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weighed over forty pounds,” she said, walking toward the rain barrel.
    She washed her face and hands, then stepped aside for Cameron. “I didn’t know you were famous.” She mentioned two of the stories Marley and Weston had told her. “Are those exploits true?”
    He took the towel she handed him and dried his face. “The basic facts are true. The details are mostly embellishments to sell books.”
    “Do you make money from the books?” Realizing she’d asked a rude question, she hastily backed away. “I apologize. I shouldn’t have asked that.” Maybe it was a blessing that she seldom had visitors. She wasn’t fit for polite company.
    “The publisher sends a bank draft a couple of times a year,” he said, looking at the pink on her cheeks. “I never asked for those books to be written, didn’t want it, and never spoke to the lying son of a bitch who wrote them.”
    It was the most heated speech he’d made since he’d ridden into her yard. Maybe some of the West’s notorious gunslingers welcomed fame, but James Cameron clearly was not among them.
    Silently they entered the house, and Della dished up the ham and beans she’d been simmering since breakfast, watching him from the corner of her eye. He wandered into the sitting area and examined a doll’s dress in her sewing bag, then picked up one of the school primers on top of a small bookcase.
    “Your dinner’s ready,” she said, putting a plate in front of what she already thought of as his seat. After he flicked the napkin across his lap, she told him about Joe Hasker. “He’s a troublemaker, Mr. Cameron. He’s been in and out of jail since he was no bigger than a tadpole. Everyone knows Joe Hasker will wind up in prison or swinging from the end of a rope.” Cameron didn’t seem to be paying much attention. “Marley and Weston asked me to warn you that Hasker’s talking about how he’d like to be the man who outdrew James Cameron.”
    He nodded and buttered a second square of cornbread.
    “Mr. Cameron, I know about Joe Hasker. This isn’t an idle warning.” His indifference upset her. “Marley and Weston think Joe Hasker intends to kill you!”
    His smile stopped the words in her throat. “Every town has a Joe Hasker, Mrs. Ward.”
    Flustered by his smile, she frowned down at her plate. “That doesn’t worry you? Believe me, Mr. Cameron. Joe Hasker is a problem.”
    “A problem would be if Monk Sly rode into Two Creeks.”
    “Who is Monk Sly?” Della gave up on the beans and ham. Unlike the man sitting across from her, she couldn’t talk about gunfights and dying and continue to eat as if they were discussing something as bland as chickens.
    “Monk Sly murdered two men and a woman in Fort Worth. Sly swore he’d kill me before I could take him back to be hanged.”
    Della threw out her hands, staring at him. “So there are two men out there right now who want to kill you?” No wonder he wore his pistols at the table. It wouldn’t surprise her to hear that he wore them to bed.
    Cameron shook his head. “I caught Sly. He’s in jail in Fort Worth. I’d hate to see that one escape.” A shrug lifted his shoulders, and he turned his attention back to his dinner.
    Della couldn’t believe it. Marley and Weston were correct. James Cameron didn’t care if he lived or died. Men like him didn’t expect to see old age.
    The realization shocked her until a second thought crept unwanted into her head. Did she care if she lived or died? What did the future offer but loneliness and hard work? Looking ahead, she saw years of sweating in the hot sun to raise pumpkins she didn’t want. Saw herself growing older as she sat alone on her porch and watched the empty road. There was no future for her, only the past. Maybe she understood Cameron better than she’d imagined.
    “Will you be leaving Two Creeks soon?”
    “Not immediately. I still have some unfinished business,” he said uncomfortably, as if he expected her to pry into what