“I, um …”
“Oh, you don’t have to say anything out loud. Not that I’d carry tales back to Denver, but you can’t know that. Better for you to keep your mouth shut than trust a stranger. I won’t take offense.”
Surely, Longarm thought, this fella couldn’t be for real. He was so … likable. Jeez. Nobody could be that transparent. Not really. Probably he was trying to lull Longarm into giving something away. Not that he could figure out what that something might be. But this Smith, or maybe it was Jones, he was up to some damn thing. Had to be.
“Excuse me a minute, would you, Long?” The man grinned and shuffled his feet some more. All right, so maybe he didn’t actually bob his head and shuffle his feet, but that was kind of the impression he gave. Then he turned to ask the Indian with him to greet the Ute headman for him.
The Indian, it seemed, was an interpreter that the Secret Service agent had brought along with him. The Indian in the derby hat said something to Bad Eye in a guttural, slightly slurred version of the Ute tongue that even Longarm knew enough to realize wasn’t an especially good rendition of the language. Fortunately, he backed up the spoken words with gestures in the pretty much universal sign language used by most all the Plains tribes, so no matter how bad he was at speaking in Ute, the two would be able to understand each other.
Bad Eye never blinked, taking it all in and responding in a fast burst of his own language.
Longarm figured if Bad Eye wanted to lay low and not let on that he spoke English, well, that was his affair. Longarm wasn’t going to take the hanky off the bush and expose him.
“This man is chief of tribe,” the derby Indian intoned in a sonorous voice, not necessarily accurately, but spoken with conviction regardless. “His name is Dead Sea. He welcome Agent Smith as his white father.” Which at least solved that small puzzle. This was the one who called himself Smith.
“Tell Dead Sea …,” Smith began, and the dance had begun. Longarm figured this was apt to go on for quite a while, and judging by the preliminary rounds, would likely end up with all parties hopelessly confused. Hell, there were worse things that could happen.
“Excuse me, Smith,” Longarm said in a soft voice while the two Indians were busy grunting at each other.
“Yes, Long?”
“I reckon you got things under control here, so I think I’ll move along. No sense in the two of us duplicating efforts, right?”
“Certainly, Long.” The so-called Smith smiled a smile that Longarm would have sworn looked genuine … if he didn’t already know better than to trust the son of a bitch. “And don’t worry. I won’t say a word to anyone back in Denver about … you know.”
“Right. Thanks.”
The two shook hands, and Longarm placed himself behind Smith’s Indian where Bad Eye could see him, then sketched a few signs in the air to tell Bad Eye goodbye, that they would talk more later.
Bad Eye grunted loudly and made signs to say thanks for the whiskey. Which confused the hell out of the derby Indian, and brought Smith into the picture as he hurried to explain that they had a wagon load of stuff as presents for the great Ute people but that they hadn’t brought whiskey with them because that would have been against the law.
Longarm hid his amusement and got the hell out of there while he could manage to do so without laughing out loud. He was pretty sure Bad Eye wouldn’t explain what he’d meant by the sign. And if he did, the interpreter would likely get the explanation wrong anyway. Longarm suspected Smith wasn’t going to learn a whole hell of a lot while he was there. But bless the handsome young fellow’s heart for trying, right?
Longarm got his gear together and headed north toward Florissant and the quick route back to civilization.
Chapter 20
Longarm was seated in a rocking chair on the front porch when Henry got home from work. It was well past dark already, but Longarm was content enough. His belly was full and he had a cheroot twined in his fingers. It was not entirely unknown for the dedicated clerk to work long hours whenever necessary, and Longarm was willing to wait however long it took so he could be caught up on whatever might have taken place while he’d been away.
“Hello, Longarm. Come inside away from the mosquitoes,” Henry suggested as he unlocked his front door and led the way in.
Longarm hadn’t particularly noticed any mosquitoes around, but then maybe the smoke from his cigar kept them away. He stood, yawning, and followed his friend indoors. “Hope you don’t mind me waiting for you here,” he said.
“It’s the sensible thing to do.” Henry smiled and continued with the task of lighting the lamps in his parlor, then moving back into the kitchen with Longarm trailing close behind. “You can’t exactly show yourself at the office right now, can you.”
“No, but I’m sure anxious to hear what the other boys are findin’. Me, I didn’t learn much so far. Except that I’d swear the Utes I talked with didn’t do the bombing themselves an’ don’t know anything about anybody else with such a plan either.”
“I wish I could give you a better-informed report than I have, Longarm, but you’re the first of our renegades—if I can use that term—who has gotten back to the city. I did get a brief wire from Dutch. He is at the Ute agency headquarters over on the west slope. He says he has found nothing so far, but will continue his inquiries there. Smiley is in Canon City. God knows what he is working on down there. Talking with some of his less reputable friends inside the prison possibly. But that is mere guesswork. All I know about it is where he went. He did not tell me why. As for the rest of our people”—Henry shrugged—“they are scattered hither and yon but have not yet reported back anything worth knowing.”
“And the official investigation?” Longarm asked.
Henry’s expression turned sour. “it is a muddle, Long. A complete mess. The acting U.S. attorney has people dashing around in a dozen directions at once, so many of them they stumble over each other and get in each other’s way, but no one has come up with anything worth knowing. Which is hardly surprising under the circumstances.”
