It had been some time since Longarm had handled an old buffalo gun. But there seemed to be no rush as, way off in the desert, the night train from Deming whistled something off the tracks.
He levered the sliding block down to expose the half-inch chamber. As he slid the monstrous brass cartridge in, Rosalinda was asking why they were waiting for the train up there. She explained, “When you wish for to stop a train at Growler Wash, you must stand by the tracks and wave something at it, comprende?”
Longarm levered the block back up to note with satisfaction how old Christian Sharps’s simple but clever action snapped tight as any banker might want his money vault. Earlier breech-loaders had tended to leak hot gasses in a marksman’s face. But the breech designed by old Christian sealed itself even tighter when pressure built up inside. That was why his guns could take ever grander loads of powder and ball, starting with the military round of seventy, then the original plains rifle round of ninety, and then on to this swamping 120 grains that lobbed a bullet farther than most men could aim, if the truth were to be told.
As he braced the loaded and locked rifle on the ‘dobe parapet he told Rosalinda, “Ain’t aiming to flag no train to Yuma. I want to see if anyone else crawls out of a hidey-hole to flag it down.” She asked, “Who could you be thinking of? I told you those ladrones were planning for to sell your badge and wallet south of the border, for the reward on El Brazo Largo!”
Longarm nodded grimly and replied, “Didn’t you tell me you were a Papago?
Ain’t you never heard of a rabbit doubling back on its tracks? We don’t have it in writing that all six of ‘em were planning on such a long dusty ride.”
Rosalinda pouted, “Had my mother wished for to raise us all on rabbit meat and cactus fruit, she would not have wed our Mexican papa. But I know how game doubles back for to fool the hunter. Pero for why have they not tried for to kill you some more if they did not ride off as we thought?” Longarm said, “Like you thought, you mean. I’d want that flashy Goldmine Gloria out of my hair before I commenced to cross over the border and moseyed my gringo way to a sleepy Mex seaport, no offense.”
She told him he was even smarter than they said he was along that same border. She asked if it was true El Brazo Largo had once wiped out a Mexican Army artillery column over in the Baja.
He modestly allowed he’d had help, and added, “I get along with a few of the more decent Mex lawmen. They ain’t all bad. Just the total pendejo running the country.”
She agreed El Presidente Diaz was sin faita un chingado zorillo, or a fucking skunk, and then they could see the smoke plume of the night train from Deming, puffing as if it really wanted to get to Yuma by sunrise.
Longarm full-cocked the Big Fifty and braced it across the ‘dobe parapet they were hunkered behind as the train came into full view, going lickety-split and never slowing down as it rumbled across the trestle spanning Growler Wash.
Longarm put the hammer back on half-cock and decided, “Reckon they figured Goldmine Gloria would stand out less in Mexico than along a railroad line she’s been known to frequent. You say your uncle’s camp is about a three- hour walk?” She said they had plenty of time for a hearty breakfast and some strong black coffee to get them off to a good start.
He started to argue. But she’d been letting him have a hell of a lot of stuff on easy credit, and he was counting on her goodwill to set him up with that Indian riding stock he couldn’t pay for either. So he allowed he’d scout to the south for sign while she warmed up some more canned goods. it was getting light enough to see colors now, so going down the ladder ahead of Rosalinda, lest she need some catching, was a tad tougher on his nerves than going up it had been. For that lace chemise covered her chunky brown thighs a third of the way down if you were standing beside her. But the view from below was more sassy, and it seemed to be true that Spanish ancestry made for more body hair than pure Indian.
But she was a married-up gal. Sort of. Longarm had long suspected Mormons and Indians got on better with one another than either could with Queen Victoria’s crowd because they weren’t as inclined to primp for their womenfolk.
It took a heap of flowers, books, and romantic twaddle to justify the warmer feelings a properly brought-up Eastern gal was expected to have for a weak-chinned banker’s son instead of, say, a poor but honest cowhand or, hell, a good-looking blacksmith who didn’t own his own business yet. Queens and such were expected to fall madly in love as diplomacy dictated, as if they were brood mares being paired with the proper stallion to drop foals with proper papers. So they had to get married in cathedrals with mile-long trains, organs blaring, bells ringing, and the multitude waving lest anybody wonder what in thunder the happy couple saw in one another.
Brother Brigham of the Latter-Day Saints had noticed while headed west that he had more women than men tagging along, and seeing that both the King James Good Book and that Book of Mormon encouraged folks to be fruitful and multiply, he’d revealed with little romantic blathering that it was all right for a man to marry up with all the wives who’d have him. The Indians wandering the western deserts had already come to much the same conclusion. But neither pragmatic bunch carried on as shockingly as some newspaper reporters alleged. Rape was almost unheard of among the Saints and their mostly Uto-Aztec-speaking neighbors, and while some parents were always inclined to marry off the daughter of the house to a rich old man, neither the Salt Lake Temple nor your average medicine man condoned the practice of making a maiden marry against her will, which was more than some royal families could say.
So it was safe to say Rosalinda and her sisters had married up with that missing Mormon trader fair and square, for practical reasons. It was easy to see little Rosalinda had a healthier appetite than your average handsome Papago was ever going to satisfy.
As she whipped up her second breakfast before sunrise, Longarm and the Big Fifty scouted out across the desert pavement to the south for sign. It was easy to find and easy to read as the first rays of sunrise caught everything at a low angle in golden and lavender tones. Desert pavement was what you got between the tall columns of cactus and low thorny scrub after the dry winds blew away all the finer dust and the mineral salts from deeper down were sucked to the surface by the rare rains to cement the fine pebbles and coarse sand together. Mexicans called it caliche. By any name it formed a brittle surface, thick as cardboard, that gave away the progress of any critter heavier than, say, a rat or lizard.
Exactly six steel-shod ponies and a couple of unshod and heavier-laden mules or smaller ponies had moved south the night before in a column of twos at a trot. Longarm made a mental note that for all her faults, the brassy Goldmine Gloria was a good rider. You ate more miles at a cool trot than at any other gait. But sissy riders of any gender found that the most uncomfortable way to ride. Experienced riders did too. But you called them experienced because they knew how to get the most mileage out of a horse. It helped some if you stood in the stirrups and only let the jiggedy-jogging saddle spank you now and again.
Longarm turned and headed back to the trading post, adding in his head. He knew experienced riders would still be moving at this hour, trotting two furlongs, walking one, trail-breaking for, say, ten minutes out of every ninety,
