.  "Every bit as bad as Ezra....  Might answer.  If I can and it won't hurt nobody here.  Only seems fair, you takin' this so calm.  What'd you want to know?"

"Have you run into a man named Corwin in the last five years or so?"

That got a shake of the head.  "Not a one.  Not by that name, anyway.  I'll swear to it, if'n you want, but I don't know what you'd want me to swear on."

"This is the West, sir, not the East.  I'll take your word."  Matthew yawned, energy draining from him now the crisis felt done.

"You say you're not huntin' Corwin."  His visitor finally moved, slipping into the moonlight.  "Don't mean he's going to be glad if you show up."

Matthew smiled at that and stretched, slow and careful to keep his hands visible, but he'd been still too long now.  "He'll yell at me because he always does, but he won't mind, either."

That got a sudden smile, one that lit Tanner's face.  "Yeah, might know what you mean there.  Friends, huh?"

"And kin," Matthew said, "but friends as well."  He shrugged.  "I'd heard rumors that made me think he might be here, so I came looking."

"Must be friends.  We're a long way from much else."  Tanner grinned and waved a hand at the bed.  "Sorry to keep you from it.  I'll just use the door, if'n you don't mind?"

Matthew did laugh, finally.  "Feel free.  Much easier than going back out the window."  Tanner moved past him to the door, keeping as much distance from him as the room allowed.  Hand on the doorknob, he paused long enough that Matthew had to ask, "Was there something else, sir?"

"No.  No, s'pose not."  He nodded with a courtesy that made Matthew think Tanner didn't break and enter very often.  "Night."

After he'd gone, Matthew checked under the bed, but his sword was still there and apparently unmoved.  That didn't entirely reassure him.

Vin paused on the stairs, unsurprised to find Ezra still in the saloon finishing another of his games of solitaire.  Ezra did it to think, same way Vin watched the clouds and wind.  Ezra reached over and tugged a chair out for him.  "You're up and about late, Mr. Tanner.  All is well, I hope?"

"Better'n I'd have thought, Ez."  Ezra didn't react, but Vin sighed, and said, "Ezra.  Yeah, sorry.  Pretty late."

Ezra nodded, hands and eyes on his game again.  His voice was there and alive, however, not absent as it got when he was planning something else entirely.  "Extremely late for you, Mr. Tanner.  May I be of assistance?  If, say, you're worried about Mr. McCormick...?"

Vin smiled.  "Nah, he's not after me.  Gave me his word on that.  Said he wasn't going to change his mind 'bout it, either."

Ezra looked up from his game, eyes bright and intrigued despite the late hour -- no wonder he hated morning patrols as much as Vin hated night ones.  Vin knew he looked tired, knew as well that he'd get maybe a couple hours of sleep before he had to wake up.  He'd be cranky tomorrow, too.  "He said that?  When?"

Vin tried not to look as embarrassed as he felt about holding the man up in his own room.  "Five minutes ago."

Ezra watched him, eyes wide and startled for a moment before he started laughing -- the slow, soft sound that laughed with a man rather than at him.  "I should have asked you to try my questions as well.  Instead I've traded two dollars and as many hours to find out he's looking for a green-eyed conman who'd happily protect a town, but wouldn't join the law to do so."

Vin shifted in the chair, back paining him as he'd never admit but all the Seven knew to watch for.  Ezra played two more cards rather than have Vin think he'd noticed, but that was just Ez being nice, the way he tried to pretend he never was.  "Worth it, maybe, 'cause I didn't get a description from him.  Did find out he don't scare easy -- McCormick, I mean -- and he's looking for this Corwin as much 'cause he's kin as 'cause he's a friend.  Said he heard rumors he might be here."

Ezra nodded very thoughtfully.  "Corwin?  That's hardly a common name."

"Surely ain't," Vin agreed.  "Don't think I've ever met someone with the name.  Ezra, McCormick looks like he could be a Pinkerton, and this ain't the first time someone's held a gun on him.  But he laughs 'bout the damnedest things."

"He is rather relaxed for one of their detectives on a job," Ezra agreed, gathering in the deadlocked game and shuffling the cards.  "If he gave you his word, I strongly suspect it's good.  He's not after you, Mr. Tanner, and I don't believe he's after me, either.  Have you any idea why Mr. Larabee was so sure he was a threat?"

"Nathan recognized him, said three years ago McCormick came through Abilene workin' for Pinkerton.  Came and warned me and Chris at the same time."  Vin frowned, puzzling it through.  "Nathan don't make mistakes 'bout that kind of thing."

"I'm quite sure Mr. Jackson did see Mr. McCormick, and that the gentleman was working for Pinkerton at the time.  Three years is quite long enough for a man to change jobs, however," Ezra pointed out, dealing out his cards again.  "Notice that we seven were not here three years ago.  But he gave you his word that he was looking for a man named Corwin?"

Vin nodded.  "Said after that he wasn't looking for me, and wasn't planning to change that."  He glanced at Ezra.  "And he ain't after you?"

Ezra studied his cards, tapping a thumb irritably on a pair of caught queens.  "I don't think so, no, Mr. Tanner.  It would be a truly inopportune time for Mother to come through, but that is another matter entirely."

"Yeah, might at that.  Your ma and McCormick in one place might just about give Chris apoplexy."  Vin studied the cards.  "Pity jacks can't play on kings.  Them queens're surely locked."  Vin yawned, belatedly covering his mouth.  "Sorry, Ezra."

Ezra waved off the apology and his voice was a hundred miles away, thinking fast about a dozen things at once, as he said, "Think nothing of it, Mr. Tanner.  Go, sleep what few hours are left in the night, sir.  This is more my time than yours.  If I think of some useful plan, I'll tell you at noon."

Vin stood up, shoulders shrugging up and back in an attempt to ease his back.  "I'll do that.  Noon?  You thinkin' he ain't gonna leave?"

Ezra laughed softly.  "He's not done, no, Mr. Tanner.  If nothing else, I do believe he's enjoying goading Mr. Larabee, a game whose attraction I must confess I understand."

Vin groaned.  "Maybe we'd better find this Corwin for him."

"And deny Mr. McCormick his pleasure in the hunt?"  Ezra laughed softly.  "No.  I could not in good conscience recommend that, either.  Go, Mr. Tanner, sleep to plan again."

Vin nodded to him and left through the back of the saloon.  There was a comfortable spot in the livery hayloft to sleep the rest of the night and maybe through the first hour past dawn.  Ezra sliding into poetic mode could be anything from the late hour to another Southerner like him in town.  Nothing to worry about yet anyway -- more like the high wisps of mare's tails that sometimes ran ahead of storms and sometimes just ran 'cause the high winds were too pretty to resist.  Or so Vin suspected.

It didn't surprise him to hear Ezra shuffle and deal a new game as he left.

Matthew replaced another issue of The Rocky Mountain News on the shelf and took a sip from his cup of tea.  "I greatly appreciate this, Mrs. Travis."

Mary Travis glanced up from the article she was writing for the next edition of her own paper, the Clarion.  The sunlight reflected almost as brightly from her upswept hair as from the small buttons on her sleeve, and she sat in clear view of the window, as close to chaperonage as was possible in a small Western town.  The habit made Matthew wonder if she'd not been long in the West or if she'd had trouble over her reputation.

"It's a more than fair trade for the doughnuts, Mr. McCormick.  I haven't had these since my last trip to Denver."

Matthew smiled.  "You might wish to speak to Señorita Recillos then, ma'am.  She has the recipe now."

"We'll get more visitors through Four Corners once word gets of them gets out."  Matthew had already heard rumors of which towns had good food or a better general store than most, and he'd only been west of St. Louis a few weeks.  He didn't doubt good doughnuts could be a draw.  Mary Travis glanced over and inquired, "Could I be of any help in your search?"

It was a kind offer and well-meant, Matthew thought, but he heard a faint trace of a reporter's curiosity in it as well as an attractive woman's interest in new doings in a small town.  No surprise; he was a stranger in Four Corners, and no doubt she'd already written of his brief detainment yesterday.  So Matthew smiled and shook his head.  "Thank you, but no.  If we were tracking across ground, I could sketch out what the footprint or the mark of hoof and horseshoe.  Hunting a man through newspaper articles, I simply have to keep reading.  I'll know him if I find him."

Mary Travis smiled politely at him, too polite to let her doubts into her voice, and bent her attention to her manuscript again.  Matthew picked up the next back-issue of the News and began reading through, hunting for surprise donations to charities, bank robberies, stolen horses at outlying farms suddenly grown rich, or anything else that might indicate Cory had been in the area.

A small blond boy came through in a tumult of dust, mud, and desire for one of the remaining doughnuts.  He retreated again leaving behind his name (Billy Travis, Mary's son), an emptier plate, and the news that 'Vin and Buck' had ridden out to make sure the Denver coach was all right, since it was running late.

Matthew forced down the temptation to join them for the ride and the company.  And, he admitted to himself, the pleasure of goading Chris Larabee a little farther.  The man could use a good fistfight to blow off some of his accumulated spleen, and after his afternoon in a cell, Matthew would have no hesitation in accommodating him.  But it was all too possible that the peacekeepers might decide to issue an invitation to ride out of town when the stage left again, so Matthew stayed to continue his research while he still could.

He exhausted the back-issues of the News and went on to the local Clarion, and smiled a thank you when Mrs. Travis offered more tea.  "I'd welcome more, Mrs. Travis.  I've not had tea this good since I left St. Louis."

She smiled, pleased.  "It's a pleasure to find another tea-drinker, Mr. McCormick.  Most of the town prefers coffee."  She stood, gathering up the tea tray, and waved him back to his seat when he stood with her.  "Please, don't let me stop you reading.  I'll be back in a few minutes."

Buried as he was in the news that Nettie Wells had bought a new plow, Ira Treadwell had come off the worse for wear in a mid-Main Street altercation with his wife, Jessamine, and Nathan Jackson would appreciate any information on local sources for boneset and honey, Matthew lost track of time until he heard his hostess return.  He stood to give her a hand with the tea tray, but she set it down on the edge of her desk.

"It needs a few minutes more to steep."  She continued to study Matthew, but not as a woman interested in a new man in town.  It reminded Matthew more of a judge looking over a new plaintiff in his court.  He met her gaze steadily, waiting her out and conceding nothing.

She finally shifted her gaze to the teapot, lifting the lid to check the color, then pouring out more tea for them both.  She filled Matthew's cup first, which made him think he'd likely passed muster.  She offered him sugar and milk, but like her, he drank his tea unaltered.  "It's very good," he said, keeping his voice as appreciative and sincere as it would have been without the inspection.

"Vin Tanner is a good man," she told him seriously.  "And I mean that in both the Eastern sense, Mr. McCormick, and the Western one."

"That he'd be a good man at my back in a fight?"  Matthew nodded.  "I've met him, ma'am.  I don't dispute either of those in the least, despite Mr. Larabee's apprehensions.  A great deal of my trouble here has come from no one accepting my statement that I am not here after Mr. Tanner.  If you had a Bible handy, I would be willing to swear to that, although I've been involved in court cases where I've had to give fewer oaths."  Between the sleep, the tea, and the chance to research his real project, Matthew was still amused by the matter, and it bled into his tone.

A widow who could keep running a newspaper in a frontier town was no fool, and she promptly reminded him of it.  "I believe you even without the oath, Mr. McCormick, but I do have to wonder why you're still here.  Four Corners is not a town with a great deal of attractions for a man from the big cities of the East."

Matthew shrugged.  "I've been to San Francisco as well, Mrs. Travis, and New Orleans.  Not all the cities are in the East, and not all of them are so attractive as might be supposed, I assure you.  Washington City is a marshy haven for malaria and fevers in the fall, Philadelphia has its charms, but a man has to be very fond indeed of red brick to appreciate them properly, and it will be years yet before Savannah or Charleston regain their charms, to say nothing at all of Atlanta."

"And you're trying to distract me."  She sipped her tea again, her pencil still abandoned on a pile of foolscap.

He kept his laughter contained within smile and voice.  "I'm beginning to wonder if I've wandered into some Shakespearean farce....  It's only a distraction if you choose to be distracted, ma'am," Matthew said.  "I was merely commenting that the draw of the cities can be overestimated.  Truth be told, if I were to head to one of the cities now, it would be Denver or on out to San Francisco."

"Then why are you here?" Mary Travis asked bluntly.  "If not for Mr. Tanner."

"Mr. Tanner is a courteous soul and a gentleman.  I have no quarrel with him, nor am I hunting him.  At the moment, I'm here because the gossip in these papers is a more efficient a way to track down my friend than exhausting myself and my horse on the trail to Denver or Santa Fe."  Matthew shrugged and added, "And Señorita Recillos' beds are dust-free, and her cooking is excellent."

Mary Travis's regard stayed skeptical until he mentioned that.  "I imagine it is an improvement on bedrolls and trail food, yes."

"Even watching for herbs, Mrs. Travis, a man can very quickly tire of beans for lunch and dinner, alternated with dried meat and journeybread -- if there's time to cook the bread, or it hasn't gone stale in your saddlebags since the evening before."  Matthew added, amused by his own complaints, "And that doesn't address the matter of coffee that never lasts out the trip, scavenging coyotes, squirrels that think they should get your bread, the hazards of Indian resentment of white men traveling their lands and killing their meat sources....  I assure you, Señorita Recillos' bed and board is a very good reason to still be here."

Mary Travis was chuckling and scribbling notes.  "Mr. McCormick, if this should end up in a newspaper after you've ridden out...?"

Matthew laughed.  "Rarely heard a man complain so?"

"Not and make me laugh about it like this, no."  She finished jotting notes and looked up at him.

Matthew didn't point out that he surely couldn't stop her if he wasn't there; he did prefer to stop her now.  "For my dignity's sake -- what of it is left by now," and he suspected she could hear how amusing he found its loss, "-- if I could be anonymous?"

"Certainly."  Mary Travis chuckled and sipped at her tea, then poured more for both of them.  "I'll even let you help me with the copy when your eyes want a break from the papers."

"Thank you, ma'am."  Matthew chuckled and went back to his reading.  With any luck, she'd be busy enough with her articles not to press for Cory's name, especially since Matthew wasn't entirely sure which one he was using this century.

Chris let his chair tilt back against the exposed support beam and rubbed his forehead against a headache that came more from trying to figure out Ezra and McCormick than from last night's drinks.  "So you're telling me McCormick finally gave Ez a name over another chess game?"

"And his word that he wasn't looking for Vin, or so Vin said this morning, brother."  Josiah spoke slowly, and Chris wasn't sure if he was contemplating their actions or why they still hadn't seen the Denver stage... and Buck and Vin.  That was worrying Chris, too, and he was giving it another hour before the rest of 'em set out to see what had happened.

JD leaned forward, quick and impetuous and wondering.  "How'd Vin get McCormick to give his word?"  He adjusted the brim of his bowler to shade his eyes before looking northeast for a plume of dust that had yet to appear.

"That's Vin's business, brother.  Seeing as there was no disturbance last night, I'd have to imagine they came to an understanding."  Josiah sounded as if he had some idea of how, too, and Chris closed his eyes against the image of Vin getting into a fight with McCormick in the middle of the night in a room Inez had rented out....

"Damn it."  Mr. Larabee bit the words off, rather than give JD worse habits than they already had.  He took a breath and asked, "Nathan, how sure are you that McCormick's a Pinkerton?"

Nathan never looked up from carving a new cane for old Mrs. Abernathy.  "I never said McCormick is a Pinkerton, Chris.  I said the man was a Pinkerton.  Also said that was three years ago in Abilene."  Nathan shrugged and added, "Still don't see why I shouldn't just go ask him what he's doing here."

Chris shook his head.  "And if he is after Vin?"

Nathan just snorted in disbelief.  "Come on, Chris, you really think Vin'd let someone lie to him about something that important?"

"Hellfire."  Chair legs dropped onto planks, rowels scraped along wood.  "We're goin' to have to do something about that bounty."

Ezra sat down on the step beside JD with an absent-minded nod of greeting, drinking his first coffee of the day, or so Chris judged it.  Ezra hadn't been up long; his cuffs were still rolled up and damp, and he was clean-shaven, but hadn't pulled on a jacket yet.  "Even apprehending the correct suspect might not clear away the bounty, Mr. Larabee.  And Mr. McCormick's word is likely good.  Pinkerton is not in the habit of employing those of questionable morals.  The question becomes, which problem are we attempting to solve first?  Attempting to move Mr. McCormick along, or trying to clear Mr. Tanner's name and reputation of the blot placed there by others?"

Chris shook his head, chewing on the cigarillo he hadn't yet lit.  "McCormick first.  He's here.  But we're going to have to do something about that bounty soon.  This is no way for Vin to live."

"Especially since he didn't do it," Josiah rumbled.

Chris glanced over to see why he'd restated the obvious and saw McCormick coming out of the Clarion office, closing the door quietly behind him.  Across the street, a couple doors down, but still close enough to hear them talk if he was listening, seeing as the day'd stayed quiet.  The kids were down at the far end of the town, playing Red Rover in front of the grain exchange and watching the blacksmith work.  Mary was still sitting at her desk, writing with one hand, sipping tea with the other, and smiling as she wrote.

McCormick nodded to them, his smile courteous and bland as Ezra marking new victims for his card games, and Chris bit back the urge to deck him just to see if he'd keep smiling.  The man annoyed him like a burr that'd gotten under the skin and was gonna have to be cut out.  Sooner he left town, the better, and not just for Vin's sake.

Chris asked abruptly, "You sure about that name, Ezra?"

"He's looking for a green-eyed conman named Corwin, Mr. Larabee."  Ezra's sipped at his coffee, then fell still when the telegraph operator ran out of his office, calling for JD.

"Sheriff!  Hey, you got to hear this!"

McCormick had paused to listen, too, but hell, so had everyone in the street.  Sometimes it was just good gossip over the wires, and sometimes it was damned important -- or the operator thought it was.  Didn't do to rile up the man who was your fastest contact to the nearby towns.

"What is it, Lafe?"  JD stood up, one hand dropping absently to his pistol.

"One hell of a fuss over in Wyoming, near Medicine Bow.  Some crazy bastard--" he saw Mary Travis standing on the Clarion porch to listen, winced, and nodded to her, "--sorry, Mz. Travis.  Some lunatic stole the Army payroll cars, Sheriff.  Off the train, with the Army guarding it.  Dropped a skunk in with the car of guards, disconnected the rear cars pretty as you please, and made off with as much gold as three horses could carry.  Word over the wire is that no one understands why it was only three of 'em loaded, 'cause tracks say there were at least eight horses."

"In case the first three go lame," McCormick answered, his face tight with something that might have been anger but looked to Chris a damn sight more like a man trying not to bust a gut laughing.  "A skunk?"

"Yes, sir, that's what Myra up in Denver signed.  She was about laughing too hard to tap it out, way she sounded, but it was her fist."  Lafe grinned at him.  "A skunk.  Man won't get away with it for long, but Lord, what a story."

Mary Travis smiled at him.  "If you hear any more details, Lafe?"

"I'll bring 'em right to you, ma'am, soon's I stop for lunch or Billy stops by to pick up the news."  He grinned at her and headed back in, laughing as he went.  "A skunk.  If that don't beat all...."

Chris watched McCormick narrowly.  "You seem pretty damn amused by this."

"Mr. Beauregard didn't report anyone as being hurt, " McCormick pointed out, and yeah, that was a grin starting to escape.  "Some sergeants are going to be downright emphatic about bathing, but the payroll will either be recovered or reissued.  And this robber neither warped the rails, nor blew up the train.  He merely separated parts of it from each other, and the Army from some of their payroll."  He gave up and started laughing as he added, "With the aid of a skunk."

"Trains are going to be guarded more carefully from now on," Josiah said, and he wasn't even trying not to laugh.  Chris gave up trying to frown, because it was mighty funny now that he wasn't trying to blame McCormick for a robbery six days' ride away.  "Mighty fine sense of humor on the man, using a skunk 'stead of dynamite."

"Or fires on the tracks... a most considerate robber," Ezra managed to say between gusts of laughter, and they were all laughing now, even Mary Travis and McCormick.  Hell, Chris couldn't remember the last time he'd heard this many people laughing so hard, even if it was over a crime.

Nathan looked up, still chuckling, and pointed to a plume of dust.  "And there's the Denver stage."

JD grinned. "We might want to ride out and tell Buck about this."

Chris snorted.  "JD, we do that and he won't take a bath this week for claiming he's no skunk-thief."

Nathan grinned.  "Nah, he'll get his bath.  Buck's not going to upset whichever lady he's charming this week.  Come on."

JD whooped and ran for the livery, with the others not far behind.  McCormick was sitting on the saloon porch when they rode past, still laughing like it'd hurt to stop.

"Good night, Señor Standish."

"We'll turn the lamps down when we go up, Inez," Ezra promised her as he had the night before.  This time he and Matthew each had a glass of whiskey to hand, having already toasted the safety of the skunk (although without specifying two legs or four).

Matthew shifted a rook sideways, chuckling as he did.  "It's going to be a good while before I can see a black and white checkerboard without laughing for that poor skunk."

Ezra considered the move, then shifted one of his knights towards an unguarded bishop.  "Mr. Tanner tells me you were at Mrs. Potter's store earlier, buying supplies?"

Matthew's hand tapped lightly from pawn to queen to bishop before finally moving a knight up to threaten Ezra's rook.  He glanced up then, one eyebrow arched in eloquent curiosity.  "I was, yes."

"Then you're departing our fair town on the morrow?"  Ezra kept his attention on the board, listening to the man's voice; it gave away more than his eyes or face.

"Even the back-issues at the Clarion ran out eventually," Matthew said lightly.  He went on more seriously, "And Mr. Larabee has no taste for my presence in town.  I prefer riding out on my horse to his rail."  A rustle of cloth followed by the quiet return of glass on wood spoke of another small sip of the slowly-diminishing whiskey.  "Were you going to move, Ezra?"

"That's not why you're leaving," Ezra stated, looking up and ignoring the game.  "The payroll robbery--"

Matthew's glance froze the words in his mouth... and confirmed Ezra's suspicion that Matthew believed he could put a name to the bandit if he so chose.  Matthew only said, "As everyone has told me, there's only so much to do in Four Corners."

Ezra took a deeper breath than usual, perfectly willing to let Matthew think he was off-balance, and finally asked very quietly, "I must ask, whether you answer or not.  The wounds you and Carl Hobart took in your daily bouts -- how did you heal them all so swiftly?"

Matthew studied him over the chessboard, eyes sharp and measuring.  "And if I asked what you were talking about, sir?"

"I know too well that I would never match you in a fight, sir, and I don't believe a bullet would stop you long enough."  Ezra ignored the tension shivering through his nerves as easily as he would have controlled a twitch or gasp during a poker game and kept his voice too quiet to be overheard from any of the corners of the room.  "Nonetheless, you are the same man I watched in Belle Chassee in 1859, and I do mean the same.  Not so much as a grey hair nor a line of age added, not even a visible scar, and I don't believe you avoided the War."  Ezra shook his head, helpless before the imperatives of his own curiosity.  "How?"

Matthew only said quietly, "Your move, sir," and continued to watch him over the chessboard.  His voice was almost gentle as if he understood the way curiosity burned in Ezra, as loss burned in Chris or the desire for communion drove Josiah.

Ezra looked down at the chessboard, the possible moves and ploys sliding away as he looked.  He made himself contemplate the squares and pieces anyway and finally sent his queen sliding down the diagonal to threaten Matthew's king's rook.

"Mmm."  Matthew took the queen with a bishop Ezra had overlooked and said quietly, "Mate, I'm afraid."

Ezra looked at the board, at his exposed king and the rook ready to take it if he didn't move, at the knight and bishop ready to strike at the king's possible destinations, and he found himself laughing.  His laughter went on long enough that Matthew handed him a silver flask produced from somewhere about his person, still warm from his body, and said firmly, "Ezra.  Drink some of that."

It was very good brandy, far too good to be wasted on an excess of mirth.  Ezra took a second swallow just to enjoy it, and a third for the pleasure for wrapping his mouth around the warm metal and teasing Matthew with things he had yet to admit he wanted....  He finally asked, "Will you tell me if I'm mad, in any case?"

Matthew had an elbow on the table, his chin resting on his fist while he watched Ezra.  "And if I did?"

"At least I would know, although no one would ever believe me."  Ezra handed the flask back regretfully.  "Hardly as if I have any proof, sir."

"No, I suspect you don't.  And I'm afraid your mother's reputation would do you no good in a court."  Nor Ezra's own profession, as Matthew didn't point out.

"I find I can't believe I've lost my faculties," Ezra said quietly, but he started to gather up the chess pieces, settling them into their box lest he lose one.  The slow smile curling Matthew's mouth made Ezra's hand tighten around the bishop; he controlled himself long enough to put it away rather than risk breaking the mitre.

"You're not mad," Matthew said, soft enough that no onlooker would have been able to overhear him.  Ezra heard all of it, however; it would be enough.  "But it doesn't appear along any rhyme or reason I've ever discerned."  Matthew shrugged and added, "Nor is it a prize to be won, given away, or seized."  Despite the topic, he was still smiling, slow and appreciative.

"Then I shall simply have to seize the night," Ezra said and leaned in to kiss Matthew.

He'd expected anything from stillness to hands pushing him away to (a more remote possibility) violence of fist or knife.  Ezra hadn't expected that McCormick would fold one hand around his nape and the other around the point of his shoulder, that the man would laugh against his mouth and turn the kiss into something slower and more exploratory -- gentle and interested and thorough.  That, he hadn't expected at all.

Matthew's mouth tasted faintly of whiskey; his throat tasted of dust, and recent sweat.  His hands were precise in the way they shifted Ezra and the way the fingers kneaded the spots in his neck that always ached after a long night of watching and remembering cards.  He smelled of sun-dried cloth, leather, a hint of lavender under those... Ezra found himself relaxing into the touch of someone who smelled like a home he hadn't seen in years.

Matthew finally moved back rather than push him away.  While Ezra was still waiting for... something, he only murmured, "I'd suggest we discuss this somewhere less public and with fewer lights," and helped gather the chess pieces and blow out the lanterns.

Moonlight painted Matthew's room in silver and shadows, striping the blue and white quilt grey and navy; the light left the roses stenciled just below the ceiling black (and explained what Inez had been doing during any number of rainy afternoons).  Matthew closed the door behind them, pushed the shutters nearly closed, and leaned in to kiss Ezra again, every bit as slow and interested.

Ezra wasn't nearly as surprised this time.

This time he retained enough self-possession to keep his hands moving, tracing up Matthew's shirt (good cotton, less fine than Ezra's but better suited to the west) to remove it and learn the body he could barely see now.  His hands saw well enough, however, tracing the few scars on a man who'd once been well-known for his skill at dancing, a man Ezra had seen fighting with a knight's sword day after day in the swamp....

Ezra shuddered at the feel of nails trailing along nape and shoulders -- not hard enough to scratch, too firm to ignore.  Matthew chuckled against his throat, careful not to leave marks as he tasted and explored.  Ezra stepped back and said breathlessly, "Best my clothes not go everywhere."

"A lamp later might be difficult to explain, yes."  Matthew sounded regretful, and was making short work of shedding his own clothes.  Ezra looked over in what moonlight remained and saw a silhouette on the bed, silver and shadow and well worth the time it took him to look.  Matthew only laughed softly -- with him, not at him -- and Ezra chuckled and joined him on the bed.

Bedding Matthew was... fun, strangely enough.  Playful and intent by turns, sometimes intertwining limbs while they laughed against mouths or throats, sometimes lying almost at the edges of the bed, hands exploring while they fought to remain silent under the moonlight.  Matthew squirmed under Ezra's teeth, urging him on with no regard for marks (later, that didn't surprise Ezra) and traced Ezra's scars lightly, unsurprised by the number or places.  For fingers callused by hard work and weapons, they found even the old, smooth scars surprisingly swiftly.  Matthew traced them gently, soothing and comforting without words being said.

Ezra kissed fine scars on the backs of Matthew's knuckles and licked between his fingers for the pleasure of hearing his breath catch, sucked at the small indentation on his palm that made Ezra wonder about mishaps and fishing hooks, traced a fingertip down a scar that curved along a rib as if worn in by repetition.  The muscle revealed under the clothes he'd expected, although not so much of it; Matthew hid his strength as Ezra did, both of them preferring to be underestimated.

That Matthew would explore him with hands was no surprise; his mouth and tongue were, and nearly drew sounds from Ezra that, with the windows here, he would not have cared to explain to Vin in the morning.  As it was, he shivered, then tugged gracelessly until Matthew shifted around to let Ezra do his own exploring and stifle his moans on something far more appreciative than a pillow.

Even here, Matthew tasted and smelled clean enough that Ezra wondered, then and later, if he'd foreseen this as a potential end to their encounter.  He had no room to complain of someone planning ahead for the best possible outcome however, and only chuckled around Matthew for the pleasure of hearing the groan against his own skin.  After that they were too busy for thinking, competing in a game where it didn't much matter who won first.

Ezra fetched up in his own skin again lying on his side on the outside of the bed with a warm body against his back, a solid arm under his neck and head, and a strong, callused hand tracing lazy patterns along his chest and belly.  He wrapped his own fingers through Matthew's, rubbing with his thumb in the other man's palm.

That got a soft laugh against his neck, and an even softer murmur of, "Thank you."

Equally soft and even more amused, Ezra said, "My pleasure I assure you."  Soon enough he'd have to get up and go to his own bed.  For the moment, that could wait, as could the questions he'd turn over in the next several days.  For now, he'd enjoy what he had rather than wish for what wasn't available to him.

Nathan and Vin rode out with Matthew the next morning, supposedly to harvest some herbs McCormick had sighted on the way in.  The man did at least wait 'til they were out of Four Corners to ask, "I assume you also came along to reassure Mr. Larabee that I've truly departed?"

Nathan just adjusted his hat, looking around to see how the catnip was coming along.  For one of the mints, it could be downright picky about how and where it grew well, or maybe the barn cats at the livery were the problem?  "Josiah can't afford to keep buying you whiskey every time you aggravate Chris into arresting you."

McCormick just laughed at that, not worried about Chris's temper at all.  Or maybe he just didn't believe the reputation.  "Make Mr. Larabee pay for it.  He really does need to check the statutes on loitering."

Peso tried to bite Matthew's mare, and found her dancing away while Vin clouted him on the neck.  "Quit that, Peso.  You could quit rilin' Chris up if you wanted to stay a while."

"Annoying him is about as difficult as finding cowboys at a box social," McCormick pointed out, but he patted Night's neck and murmured to her to steady down.  Good man with his horse, anyway, and he'd done a fine job of catching those bank robbers in Abilene.  "And no, thank you.  I don't care to leave on a rail or in a cloud of tar and feathers.  Time I moved along."

"Where ya headed?" Vin asked.  "Wyoming?"

"The Rockies first and probably down to Santa Fe after that."  McCormick adjusted his hat against the early morning light, looking around with the cautious eye of a man who might need to remember the way back, whether he said he was coming back or not.

Nathan asked curiously, "You expect us to believe Chris is why you're headin' out?"

"Mr. Jackson, I've given up on getting anyone in Four Corners to believe me about anything."  McCormick sounded like he thought it was funny, which made Nathan grin.  "Not Mr. Larabee, Mrs. Travis, Mr. Sanchez, or yourself.  Do feel free to come up with better reasons, but let me know about them if you would.  I've been enjoying the creative streak of your fair town's inhabitants."

Vin laughed.  "You sound just like Ez.  So?  What should we tell people?"

"Pinkerton called?" Nathan suggested, just to hear what he'd answer.

"Mr. Beauregard could scotch that theory, I'm afraid.  No telegram, and I didn't receive any mail from the Denver stage.  It's also been more than a year since I've worked for Pinkerton."  McCormick glanced over, however, and nodded to him.  "You did a fine job in Abilene, sir.  I was most grateful for your assistance with Mrs. Pruitt.  Hopefully I left enough for your fee?"

Nathan flushed, grateful his skin concealed it, and nodded back.  "More'n the locals would have paid me, enough to let me keep moving on.  Appreciated it.  Did you ever hear if that lady's arm healed up properly?  That was a bad break under those cuts, made setting it tricky."

McCormick shook his head.  "Like you, Mr. Jackson, I had to leave before I heard how events settled out.  I'm afraid I don't know, either."

Vin glanced between them, surprised.  "You didn't say you'd met him, Nathan."

"Hell, Vin, Chris would have kept asking questions I couldn't answer.  Man came in, brought me a patient, and went on with his business.  Maybe five minutes all told, and then I was too busy to pay much attention.  What was I going to tell Chris?"  Nathan shrugged it off, trusting Vin to drop the subject.  Until later, anyway.

"The color of my blood?" McCormick asked, amused.  "What vest I was wearing that day?  Whether I paid you in coin or bank notes?"  He shook his head, then pointed to a patch of green.  "There's the comfrey, Mr. Jackson.  The boneset is down by the streambed, just east of the three rocks over there."  He pointed to a formation a few hundred yards along.

"'Preciate it, McCormick."  Vin grinned at him, and Nathan wondered what secret those two had, because they both looked mighty amused about something.  "Good luck finding Corwin."

"Luck's always needed for that, Mr. Tanner.  Thank you."  He rode on as Nathan and Vin turned off to collect the comfrey, not speeding up, but not slowing down either, still glancing around from time to time.

Nathan swung out of the saddle, ground-tied his horse, and got to work collecting the comfrey.  "Think he'll stay gone?"

"We ain't who he's lookin' for."  Vin shrugged and helped Nathan dig up the comfrey, roots and all.  "And he didn't like annoyin' Chris that much."

"Hell, he can trust Ezra to do that for him," Nathan agreed, grinning.

"So can we."   Vin was grinning, too.  "Come on.  Maybe when we get back Lafe'll know if that poor skunk escaped."

"If he doesn't, we can ask Ezra for more stories about those sword fights he used to watch."  Nathan chuckled.  "Or I can make him come practice with me.  Wouldn't do to get rusty."

Vin just chuckled and checked again to make sure McCormick was still leaving.  Wouldn't do not to know that when Josiah asked.  And Buck, and JD, and maybe Ezra.  And definitely Chris.

Nathan shook his head.  Some folks just shouldn't be allowed in one place together, and he was putting Chris and McCormick at the top of that list.  Just as well he'd gone on.  When he wasn't working for the law, McCormick was even more aggravating than Ezra.

~ ~ ~ finis ~ ~ ~

Comments, Commentary, and Miscellanea:

Rowels:  big, wheel-shaped spurs.

Barratry:  consider it early insurance fraud.  Claiming a ship had sunk and its cargo been lost, when really it's been renamed and the cargo sold.

Pinkerton was an honest Chicago policeman, who personally protected Abraham Lincoln on his inaugural trip to Washington, D.C., and ended up establishing both one of the first detective agencies and the Secret Service.  His detective service was known throughout the West, and the men were frequently called Pinkertons.

There's a bounty on Vin Tanner's head for a crime he didn't commit.

Cory Raines (played by Nick Lea of X-Files fame) was a bank robber, con artist, etc, etc who studied with Matthew McCormick back in the 13th century (per the Highlander episode "Money No Object").  Also green-eyed, and prone to altruism and mischief.  Carl Hobart was a slave owned by Matthew's father-in-law who became an immortal when he 'disappeared.'  He was actually shot, left to rot, and instead revived (per the HL episode "Manhunt").  But a dozen or more field hands saw him return to kill Seth and Silas Hobart; there's no way Ezra didn't hear that story if he lived in the area then.

The Magnificent Seven episode "Love & Honor" established that Nathan and Ezra can both use swords (although Nathan's much better with them).  No, there's no explanation of why Nathan's owner made him learn to use a sword.  (Well, okay, to have a sparring partner, but, er, teaching a slave to fight really could have gotten the owner whipped or hung, so it never did make sense to me!)

The Rocky Mountain News is the oldest Colorado newspaper and is still in existence.  And newspapers in that time were gossip rags that did in fact report everything from who'd bought a new mule, who'd been heard arguing by the neighbors, and asking questions like 'Who's going to remove the dead cow that's blocked the intersection at Main and 4th for the last five days?'  (Yes.  I'm serious.)  They would be the best place to look for word of orphanages striking it rich, families 'inheriting' unexpectedly, or other signs of Cory's passing.

The changeover from quills to fountain pens and other nibs began around 1850.  However, in the early 1870s the USA consumed more than 20,000,000 pencils per year.  Pencils were cheaper than good paper.

::tries to look innocent::  That the TV show The Virginian was set in Medicine Bow, Wyoming is, of course, complete coincidence.  So is Medicine Bow's nearness to the Outlaw Trail, a string of hideouts and friendly ranches that ran from Mexico to Canada.  Really.  (And I never read Louis L'Amour, either.)

Yes, telegraph operators were valued, they knew each other by their 'fist' (the way they tapped out the Morse code was apparently highly individual), and they passed gossip when the lines weren't busy.  They also had pseudonyms, cross-wire friendships (and one cross-wire marriage, where the bride, groom, and minister were in three separate locations, and all the operators on the line were considered witnesses and guests at the ceremony), and a few other things that sound a great deal like the Internet.

Yes, rails were frequently sabotaged during the Civil War, but to the best of my knowledge, not with skunks.  No skunks were harmed during the writing of this story.

Ezra's mother is a con-artist herself, and has gone through at least five husbands.

This story was started easily four years ago:  started, abandoned, retried, abandoned, glared at... and finally finished because I got stubborn.  Originally inspired by Sting's "Shape Of My Heart."

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