“The hell you say,” Longarm snorted. “You meant to keep him! And I’ll just bet anything you were in that office bragging to the boys that it was surely your lucky day.”
“No, I wasn’t! Honest!”
Longarm had no wish to arrest the man, but he did want to put a good scare into him so that he’d handle things differently the next time. “Then why didn’t you stop at the marshal’s office in town and report the missing animal and outfit?”
“Well … well, I was just gonna do that! But first, I had a responsibility to my company to return my wagon and …”
“Aw, shut up,” Longarm ordered. “Just get my damned rifle and shove it back in the boot and then get out of my sight.”
“You’re not going to arrest me?”
“Depends on how quick you are,” Longarm said.
The man darted inside the office and returned in a wink. He jammed Longarm’s rifle into its scabbard and retreated, saying, “You better get yourself to a doctor! You don’t look too damn good, Marshal!”
“I’m not too damn good,” Longarm said, taking Splash’s reins and leading the paint back into town.
Two hours later, he was soaking his poor bullet-creased, rock-bruised body in a hot bath, smoking a nickel cheroot, and sipping on some pretty good whiskey. The twisted knee had swollen up like a green gourd, and Longarm knew it would give him fits in the days just ahead. But he would mend. He always mended.
He also knew that there was a reasonably good-looking woman downstairs hoping he’d signal her to come up to his room for a vigorous romp in the sack, but Longarm wasn’t at all up to that.
You’re lucky, he thought, leaning his head back against the side of the tub and then closing his eyes, just real damn lucky to be alive.
Chapter 11
The Assassin had followed the Arkansas River and then the San Luis Creek, always heading south. He’d climbed over some damned high passes, and now he stopped and gave his horse a badly needed breather as he gazed down on South Park.
It was by any measure a huge valley, ringed on the east by the craggy Sangre de Cristo Mountains and on the west by the towering Continental Divide. As far as Jim Smith could see, South Park was carpeted with deep, lush grass and dotted with prosperous cattle ranches. Smith knew the winters up in this country were extremely severe, but spring, summer, and fall were so breathtaking that it probably made the winter struggle worthwhile. Even now, the cottonwoods following the valley’s winding streams were starting to turn red and gold.
It doesn’t get much prettier than this, Smith decided as he cocked his right knee around his saddlehorn and squinted against the bright afternoon sunshine. Too bad that I have to come here for a killing.
The Assassin wondered just how he was going to go about finding Red Skoal and the Ute woman. Smith didn’t really want to just start riding from ranch to ranch because he knew that, in an isolated valley such as this, news traveled very fast. He would be willing to bet that Red Skoal would be warned long before he could be found. And without the element of surprise, Smith realized that his chances of successfully killing Skoal would be slim or none.
So, what to do next? There was a settlement in South Park. He could see it off in the distance, and knew that it was nothing but a general store, livery, hotel, cafe, two cowboy saloons, and one abandoned stage stop. The settlement would be the place to go. Once he was there, The Assassin was sure that a way to find Red Skoal would just naturally present itself. He’d always been lucky that way, just letting things come to him. And so, there again, it was a matter of patience. Patience, Smith knew, required courage and self-confidence. Without courage, men grew nervous and they invariably jumped into things that they ought to leave alone. They needed confidence that, given a little time, everything would come as it should.
Yep, patience was the main thing, but its underpinning was courage and confidence.
Three hours later and just about sundown, Smith rode into the little settlement and tied his horse in front of the busiest of the two ramshackle saloons. He started to go inside, then changed his mind and headed over to the cafe. There was a handful of men inside, but none of them was Red Skoal.
“Evening, stranger,” the man wearing the apron called. “You look like you could use a meal.”
“I could,” Smith agreed, smiling and trying to ignore the way that the damned cowboys were staring at his facial disfigurements. He pulled up his bandanna a little higher around his neck and marched over to a rickety little table with two chairs. Sitting down heavily with his back to the wall, he kicked his boots up on the second chair, cocked back his hat, and glared at the cowboys. When they kept looking at him, he growled, “What the hell are you boys staring at, gawdammit!”
There were four of them, all just kids really. That was why he excused them for their bad manners. But had any of them been foolish enough to give him a rude reply, he’d have had to administer a hard and painful lesson.
The cowboys suddenly got very interested in the subject of cattle, and Smith relaxed and called, “Mister, I’ll have a water glass of whiskey.”
“Coming right up!”
The whiskey was awful but it was in a big glass, and after the first shuddering swallow, it wasn’t so awful anymore. The proprietor, a dumpy, balding man with a red, sun-ravaged face, said, “All I serve for supper is steak or venison or trout, along with potatoes and good bread.”
“Steak and trout,” Smith grunted. “Heavy on both and heavy on the bread and potatoes.”
“Don’t like venison, huh?”
“Not especially.”
“I’ll throw the steak on the fire, and the trout and potatoes are cooked and ready.”
“Then bring ‘em on,” Smith said.
