and buy Dolly a cloak to cover the somewhat battered dress that was the only garment she’d had left after losing her horse and saddlebags while escaping from the posse that had been chasing her and Taylor. Longarm tried to persuade her to get a new dress too, but she’d refused. She was wearing the cloak now, of a light blue that brought out the almost white sheen of her long hair, which fell down her back in rippling waves.
After getting off the ferryboat that had taken them across the Arkansas to Fort Smith, they’d learned that the first train Dolly could take to her chosen destination wouldn’t pull out until mid-afternoon of the following day, so Longarm had taken a room for them at the Fenolio Hotel. It had been a long night and, predictably, neither of them had gotten much sleep. Dolly had been insatiable, and Longarm had kept responding to her urging for just one more time. Now, with only a few minutes left before the southbound train was due, they faced the inevitable parting that always convinces casual lovers they haven’t had enough time together.
Longarm saw Dolly’s eyes shift past him and her eyebrows pull together in a frown. He asked, “What’s the matter?”
“Windy, is the law here in Fort Smith looking for you?”
“Not that I know of. Why should they be?” Then, realizing his mistake as soon as he’d asked the question, he added quickly, “There hasn’t been time for me to get on the wanted list here in Arkansas, and I never have pulled any kind of job close to Fort Smith. Why?”
“There’s a man over by the wall there who’s been watching us. I thought once or twice he was going to come over to our table, but he never did.”
Longarm swiveled in his chair to look where Dolly’s eyes had been fixed. He saw nobody who seemed especially interested in them.
Dolly shook her head. “He’s not there now. When I looked away from him to talk to you, he just disappeared.”
“I don’t reckon it amounts to anything. Could be he mistook one of us for somebody he knew.”
“I guess that was it. And he left when he saw he was wrong.”
“Something like that.”
Outside the depot, the whistle of an approaching train sounded. Longarm said, “That’d be the Frisco southbound coming in; it’s the only train that’s due. Maybe we better get out on the platform. It only stops here for about ten minutes, just long enough for the baggage to be unloaded and the passengers to get on.”
“I’d like to stay with you, Windy. You know that.”
“Sure. I’d like for you to. But both of us know it just ain’t in the cards, Dolly.”
“No. Well…”
Dolly stood up. Longarm dropped fifteen cents on the table and they walked through the depot and out onto the platform. The train was just coming into sight. The engine passed them with a loud whoosh of steam from its cylinders as it slowed for the stop. The baggage cars slid by, and the porters and handlers began dragging their high, four-wheeled carts along, keeping abreast of the cars they’d be working. Passengers waiting to get aboard started shifting their positions to be where the day coaches and Pullmans would stop. From the coach windows, as the train finally halted, faces pressed against the windowpanes as those traveling beyond Fort Smith gazed out to scan the boarding passengers.
“Let’s walk back to the observation car,” Longarm suggested. “There’s not usually anybody on the last car when a train makes a stop. It’ll be a little bit more private than saying goodbye with all those people gawking at us.”
Dolly slipped her arm through Longarm’s as they walked slowly toward the back of the train. She said, “I don’t know how long I’ll be in Texarkana, but if you’re ever down that way-“
“Don’t worry, I’ll stop in.”
She smiled. “You don’t even know which saloon I’ll be at.”
“Won’t make any difference. Texarkana ain’t all that big a town. I’ll find you, if I come that way.”
Dolly suddenly became serious. “I’ll never see you again, will I, Windy?”
“It’s hard to say. A man in my line of work don’t know where he’s apt to turn up from one day to the next.”
“I don’t know how I’ll ever be able to thank you for everything you’ve done for me.”
“You don’t need to thank me for anything. You already have.”
A pair of short blasts sounded from the locomotive’s whistle, and the voice of the conductor called from the center of the train, “Boa-ard! All aboard!”
Longarm assisted Dolly up the steps of the observation platform, then followed her and stood on the bottom step. Dolly bent forward to kiss him goodbye. Their lips were still pressed together when the train began to inch forward. Longarm held his place until the observation car reached the middle of the station platform, then stepped off. Dolly lifted her arm to wave at him, and her expression changed from one of almost tearful sadness into a look of alarm.
“Windy!” she called. “Behind you! The man who was in the cafe!”
Longarm whirled. A burly man stood a dozen paces away, half-hidden by one of the latticed ironwork pillars that supported the roof over the platform. He was drawing a pistol from a shoulder holster.
Longarm drew as he dropped off the platform. The burly man had not yet cleared his revolver from its holster when he saw Longarm’s lightning-fast move. He stepped behind the pillar. Longarm had anticipated the move. He held his fire, and when his booted feet hit the cinder roadbed a foot or more below the level of the platform, he curled his legs under him and leaned to one side. The edge of the wooden platform now hid him from the stranger.
Down the track, the train was rounding a curve. Longarm was vaguely aware of Dolly, who still stood on the observation platform, a blur of blue cloak and white face, as the train moved on out of sight.
