The Last Kind Words Saloon: A Novel by Larry McMurtry Read Free Book Online

shindig. He got it out of his saddlebag and took it to the schoolroom: three benches, a blackboard, and a high stool for the teacher.
    “Just put it on the bench and don’t interrupt,” she said, without looking up from her perch. “Right now we’re reading about the Rhine maidens.
    Goodnight knew that matters were still frosty, all because of two young horse thieves hung from a telegraph pole.
     

 
    - 20 -
    In the night Mary’s sour attitude changed—though less often now that they temporarily lived in the tent, where they had two handsome cots side by side.
    “How come when you finally get home all I get is snores?” she wondered; she was a foot from him, in the dark.
    “You’re sure not much of a hand with women,” she added.
    Hard as he tried to stay ahead of Mary, mostly he always felt behind. “Here I am, available if I’m handled easy, and what do I get but snores.”
    “It’s the middle of the night—ain’t that the usual time for snores?”
    “If you slept on your elbow, like I do, you’d be far less likely to snore,” she informed him.
    “A man lying flat on his back, like you do, is naturally apt to snore.”
    Goodnight began to get annoyed. Why talk if it was only to gripe at him?
    “I should have stayed in Long Grass another month . . . maybe then you’d appreciate me when I showed up.”
    “Maybe, but even now, late as it is, I might appreciate a visit.”
    “Do what?”
    “A conjugal or connubial visit. If you remember what that is . . . I barely can.”
    “I don’t want to talk all night, Mary.”
    “I wasn’t inviting you to talk,” Mary said.
    Stumped and somewhat annoyed, Goodnight rolled onto Mary’s cot and mounted her—he was surprised by her readiness to be mounted. She was not silent during the mating, either, emitting a screech at the end that must have carried far over the still prairie. Goodnight felt a little embarrassed but Mary at once went to sleep.
    At the lots, on his blanket, Bose did hear something coming from the Goodnight tent.
    “Miss Molly,” he said, smiling to himself.
    A young cowboy named Tim heard the sound too—he was sleeping near Bose because he had heard that rattlesnakes wouldn’t come near a black man.
    “Are they murdering one another?” Tim asked.
    “No, and it’s none of our business,” Bose said.
    Two other young cowboys, Willy and John, slept within a circle of lariat ropes because they had heard that a snake would not cross a rope.
    Bose knew better. Snakes went where they wanted to go: they didn’t care about white or black and they didn’t care about ropes. He himself let snakes be—remove snakes, good and bad, the whole prairie would belong to prairie dogs and pack rats. And resident rattlesnakes rarely struck. Bose often found a snake in his saddle in the morning, and yet he had never been struck.
    The moon was full that night—it was the color of a pumpkin—it was almost close enough to touch—that was just how it seemed.
    Around five in the morning Bose heard the crunch of boot heels and knew Boss Goodnight was up. He was always up at five—even earlier if he had something important to do.
    “I hope those carpenters get here soon—I mean my carpenters, not Lord Ernle’s. Mary’s not going to tolerate cots much longer, and I don’t blame her. I’ve got a crick in my back from sleeping on a damn cot as it is.”
    “Lady like Miss Mary needs a house of her own,” Bose said.
    “She ain’t a Miss,” Goodnight said. “And you can call her Molly—I can’t seem to.”
    “Sometimes a lady don’t want to be a lady,” he said, mainly to himself.
    “Do you care, boss?” Bose asked.
    “No,” Goodnight admitted. “The damn expense of a fulltime lady would soon leave me busted.”
    Bose picked up the rope and went to catch the horses, though it was barely light enough for him to throw a loop.
     

 
    - 21 -
    Goodnight was stepping off a patch of prairie where he meant to build his principal cattle pens