“What are they doing now?”
“The driver is starting the horses. Now he’s wheeling them around. They are going to head south. In about thirty seconds they’re going to be out of my view.”
Longarm got to his feet. “I am much obliged to you, sir. I’ll see you when I get back. Maybe we’ll have a drink and talk about it.”
The telegrapher said, “If you’re going to follow them folks, you had better get high behind because they are a-movin’. They’ve already gone out of my sight.”
Longarm rushed out of the office and hurried around the building on the track side back toward the freight platform. When he got to the end, he peered around just in time to see the wagon heading south on the town’s main street. A building blocked his view so he had to cross the platform to the street side to where he could see. He saw the wagon continue on south and his heart sank. They were headed for the bridge just as sure as shooting. They were going to the hacienda. Damn, he thought. Harding would get there, see the dead bodies, know that Longarm had escaped, and he would be hell to catch after that. It would flush him, sure enough.
Longarm hurried down the steps, caught up his horse, and walked out into the street. He could just barely make out the buggy; it was some five or six blocks ahead of him. He mounted as quick as he could and struck a fast walk, hoping to keep up with the buggy but not get too close. It was continuing on south toward the bridge. He followed for two, three, and then four blocks, watching the buggy. It had already passed through the central part of town and was only a quarter mile from the bridge. He was certain that it would be going across.
But then, to his amazement, the buggy suddenly turned to the right, toward the west. He wasn’t sure what that meant. He could only hope that Harding and his party were headed for some country road that ran down along the river in the direction where Sarah had said the hunting lodge might be found.
Even though it was well past eight o’clock, the streets were still crowded and many stores were open. Fortunately, most of the people were up on the sidewalk and he was able to kick his horse into a lope, only now and then having to dodge a wagon or someone who had suddenly decided to dart across his path. He got to the corner where the buggy had turned and slowed his horse to a walk as he cautiously went around. It was dark for the space of a couple of blocks from the overhang of buildings. Then, he got a glimpse of the buckboard moving along at a good clip, having cleared the outskirts of town. He urged his pony forward to keep within good sight of them.
Once away from the town, the country was rolling plains covered with mesquite and cedar thickets and now and again a post oak tree. The bare spaces were taken up by greasewood bushes and cactus brambles. Longarm could clearly see the white caliche road sneaking its way through the darker heavy overgrowth. The buckboard was about a half mile ahead. He came into the moonlight cautiously, aiming to make sure they didn’t see him following behind them. For a short while, he tried to follow off the road, picking his way through the dense growth of stunted trees and plentiful bushes and briars. The going was too slow, and besides, it was scratching his horse across the legs and the chest plate. If he kept it up, the animal would get shy and go to bucking or pitching. He swung back into the road but took his time, going slow, catching occasional glimpses of the buggy ahead as the road wound to the left and now back to the right. If Sarah was right that it was a ten-or fifteen-mile trip then he had plenty of time to follow them. The only thing he worried about was the road forking.
He followed slowly for about an hour, catching glimpses of the buggy only now and then as it continued its westward progress. He calculated they had come at least seven or eight miles from town. The buggy was still moving at a smart trot. Longarm let his horse out a little into a fast walk. He didn’t want them to get too far ahead nor did he want them to arrive at the hunting lodge too far in advance of him. Could be they’d get their business done quickly and he’d meet them coming back. He was very anxious to hear what went on in the hunting cabin.
Another hour passed and he thought they should be close, very close. The moon was higher now and casting a good glow. It would be very difficult to get near them without being seen, so he forced himself to maintain a pace a little slower than theirs. A little more than two hours after he had begun to follow them across the countryside, he got one last glimpse and then they seemed to disappear. He rode on ahead, picking up the pace. He had grown used to the movement ahead, the sudden flashes of the buggy as it stood in contrast to the brush it was going through along the road. Now, there was nothing ahead. No movement. In a kind of panic, Longarm urged his horse into a slow lope, conscious of the sound the horse’s hooves were making. He could not let them get too big of a lead on him. Just as he was beginning to worry that he might have lost them, he saw a trail lead off to his left toward the river. In the moonlight, he could see the wagon tracks. They looked very fresh in the loose dirt. He pulled his horse up and leaned out of the saddle to study them and then looked toward the river. By squinting his eyes, he could make a small structure separate itself from the treeline. The trees appeared higher down near the river, which, of course, would be the nature of things. He looked back to his right where the road continued. There were no signs of fresh wagon tracks. He had to believe, based on time and distance, that Harding and his cohorts had reached the turnoff to his hunting lodge.
Longarm turned his animal left, holding him to a slow walk. He went perhaps half a mile. Now the outline of the small building was becoming distinct in the night. He guessed it to be no more than a quarter of a mile away, but night distances could sometimes be misleading. He rode on for a couple of hundred yards more and then stopped his horse. He dismounted and led the animal back into the bushes, tying him to a post oak tree that reared up amongst a grove of mesquite. The horse wouldn’t have anything to eat or drink, but Longarm didn’t expect to be long.
He began to work his way through the bushes toward the cabin. After about ten minutes, he reached the river’s edge and he saw why Sarah thought the cabin was on an island. It was actually on a spit of land that ran out into the river like a peninsula. Once toward the center of the river, the patch of land widened out until it was about an acre in size. Set in the middle of that was a one-story lumber and adobe cabin. Its roof was almost flat as were so many in that part of the country. It appeared to be shingled with tar paper. A stovepipe stuck up from the back corner, but there was no chimney for a fireplace. Laredo was not a town where people used fireplaces for warmth, since it seldom got below seventy at any time of the year.
He could see the peninsula that ran out to the big parcel was lower, and he could imagine when the river was up, it would be under water, making the cabin virtually an island. As if to confirm this, a rowboat was tied up at the bank and he could quite easily see the tracks of the buckboard where the wheels had sunk into the soft ground as they had driven the hundred yards to the cabin.
He spent a few moments studying the situation. The door was shut and there were two windows at the front but they were small and high up. It would be difficult for anyone to see him out of those windows. Nevertheless, he didn’t want to take the chance of being seen by heading directly for the house. He took his boots off, and holding them in one hand and carrying his revolver in the other, he stepped down into the river water, first up to his knees and then up to his hips. Bending low, he worked his way slowly to the higher ground that the cabin was sitting on. He came up out of the water on the side of the cabin. There was one window that was set like a normal window with a sash, but there was a curtain over it that made it difficult to see inside. He snuck past that and got around to the back of the cabin. There was nothing there except a blank wall.
Behind the cabin was a corral where the two buggy horses had been turned in. There was a small toolshed or
