by Tabor Evans
But even as he stepped down off the walk to cross the dusty sunlit street, he could picture the gallant little smile of a gal putting on a spanking new dress over bare flesh. So he muttered, "Shit!" and spun on one heel to retrace his steps to that shop.
So the bullet aimed at him with his next step out of the shade missed the small of his back by a whisker to hum on up Central Avenue until it thunked into the rump of a tethered cow pony and caused considerable excitement out front of that one saloon.
As the rump-shot pony neighed and bucked loose up yonder, Longarm threw his package over a watering trough and followed it headfirst to land on one shoulder and roll across the plank walk behind a rain barrel as, sure enough, a second bullet thunked into said barrel and Longarm pegged a shot of his own at a haze of gunsmoke drifting up from behind the false front of a shop across the avenue.
The little old lady popped out of her doorway like she thought it was the front of a cuckoo clock, demanding to know what was going on.
Longarm yelled, "Get back inside before you get your ass shot off!"
So she did and then a million years went by as rainwater pissed out of the barrel he lay behind to run across the planks and water the dry dust and horse turds with nothing else moving for blocks until Longarm heard a voice from behind him calling, "I see you behind yon rain barrel, cowboy! Rise and shine with your hands polite if you don't want two rounds of number nine buck up your ass. For I am the law and I have the drop on you!"
Longarm rolled on one elbow to gaze back along the shady side of the avenue. He called out to the older jasper aiming a double-barrel Greener his way, "I'm the law my ownself. Federal. Watch out for the false front above the stationery store catty-corner across from me. I suspect it was a Henry or Winchester that just fired my way, twice. That pony running off from the saloon behind you would have gone down if it had been hit with a buffalo round."
The Cheyenne lawman eased along the walk toward Longarm with his Greener trained more politely, albeit no shotgun charges were about to hurt anybody sheltered behind plank siding, that far off.
But the old-timer wasn't dumb. As he joined Longarm behind that big barrel, a lesser light tagging after him asked what came next. So the Cheyenne lawman said, "Go back. Get Pete and Simmons to go with you as you circle wide to move in behind that stationery store. Some son of a bitch just shot Jeff Wolheim's pony from yonder rooftop, and if he's still there I want him dead or alive!"
As his backup moved off, the old-timer introduced himself as a Marshal Casey. Town marshals got to do that. They both knew Longarm was the senior peace officer present when he introduced himself as a deputy marshal. He'd already told Casey he was federal.
Casey naturally wanted to know what the hell the two of them were doing behind that barrel.
Longarm told him, "I was only passing through on my way to a trail town called Keller's Crossing. I had just sent a wire saying I suspected I was on a fool's errand. You just pointed out how easy it is to say dead or alive in the heat of the moment. But somebody seems intent on keeping me from getting any closer to his or her odd situation."
Marshal Casey asked if they were talking about that rash of dead outlaws occasioned by tomboys packing guns and badges, by the great horned spoon.
Longarm said the attorney general and Billy Vail were sort of shocked by such unladylike behavior as well and asked what a lawman closer to the scene might have heard about it.
Casey hunkered around to brace his back against the planking with his shotgun across his knees as he replied, "You name it. We've heard it. None of them crazy shootouts have transpired here in the territory. But the smart-money boys have passed the word it ain't too smart to go anywhere's near Keller's Crossing with a running iron in one's saddle or larceny on one's mind."
Longarm cocked a thoughtful brow and said, "Ain't had any reports about lost, strayed, or stolen cows. But you just now said you've been hearing all sorts of rumors. Reminds me of other trail towns I've run across. There's nothing like tales of blood and slaughter to keep the faint at heart at bay, or, contrariwise, attract trouble the way an open pot of honey attracts flies."
Marshal Casey said, "Most of the saddle tramps and mean drunks in these parts would seem to have been avoiding Keller's Crossing since them loco lady peace officers have taken to acting so hard-hearted."
Longarm nodded grimly and replied, "I just said that. A heap of naturally wild kids settled down once word got around that Dodge City was a piss-poor place to shoot out streetlamps. On the other hand, hard cases such as Clay Allison, John Wesley Hardin, and those murderous Thompson brothers might never have drifted into Dodge if it hadn't sounded so lively."
Marshal Casey nodded thoughtfully and said, "I follow your drift. You're saying that as word gets around about a peace officer with a serious rep and a nice ass, any hard cases riding in to test her mettle are likely to be harder than usual?"
Longarm couldn't resist answering, "I ain't seen the ass of either J. P. Keller or Undersheriff Reynolds. Have you?"
The Cheyenne lawman grinned dirty but confessed, "Wouldn't know either gal if I woke up in bed with 'em. But word around here is that few men would complain if they found themselves in such a surprising situation. Talk to two saddle tramps and you get three descriptions. But I've been given to understand both gals are grass widows. A gal would have to have a muley streak to carry on so mannish to begin with if you ask this child!"
Longarm hadn't. But it was a point worth considering. Divorced women were called grass widows because, single as they might be in the eyes of the law, they still had husbands above the grass instead of below it, like decent widows were supposed to.
There was nothing unlawful about a woman being a grass widow, as long as she didn't mind the gossip. They'd already told him Keller's Crossing was dominated by a few founding families, with pushy distaff members of the same taking more interest in local politics.
They both heard a hail and saw a distant hat being waved above the rim of that false front above the stationery store.
Casey said, "That's Pete's old cavalry hat. Pete rid with the cav agin Red Cloud back in sixty-six."
He called out that they wouldn't shoot. A bare head and some with hats peered over the top rim of that false front at them. So the two of them got up and headed across.
Casey muttered, "I just hate it when they shoot and run like fool roaches in the lamplight."
He called up, "Any sign up yonder, boys?"
Longarm was as surprised when the one called Pete yelled down to them, "Plenty. There's an old boy up here with half his face torn off. Looks as if he caught some pine siding and a key-holing bullet smack in the mouth. Not long ago, judging from all the blood still oozing out of him. But whenever or whatever happened to him, he's dead as you told us to take him, Marshal!"
CHAPTER 8
When Longarm and Marshal Casey joined the others atop the flat roof across the way, Longarm saw he'd guessed right about the Henry rifle the sneaky cuss had been pegging away with. It lay beside him on the tar paper as he stared up wide-eyed from his bloody mangled face. Longarm's return fire had left cat's whiskers of splintered sun-silvered wood sticking to the raspberry jam around his shattered teeth. But one of said teeth was gold, the staring eyes were oyster gray, and the heavy brows above them met in the middle.
The tan ten-gallon hat over by a smoke flue went with his fancy tooled Justin boots and buscadero gun belt. So Longarm wasn't too surprised when he hunkered down to find a tooled leather wallet on the corpse with a library card allowing he was Thomas Taylor out of Amarillo.
He told the other lawmen assembled, "This adds up to a serious want known bests as Texas Tom Hatfield. He had state and private bounties posted on him. We wanted him for robbing a post office. The states of Texas and Arkansas want him for back-shooting peace officers in both jurisdictions. The Pinkertons are paying the most because of a train he robbed in Kansas."
He rose back to his considerable height and turned to
the town law to soberly add, "I am telling you all this because I'm up this way with other fish to fry. My own boss frowns on his deputies filing for reward money. You'd be welcome to as much as you can collect on this son of a bitch if you wanted to claim him as your very own and save me some paperwork."
Marshal Casey shot a sweeping look across the faces of his own men, there being no others up there with them, yet, and declared in a certain tone, "The son of a bitch put up a hell of a fight when we asked him what in thunder he was doing up here with that infernal Henry and no hunting permit. But just for the private peace of my soul, Deputy Long, what in blue blazes was this all about?"
To which Longarm was forced to reply, "I ain't sure. This rascal had a rep for back-shooting lawmen, on his own or for pay. Since I just recognized him as a wanted killer, he might have recognized me earlier and decided to kill me on his own. It's just as possible, and as likely, somebody else wanted me killed lest I be getting warm. If I knew whether I was getting warm or not I wouldn't have to guess so hard."
He moved toward the fire steps they'd all climbed up as he continued, "I got to get it on back to my hotel with a package I dropped across the way. Had this skunk known where I was staying, he wouldn't have been following me around. I reckon he, or they, were watching for me by the Western Union. That's where I'd watch for a lawman on a field mission if I'd just heard he was in town."
One of the younger deputies started to ask how come the late Texas Tom had scaled those fire stairs with yonder rifle instead of just letting fly with it over by the telegraph office.
Before Longarm or Casey could reply, a more weather-beaten deputy snorted in disgust and said, "He wanted to get away with it, you asshole. All sorts of folk point fingers at you when you gun a man on the streets of Cheyenne in broad-ass daylight. If he hadn't missed from up here, he'd have just laid low ahind yonder false front until his gunsmoke and the excitement faded away. Weren't you paying any attention when we shot it out with him, just now?"
The kid deputy grinned sheepishly and allowed he'd forgotten. So Longarm knew he was free to climb down from the roof and elbow his way against the current of the gathering crowd.
There was hardly anybody on the far side of the street in front of the notions shop. He saw nobody had lifted the brown paper package he'd thrown against the siding near the entrance. As he bent to pick it up, Daisy Gunn A. K. A Crawford joined him, breathless, barefoot, and back in her mannish duds, to sob, "Oh, Custis! I knew you were mixed up in it as soon as I heard the shots and folk in the hall commenced yelling about a shootout betwixt lawmen and a rooftop sniper!"
Longarm grabbed her gently but firmly by one thin arm and frog-marched her inside, where the nice old lady was holding a broom as if to repel boarders as she wailed, "Get out of here before I call the law, you ruffian!"
Longarm moved Daisy back from the front glass as he told the little old lady, "I am the law and I only talked rough because you were in the line of fire, ma'am. This other lady, though you wouldn't know it, is the one I just bought them more ladysome duds for. Now, I have yet another business proposition for you. How much would you charge me to let my deputy, here, dress up more girlish and stay here with you as if she was hired help or a visitor from other parts?"
The older gal told him not to be ridiculous. Then, being a gal, she asked him what they were talking about.
Longarm explained, "I am U.S. Deputy Marshal Custis Long. This here is Deputy Daisy Crawford. Like you can see, I've had her disguised as a boy because she's working undercover for the U.S. Government and me. Them shots just fired at me from across the way may mean the crooks we're after have been watching us a spell. Me and Miss Daisy were checked into the Pilgrim Hotel. By now the other side might know this."
The older woman stared primly at the raggedy barefoot waif he'd just described as a girl checked into a hotel with him and sniffed, saying, "You should both be ashamed of yourselves, working under cover or on top of the covers!"
It was Daisy who blazed, "He ain't been fucking me, ma'am. He's been so pure it makes me want to puke!"
The older woman looked away, red-faced and trying not to bust out laughing. Longarm said, "I ain't asking you to hide me, ma'am. I need a place to hide Deputy Daisy where I won't have to worry about her as I do some scouting ahead."
She didn't look convinced.
Daisy asked what he was talking about, asking, "Didn't you tell me we were fixing to sneak out of town together as soon as it got dark?"
Longarm nodded and said, "I did, and like Mr. Robert Burns wrote, the best laid plans of mice and men get old and gray when the other side could be on to 'em. They may or may not know I checked into that hotel with a ragamuffin of indeterminate sex. Whether they've taken you for a sissy boy or a mighty rough gal, they'll be expecting us to still be together when, not if, they notice we ain't at the Pilgrim Hotel no more. So I'd be harder to spot, sneaking about alone, while you'd be harder to spot doing the same, in a whole new outfit, as soon as I figured it was safe to send for you, see?"
Daisy didn't. It was the more worldly shopkeeper who set aside her broom to explain, "I see his plan and it makes a lot of sense, dear. He chose some much more feminine clothes for you, earlier. If we did something about those farm girl braids... Perhaps an upswept hairdo with just a little discreet powder and paint... I could introduce you as a niece I'm breaking in, unless you'd feel safer hiding out up in my quarters above the shop."
Daisy said, "Oh, Lord. I've been cooped up less than one day in a hotel room and it feels like being in a soft jail. I got this gun in my hip pocket if anybody comes in here after me."
Longarm and the older woman exchanged more grown-up glances. He shrugged and said, "I had to deputize her in a hurry. The right sort of help can be hard to find at short notice."
The little old lady smiled thinly and replied, "So I can see. May I consider myself one of your posse, or would you describe us as a harem?"
Longarm laughed easily and said, "My boss would never go along with that notion and, even if he would, I ain't a Turk nor Mormon, ma'am. So I reckon we'd best describe you as a concerned citizen, and how much is this going to cost the justice department?"
The little old lady said, "People who know me well enough to ask such questions call me Covina, Covina Rivers. If Daisy, here, is willing to help around the shop, make her own bed upstairs, and behave herself in general, we'll call it even. As you said, good help is hard to find."
Longarm said she had to charge Daisy's grub at the going army and civil-service rate of four bits a day. So they shook on it, and old Covina carried Daisy and her new duds to the back of the store, where she was supposed to change and stay put until quitting time.
As she drifted the other way with Longarm, she told him she knew how to make a tomboy look like a young lady. She suddenly blurted out that she'd been considered poised as well as pretty, one time.
Longarm smiled down at her in the doorway to reply, "You're still a handsome woman, Miss Covina. I've known ladies with older-looking faces who did wonders and ate cucumbers with a little help from a bottle of henna or sepia tincture."
She sniffed and said that would be a cheap trick. He had no call to argue. Portia Parkhurst, attorney-at-law seemed sort of proud of her gray hairs, all over, as well. As they parted in the doorway he tried not to picture either sweet old thing allowing him even a peek at their pubic hairs by lamplight. He assured old Covina he'd wire complete instructions from wherever he might be when and if he thought it safe for Daisy to break cover.
As he made to leave, old Covina grabbed his sleeve and demanded, "Have you two been telling me the truth, about your relationship, I mean? She's really attractive, and a woman can tell when another woman is ready and willing."
Longarm sighed and said, "I'd be a liar if I said I wasn't willing, Miss Covina. I'm a natural man, and all men should be horsewhipped regular for the willing thoughts they have about you ladies. I ain't got time to explain why a lawman can't afford to indu
lge such thoughts with a lady who may have to back his play in a federal court. I told her why, and I'm sure the two of you will have plenty of time to jaw about each and every thing I've ever said or done to her."
The older woman showed how worldly she might be indeed by laughing lightly and declaring, "I guess that means there's no hope for poor little me, either, you unfeeling brute."
He laughed back and lit out, lighting up along the way as he told himself to stop picturing that nice little old lady buck naked. She'd likely been a looker as well as a prick teaser in her day. And he'd found what Ben Franklin had written about older women could come as a pleasant surprise, indeed.
Dr. Franklin, writing to a young diplomat in Paris, France, had advised him to take up with old French widow women instead of young wives who'd get them into duels or chambermaids who'd get them into trouble with their papas. Franklin had opined and Longarm had found it true that, just as a tree could turn funny colors from the top as the sap was still running sweet farther down, in older-looking gal could still have a lot of juicy life left in her while, above all, as old Ben had pointed out, they were more likely to feel grateful than sore at a man in the cold gray dawn.
Longarm laughed at himself and Ben Franklin as he strode on to the hotel with neither Daisy's duds nor Daisy waiting for him now. He had to go back, himself, to fetch his possibles, saddle, and Winchester. If he hadn't, he'd have holed up somewhere else, himself, until it was safer for certain to move on. For anybody who'd learned he was there in Cheyenne was as likely to know which hotel he'd checked into under his own fool name, leaving instructions for his home office to wire him there.
So he entered the Pilgrim the sneaky way and slipped up the back steps, where he discovered to his relief that the match stem he'd stuck in his door crack was still in place.
He let himself in, scooped up his load, and let himself out just as sudden after tossing both his and Daisy's keys atop the unmade bed for the chambermaid to carry down to the desk after check-out time.
