Justice, and I’ll kill anyone who tries to stop me!”
“You talking about me or them vigilantes all around outside?”
“Both. I’ve had just about enough of their nonsense and I’m not too happy about the way you’ve been trying to whittle your opposition down to size. I warn you, if you make any attempt to run me out…”
“Hey, look here, he’s got a copy of this month’s Capon Billy’s Whiz-Bang. It’s pretty humorous. You oughta read it sometime. Do wonders for your disposition. Nobody’s aiming to run you out, old son. I didn’t run the old man or the railroad dick out of Crooked Lance, and I shot that other feller fair and square. What’s eating you? You are a real Mountie, ain’t you?”
“You want to see my credentials?”
“Nope. My boss told me to expect a Mountie here, and I doubt anyone else would want to wear that red coat.” Longarm’s eyes narrowed, thoughtfully.
The Mountie asked, “What’s wrong? You look like you just thought of something new.”
“I did. I’m starting to feel better about that feller I just shot. There was somebody from the Clay County Sheriff’s office coming out here. That bounty hunter must have waylaid him! Somewhere in the mountains there’s at least two lawmen buried!”
The Mountie put a hand in his tunic and took out a leather billfold, saying, “I insist you read my Sergeant’s Warrant. You’ll note it gives my description in addition to my name.”
Longarm scanned it and said, “You’re likely Sergeant Foster, right enough.”
“William DeVerrier Foster of the Royal Canadian Northwest Mounted Police, to be exact. May I see your identification?”
Longarm grinned and took out his own billfold, showing his badge and his official papers to the other. The Mountie nodded and asked, “Have you checked Captain Walthers’ credentials?”
“Didn’t have to. I asked him a few trick questions since we met. Besides, who but an army man would be after a deserter? You got a point. Maybe you do get your man, most times.”
“Do I have your assurance you’ll not try to get rid of me as you did the others?”
Longarm nodded and said, “You got my word I won’t shoot you or try to buy you off with reward money.”
He’d already decided there had to be some other way.
Longarm didn’t ask Captain Walthers to show his i.d. He knew the Mountie would, and it was just as well they didn’t get to be friends.
By noon the dead man had been buried, amid considerable whooping and shooting off of cowpoke’s guns. One could get the impression that folks in Crooked Lance didn’t get many occasions for a celebration. Longarm didn’t attend the funeral. He was not a friend of the deceased and it seemed an opportunity to have a word with the prisoner.
It wasn’t. A pair of hard-looking men with rifles stood by the log jail and when Longarm said he wanted to talk to Cotton Younger they told him it would be over their dead bodies. He considered this for a moment, and decided it wasn’t his best move.
As he walked over to the general store the midget, Cedric, fell in step at his side, taking three strides to each of Longarm’s as he puffed his big cigar and piped, “We’re gonna have to make our play damned sudden, Longarm. Cotton Younger don’t figure to keep much longer.”
“How’d it get to be our play, and what are you talking about, Cedric?”
“There’s advantages to being a detective knee-high-to-a-grasshopper, big man. Us little fellers can get into places most folks don’t consider.”
“You been listening to folks from under your wet rock?”
“That’s close enough. Want to know what the talk in town is, now?”
“Maybe. What’s making you so friendly, all of a sudden?”
“I don’t like you, either. Never have liked you, even before you had your way with my woman, but I don’t play this game for likes or don’t likes. I’m in it for cash. You want to trade more insults, or do we work together?”
“Depends on what we’re talking about, Cedric. Suppose you start with something I don’t know.”
“They’re fixing to lynch Cotton Younger.”
“What? That don’t make a lick of sense, damn it!”
“You met anybody in this one-horse town with a degree from Harvard yet? I overheard some of Timberline’s hands talking about a necktie party. You see, the redhead, Kim Stover, is the brains behind the scheme to build up Crooked Lance with the proceeds of… whatever. When I say ‘brains,’ I ain’t saying much, for as me and Mabel see it, the game is as good as up. Ain’t nobody here in town fixing to get paid a thing but trouble.”
“That’s what we’ve all been telling’em.”
“I know, and everyone but that stubborn widow woman can see it.”
“Then why don’t Timberline turn the prisoner over and have done with the mess?”
“He can’t. He’s in love with the redhead and she’d never speak to him again if he double-crossed her like that.”
