blast of a gun? There’d been a piece about it in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Weekly. A silenced shot might explain a lot, but the shots just fired at him had sounded like a plain old .44-40. Even with a silencer, the Wendigo would have to be a fancy marksman to pick folks off in the dark from any distance. Luckily, whoever’d just been blazing away at him hadn’t been too good a shot.
Aloud, he muttered, “Shit, a man picks up a lot of enemies packing a badge. Could have been just about anyone.”
He passed a reservation marker where, though the locals trespassed their cows a mite along the edges, the brush began to thin out, replaced by the short-grass God had put there in the first place. The Blackfoot didn’t have enough stock to graze this far from the agency. The prairie hereabouts was unspoiled. The land was tough enough to take the antelope and jack’s occasional attentions. With the buffalo shot off, the virgin range was fat enough to seem indecent. Lots of last summer’s straw was still standing. He’d have to tell Cal Durler it was time they either burned it off on purpose or had a wildfire from the sparks thrown by a passing train.
He followed the right-of-way, noting a couple of cuts he considered high enough for someone attempting to get aboard a train without a ticket, but when he took the time to investigate each one for sign, he found none. He came to the place where they’d found Roping Sally and swung away to head for the agency. All he’d learned was that someone was out to kill him, but he’d known that much before.
He found Nan Durler alone at the agency. She said her husband had driven Prudence Lee into town and added, “You should have met them on the road.”
Longarm said, “Didn’t come back by way of the wagon trace. Is Miss Lee leaving?”
“No, she said she had some shopping to do. They’ll likely be back for supper in a few hours. What happened to you? You look like you’ve been rolling in the dirt!”
“I have. The dust’ll brush out of my clothes, but I could use a bath and a fresh shirt.”
“We’ve a washtub in the back shed you could use,” she offered, “if you’ve a mind to. I’ll boil some water and fetch you a towel and soap.”
Longarm left his coat and gun rig on the bed in the guest room and lugged four buckets of pump water to the tub as the Indian agent’s wife put two big kettles on the kitchen range. She served him coffee at the table while they waited for the water to heat up.
He noticed that Nan wasn’t having any as she sat across the table from him. When he commented on this, she brushed a strand of hair from her forehead and sighed, “It seems all I do out here is drink that goddamn coffee. Next thing you know I’ll be dipping snuff. I’m beginning to feel like one of those white-trash girls I used to feel so sorry for.”
“I reckon it does get tedious out here for a woman alone, but you’ve got Prudence Lee to talk with, now.”
“Good God, she’s no more company than my husband! All either of them seems interested in are these infernal Indians! Prudence prattles endlessly about their heathen souls and Calvin’s up half the night fretting about his balance sheets! You’d think it was important that they got his model farm working on a paying basis, for heaven’s sake!”
Longarm took a slow sip of his coffee. “Well, it’s likely important to Cal. He’s got a heap of responsibilities out here for a man so young.”
“So young is right! Sometimes I feel like I’m his mother. The trouble is, I never married him to be his mother.”
“Well,” he tried to console her, “you’ll doubtless have some real kids to mother, sooner or later.”
“With Calvin?” She laughed, a bit wildly. Then she stared at the spoon she was bending out of shape between her fingers on the table and muttered, “Not hardly. A woman needs a man to be a mother.”
Longarm rose from the table, leaving half of his cup filled, and said uncomfortably, “Uh, I’ll fetch my fresh shirt and such. Water’s boiling, now.”
He went to his room and dug out some clean underwear before heading for the porch shed. He noticed Nan was still at the table, fidgeting with the spoon. He went out back and closed the shed door behind him before he remembered that he’d forgotten to pour the boiling kettles into his tepid well water. He hesitated, then decided he could get as clean in cold water.
He stripped, hanging his clothes on the nails Calvin had driven in the plank walls, and gingerly got into the tub, hunkering down in the well water, which was neither warm nor freezing. He lathered himself with the washrag and turned the water chocolate-brown with trail dust. It would likely dry somewhat gritty on him, but at least he wouldn’t smell bad in his fresh shirt.
The door opened. Nan Durler was standing there with a kettle.
Stark naked.
Her voice was calm as she said, “You forgot the hot water for our bath.”
Longarm studied the brown water between his wet knees as he answered in a desperately casual tone, “Our bath, ma’am? This tub’s a mite small for two and, uh, your man might think me a mite forward if he came home to find us like this.”
“I told you they’ll be in town for hours,” she reassured him. “You just stay the way you are and I’ll put a foot on either side and sort of sit down facing you. I think we’ll both fit right nicely, don’t you?”
“Nan, you’re a married woman,” he protested.
“Come on, you know you want me.”
“What I want or don’t want ain’t the point. Your husband is a friend of mine,” he told her.
“Would to God he’d be more friendly to me! I need it, Longarm! I need a man inside me so bad I can taste it! Come on, we’ve got all afternoon. If you don’t want to do it here, let’s go back inside and do it right on the bed!”
She moved her blonde pubis provocatively and laughed hysterically. “You can have me on the bed. You can have me on the kitchen table. I don’t care where we do it, just so we do it, right now!”
