Brother's Keeper (Justice, Montana)

[Harold Alexander Truss]

The Mayor closed his eyes, the outburst from Shoney cut every bit as deep as the bullet did. He turned away from Andy's question, but in the end he still addressed it.

"Yeah. Horse thief."

He hoped that she didn't feel keen on prying further. It was a painful topic.

[Andy McCall]

She might've let it all well enough alone, but Andy couldn't help her rabid curiosity. It was plain to see that the Mayor wasn't so interested as her, but she had to know.

They walked slowly back into town, once more headed for Doc Lenard's, and Andy pulled a clean workrag from the nearest saddlebag draped behind her rig.

She gingerly reached a hand out to put the rag in his bloodied hand.

"Him bein' a horse thief don't tell me much," she prompted.

[Harold Alexander Truss]

"In my family, and my line of work, that ought to tell you everything you need to know."

The Mayor squeezed on the rag, which began to saturate with lazily trickling blood. The ooze increased incrementally with each squeeze. The throbbing could be heard in his ears. Had he really just shot a man dead just now? He couldn't even sink into the morass of his own shock, due to Andy's distraction.

"I'm the only one who still calls him that, but its been five years since I've even seen him."

[Andy McCall]

Andy thought about that. It made sense in its' own way, that Truss would hold more'n a bit of a sore spot for a horse thievin' brother - especially considering how straightlaced the Mayor himself was. She could've stopped there and been done with it, but she wanted to know more.

"But how'd Shoney know 'bout him?"

[Harold Alexander Truss]

Truss gave her a look that was nearly pleading.

"I'm tired."

It was a simple statement that transcended everything. Physically, mentally, but spiritually by far. He looked down to the bloody kerchief in his hands.

"Everything I've done in this town these past years, and I've just sold it all away."

[Andy McCall]

At that she scoffed.

"Sold it away?"

Andy rolled her eyes and blew out a snorted breath, stuffing her thumbs into the front of her gunbelt as they walked. Him sayin' he was tired wasn't nothing but a way to stop talkin' about painful memories, and that much Andy could respect. Now though she turned from talk of family to the here and now.

"And if you hadn't done shot 'im? What then? Self defense ain't a thing to look badly on."

The last time she'd spoken those words had been in her own defense from him. Now though, she said them in defense of him, from his own self.

[Harold Alexander Truss]

Was it self defense? Was that it? Why had he gone back for the gun? Was he just minding his business, or was he looking for a confrontation? He was forced to revisit that terrible moment. What if he hadn't pulled a gun? Would he have been content to watch Shoney and Crawfish erase each other from the earth?

No. He played it again and again. He made a choice to fight.

He stiffened up, departing from his introspection, lest Andy get a further glimpse of his hypocrisy.

"It's done. Now, we gotta deal with what comes next."