Legend With a Six-gun (9781101601839) (14 page)

He bent over and pulled her to her feet, saying, “Put on your damn robe and git, girl. Aside from my delicate feelings, I've got work to do.”

“You can't discard me like some used toy, damn it! The two of us are lovers.”

“You mean we were,” he corrected her. “I ain't any toy, either. If Ralph can't keep you satisfied, the saloon is filled with horny cowhands almost every night. So, like I said, I'm out of the game.”

She shrugged and bent to pick up her robe, saying, “You'll be sorry, the next time you wake up with a hard-on. Ralph's left me more than once. But he always comes crawling back for more.”

“Some men are like that. I ain't.”

“Pooh, you men are all such hypocrites. There's not one of you who doesn't fool around on his woman, but when one of us acts the same, you act like you're shocked silly.”

“You're probably right, ma'am. I reckon we ought to be horsewhipped for being like that, but that's the way we come.”

“I'll bet you have somebody else lined up, right?”

He grinned and said, “Maybe.”

She laughed and said, “I knew it.” She put her hand on the doorknob and added, “Well, if it doesn't work out, don't go to strangers. Meanwhile, good hunting, darling.”

She left. Longarm sat on the bed and lit a cheroot, wondering how Ralph was going to take her odd views on free love this time. He puffed furiously on the cheroot as he ran the day's events through his head. At least he supposed he could scratch the Baxters off his list of suspects. He wouldn't take Sylvia's word for it that the sky was blue, but the room clerk had told him he hadn't seen the couple for hours, and for now, Longarm was willing to go with the assumption that they had been exactly where he had found them. He was stuck for ideas. It was too dark to look for sign and he reckoned the murderers hadn't left any anyway.

For some reason he found himself thinking about the pretty little librarian over at the county seat. He shook his head to clear it. That was crazy. He had enough of that kind of trouble on his plate. There was a jealous husband just down the hall and a Mexican gal waiting for him who'd likely pull a knife on him if he looked at another woman. He frowned, blew a smoke ring, and thought,
Misdirection. That's what the book said. I ain't been looking at the right places. While I'm checking out a mine everybody says is all right, the rascals kill three men and a dog and damned nearly me, too.

MacLeod would have his ore cars filled again in a day or so, since he had plenty of ore in the tipple at the mine head. Should he sniff around up there some more? No. That was what he would be expected to do. Check out the bank to see if MacLeod had told the truth about making another loan? That was also an obvious move. The stage crew had said MacLeod had really come up from Sacramento. What about wiring headquarters for a rundown on the Baxters? The girl's story jibed with what MacLeod had told him about their fronting for people who wanted to buy the mine. The telegram wasn't likely to be a plant. He doubted that they'd expected him to find them in bed like that. On the other hand, it was a neat alibi for folks to appear to have no shame. Ralph could have slipped out the back way. But what was his game? To crush MacLeod financially so he would sell the mine cheap? It was possible. But the snooty Bostonian couldn't move tons of ore all by himself, even with Sylvia helping. You'd need a whole crew to shovel all that ore and hide it. A man masterminding others didn't have to stage a bedroom farce; he'd just sic some sidekicks on you.

Had that gunslick over at the county seat really been just a pal of the Calico Kid's, or was that a set-up too? Wheels within wheels.

Misdirection
, he told himself.
Nothing really matters but the way they've been stealing that ore. Find out how they work that one slick trick and you'll have the rest of it on a platter!

He snuffed out the cheroot and checked his sidearm's ammunition. Guarding the shipments by sitting on top of the ore was useless; it hadn't worked for any lawman who'd tried it. There had to be something else he should be watching instead.

But what in thunder was it? They weren't switching the ore before it was loaded. They weren't switching it at the stamping mill. And he'd been sitting on it everywhere between. What they were doing appeared to be plain impossible. But they'd done it, over and over.

“Secret trapdoors?” He asked the .44 in his hand. Then he shook his head. If they'd been sneaking the ore out the bottom of the cars as they rolled, he'd have noticed because he'd have gone down through the trapdoor with it. If they'd somehow switched moving cars in a tunnel, say, he'd have been switched as well. But another shipment would be leaving and he knew if he didn't figure it out, the ore would never arrive at the stamping mill. MacLeod would go bankrupt and have to sell to that snooty Baxter. . . .
Back off. I've been down that trail and it doesn't lead anywhere I ain't thought of.

He put the gun in its holster and rose to his feet. He knew where he'd be spending the night, and that part was just fine. He had a while to figure how to guard the next shipment. Meanwhile, Felicidad was waiting.

*   *   *

Longarm lay in the fourposter, smoking in the dark with Felicidad's head on his naked shoulder. She murmured, “That was lovely,
querido
. But I can sense you are troubled. Is it about poor Tico and those other muchachos?”

He said, “They tried to kill Romero and me, too. Romero has a wife and kids. I've been thinking of magic tricks. I'm usually tolerably good at spotting a cardsharp dealing funny. I've never been taken by the shell game. So, if nobody can shift a card or a pea without my noticing, how do they move two loaded freight cars out from under my big behind?”

“I like your behind,” she purred. “It is solid as a rock and you are so good at moving it. When you finish that smoke, can we make love again?”

He nodded and stroked her naked shoulder fondly though a bit distractedly as he ran every move of the past few days through his mind. Damn, that little librarian had a nice pair of legs. The gunslick who had thrown down on him had probably recognized his gelding tied up out in front of the library. He hadn't told the librarian his name, so she hadn't been in on it. She was just a lonesome little thing who liked tall men. She didn't look like a gal who went all the way. He thought it was likely she'd want to take him home to meet her folks.

Felicidad broke into his reverie, asking, “When will you be riding with the next shipment?”

He said, “Don't aim to,” wondering why she'd asked. Then he decided it was a natural enough question. He was in a line of work that made men suspicious by nature. Felicidad had bid on the mine property, but her offer wasn't even under consideration. If she was fronting for some local Mexican outfit who wanted the land back, they were certainly being clumsy. MacLeod wouldn't be their main worry now. The Baxters were offering over a million for the Lost Chinaman. Anyone else who was after it should have taken a shot at Ralph by now. Once his syndicate got control, there would be plenty of working capital to hire a whole squad of Pinkertons.

He reached out to snuff the cheroot and Felicidad said, “Let me get on top this time.”

She rolled over on him and started fondling him, asking, “Is something wrong? You are not responding,
mi querido
.”

He started running his hands over her body to help focus his attention and she leaned forward to pass her nipples over his lips. That helped a lot.

She murmured, “Oh, you have such a lovely body, and there is so much of it,” as she slid her thighs up on either side of his chest. She raised her knees and braced a foot in each of his armpits, still jackknifed forward. It opened her so wide he could have gotten in soft, but he wasn't soft anymore. He closed his eyes and pictured the little library gal in the same position. Why was it a man always wanted what he couldn't have? He knew that if he was wrestling with the librarian somewhere, he'd be wondering what that Mexican girl back in Manzanita was like.

He started moving up to meet her as she rode him like a trotting horse, but his mind was up at the mine. Lottie MacLeod was pretty, too. But that wasn't the answer. Everyone expected him to be riding shotgun on the next shipment. What could he do that they wouldn't be expecting?

Felicidad said,
“Ay, que chihuahua!”
as he absently nibbled her breast. He saw she was about ready. So he rolled her over, braced both of his feet on the rug, and started plunging deeply into her with her ankles locked around his neck. She screamed aloud in pleasure and raked his back with her nails as she sobbed, “Yes, yes, all of it, all the way!”

He gave her what she was pleading for. That was easy. But the thinking part of him kept chewing like a bone on the next shipment.

Going through the same motions over and over wasn't as tedious in bed as it was in his job. But he and those other lawmen had just been jerking off at the high-graders. Billy Vail had sent him all the way from Denver to screw them
right!

His anger at his own frustrated investigations added what the girl took for passion to his thrusts and she gasped, “Oh, my God, I love you! No man has ever made me feel like this before!”

She was making him feel like a shit, but he didn't say so. She was pretty and had her own land, and many men would have jumped at the chance to keep her permanently. How was he to make her understand that he wasn't one of them?

He'd met more than one woman in his time with whom he could have stayed. His badge, his gun, and the enemies he'd made kept Longarm moving on. Many a gunslick without the sand in his craw to come at him face to face would jump at the chance to hurt a lawman's wife or kids. He couldn't be married to a woman and do his job at the same time. He'd comforted too many lawmen's widows in his day even to think of it.

But he still felt guilty as the girl cried out and climaxed under him. He pumped her down from heaven and rolled off as she sighed, “Oh, I can't get enough of you,
querido
.”

He murmured, “Me neither. My back gives out ahead of the parts that count. That ornery little rascal would rut us both to death if I let him.”

She laughed and said, “I'd hardly call him little. Do either of you love me, just a bit?”

“More like a lot,” he lied. “But let's just be still while I slow my pump down and catch my breath.”

If he told everyone he was giving up and let them send the ore down with some of Lovejoy's men guarding it, that would leave him free to skulk about a bit himself.

It hardly mattered whether or not Lovejoy could be trusted. He knew nobody on the train was going to see anything. But he wondered what
he
might see, watching from the sidelines.

Felicidad said, “I shall miss you so when you leave me,
querido
.”

He blinked and asked, “Did I say I was going somewhere?”

She said, “You didn't have to. I have come to know the sort of man you are.”

“Listen, Felicidad, it ain't like I'm not fond of you. You're the prettiest little thing I've ever met, and—”

“Hush,
querido
. No lies between friends. I shall never forget you. I shall probably always be at least a little in love with you. But I am not a stupid woman.”

“I never said I thought you were. Does this mean you don't want me to come back any more?”

“You will always be welcome in my bed as well as my heart, my darling. I have tortured myself trying to think of some way to make you stay with me. I even thought of saying I was in trouble, but you must have heard that many times before, eh?”

He had, but he didn't say so.

His thoughts returned to the Lost Chinaman with an almost audible snap. He couldn't follow the next gold shipment on horseback. It wasn't possible to stake out every mile of the track. And if he
could
watch from the side, what was he likely to see? There wasn't a better view than right aboard the damned tram in any case; anyone could see that. He frowned and muttered, “Yeah, and that's what everyone's been doing! We've all been watching the magician's waving hand!”

Felicidad asked what he was talking about. He pulled her closer, cocking his right leg over her thigh. She laughed and asked, “Do you want to do it
again?
” and Longarm answered, “Yes ma'am, this time it'll be my pleasure.”

“You mean you didn't enjoy it the last time?”

“Hell, you know I did,” he lied, adding, “but I just thought myself out of a box and I'm feeling bright-eyed and bushy-tailed as hell!”

Chapter 7

He left Felicidad's before dawn, but as he rode across her spread toward Manzanita, he noticed a couple of her vaqueros topping a rise to his right. They didn't seem to be coming at him, so he waved and rode on. They didn't wave back. They didn't act as though they'd seen him at all.

He thought of a phrase from an old song: “All the boys on the rancho are wild about poor Pancho's widow!” But if he was stepping on any toes, it was their own blamed fault. Felicidad's husband had been dead for some time and they'd left the poor little woman playing with herself all alone in that big house long past what common courtesy dictated.

He cut through a grove of live oaks to put some of his new plan into action. As he'd anticipated, the telephone line to Sacramento followed the ridge beyond the grove, strung on ponderosa poles.

He dismounted, tethered the gelding to an oak, and shinnied up a pole in the gray light to cut the wire before he rode on.

When he got back to the hotel, the room clerk told him the Baxters had started earlier for Sacramento. Their key was in the box and they had said they would be back that afternoon. So Longarm went upstairs, forced their door, and started quietly messing things up, grinning like a polecat in a henhouse.

He pulled the mattresses off both beds and slashed them open with his pocketknife, scattering feathers all over. He took Ralph's extra coat from the closet and tossed it on the floor with its pockets turned inside out.

There was a hatbox under Sylvia's bed. He opened it and dumped the contents on her slashed mattress. He noted with interest that she took care of herself with a fancy French douche bag of India rubber.

He opened all the drawers he could find. He stole all the papers and messages. He opened the chemistry kit, and because he didn't really want to do enough damage to hurt the innocent owners of the hotel, he put the acid bottles in his pocket, hoping they wouldn't leak as he scattered the rest of the glassware on the rug and planted a boot heel on it. Some of the stuff fizzed and the rest stank like hell.

He went to his own room and messed it up also, but a bit more gently. Then he went downstairs and yelled angrily at the startled clerk, “Someone's been in my room! It's been searched and torn up. I thought you said you run a first-class hotel here!”

The clerk followed him upstairs and clucked over the signs of forced entry. He didn't enter the Baxters' suite, of course, but when they complained, Longarm knew the clerk could be counted on to tell them the deputy's room had been burgled too. Longarm accepted the man's apology and confusion in good grace, saying nothing had been stolen, and went to have breakfast while the hotel's staff cleaned up the mess.

Some teamsters were having breakfast in the greasy spoon near the jailhouse, so Longarm struck up a conversation with them and explained that he was about to pack it in. He said, “One man can't do it all by himself. I figure I'll hand that high-grading back to old Lovejoy, at least until I can get a whole posse of federal men up here to search every canyon and abandoned mine shaft all at once.”

One of the teamsters nodded and said, “We've been jawing about that high-grading some, Deputy. Us mule skinners know nigh every road and byway in these parts, but none of us have cut sign where strange freight wagons have been.”

Longarm said, “That ain't the problem. Anyone could hide his wheel marks just by dragging a branch of canyon oak tied to his rear axle. The problem is that there are so many trails. I've been in all the likely hideouts, but that doesn't mean much. One rider can only be in one place at a time and I think they've been playing a razzle-dazzle, shell-gaming the poor, lone lawman by moving about like spit on a hot stove.”

The teamster frowned and said, “All that ore, Deputy? Meaning no disrespect, I haul stuff for a living. This is right rough country to be scooting all over the map with tons and tons of rock!”

“Hell,” Longarm swore, “they've likely dumped the ore down any of a hundred canyons. You can scoot tolerably with empty wagons, even big ones.”

The two teamsters exchanged glances. Then the one farthest down the counter chimed in, “That don't make sense! Why would anyone want to high-grade the Lost Chinaman only to dump the ore down a fool canyon? Ain't the ore no good?”

Longarm nodded and said, “It tests out as fair ore, but it looks like any other rock. Dumped down a hillside or in a creek, it wouldn't attract notice from anyone passing, who'd just think it was the same old country rock you see all over, hereabouts.”

“Well, sure,” the third teamster admitted. “But what's the infernal point? You can't spend gold that's just laying in a creekbed, can you?”

“Not right away. But after the search dies down, say in a year or more, you could just come back, start loading up, and say—if anyone asks—that you just found a new placer. Hell, if they've dumped it all in the same place, they could file a mining claim on it and no one would be the wiser!”

The teamsters gaped at him in dawning understanding and one of them said, “Jesus H. Christ! I suspicion it would
work!
”

His companion added, “Sure it would! That's a right smart answer to how them high-graders have been getting away with the stolen ore. Everybody's been trying to figure how they've hauled it out of the county over the mountains, but if they've been dumping it nearby— Why don't you just form up a posse and start looking for it, Deputy?”

Longarm shook his head and said morosely, “It'd take too long. Like I said, it's just rock to the eye. We'd have to prospect every pile of loose rock with chemicals and such. It'd take forever even with a hundred men. Besides that, I might be wrong. Nope, I'm packing it in for now. If the treasury boys want their gold so bad, they can just start looking for it themselves. Justice is handing them back their hot potato.”

He finished his ham and eggs and left, knowing the teamsters would gossip. With any luck, he'd just started a gold rush. Every man in Calaveras County who had nothing better to do would be poking around in any brush-filled canyon or abandoned mine shaft he could think of, with no intention of reporting anything he might find, for it was finders, keepers when it came to color lying about in the open.

He moseyed over to the jailhouse and went in. He found Constable Lovejoy tinkering with the telephone on his desk. He said, “'Morning, Lovejoy. I've got a favor to ask.”

Lovejoy said, “I can't get this infernal machine to work. What can I do for you?”

“Well, I don't want to play with your talking telegraph. I never thought it was a practical notion anyhow. Kevin MacLeod will be shipping again by this time tomorrow morning. I was wondering if you could lend him a couple of deputies to ride the train with him.”

“Reckon I could, but where do
you
aim to be?”

“Halfway back to Denver, Lord willing. I'm as stuck for answers as the rest of you boys.”

Lovejoy grinned and said, “So you're giving up too, eh? I thought you was supposed to be such a smart, sassy detective from the big city!”

“Don't rub it in, old son. I'll allow the rascals are slicker than I reckoned on,”

“I thought you had a rep for never giving up on a case,” Lovejoy needled him.

“James Butler Hickok had a rep for never getting shot, too. ‘There was never a pony that couldn't be rode, and never a rider that couldn't be throwed,' like the song says.”

Lovejoy looked unaccountably pleased as he said, “Well, I ain't thanking you for giving this can of worms back to me. But I could have told you it was too big a boo for any one man. Me and the boys will just have to muddle through until they slip up, or until they steal every ounce of gold in the Lost Chinaman and retire for life.”

Longarm said, “You just do the best you know how. I'm wiring my boss for permission to crawfish out of here. I'll probably, be around town for a while, so feel free to call on me if you come up with anything before I get clearance.”

Lovejoy said, “It's too bad this here telephone is out of order. I could have saved you a trip to the Western Union office at the county seat if the blamed thing was working right.”

Longarm said, “I know. But I'll just mosey over to San Andreas. To tell the truth, I figure Marshal Vail's going to ream my ass for failing him, so I ain't in such an all-fired hurry to give him the news.”

He departed, leaving Lovejoy grinning from ear to ear, and mounted up to ride out. Before heading for the county seat, he walked the gelding up the trail to the Lost Chinaman, where he found Kevin MacLeod supervising his men as they hauled rock from the mine. Longarm didn't dismount as he smiled sadly down at MacLeod and explained that he was cashing in his chips.

MacLeod said, “You can't be serious! I'm shipping these cars down in less than twenty-four hours!”

Longarm said, “I know. Lovejoy says he'll have some deputies riding shotgun for you.”

“Damn it, Longarm,” MacLeod protested, “those townies don't have the sense to spit! If they hit me again I'm a goner! My men are asking for higher wages, since Vallejo and those other two got killed. I don't have enough to stay in operation. The ore
has
to get through this time!”

Longarm shrugged and said, “Ralph Baxter's in Sacramento right now, doubtless wiring for permission to up the ante. You and Lottie could live right nicely with over a million by way of consolation.”

MacLeod shook his head and said, “I don't want to be just rich. I want to die
stinking
rich. I've lost nearly a million in bullion since they started high-grading me! Do you have any notion what it feels like to be starving on bread and beans on top of your very own gold mine?”

“Pretty frustrating, I imagine. But face it, MacLeod. The rascals are just too much for either of us. I will file a full report and see if I can get some treasury men up here. Meanwhile, having done all one man can do, I have to get back to my office.”

As Longarm rode off, MacLeod shouted, “Damn it, come back here! I'll
pay
you to stay just one more day! I'll give you a quarter share of the gold I'll be shipping!”

But Longarm shook his head and rode on without looking back. He headed for the trail to San Andreas, but as soon as he was well clear of the neighborhood he cut upslope and rode into the mountains. He followed a game trail along a ridge until he came to a lookout point dominating the valley below, and there he dismounted.

He gathered dry twigs and used the papers he'd stolen from Ralph Baxter to start a fire. When it was burning properly, he slipped the saddle off his browsing mount and removed the saddle blanket.

He cut some green branches and threw them on the fire, sending up a billowing cloud of white smoke that smelled like medicine. He piled on more green brush and dropped the blanket across the smoldering mass, trying to remember how he'd seen a friendly Sioux do it, over on the other side of the Rockies.

As the smoke puffs rose in a series of balloon-shaped clouds, a voice behind him asked calmly, “Why are you doing that?”

Without turning, Longarm said, “Howdy, Bitter Water. Acorns any good this year?”

The Indian came out of the brush and squatted at his side, saying, “I have heard of smoke talk, but my people do not use it.”

Longarm said, “I know. But lots of folks are ignorant. They'll be spotting this smoke talk about now from all over the county. I'm likely scaring the shit out of everybody down there, considering the Modoc war wasn't all that far back, or all that far away.”

Bitter Water frowned and said, “My people are not on the warpath. There are no other bands in these hills. Who are you supposed to be signaling? What are you saying with that smoke?”

“Signaling nobody and saying nothing. A Sioux would likely laugh himself to death at me. But it's my hope that any white man who spots this smoke talk will get his womenfolk and kids inside and round up all his stock. I doubt if anyone will be out hunting deer today, either. When there's smoke talk against the skyline, men don't ride out much unless they have a damned good reason.”

Bitter Water pondered this as Longarm shook the dust and ashes from the blanket and sat down cross-legged next to the Indian, who finally nodded and said, “Heya! You intend to pin down all the innocent, unimportant people around Manzanita, then see who still rides abroad on more serious business. It is a good trick—for you. But what of me and my people? Won't the soldiers come to hunt your wild Indians?”

“No. I'm riding over to the county seat to send some wires. I'll tell the officers who loaned me that gelding that you folks are working for me, but not to tell anyone else.”

Longarm took two cheroots from his coat pocket and offered one to Bitter Water, who accepted it with a nod of thanks. The lawman lit the Miwok's cigar and then his own with a burning twig from the fire. They smoked in silence for a while until Bitter Water shook his head and said, “The soldiers may believe you, but I think it is a crazy story. What are we supposed to be helping you to do?”

“Look for outlaws, of course. I'm deputizing your whole tribe.”

Bitter Water laughed. “Now I know you are crazy. We Miwok are not lawmen. We stay as far from you people and your crazy laws as we can!”

“Just the same, I'm saying I've deputized your band. When you've a mind to, you can drop by the Indian agency and pick up the dollar a day I'm paying, oh, say thirty of you. I reckon the taxpayers owe you that much anyway, considering.”

Bitter Water said, “You are generous, but crazy. If I were one of those outlaws I would see through your scheme. You grow weary with chasing them around in circles, waiting for them to make the next move. So now you are stirring up trouble to give
them
something to worry about!”

Longarm grinned and nodded, saying, “You'd make a tolerable lawman yourself, old son. I reckon the two of us had best be on our way now. You hear that distant tinkle?”