Bodenheimer had said, “He ain’t got no jurisdiction over me.”
Longarm had replied, “Well, you can certainly take that up with him when he takes you over. Might be he’s a reasonable man and will only break a couple of your arms.”
Now they rode along in silence, Bodenheimer sullen and stolid, Longarm wondering if Austin Davis was going to show up at the right time and have his part down and not mess things up by making a fool of himself.
Longarm had called Davis’s attitude frivolous; Austin Davis had replied that Longarm didn’t know lighthearted and carefree when he saw it.
Longarm was hoping that Bodenheimer was brooding about his trip around the town square. He had done it deliberately, not to ridicule Bodenheimer, though he was willing for that to happen, but to soften him up for what was to come from Austin Davis. Bodenheimer had to believe that the bandit ring was finished and that he was finished and had nothing to lose by spilling what he knew. He’d been kept in the jail for the past forty-eight hours, so he could have no idea what had been the extent of Longarm’s investigation. And now Longarm was taking him to the sheriff of another county. Or at least that was what he was supposed to believe.
They’d been riding for about three quarters of an hour, and Longarm was beginning to wonder where Austin Davis was. By his calculation they’d come closer to five miles than two. He wondered if Davis had run into a bottle of whiskey or a poker game he just couldn’t pass by.
Maybe the damn fool thought Longarm was playing at some sort of game and that he just gave orders for the pleasure of it. He was starting to get a little hot under the collar when he saw his provisional deputy suddenly burst out of a mesquite thicket and come riding straight for them. Longarm stopped his horse, stopping Bodenheimer at the same time.
Bodenheimer just stared at Davis as he came riding toward them. Davis jumped his horse up on the road and then reined him in and came to a sliding, rock-scattering stop. He had his revolver drawn. He said, “Hold up there, Marshal.”
Longarm said, “Who are you and what do you want?”
“Never mind who I am. What I want is this man. He gestured with his revolver toward Bodenheimer. “I hate to do it, Marshal, but I am going to have to take your prisoner.”
Longarm said, “You can’t do that. He is a federal prisoner. I can’t surrender him.” He was noting with approval that Davis was staring at Bodenheimer with that cold, black-eyed look he’d shown Longarm in the hotel room.
Davis said, “I will have this man, Marshal. He is responsible for the death of my wife in a neighboring town when this man’s gang pulled a daring daylight robbery.”
Longarm thought that “daring daylight robbery” was laying it on a little thick, but then Bodenheimer was a little thick, so it probably didn’t matter. Longarm said, “I won’t surrender the prisoner.”
Davis said, “You have to. I have the drop on you.” Longarm glanced at the barrel of Davis’s gun. The front sight, called the drop, had been filed off flush with the top of the barrel. It was a practice followed by most men who did business with handguns because a revolver was never aimed so much as instinctively pointed and the front sight was useless and might get hung up as you drew. Longarm had always disagreed with calling the front sight a “drop” after its resemblance to half a raindrop or teardrop. Longarm always thought it looked more like a half of a penny. But then, he supposed, you couldn’t go around saying, “Hands up! I’ve got the halfpenny on you!”
Now he said, “All right, stranger. I have no choice. You do have the drop on me. There is nothing I can do.”
Davis said, “Ride on ahead, Marshal. Your work with this man is over. I’m taking on his future.”
“You mean just ride off and leave him here with you?”
“That is what I mean, Marshal. You have no choice.”
Longarm had been watching Bodenheimer. The sheriff had been glancing back and forth between them as they had enacted their little drama. Other than looking mildly surprised when Austin Davis had first ridden up, he had not shown any emotion. But now, as Longarm started his horse off, he suddenly cried out, “Marshal, what are you about here?”
Longarm turned and looked back at him. “I’m about to ride off and leave you in the hands of this man whose wife was killed as an innocent bystander in one of those robberies you arranged.”
Bodenheimer glanced at Davis and then back to Longarm. He said, “You can’t! I’m yore prisoner! This man is liable to do me serious harm. You can’t leave me!”
Longarm said, “You should have thought of that, Otis, before you started all this mess. If I were you I’d just pray he gives you a quick end. He looks pretty damn vicious to me. Lord knows he is ugly enough.”
He put spurs to his horse before Bodenheimer could reply or before Austin Davis could rise to his last remark. He rode at a gallop for a quarter of a mile before he slowed his horse and looked back. He could see Austin Davis taking Bodenheimer off the road and into the thickets and hills of the rough country.
They had decided between themselves that it should take Longarm about two hours to make it to the auction barn and then back to meet Austin Davis and Bodenheimer. Of course that didn’t allow for any time talking to Ownsby, who Longarm knew would want to discuss the latest developments in his robbery. But since there hadn’t been any developments Longarm was willing to talk about, he didn’t reckon to spend much time at the auction barn. Consequently, he had urged Austin Davis to get right to work on Bodenheimer. “It will take you half an hour to get through the fat so you can find a nerve to twinge.”
But Davis had claimed he was going to spend the first hour just staring at the sheriff. “You’ve seen that look of mine. Makes women melt and strong men seek shelter. You may not believe this, but I one time killed an entire field of knee-high cotton with this very look. And done it in less than five minutes by my watch.”
Longarm was looking forward to finishing the job, and not just so he could go home to Colorado. He was seriously interested in getting shut of Mister Davis and his “lighthearted and carefree” ways. He was also, if matters worked out the way he planned, looking forward to giving Mister Austin Davis quite a shock at the conclusion of the affair. He didn’t know how Mister Davis felt about surprises, but he was looking forward to having the opportunity to see if he took it in his lighthearted and carefree fashion. He doubted that he would.
It was close on to the two hours as he approached the stretch of road where Austin Davis had intercepted them and taken Bodenheimer off his hands. He was very hopeful that Davis had managed to turn the sheriff around and get something useful out of him, something he could use.
