“I did not believe it possible, but once again your word skills has done blowed away this simple rodeo cowboy,” he said. “I know now I have chose the right man to recommend me to President Bush. God bless you, sir.”

I went inside the office. Through the window I could see him stretched out under a tree on the courthouse lawn, the side of his face propped on his hand, watching the passersby, none of whom had any idea that a man wearing a shirt stamped with the colors and design of the Stars and Stripes was thinking thoughts about them that would cause the weak of spirit to weep.

I called Temple at home, but no one answered. I called the agency where she worked as a private investigator with a man and another woman. “He was waiting for me outside the office,” I said.

“He’s going to reoffend. Just wait him out,” she said.

“Temple?”

“Yes?” she said.

“If he comes around the house and I’m not there, shoot him,” I said.

“I’ll shoot him whether you’re there or not,” she replied.

THE MORNING COURT judge was Clark Lebeau, known for his egalitarian attitudes, short tolerance for stupidity, and unusual sentences for people who thought they would simply pay a fine and be on their way. Businessmen found themselves working on the sanitation truck; animal abusers cleaned the litter boxes at the shelter; and drunk drivers mowed grass and weeded graves at the cemetery. Rumor had it he kept both a gun and a bottle of gin under the bench.

“What the hell were you doing with a pistol?” he asked from the bench.

“I guess I was gonna pawn it,” Johnny American Horse replied.

“You guess?” the judge said.

“I was pretty drunk, your honor.”

“The officers said it was under your coat. That means while you were passed out you managed to commit a felony. Where’s your goddamn brains, son?”

“Left them in the Oxford, your honor,” Johnny said.

I winced inside.