Doctor and the Kid, The (A Weird West Tale) (Weird West Tales) by Mike Resnick

happened.”
    “Who's your sponsor, if I may use the word?” asked Holliday. “I suspect that it's Hook Nose.”
    The Kid shook his head. “Some old geezer named Woo-Ka-Nay.”
    “That is Hook Nose,” said Holliday. “Medicine man of the Southern Cheyenne. They say he and Geronimo of the Apaches are the two most powerful medicine men around. I've seen some of what they can do.”
    “Geronimo,” repeated the Kid. “I thought he was their war chief.”
    “No, he's a hell of a warrior, but his official job is medicine man. Their best war chief is Vittorio, though if he could do it full-time I'd wager Geronimo would be just as good, maybe even better.”
    “Well, you live and learn,” said the Kid. “What does Geronimo want from you? He must want something to make bullets bounce off you.”
    “They don't bounce off; they vanish. Check your clothing. There are no holes.”
    The Kid shrugged. “Whatever.”
    “He wants me to do a favor for him.”
    “Something he can't do himself, no doubt?”
    Holliday nodded. “Yes.”
    “And he's paying you by making you in … inv …what the hell's the word?”
    “Invulnerable.”
    “Big goddamned word. So is that the deal?”
    Holliday looked at the Kid for a long minute. You haven't figured it out yet, have you? Finally he spoke: “Yes, that's it.” Then: “How about you?”
    “Seriously?” said the Kid. “I think he just wants me to kill more white men.”
    “Nothing more explicit?”
    “What's ‘explicit'?”
    “Exact,” said Holliday, certain the Kid wouldn't know “precise.”
    “Not that I know of,” replied the Kid. “It's a fair enough deal. I'm in the cattle trade these days.”
    “Stealing cattle?”
    “Do I look like a farmer?” said the Kid with a laugh. “Anyway, my line of work gets dangerous from time to time, and I think he's protecting me so I can keep killing white men—and especially white lawmen.” Suddenly his boyish expression darkened. “And I've got one at the top of my list right now. It'll be the only time I've ever gone out hunting for someone; usually they call me out, or come after me when I'm working, either as a soldier or a cowboy.”
    “Soldier.” “Cowboy.” I love the way you rationalize, even though you have no idea what rationalize means. “Who's the man you're after?” Holliday asked aloud, more to be polite than out of any serious curiosity, since he knew almost no one in New Mexico.
    “A man I used to ride with,” said the Kid. “Then he became a lawman. I trusted the bastard, and he arrested me. I could have killed him when he approached me, and because I thought he was my friend I didn't.” His face clouded over. “I won't make that mistake again, you can bet your ass on it.”
    “Has he got a name?”
    “Pat Garrett,” said the Kid. “Sheriff Pat Garrett,” he added contemptuously.
    “I'd heard, or maybe read, that Lew Wallace pardoned you,” said Holliday.
    “The governor?” said the Kid. “Yeah, he did, provided I give him evidence on some other killers. Since I didn't ride with them, I gave it.”
    “So if you were pardoned, why did this Garrett arrest you?” asked Holliday.
    “I shot a few more lawmen,” said the Kid nonchalantly. “A couple of reporters were in court when I got sentenced. Didn't you read about it?”
    “That you were sentenced?”
    “What I said when I was sentenced.”
    “I must have missed it,” said Holliday.
    “The judge said to me, ‘William Bonney, you are sentenced to be hanged by the neck until you are dead, dead, dead!’” The Kid grinned. “And I said, ‘Judge, you can go to hell, hell, hell!’”
    “Sounds like an interesting, if redundant, conversation,” remarked Holliday.
    “Didn't you ever talk back to a judge when you were sentenced?”
    “I know it's going to come as a shock and a profound disappointment to you, but I've never been convicted of anything.”
    “You just love them big words, don't you?” said the Kid, not without