Longarm said, “I might not have done that, old son, if you hadn’t acted like you wanted to tear my arms off and whale me over the head with ‘em.”
“I heard shootin’ back there-“
“And you didn’t stop to find out what had happened,” Longarm broke in. “You just came busting in there ready to beat the hell out of anybody you could lay your hands on.”
Oscar glowered at him for a moment, then shrugged. “Well … maybe. It’s my job to keep things peaceful back there, and the quickest way to stop a ruckus is to bang a few heads together.”
“There won’t be any more of that,” Bolt said. “Now, let’s take a look at those dead men.”
They all filed into the back room, Cy still dragging his feet so that Longarm had to shove him along. There was no sign of the cowboy or the gambler, which came as no surprise to Longarm. They must have cleared out right after he’d gone in pursuit of Cy, well before the arrival of the local badges. Neither of them would have wanted to get mixed up in the aftermath of this corpse-and-cartridge session, which after all had had very little to do with them.
The bodies of the two black-suited men were still sprawled on the floor, the one Longarm had shot in the throat lying in a pool of drying blood. The other man’s shirt and vest were stained crimson, but that was all. Using the toe of his boot, Bolt rolled over the corpse that was lying on its face. He studied the features of both men for a moment, then said, “I don’t think I know ‘em. How about you, Dave?”
“Might have seen ‘em around town, Marshal, but I don’t know their names or why they’d try to gun down Uncle Sam here,” replied Singletary.
“Guess I’d better check their pockets for identification,” said Bolt with a sigh. That was going to be a bloody job.
“No need,” said Longarm. He had been staring at the faces of the dead men, and a couple of names had popped into his head. He dredged up the rest of the memories that went with the names. “That one’s Ned Collier.” He pointed at the man who had first recognized him. “And the other one’s Ash Benson. They robbed a trunk full of negotiable government securities off a stagecoach up in Colorado a couple of years ago. The securities were being carried on the stage so that anybody who was after ‘em would be thrown off the trail, seeing as how such things usually go by train with an official courier. Nobody counted on the stage being held up by a couple of second-rate road agents like Ned and Ash here. That was the start of a string of good luck for those boys. I chased ‘em for six months and never got close enough to lay hands on ‘em.” Longarm shook his head. “Their luck ran out, though. Still, they’d cleaned themselves up a heap, and I might not have recognized them if they hadn’t gone to shooting at me.”
“You’re sure about this?” asked Bolt.
“Damn sure. You can wire Chief Marshal Billy Vail in Denver, and he’ll confirm everything I’ve told you. The case against these two was still open.”
Singletary laughed and said, “Looks to me like you slammed it shut, Marshal.”
“Yeah, I reckon. Am I free to go?”
Bolt nodded. “I suppose so. Will you be in town for a while?”
“Three days,” Longarm said. “I’m staying at the Camino Real.”
The city marshal quirked an eyebrow at that, but he didn’t question why a fellow lawman—surely underpaid, as all lawmen were—was staying at the town’s fanciest hotel.
“We’ll be in touch if we need to talk to you again.”
Longarm nodded and tugged on Cy’s collar. “Come on, old son. You and me got to have a talk.”
Chapter 8
“You can let go of me now,” Cy complained when they reached the street. “I’m not going to run off again. I know I can’t get away from a long-legged galoot like you.”
“You know, I could’ve just shot you instead of chasing you down,” Longarm pointed out. “When you ran out of that saloon, you became a federal fugitive.”
“I haven’t broken any laws, damn it! Why are you persecuting me, Long?” He let out a groan. “As soon as I saw you sit down at the table, I knew you’d come there to make life miserable for me. I was hoping you’d just pretend that you didn’t know me!”
“Take it easy,” Longarm said coldly. “I ain’t going to argue with you here on the street.” He released Cy’s collar. “I’d rather just have the answers to some questions.”
The jockey sighed. “Go ahead and ask whatever you want. I don’t want you to start beating on me again.”
Longarm’s jaw clenched as he reined in his temper. “I don’t recall ever hitting you without a damned good reason, mister. Were you planning to shoot me when you pulled the gun back there in the Crystal Star?”
Cy shook his head and said, “Of course not. I just wanted to be able to protect myself in case you tried to shoot me. I know you’ve got it in for me.”
“Maybe with damned good reason. Somebody clouted me on the head last night and tried to push me off that train as it was crossing the Rio. Happened right after that fracas I had with you and your pards in the baggage car.”
Cy stopped short and stared at Longarm, appearing thunderstruck. “You think I tried to kill you last night?”
“The thought crossed my mind,” Longarm replied dryly as he motioned Cy into the doorway of an empty store so that they would be out of the way of the pedestrians passing along the boardwalk. “You strike me as the sort of fella who holds a grudge.”
Cy shook his head again, more vehemently this time. “I swear I didn’t do it, Marshal. I didn’t follow you out of the baggage car. You can ask any of the other jockeys.”
“What about one of them? There were a few of ‘em who sided you and got knocked around for their trouble.”
