Page 12 of River Ride

“Not so much,” said Virge. “If Wayne was doing something shady, Chuck didn’t know about it.”

“Or he was a good liar,” I said.

“Yep. Either one,” said Travis.

“At least he didn’t pretend he never saw Wayne up here like Groveman did.”

“Yeah, that was a bare-faced fuckin whopper,” said Virge.

Cut Bank Mill.

It took us a few minutes to find Terry Marshall at the mill. Turned out he worked the order desk and we had to wait to talk to him until he took a couple of phone orders.

“Sheriff, I was expecting you. My wife called and said she sent you up here to talk to me about Wayne.”

“That’s right.”

“Damned shame is what it is. Wayne Treadway was a great guy and one of my best friends.”

“Sorry for your loss, Terry,” said Travis. “Want to tell me what Wayne was doing up here in the middle of summer? One of your buddies told us Wayne only drove up from Missoula for hunting season. September, October. Like that.”

“Guess he was on vacay and felt like driving up to see his friends, Sheriff. That ain’t against the law.”

“Nope. It ain’t.”

“Why would Brian Groveman lie and tell me he hadn’t seen Wayne when y’all were drinking together in your garage?”

That question caused Terry to look puzzled for a minute. “No idea why Brian would say that, Sheriff. Far as I know, Brian had no reason to lie. Wayne was here. We all saw him.”

“But Brian did lie and that lie is bothering me a lot. Makes me think the whole works of y’all got something else going on that I’m not seeing.”

Terry frowned. “Like what? We got nothing going on. You got it wrong, Sheriff.”

“Maybe I have,” said Travis. “I’ll let you get back to work, Terry. Thanks for your time.”

“No problem, Sheriff. I’m always happy to help the law.”

We piled into the truck, and I asked Virge what he thought. “Terry telling the truth?”

“Seemed to be, but he was nervous as hell on a Sunday. See his hand shaking when he was playing with his pen?”

“I saw it,” I said. “I think Terry noticed his own hand shaking and that’s when he laid the pen down.”

“Didn’t notice it,” said Travis. “That’s what we’ve got Virgie for. Our own professional lie detector.”

I gave my brother a fist bump.

Wild Stallion Ranch. Montana.

When we got home, me and Virge did more work on the barn at chore time. We finished up and the barn was in perfect condition. Clean and ready for extra horses.

“This is like getting guest rooms ready.” Virge pushed all of the stall doors wide open, stood back and laughed. “We got guest horses coming our way.”

I laughed with my brother.

“Feed order will be delivered tomorrow. We’ll put it away and sweep the floor one more time. Don’t think this barn could look any better.”

Virge glanced around. “Damned near perfect.”

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