“She puts up with me just fine!” Mac yelled. “Better’n anybody can put up with you, old man.”
“Stop it!” shouted Linnet from the doorway, rain dripping off her. “I could hear you two shouting outside even in this downpour. Hello, Wesley. I haven’t seen you for weeks.”
Mac, rigid with anger, went behind the counter.
“Hello, Linnet,” Wesley said softly.
“Wesley,” Linnet said pleasantly, “would you please tell me what’s been going on in here?”
“I don’t know if I should…” Wes began.
“Tell her,” Mac snapped. “Cain’t nobody keep a secret from her.”
Briefly Wesley told her about Leah’s refusing to leave the farm, about her unhappiness, and then about what he’d done to clear her name. Then he told of what had led up to the argument.
Linnet thought for a moment. “Do you know something about the robbers?”
Wesley wasn’t going to tell Mac that Bud, Cal, and Abe had been part of the robbers, not when Miranda might marry Bud or Cal. “There is a leader,” he said quietly. “All I know is that he’s called the Dancer.”
“You have no idea who he is?”
“I was given a name, but it was a lie.” The last thing Wes wanted to do was tell Mac what Revis had said. Mac’s temper was explosive enough over little things, but what would it be over this?
“What was the name?” Linnet asked.
Wesley hesitated.
“You can be sure it won’t go beyond these walls.”
“I knew right away it was a lie. When Revis was shot he gave us a name, but none of us believed it. And besides, Mac, you spent two years in North Carolina. It couldn’t have been you.”
The silence in the room was deafening.
“Me?” Mac said, then slowly he began to smile. He walked over near Doll. “You hear that, ol’ man? I’m supposed to be the leader of these outlaws. I’d like to know when I’m supposed to get time what with all the kids I’ve got, and what did I do with the money? Miranda wants a new dress once a week and I can’t give her one.”
He seemed to be highly amused by the whole idea.
“Seems mighty peculiar to me that a man that’s dyin’ would tell a lie,” Doll said.
Wesley was sure Mac would start yelling at Doll again.
“That is odd,” Linnet said. “What do you think, Devon?”
“He was scared,” Mac said flatly. “Maybe this Revis has some kinfolks and if he gave away who the Dancer was, this Dancer would kill ’em.”
“I hadn’t thought of that,” Wesley said. “I just never believed what Revis said about you.”
“But you did ask around enough to know Mac was in North Caroliny and couldn’t be this robber,” Doll injected.
“So why does the Haynes woman still say Leah is a murderer?” Mac asked.
“Because whoever the Dancer is, he’s afraid Leah knows something. Did Leah know Revis very well?” Mac answered his own question before anyone else could speak.
“Not the way you mean,” Wesley snapped. “But—” He came off the barrel. “Revis could have bragged to the Dancer. Revis was a loner, skulked about the woods all the time, nobody ever knew what he was thinking, but he liked Leah. From what I gather he killed the Haynes woman’s husband just so he could force Leah to stay with him. He seemed to terrify most women and Leah…Leah doesn’t usually scare too easily.”
“I once lived in a town,” Linnet said softly, “where if one of the residents had been accused of murder the other townspeople just might have hanged her. Sweetbriar isn’t like that,” she said proudly, “but even our town can be pushed too far. Some of the newer residents are saying you may have paid those two men to say Leah was forced into the robberies.”
“Just tell me who they are and I’ll break their lying bodies in two,” Wesley said as he spat.