“there you go, Your Honor. That takes us to the midget, Cedric Hanks, and the lady being held over in that jail cell as a material witness. They were what they said they wer, bounty hunters. They knew they didn’t have the weight to ride out with the prisoner. They only wanted him to tell ‘em where the James Boys were, so they could collect on that much bigger bounty. They were playing their tune by ear, pumping the rest of us for information, obstructing us as best they could. Sort of like a kid tries to fix a stopped clock by hitting it a few licks and hoping.”
“You say the midget was the more vicious of the pair?”
“No sir, I said the smartest and most dangerous. I’ve sent a few wires and gotten more on ‘em to go with what the railroad detective first told me. Little Cedric had a habit of collecting his bounties the easy way and was probably in on more killings than we’d ever be able to prove. So it’s just as well he made things simple for us by acting so foolish. He was at least a suspect when he got killed trying to escape, so my office says I’m not to worry about it overmuch. I intend to hold his wife seventy-two hours on suspicion anyway, before we cut her loose. She said some mean things about this other lady and she’d best cool off until Miz Stover’s out of Salt Lake City.”
Longarm turned to the redhead and said, “I’ve been meaning to ask about that set-to before. I went to all that trouble to get Cotton Younger in here peaceable, pussyfooted to get you gals out of the room before I announced his arrest, and there you two were, rolling and spitting like alley cats between us, and he was able to make a break for it!”
Kim Stover blushed and looked away, murmuring, “If you must know, she passed a very improper remark and I slapped her sassy face for it. I suppose I shouldn’t have, but she sort of blew up at me. After that, it’s sort of confusing.”
“I’d say you were winning when the bailiffs halled you apart. You’re gonna have a mouse over that one eye by tonight, but she collected the most bruises.”
“She bit me, too. I daren’t say where.”
Judge Hawkins took out his pocket watch and said, “we’ve about wrapped this case up, and damned neatly, too, considering. By the way, Deputy Long, do you know a Captain Walthers, from the Provost Marshal’s office?”
“Yessir. They’ve heard about this over at Fort Douglas, have they?”
“Yes. I just got a hand-delivered message, demanding Cotton Younger as an army deserter.”
“You reckon they’ll get him, Your Honor?”
“Justice Department hand over spit to the War Department? I turned the fool message over and wrote, ‘Surely you jest, sir!’”
“They won’t think that’s funny, Your Honor.”
“So what. I thought it was funny as all hell.”
The train ride from Salt Lake City to Bitter Creek took about nine hours—a long time to go it alone and far too short a time sitting across from a very pretty redhead with a black eye.
They’d wound up things in Salt Lake City by mid-afternoon. So the sunset caught them more than half way to where Kim Stover and the others were getting off. They’d had dinner in the diner alone together, since the others were considerate, for cow hands, and Kim had stated that she was mourning Timberline’s demise, and was ready to forgive and forget where Longarm was concerned. He’d asked a friendly colored feller for some ice for her eye, but all it seemed to do was run down inside her sleeve, so she’d given up. He thought she was as pretty as a picture in the evening light coming in through the dusty windows, anyway.
She was studying him, too, as the wheels under the Pullman car rumbled them ever closer to the time when they would have to say goodbye. She licked her lips and said, “Your cigar is out again.”
“It’s a cheroot. I’m trying to quit smoking.”
“Don’t you allow yourself any bad habits?”
“Got lots of bad habits, Miss Kim. I try not to let ‘em get the better of me.”
“Is that why you never married?”
He looked out at the passing rangeland, orange and purple now, and said, “Soldiers, sailors, priests, and such should think twice before they marry. Lawmen should think three times and then not do it.”
“I’ve heard of lots of lawmen who’ve gotten married.”
“So have I. Knew a man who let ‘em shoot him out of a circus cannon for a living, too. Didn’t strike me as a trade I’d like to follow. He left a wife and three kids one night when he missed the net.”
“A woman who thought enough of a man might be willing to take her chances on widowhood.”
“Maybe. More to it than that. A man in my line makes enemies. I’ve got enough on my plate just watching MY own back. Could run a man crazy thinking of a wife and kids alone at home when he’s off on a mission.”
“Then you never intend to settle down?”
“After I retire, maybe. I’ll be pensioned off before I’m fifty.”
“Heavens! By the time I’m fifty we’ll be into the twentieth century!”
“Reckon so. These centuries do have a way of slipping by on us, don’t they?”
“You mean life, don’t you? I’m staring thirty down at medium range and there’s so much I’ve missed. So much I never got to do. My God, it does get tedious, raising COWS!”
Well, the price of beef is rising. You’ll likely wind UP rich and married up with someone, soon enough.”
