The place had the best accommodations in town, which came as no surprise to Longarm. Someone like Miles Padgett would stay in only the best hotels. The Cassidy sisters and the other horse owners were staying there as well. Longarm hoped there would be room for him too. If not, he would simply have to make room.
But it was a good thing that Uncle Sam would ultimately wind up paying for this, Longarm thought with a grin as he followed Padgett into the fancy lobby. He could never afford to stay in a place like this on a deputy marshal’s wages.
Leon Mercer was waiting for them inside, and explained that he and the senator had adjoining rooms on the second floor. “I got you the room across the hall, Marshal, he said to Longarm. “That was the best I could do.”
“Not quite,” said Longarm. “You’ll take the room across the hall, and I’ll bunk in the one next to the senator.”
“Impossible. I have to be on hand to assist Senator Padgett-“
“It’s all right, Leon,” Padgett told him. “You’ll be right across the hall if I need you.”
Mercer sniffed. “Well, I don’t like it, but I suppose the arrangement will have to do.”
“How was your ride with Miss Janice?” asked Longarm, unable to resist needling the stuffy assistant a bit.
Another flush spread across Mercer’s features. “Miss Cassidy is quite … quite a lovely young lady.”
“She sure is,” agreed Longarm. He was willing to bet that Janice had flirted with Mercer every foot of the way and had enjoyed every minute of it.
Longarm’s war bag and repeater had already been taken up to the room. He checked on them, moved the bag and rifle across the hall to the room adjoining Senator Padgett’s, then carried Mercer’s bags over to the other room. Mercer watched with poorly concealed resentment. He had to feel as if Longarm was poaching on his territory, namely the senator. Mercer would just have to get over it, though. This assignment of Longarm’s wouldn’t last forever, only until he found out what he needed to know.
The hotel dining room was indeed still serving breakfast. Longarm sat down with Padgett and Mercer and proceeded to put himself on the outside of everything he had thought about earlier, plus a small army of fried potatoes. Just as he had expected, he felt like a new man when the meal was finished—a well-stuffed, drowsy man.
But there was work to do, and a last cup of coffee—spiked with a healthy dollop of Maryland rye from a bottle that the waiter brought in from the bar next to the dining room—perked up Longarm enough so that he thought he could make it through the day.
He started by asking Senator Padgett what his plans were. “I’m going to take it easy today,” Padgett replied as he fired up one of those Havana cigars. He didn’t offer one to Longarm this time. “Tomorrow I’m supposed to make a courtesy call on the mayor of El Paso, but today I intend to rest.”
That sounded good to Longarm too, but he didn’t have time for it. “Go to it,” he told Padgett. “Just lock your door and don’t go wandering around.”
“What will you be doing, Marshal?”
“Thought I’d look up an old friend or two whilst we’re here. Don’t worry, Senator. I can almost guarantee that nobody will take a shot at you again.”
“Almost guarantee? What do you mean by that?”
“I think that fella from Albuquerque is long gone. He didn’t expect anybody to shoot back at him. I could tell he was mighty spooked when I returned his fire. Could be he ain’t even stopped running yet.”
Padgett laughed. “I sincerely hope you’re right, Marshal. Very well, I’ll be in my room if you need me. I assume Mercer is allowed to work with me?”
“Sure,” Longarm said with a casual wave of his hand. “I don’t think it’s very likely he’s the one out to kill you.”
The senator looked pained for a second, as if he wished Longarm hadn’t reminded him that he was targeted for death. But then the familiar cocky grin reappeared on his face, and he headed upstairs with Leon Mercer trailing him. The assistant was already talking about those legislative reports the two of them needed to go over.
Longarm needed some information too, but not the kind he could get from a report prepared by some fella like Mercer who practically had to be dragged away across the Potomac. What Longarm needed was to find out where the high-stakes card games were held in this town.
But as he turned toward the front entrance of the hotel, he saw Cy slipping out the back. There was definitely something furtive about the jockey’s movements.
A grin spread across Longarm’s face. Maybe he wouldn’t have to go in search of the information he wanted.
Maybe Cy would lead him right to it.
Chapter 7
Longarm gave Cy time to get a little lead on him, then walked quickly through the hotel bar to the rear entrance. He stepped out onto a side street and looked in both directions. It was a little difficult to pick out Cy’s figure among the pedestrians along the busy street, since for the most part the Mexican inhabitants of El Paso were both shorter and more slender than the whites. Longarm spotted the checked shirt Cy was wearing, though, about a block and a half away. He walked after the jockey, not hurrying now. He didn’t want to get too close.
Cy turned right at the corner, which took him straight toward the Rio Grande. Maybe he was going over to Juarez, Longarm thought. That brought a frown to his face. He had been to Juarez several times in the past, and he’d been shot at there more than once. Not only that, but he’d never gotten along very well with the Mexican authorities either, probably because of the times when circumstances had led him to give a hand to various groups rebelling against the dictatorship of Porfirio Diaz. The common folks on the other side of the border liked Longarm and called him Brazo Largo; more than one lawman over there would have been happy to see him in front of a firing squad.
As it turned out, Cy wasn’t bound for Mexico after all. He stopped at a three-story frame building that housed a saloon and brothel. Longarm recognized the structure. He’d been there before, when it had been called the
