“Sure you are!”
“No, it’s true! Jimmy saved my life a few years ago, and I’ve come to try and return the favor.”
“Well,” Eli said, “I expect that you are way late. Like I said, Jimmy was havin’ hard times, and I believe he just made up the whole story. Could be he even got someone to give him those Spanish coins so they could work the local folks into a frenzy and start another gold rush. That kind of thing does a lot for the local businessmen, you know.”
“I see your point,” Longarm said, “but it just doesn’t sound like the kind of thing that Jimmy Cox would do. I mean, his word was his bond. He was a little crazy and difficult to be around sometimes, but he wasn’t the kind to pull off that type of complicated hoax.”
Eli shrugged. “Then someone else talked him into it. I dunno. But I’ll guarantee you it was a hoax and one that I figure backfired and got old Jimmy plugged.”
“Help me to find him,” Longarm whispered. “Help me to get to the bottom of his disappearance.”
“No,” Eli said grabbing the bottle and starting to rise. “It’s too damn dangerous.”
Longarm clamped his hand on the prospector’s wrist. “I need your help and I’m willing to pay for it.”
Eli relaxed, then slumped back down in his chair. “So,” he said, “you do have money. What are you, a rancher or someone important?”
“No,” Longarm said. “Anyway, the reasons why I want to find Jimmy are good and they don’t include murdering him for some Spanish coins. I really do owe the man my life, and I mean to repay him at any cost.”
“I need a good grubstake,” Eli said. “A real good grubstake.”
“Which would cost?”
“About a hundred dollars ought to be enough.”
“I’ve got that much money being wired to me from Denver,” Longarm said. “Thing of it is, the money was sent to Prescott and is probably resting in the bank.”
“So we can go get it!”
“Maybe,” Longarm said, not wishing to go into the business of the Prescott bank’s being closed because of a death. Better, he decided, to just use some of the recovered cash he’d gotten before torching the Bass gang’s cabin.
“Listen, Eli, I’ll get the money somehow. The thing that’s important is that you have some idea of where to start looking for my friend. It’s big country out there, and I don’t have any time to waste.”
“I have a fair idea where he was heading when he left town the last time,” Eli admitted.
“Good! Then we can leave tomorrow.”
“We can leave when you get your money and grubstake us,” Eli corrected. “Tomorrow, or the next day, or the next, it don’t matter to me.”
“Well,” Longarm said, “it matters to me. Jimmy Cox may be suffering torture right now.”
“Or singing with a harp in heaven or howling in hell,” Eli added.
“Yeah, that too,” Longarm replied. “Tomorrow then?”
“You leavin’ me with this bottle still half full?”
“I am,” Longarm said. “I’m leaving while I’ve still got a stomach and I suggest that you do the same.”
Eli chuckled. “I been drinkin’ this and worse for forty years and I’m healthy as a horse. Guess that I’ll finish this bottle.”
“I’ll get the money and meet you here tomorrow morning,” Longarm told the man. “Just be sober enough to buy what we need and leave.”
“You got a horse?”
“No.”
“Good,” Eli said. “We’ll walk. Better buy yourself some extra heavy boots.”
“No,” Longarm said, “you walk if that’s your style. I’m buying or renting a horse.”
“Suit yourself, but he’ll have a damned hard go of it out there on the desert without food nor water.”
Longarm scowled. Maybe, he thought, he had better forget about a horse after all. “How far do you think we’ll have to go to find Jimmy?”
“He’ll be within fifty miles, one way or the other.”
This news did not comfort Longarm. “All right, Eli. But if you’re leading me on a dead-end trail, you’re going to be real damned sorry.”
The prospector cackled softly as he poured another drink. “Mister,” he said, “I’ve always been sorry. I’ll die sorry. Don’t matter to me, though, as long as I die rich.”
Longarm left the man. He collected his old saddle, blanket, and bridle at the door and visited a couple more saloons, asking if anyone had seen Hank Bass. No one had, so he wearily returned to his hotel room.
He slept long and well that night. When he awakened, Longarm dressed, shaved, and went to the telegraph office to find out about the condition of Victoria’s fiance.
“Mr. Potter died of his gunshot wounds yesterday,” the telegraph operator announced. “There’s a funeral tomorrow morning in Prescott at ten o’clock.”
