Tabor Evans by Longarm, the Bandit Queen

a while, can't you see that?" Yazoo said.
    Starr finally made up his mind. "I guess it's all right," he told Longarm. "Come on in and sit down. Belle ought to be here any minute, she just had some business to do in town."
    "That's what Yazoo told me," Longarm said, following Starr into the house.
    He looked at the dim interior. It was no more attractive than the outside. A partition had been thrown across one end, and through its door he could see a tousled double bed. In the main room, which took up two-thirds of the dwelling, there were several chairs, a table, and a wood-burning stove that shared the chimney with a fireplace, now standing empty. Pots were on the stove, and the smells of cooking food mingled unidentifiably in the air.
    Starr Went to the stove, lifted the lid of one of the pots, and stirred the contents. "I told Belle I'd have supper ready when she and the others got back," he explained. "Well, sit down, Windy. You want a drink?
    I'll guarantee it; we make it right here on the place."
    "Pour me one while you're at it, Sam," Yazoo put in.
    Longarm said, "I'll join you in a little nip, sure."
    Starr pulled a bottle out of a wooden KC Baking Powder box, one of several nailed to the wall at one side of the stove to form a rough sort of kitchen cabinet. He found glasses, Put them on the table, and filled them.
    Longarm tasted the liquor. It was raw at the edges, and corn whiskey wasn't much to his fancy, but he downed it and said, "Real good stuff, Starr. You do the distilling?"
    "Mostly, me and Yazoo. Belle's busy with other things."
    Yazoo had finished his drink while Longarm was still tasting. He filled his glass again and held the bottle out to Longarm, who shook his head.
    Yazoo urged, "Come on, Windy. One more never hurt a man."
    "After awhile." Longarm said, then turned to Starr. "Quite a place you got here. Good and private."
    "That's what everybody says. Good for business, you know."
    Longarm was studying Starr as the Bandit Queen's husband moved around the stove, lifting a Pot lid, shoving in a fresh stick of wood. Starr was a slight man, and on the short side. Except for his movements, which were swift and sure, and his toed-in walk, he showed no signs of his Cherokee ancestry. Longarm judged that the Indian blood Starr had was pretty well diluted after a hundred years or so of his tribe's intermarriages with whites, blacks, Spaniards--racial discrimination wasn't a Cherokee trait.
    Starr's features were regular, his nose a bit broad at the nostrils, his lips full. His face was long rather than square, his chin small and slightly receding. He was clean-shaven, but wore his hair long, brushed straight back to fall just above his shoulders. The hair was not Indian-black, but had a slight auburn tinge. It was perfectly straight, though, and somewhat coarse. Yazoo was Pouring himself another drink. He extended the bottle to Longarm again. "You better keep up, Windy. About all a man-" He stopped short and cocked his head to one side, listening.
    Longarm listened too. The thrumming of hooves was coming in through the open door. Three or four horses, as closely as Longarm could tell. The hoofbeats grew steadily louder."
    "Must be Belle and the boys coming back," Starr volunteered.
    Voices trickled in from outside. Longarm swiveled his chair around to face the door more squarely.
    A woman appeared in the doorway. She was tall, her height emphasized by the long green velvet dress she wore; the dress was full-skirted, and its hem swept the floor. She had on a man's Stetson, cream-colored, uncreased; one side of the brim was pulled up and pinned to the crown with a plume of ostrich feathers dyed green to match the dress. What drew Longarm's attention was the pair of silver-plated, pearl-handled pistols that she wore high around her waist.
    She looked at Longarm with obsidian-black eyes and asked, "Who in hell are you?"
    "It's all right, Belle," Sam said quickly. "His name is Windy, and he's looking for a place to