for it always seems to be the ugliest rumors that spread the quickest and take the deepest roots.
Angela Fulton gathered up a light shawl to put over her shoulders against the chill of the evening, then said her goodbyes. Longarm stood to watch her out of the house, then sat back down again to finish his cheroot while Buddy turned to the chore of cleaning up the dishes and wiping down the table. To his credit the kid didn’t skimp on the job and didn’t try to put it off either. Nor, Longarm noticed, did he resume the lighthearted talkativeness that he’d been given to earlier. Back, Longarm realized, when he’d thought the income from this overnight guest would keep his ma from having to go out and work tonight.
Once his smoke was done Longarm stretched and contemplated the remainder of an evening that was still very young. The sun was barely down, and all he had to look forward to now was the dubious comfort to be found on the stretched canvas cot where Buddy normally slept.
“I tell you what, son.”
“Yes, sir?”
“You don’t need me around here, and I’m sure not sleepy enough yet to be wanting to go to bed. I think I’ll wander down the way an’ see can I find a card game to sit in on.”
“Oh, I don’t think there’s any gambling allowed around here, mister. I’m pretty sure it’s again’ the law.”
“If I can’t find a game then, Buddy, I’ll settle for a drink and a little conversation. You aren’t scared of being alone here, are you?”
“No, sir.”
“All right then. You tend to things here. And don’t worry. I won’t be out late, and when I come in I’ll be real quiet in case you’re asleep.”
“I won’t be asleep, mister.” The boy looked upset, although Longarm didn’t know what he had to be concerned with.
Longarm retrieved his hat from the wall hook where Mrs. Fulton had left it. With a wink and a cheerful word to Buddy, Longarm went out into the cool night air that swept down through the Cargyle canyon to spill out onto the grassy flats that began here at the canyon mouth.
Chapter 14
The saloon—it was the biggest and most popular of the several that were available at this unofficial end of Cargyle—was so cheap and basic that they didn’t stock any form of rye whiskey, much less the excellent Maryland distilled rye that was Longarm’s preference. They had bar whiskey—Lord only knows what might be found in it in addition to bulk alcohol; tobacco, red peppers, and gunpowder were common ingredients—at twelve and a half cents or bottled bourbon at fifteen cents. Longarm took a look at the stained and faded labels on the bourbon bottles and suspected the only difference between the bourbon and the bar whiskey here would turn out to be the price. He settled for beer, and strolled to the side of the room where, Buddy’s cautions apart, there was some gaming in progress.
It took Longarm little more than a glance to decide that these were not friendly games among gents who were whiling the hours away. These were serious attempts by poor workingmen to wrest gaudy sums of cash from the house.
Wherever one can find a deck of cards, a pair of dice, or a wheel of fortune one can also find hope. Longarm understood that. What he also understood, and these soot-stained miners obviously did not, was that generally speaking a gambling house doesn’t take any gambles when it opens a game for play. In all games the edge belongs to the house. Hell, that’s what all the rules are for, to ensure that basic truth.
Some houses are greedier than others, but there really isn’t any need for any of them to rig their wheels or load their dice. An edge belonging to the house is built right into the play. The house will just naturally win, even at poker, where a genuinely honest game can be played whenever the house is willing to take a rake off the ante of each hand and leave everything else to the relative skills of the players. That, Longarm knew, was the fairest and most honest play available in any casino or gaming hall.
Still, some folks can’t be content with winning a constant percentage. They want to take it all. And judging from what he could see here, whoever ran this place wanted it all.
Within ten minutes of standing there sipping at his beer Longarm could spot three shills who were working for the place. They were easy to locate. They were the ones that were winning. And of course every time one of them won, there was a loud hurrah as onlookers cheered and hangers-on crowded close so they too could play at the “hot” tables where all this winning was taking place.
The whole thing was damn near funny because the shills were so blatant they didn’t even pretend to be workingmen themselves. They dressed in rough clothes and clodhopper brogans, but their fingernails were clean and the backs of their necks had seen neither coal dust nor bright sun in many a year. And these boys won no matter what games they played. Roulette, the wheel of fortune, craps, faro, or poker, it didn’t matter. They’d lose a little, then win a lot. And every time one of them won it spurred the suckers—the real players—on to fresh enthusiasm.
Longarm was tempted to sit in on one of the games just so he could have the pleasure of exposing the sham. It wouldn’t be hard to do. Find the wire, the magnet, the birdshot, the marks … whatever. Lay it out for all to see and raise some hell. But dammit, cheating at cards wasn’t exactly a federal offense, and personal satisfaction wasn’t what Longarm had come here to find.
The sensible thing for him to do, he knew, was to go quietly away. Get a good night’s sleep and maybe talk about this place when he saw Harry Bolt in the morning.
After all, this was Harry’s town, not his. And Longarm had good reason to know how touchy Harry Bolt could get. Passing Harry off before he ever said howdy probably wasn’t a tactic Billy Vail would approve.
So Longarm kept his mouth shut and his cash in his pocket. He reckoned he’d finish this beer and go back to the Fulton house. If nothing else, maybe they’d have something there that he could read until he got sleepy enough to head for the blankets. He manufactured a yawn in an attempt to encourage a drowsy state of mind, and took another look around the crowded barroom.
He looked. And then looked hard yet again. There was something about one of the bar girls that … aw, shit, he told himself.
The woman caught his eye as he was staring at her. Beneath the white powder and bright red rouge she paled and gasped for breath. After a moment’s hesitation she started across the floor to where Longarm stood gaping at her.
