Longarm and the Stagecoach Robbers (11 page)

He caught the same up-bound train and again reached Fairplay in the middle of the night. Instead of checking into the Pickens House this time, he walked past it, went around to the back of the Carver Express Company, and knocked on Charlise's door.

When she came to see who was there at such an hour, Longarm cheerfully announced, “There's a weary traveler out here in search o' rest. An' maybe something else, too.”

Charlie laughed and unlocked her door. “Custis. I was hoping they would send you again. I take it you heard what happened?”

“No details,” he said. “Just that it did happen. D'you happen t' have any coffee left over? An' let me look at you, girl. You're a sight for sore eyes.”

Charlie was wearing a slightly tattered terry cloth robe and her hair was a bird's nest. Longarm smiled to himself. She had not let him see the old robe before, and she had always been careful to keep her hair brushed when he was around. This evening he took her by surprise and saw her without any efforts to doll up. It was rather flattering, he thought, that she had been so careful about those things before.

“You look terrific,” he said, lying only a very little. He took Charlie into his arms, lifted her chin, and gave her a long, lingering kiss.

Charlie's tongue probed into his mouth and her left hand sought out the bulge behind his fly.

“I'm glad you are here,” she whispered, holding him tight. “Are you tired after the trip up?”

“Mm-hmm,” he mumbled.

“Come to bed. We'll talk in the morning.”

“Fine, but is Will all right? I wasn't given any details,” he asked, pulling away from the kiss but keeping an arm around Charlie's waist.

“He's fine. Angry. I think a little frightened although he wouldn't admit to it.”

“He should be. When people with guns stop an' rob you, you got every right t' be scared,” Longarm said.

“Really, Custis. We can talk about all of that in the morning.” She smiled and tugged him forward. “Come to bed now. I want to feel you inside me again.”

Charlie giggled. “Just those few days and I was missing that beautiful cock of yours.”

“Then let's us do somethin' about that, darlin',” Longarm said, allowing himself to be dragged into the tiny bedroom.

“Good Lord, Custis!” Charlie sat up and wiped her lips with the back of her hand. “You were only away for a couple days, and you built up that much cum? I thought you were going to drown me.”

He laughed and pulled her down beside him. When he kissed her, she tasted salty and warm from his cum.

Longarm fondled Charlie's right tit and toyed with the nipple.

“That feels
so
good,” she mumbled. “Can you get it up again?”

“Can a goose honk?” he said.

Charlie gave him a playful slap on the chest. “That isn't an answer, silly.”

“Hell, I kinda thought it was.”

Charlie laughed and once again bent over Longarm, taking him into the warmth of her mouth. He quickly grew and strengthened, his cock returning to its previous state of eagerness.

“Impressive,” Charlie said, sitting upright. “But what can it
do
?”

“Let me show you what it can do,” Longarm told her. He took her by the shoulder and pulled her down onto her back, slid a hand between her legs, and pried them apart then rolled on top of her.

Charlie reached down between her legs and took hold of him. With her help, his cock found the way home, sliding into her. Filling her. Bumping up against the little, peach-shaped bulb deep inside her.

“Did I hurt you?”

“What? I'm not supposed to move?”

Both of them laughed.

This is good, Longarm thought. This is the way it's supposed to be between a man and a woman who like each other. That's the key ingredient: That they
like
each other.

It occurred to him that, yes, he very much liked Charlise Carver.

“What's your maiden name?” he asked mid-stroke.

“Where did that come from?” she shot back at him.

“I dunno. I just wondered, that's all.”

“You pick a fine time to ask things like that.”

“You don't have t' answer if you don't want to.”

“Charlise Elizabeth Randolph Carver, Randolph being my name before I got married. Satisfied?”

“Yeah. Thanks.” He chuckled and nibbled on her ear, pulled back, and drove forward, harder now and faster until he came once again, this time spitting not quite so much cum into her after she so efficiently swallowed his first heavy load.

He quivered, driving deep inside her, and Charlie clasped him and shuddered in her own sweet spasm of release.

It was good to be back, he thought.

“You're back,” Will exclaimed the next morning when he walked in and saw Longarm seated at the table with a cup of coffee.

“Obviously,” Longarm said. “We heard there was another robbery, so the bastards haven't moved on. Sit down, Will. Tell me about it.”

Will glanced first at his mother, then pulled out the chair Longarm indicated and sat. Charlie poured a cup of coffee for her son then turned back to the stove, where she was working on a skillet of very aromatic bacon.

“There isn't much to tell,” Will said. “It was the same as before. They stepped out of the brush, all covered with their dusters and flour sack masks, one on each side of the road, carrying those ugly damn sawed-off shotguns.

“They never said a word, either one of them, just gestured with the guns. That was enough. I pulled to a stop and tossed the mail down to them, and they backed away. I waited until they were back in the brush alongside the road and started off again.

“The funny thing was, this trip I was carrying a strongbox. I don't know what was in it. Not for sure. But it was sent from a mine in Bailey to a bank down in Colorado City. So I assume it was raw gold though, like I say, I never actually saw what was in there.

“Surely whatever was in that strongbox was a lot more than could have been in the five letters I was carrying at the time. But all the robbers took was the letters.

“Maybe they didn't know about the gold. I have to believe that they didn't. But they could have robbed me of that, too.” Will shook his head, leaned forward, and blew on the coffee. He took his coffee black, just like his mother.

“Were there any passengers?” Longarm asked.

“One. The robbers never tried to take anything from him.”

“This passenger,” Longarm said. “Is he a regular on your runs? I mean, could he be signaling the robbers somehow?”

“I never saw the man before,” Will said, “and if he was giving them any sort of signal, I certainly never saw him do it. They ignored him. All they took was the mail, and there was precious little of that on that day.”

Longarm grunted, deep in thought, and sipped at his coffee.

He paid attention, though, when Charlie set plates of bacon, biscuits, and red-eye gravy in front of them.

When it came time to go out to the coach, Longarm said, “I'll ride with you t'day. An' this time I brought my rifle along. If we see the sons o' bitches lurking along the road, I can reach out to 'em with it whether they want to step forward an' challenge us or not.”

“In that case,” Will said, “I hope to hell the bastards try to rob us today.”

“We'll give them the opportunity,” Longarm said. “That seems to be the best we can do. The rest is up to them.” He wiped his lips with the napkin, stood, and gave Charlie a kiss. If Will objected to Longarm's show of affection for his mother, he did not show it.

For three days Longarm rode “shotgun” on Will Carver's stagecoach. He did not so much as catch a glimpse of the hooded pair in the linen dusters that he had seen once before.

Saturday evening he helped Will rub down the horses, check their hooves, and clean the harness. Longarm was up to his elbows in neat's-foot oil when Charlie came out back.

“You have a visitor, Custis,” she said, then added, “and supper will be ready in fifteen minutes.”

“All right, thanks.” He laid aside the oily rag he had been using on the harness and rolled his sleeves down. He used a dry rag to wipe his hands then buttoned his sleeves and picked up his coat, putting it on as he headed for the back door and on through to the office.

“Willboughby,” he said, greeting the Fairplay postmaster. “What brings you here on a Saturday night? I would have thought you'd be out carousing.”

Longarm's humor passed completely over the head of the small, clerkish postmaster. If there was anyone in Fairplay less likely to be carousing on a Saturday night, Longarm had not met the man.

“I want to talk to you, Long,” Willoughby said.

“Sure. What about?”

“Could we sit down,” the little man said.

“O' course, but let's go outside an' set on the porch. I'd like to smoke an' Mrs. Carver don't like the smell of it.” He motioned Willoughby ahead and followed the little man, already reaching in his coat for a cheroot.

Once settled into rocking chairs on the front porch, Longarm flicked a match aflame and lit his cheroot. “What's on your mind?”

“I want to know how close you are to capturing the brigands who have been robbing the mails,” Willoughby said.

“Hell, I don't know what t' tell you. I been riding with the coach an' carrying a rifle, but so far they haven't showed themselves.”

“In other words, you have not been accomplishing anything,” Willoughby said.

“You could put it that way, but what else do you think I should do?” Longarm told him.

“The reason I ask,” Willoughby said, “is that I have been in contact with the postmaster general. He is asking for my recommendation as to whether the mail contract with Carver Express Company should be terminated and someone else given the job. In fact, he is asking who I would suggest take over the mail route.”

Longarm puffed on his cheroot in silence for a moment while he digested the meaning of what Willoughby had just said.

If the mail contract was revoked, he knew, it would ruin Charlise and Will. The company could not survive without the income provided by the post office. The Carver Express Company would go into bankruptcy, and Charlie would be without the future she was trying to provide for herself and her son.

It was a harsh prospect, he thought.

“Can you hold off with that recommendation?” he asked.

“For a few days, I suppose. Do you think you can catch them?”

“T' tell you the truth, Jon, I don't know. But give me a few days t' stew on this, will you?”

“A few days then,” Willoughby said, standing and brushing the seat of his trousers. “I'll write back to the postmaster general and tell him I need more time to come up with my recommendation.”

Longarm nodded. “All right. Thanks. I'll, uh, I'll let you know if I think of anything. An' you'll be the first t' know if I catch the sons o' bitches.”

“Good night then, Marshal.” Willoughby turned and hurried away down the street toward the business district.

Longarm stayed where he was, smoking and pondering, until Charlie came out to call him in for supper.

Longarm and Charlie spent Sunday in bed except for getting up to eat and to tend to the horses. Their small talk was mostly about the robbers. Longarm had not told her what Willoughby said about the postmaster general and the possibility that she could lose the mail contract.

That was the subject that preyed on his mind the whole day, however.

Several times Charlie asked what he was so deep in thought about.

“Oh, nothing,” he responded each time, adding a smile to his lies.

“If you say so.” She obviously knew that he was lying, but she did not challenge him any further.

Will seemed to accept coming to meals and seeing his mother wearing nothing but a bathrobe. It was obvious that she was barefoot and happy at her stove.

After supper Will invited Longarm to go into town for a drink.

“My treat,” he said.

“Sounds fine. Let me get my coat an' hat.”

When they were out on the street, Will said. “Would you have any problem going down to Maybelle's for that drink, Custis?”

“No, o' course not,” Longarm said, lengthening his stride and heading in that direction.

Maybelle's whorehouse was busy when they got there, typical for a day when the miners and most businessmen were off work and had both free time and a little money to spend.

Will led the way into the parlor. A cute little redhead attached herself to Will and told Longarm, “Ma'am says you should get first pick of any of the girls and never mind who's in line ahead of you. I guess you're something special, huh?”

“Not really. An' I just came in here t' have a drink with Will. I won't be needin' a girl tonight so there's no cause t' get folks upset about who's next in line.”

He looked across the room to where Maybelle was standing at the wide doorway and gave the madam a salute with a forefinger to the brim of his Stetson.

Maybelle smiled and turned away to tend to business elsewhere.

“What are you drinking, Marshal?” a young Hispanic woman asked.

“Rye whiskey,” he said. “Neat.”

“Yes sir.” She was gone only a minute or so before she returned with a tumbler of excellent rye for Longarm and a tall, fruity something for Will. Will paid for both drinks.

Over the rim of his glass Will said, “You know, don't you, that my mom is hoping you'll stay up here permanently.”

“You mean buy into the line?” Longarm asked.

“Or into her,” Will said.

“I didn't know . . . look, Will, I got a job already. It's a good job an' I like to think I'm pretty good at it. But except for carrying this badge, I'm not really a very permanent kind o' fellow. I mean . . . I like your mother a lot an' I know she likes me, but . . . I'm not gonna marry her an' I don't figure to buy into the stage line neither. I hope you understand that. More important, I hope she'll understand it.”

Will nodded. “Good,” he said and took a drink of whatever it was he had ordered.

“You're all right with that?” Longarm asked.

“Truth is, I prefer it,” Will said. “Mama deserves to be happy, and I hope she is, but I have the feeling that you are not the man she needs. Not in the long run, that is. Uh, no offense intended.”

“None taken,” Longarm said.

“Good,” Will said again. He drained his glass and stood, heading for the little redhead who had greeted them when they arrived.

Longarm took his time with his rye then stood and ambled over to the doorway.

“Thanks for your courtesy,” he told Maybelle on his way out.