Bitterroot (Billy Bob Holland 3)

"How do you know?"

"I just talked with her. She's hiding out on Swan Lake."

"She confessed to you?"

"Not exactly."

"Here we go again."

"Pick her up, Sheriff. I'll give you the directions."

"It's Sunday. On Monday I'll think about it. In the meantime, try to enjoy life. Give the rest of us a break."

When I got back to Doc's, he and Maisey were raking manure out of the barn and shoveling it into a wheelbarrow and hauling it to a compost heap by his vegetable garden. Doc was bare-chested and sweaty and had tied back his long hair with a blue polka dot bandanna.

I walked out to the horse lot and leaned on the top rail of the fence and watched the two of them work. Maisey kept smiling at me, as though I were being remiss in not helping them. I hated what I was about to say.

"Got something on your mind?" Doc asked.

"Yeah, if you can take a little walk with me," I replied.

"Maisey's a big girl," he said.

"This one's private, Doc."

"We got no secrets here," he said.

"Sue Lynn Big Medicine torched Lamar Ellison. There was a guy outside Ellison's house when she did it," I said.

Doc paused with his hands propped on the inverted end of the rake and gave me a measured stare.

"No kidding?" he said.

"That's what the lady said."

"Maybe that'll help us at the trial," Doc said.

"Could be. Was it you?" I said.

He brushed at his nose and watched a hawk up in a tree not far from Lucas's tent.

"I saw that Witherspoon boy while you were gone. Out yonder in the trees," Doc said.

"Did you turn around on the road and go back to Ellison's place that night?" I asked.

"I guess you got to ask questions like that. Even though they might sorely disappoint an old friend. Well, the answer is-" he said.

But he didn't get to finish his sentence. Maisey threw down her rake in the dust and walked toward me with both her fists clenched, saying to her father, "Don't you answer that question." Then she turned her outrage on me.

"You listen, Billy Bob Holland. Don't you ever question my father's honor. He's your friend, so you by God had better act like it," she said.

I took off my hat and hit a horsefly with it.

"I can understand your sentiments, Maisey," I said.

"No, you don't. No matter how all this turns out, no one is ever going to question this family's integrity again," she said.

I raised my hands.