Returning to the horses and the mule, he watered and grained the animals. When a young boy came from the Mockingbird carrying a wooden plate filled with roasted pig and flatbread, Sam sat down on an empty crate beside the horses and ate his fill. As he finished, Turner Pridemore stepped inside the barn and stood facing him from ten feet away. The scalper leader’s right hand rested on the butt of his big Walker Colt. Sam looked up as if he’d been expecting him. “Have we got more to talk about?” he asked quietly. Even though Pridemore had come in alone, Sam saw scalpers waiting outside the front door. “Yeah,” Pridemore said. “Figured we best talk alone, make sure we both understand each other.” “Talk, then,” Sam said. He set the wooden plate aside and stood up, his hand at his side near the butt of his own Colt. Pridemore said, “We both know it won’t be long before more soldiers show up wanting to know what happened to Captain Penza and his men.”
