flung the carbine to his shoulder, aimed at the back of the man’s head, which was only fifteen yards off, and then fired, There was a loud thunk and the man heaved up in the air and then fell flat.
Furiously, Longarm yelled at them, “That sound you just heard was the sound of a fool getting shot. Any more of you want to be heroes? I’ll drag the next one of you sonofabitches that tries that behind my horse for ten miles before I shoot him.”
Finally, all the dead were counted and all the wounded had been either helped or carried clear of the rest. There were eighteen raiders in all, five wounded and thirteen dead.
Off in the distance, Longarm could barely see the head of the engine of the train half hidden from view behind a butte. He could see puffs of smoke rising from the stack. He said to his friend, “Fish, we’ve got to get these men some help. They need to be carried into Springer where they can see a doctor. Why don’t you ride on over there and tell the engineer to bring the train up. Then get some of the workmen to load these wounded men onto those flatcars and bring them back into Springer.”
It took a long half hour for Fisher to ride to the train, for the engineer to bring his two flatbed cars up to the end of the rails, and for the workmen to get down and carry the wounded men back to the train. Longarm looked at his watch anxiously. It was after one in the afternoon, and he and Fisher were at least ten miles from the Oklahoma border where they were supposed to meet the Gallagher brothers. As far as he was concerned, the meeting was still on, and as far as he was concerned, that meeting was the cause of the slaughter that had just taken place.
When the wounded were taken aboard and the train was about ready to pull out, Longarm rode over and signaled to the engineer to come to him. He had decided on the engineer as the best man to be trusted with his suspicions. He told the engineer what he thought: that somewhere in the camp of the Silverado Mining Company was a spy for the Gallaghers who rode out and notified them whenever there was to be work done on the track. The engineer scratched his head and looked surprised.
Then the engineer said, “You know, that makes a hell of a lot of sense. Every time we’ve tried to work this last month, no matter what day we tried to work or what hour, no matter how many days we skipped, they’d always come down on us about four-five hours after we got cranked UP.”
“In other words, about the amount of time it would take to ride from the headquarters into Quitman and then from Quitman to here.”
The engineer nodded. “I see what you’re saying, neighbor.”
“If I was you, I wouldn’t speak of it to anyone else except Eugene and ask him to tell Mister Simmons. But I think it’s very likely that you have a spy in your midst. What I would do is schedule a work party, and then I would see who came up sick or lame the next morning or who left camp and was suddenly missing or who couldn’t go along. You may not have that trouble anymore. It might be settled.”
The engineer looked at all the dead men lying out on the prairie. He said, “Yeah, but their kind is a dime a dozen. From what I’ve heard of the Gallaghers, they can raise fifty more of them overnight. No, I don’t reckon this business is finished, but I’ll sure keep it under my hat, this tip you gave me. I’m much obliged to you, Marshal.”
Longarm asked the engineer if he would wait, saying that he had another passenger for him. Without telling Fisher where he was going, he spurred his horse over to the foot of the butte, and then clambered up to the rocky ledge where they had made their fight. He had two vials of the nitro left, but he wouldn’t be able to take Pedro with him, not on the ride that they were going to have to make to the territorial line between Oklahoma and New Mexico. Nevertheless, he was going to use the burro to carry the iced nitro back down the butte.
With great care, Longarm loaded the canvas sacks back on the burro and secured them in place with ropes, and then took Pedro’s lead rope and started down the craggy half-mountain, half-rock. It was with some relief that he finally reached the bottom. He mounted his horse, taking Pedro on lead, and rode slowly over to the train.
He could see Fisher watching him. Of course, Fisher didn’t know there was another oilskin packet remaining in the canvas sacks. Longarm did.
At the train, he dismounted and carefully took the canvas bags off the burro. He patted the animal affectionately, and then saw that two of the crewmen lifted the burro up onto the flatcar. He said, “Take care of my old buddy there. He’s earned his keep today. Somebody make sure that he gets fed.”
One of the workmen said, “Oh, you don’t need to worry about that, sir. This here burro is one of Mister Eugene’s favorites. He’ll give him a mighty good feed tonight.”
Fisher and Longarm stood and watched as the train slowly backed down the line. In five minutes, it was out of sight back behind the next butte. After that, Longarm began the tender process of packing the two vials separately in each of his saddlebags. He gave all of his ammunition and his extra revolver to Fisher along with the remaining bottle of whiskey that he had.
Fisher said, “You ain’t going to do what I think you’re going to do, are you?”
“I don’t have much choice, Fish.”
“Well, I can tell you somebody who is not going to ride beside you.”
“I don’t blame you. If I’s you, I’d ride half a mile away.”
“Yeah, sure, so you could say that I was scared. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
“No, I’d much rather have your company, to tell you the truth.”
Fisher gave him an astonished look. “Why, you sonofabitch. You don’t care much about a friend if you’d just as soon see him get blown sky-high with you.”
Longarm was busy packing his saddlebags with ice. He had brought one of the empty oilskin pouches with him. He loaded it with ice before carefully putting one of the vials of nitro inside, then closed the flap and buried it in the ice already in his saddlebags. That left the second vial by itself. He reloaded its contents with ice and put it in the other side of the saddlebags.
Fisher stood there in stunned silence, watching him. “I hope you realize that it ain’t exactly the same as that burro carrying them. That horse of yours is way and gone more jouncy than that burro.”
Longarm put his foot in his stirrup and stepped aboard his horse. He said, “I ain’t got a choice, Fisher.” He had the slingshot in his hand and he turned, unbuckled the flap of his saddlebags, and put it in with one of the vials of nitro.
