“Naw, he just … he just ain’t quite right. That’s about all you can say about him.”
Longarm said, “When was he found wandering down the road with a rifle?”
The barber was busy scraping away at Longarm’s face. He stopped and wiped the razor on the cloth under Longarm’s chin, then asked, “What would be your interest, mister? You a friend of the Castles? You must not be or you’d know who Virgil is.”
Longarm said, “Well, just general interest. I’m a … new in town. If there is someone running around naked carrying a rifle, I guess I’d just kind of like to know about that.”
He said, “The Castles are highly regarded around here. We don’t do much talking about them.”
Longarm asked, “Well, by any chance was it last night that he was found wandering down the road?”
The barber didn’t bother to stop shaving Longarm’s face. To Longarm, it seemed like he dug the razor in a little deeper. The barber said, “Like I said, mister, the Castles are pretty highly regarded hereabouts. We don’t do much talking about them. It ain’t good for business, if you know what I mean.”
“Suit yourself. Really ain’t none of my business anyways. I’ll be riding on in a couple of days.”
“That might not be a bad idea.”
When the barber was finished, Longarm got out of the chair and paid for the shave and the haircut. He put his hat on and carefully looked at the two loafers he had heard talking before walking outside. He stood on the boardwalk for a moment thinking, then as if on sudden impulse, mounted his horse and set off at a good pace for the railroad station and the telegraph office.
What he was going to do was a long shot and not particularly legal. Technically, the action that he was about to take was within his jurisdiction, but it was not the sort of thing that Billy Vail would smile about.
Once at the telegrapher’s office, he wrote out his message, took it over to the operator, and handed it to him silently. He watched the man’s face as he read it. When the man had finished the rather long message, he looked up, startled, at Longarm.
Longarm said evenly, “I’m going to give you some advice, my friend. That message is federal government business. If it goes out of this office … if any word of it comes out of your mouth, even to your grandmother, there is an outstanding chance that you’ll be spending a pretty good chunk of your life at Leavenworth Prison.”
The telegraph operator, who was a thin, chalky man with sunken cheeks, stared at him and gulped. Longarm slowly pulled his badge out and, holding it in the palm of his hand, shoved it in front of the telegrapher’s face.
He said, “Take a good look at it. Don’t make any mistakes.”
The telegrapher finally found his voice. He said, “Yes, sir. Yes, sir. I ain’t saying a word. Yes, sir. No, sir.”
Longarm said, “I just don’t want you to get confused as to who carries the most weight, the Castles or the United States government. In a fair fight, the United States government is going to win every time.”
“Yes, sir!” the telegrapher said.
“Send it.”
“Yes, sir.” The telegrapher wheeled on his stool, went to his desk, and began hitting the wireless key.
Longarm listened to the dots and dashes, knowing what the message said. He had wired a friend of his, a deputy marshal in Omaha, Nebraska. He had asked the deputy marshal to find a friendly federal judge and have that judge wire him a warrant for the arrest of the Castle family for the illegal importation of Mexican cattle and the illegal sale of those cattle inside the United States. He had closed the telegram by asking his friend not to question the reason, saying that he was on the track of something far more serious than the movement of Mexican cattle, and that he needed a handhold somewhere so he could move some of the obstacles that were blocking his path. He was fairly certain that his friend would understand and comply. He had chosen Omaha instead of Kansas City or St. Louis because he was fairly certain that the Castles would ship cattle to Omaha and the deputy marshal in Omaha happened to be a good friend of his. It was as simple as that.
When the message was sent, the telegrapher looked expectantly at Longarm as if awaiting further instructions. Longarm disappointed him by simply paying for the telegram and leaving without another word. He took the blank on which he had written out the message with him.
He rode back to his hotel, had a late lunch at a little cafe just down the street from the Cutler, and then went to his room, poured himself a drink, and sat down on the bed to think.
He was almighty curious about Virgil Castle. Could the killings indeed be the work of a weak-minded member of a powerful clan? Maybe they were too smart to believe that they could move the army by killing individual soldiers, but perhaps Virgil was a little too thick-headed to understand that and had just been trying to help matters along in his own muddled way. It made a plausible explanation. The man could have overheard his father or his brothers talking about the garrison, saying that it was standing in their way, and figured that the simplest way would be to shoot a soldier. He still didn’t know when Virgil had been spotted naked carrying a rifle, or even which road he had been seen on. Longarm immediately set his glass aside and went in search of Todd.
He found the young man in the lobby of the hotel. He drew him aside, told him what he had heard in the barbershop, and asked Todd if he had heard the same.
Todd looked around nervously. “Mr. Long, I don’t reckon that we ought to be talking about the Castles, especially Virgil. They don’t allow nobody to make fun of him.”
Longarm said, “I just want to know when he was seen walking naked down a road carrying a rifle.”
Todd looked around again to make sure that no one could overhear him. “It was last night … late last night.”
“You mean, like midnight or after?”
“Yes, sir,” Todd said. Then, with an appeal in his voice, he said, “Mr. Long, you ain’t gonna tell nobody that I told ya, are you?”
