“Before you go, Longarm, I want you to help me show the colors here at noon.”
“Show the colors? I don’t understand. You want me to do something with the flag, Boss?”
“I didn’t mean literally. But I want a nice show of force from as many of our people as we can put together this morning. There is a very important visitor I want you all seen by.”
“Mm?”
“A close friend of the president, actually. He’s been appointed Special Commissioner for Indian Affairs and sent here to look into the question of grazing rights on the Ute lands.”
Longarm grimaced. He was familiar with that particularly thorny problem. There was a large and highly vocal contingent of stockmen, ranchers who raised both beef and sheep, who felt they should have the right to graze unfenced lands including those claimed by the Ute nation. And there was a smaller but equally vocal group of moralizers, most of them not Coloradans at all, but fainthearted folks from back East who Longarm privately referred to as the Lo! the Poor Indian crowd, who supported Ute demands that the open lands be kept free of privately held livestock and available only to the Indians for their own hunting needs.
Neither side had yet expressed any willingness to compromise.
And each had solid political influence, the ranchers receiving support from senators and congressmen representing voting blocs in the West, and the Indians’ supporters enjoying the support of politicians in the East, and Midwest. Southern politicians seemed indifferent to the question; they had their own problems.
In any event, Longarm knew the question was a potentially explosive one, and whoever won this small and seemingly insignificant battle might well achieve a superiority of power that would carry over into other decisions for months or years to come, certainly until the next congressional elections, and possibly much longer. So yes, this visitor was important indeed, and could well have much influence on the entire western part of the country.
“The U.S. attorney and I will be hosting a luncheon for the commissioner and his wife,” Billy explained. “At the Cargile Club,” he added.
Longarm’s eyebrows went up and he whistled. “Fancy,” he said. Which was something of an understatement. The Cargile was without question the grandest, most elegant—and most expensive—outfit ever to hit Denver. Or probably anyplace else between San Francisco and—Longarm didn’t know, maybe Boston. Anyway, it was one highfalutin son of a bitch.
“I could wait until afternoon,” Longarm offered, “if you’d take me with you.” After all, going as the guest of someone with money and influence was the only way Custis Long would ever be allowed through the gilded doors of a place as tony as the Cargile Club.
“You know I’d take you except that you’re officially off duty now.”
“You haven’t signed that leave request yet,” Longarm pointed out.
“No? I thought I did.” Billy examined the form in his hand, leaned forward, and plucked his pen from the inkwell. He scrawled a signature onto the paper and said, “Of course I did. See there?”
Longarm chuckled and went gratefully out to the main office to wait for the informal reception to welcome the visiting dignitary. After all, he had his days off. That was what counted here.
“Goodbye, sir. Goodbye, all.”
Longarm stood among those who had drifted outside to see the party off to their luncheon. Longarm didn’t have any idea what the ass-kissers expected to accomplish by clinging to the coattails of the commissioner and his lady. Longarm’s motive in going along was to get the hell out of the building so he could grab a hackney and head for the hospital to tell Deborah that he would pick her up at the end of her shift. And after that … He grinned, thinking about what would come after that.
A carriage had been arranged for the short journey from the Federal Building on Colfax Avenue up past the State Capitol and on to the Cargile Club. The carriage was a handsome thing drawn by a sleek and perfectly matched four-up of dappled grays. Damned horses even had purple plumes on their headstalls. Which seemed a bit much in Longarm’s opinion, but then what in hell did he know about how a body is supposed to act when he’s rich and important. That was unexplored territory as far as Deputy Long was concerned.
“Bye,” Longarm mumbled softly as those around him called out best wishes. “Bet you ain’t gonna have near as much fun as me,” he added half under his breath so no one else could hear.
The commissioner and his wife were helped into the carriage by a fellow in some sort of red coat. Then the U.S. attorney and Billy Vail climbed in with somewhat less pomp and circumstance. The man in the red coat bent down to fold the steel steps away.
As he did so, a figure broke from the crowd that had gathered to see what all the carrying-on was about. The person was slight of frame and was wrapped in a heavy cloak. Longarm had a brief impression of long, black hair, tall boots beneath the hem of the swirling cloak … and a stream of thin smoke trailing from the running figure’s hand.
The cloaked form dashed directly at the carriage, swooped close behind the footman, and tossed something over the red-coated man’s shoulders and into the carriage.
Longarm felt a sickness in his belly and leaped forward. He was much too late, though. And whoever had cut the fuse on the bomb knew his business all too well. There was no time for anyone inside the carriage to react.
A flash of orange and red flame filled the windows of the rig, and a sharp, loud report boomed out to fill Colfax and stun the crowd into immobility.
The body of the carriage seemed to bulge, then to sag as the frame was broken and the body ripped apart. The back end broke completely away from the front part of the rig, and the terrified team dragged what was left of the wreckage down the street at as hard a run as they could manage.
Lying on the cobblestones where the entire carriage had been was the back end of the broken vehicle surrounded by bits of lacquered and charred wood.
And a broken body wearing a gay dress covered with ruffles and with blood.
Longarm tried to push his way through a suddenly hysterical crowd, his Colt held high as he hoped for a shot at
