Mrs. Lucas was the lady whose neighbor’s cat spied on her. The man who might—or might damn well not— become sergeant was laughing when he walked out the door.
Chapter 40
“Come in, Lester.”
Amos Vent gave a mildly puzzled look at the skinny man in the straw hat and bib overalls who was just leaving the police chief’s office.
“You might oughta shut the door,” Longarm suggested.
Amos helped himself to the chair Longarm had put in front of the desk for the convenience of visitors—he was thinking of replacing it with a rack and thumbscrew instead but didn’t know if the city budget would allow for the purchase; it was something he would certainly have wanted to check out if he had to stay here for any length of time—and shook his head at Longarm’s offer of a cheroot.
“Mind if I light up?” The question was hardly a serious one. Longarm’s match was aflame almost before he’d finished asking it.
“Your subordinate said you wanted to see me, oh great white chief?”
Longarm grinned and flicked his match, still burning, in Amos’s general direction. “Damn good thing you jumped t’ obey too or I’d’ve had you in irons.”
“That’s why I came in such a hurry.”
“Tell me, Amos, d’you have everything you need on our good friend Sergeant Braxton?”
“Everything the major could want,” Amos confirmed. “It’s pretty clear he was working on behalf of a political party and not for the state of Texas or the Ranger force.”
Longarm grunted.
“He knew where those books were and he wanted to keep them for whatever use Bender had them.”
“Stole them,” Longarm corrected.
“Yeah, that’s the way I see it. Though I suppose we won’t ever know if it was Bender himself that knocked into you in the dark that night or if it was one of his Texas First henchmen. For sure, they were behind it. Behind the killings then too, I’d say.”
Longarm shook his head though. “Not at all, Amos. Bender and his people were plenty happy to take advantage of the killings when they happened. But it wasn’t them or the Whigs who are behind the murders.”
“Can’t be the Democratics then, can it? I don’t see how they’d fit into
…”
“Not them either,” Longarm told him.
“But shit, old pard, it pretty much has to be one of them, doesn’t it?”
“Matter o’ fact, Amos, it doesn’t.”
“You wanta explain that?”
“Amos, it was told to me straight out, right after I got here. But you and me, we was so intent on finding conspiracy that we never considered the plain and simple. The killer son of a bitch named Buddy Matthews. Herbert Matthews for the proper version of it. He got out of jail recently an’ has been wandering around getting revenge on the people that he thinks are responsible for ruining his life.”
“That’s the fellow that judge’s widow told you about.”
“That’s the one,” Longarm agreed.
“But what about …?”
“Politics had nothing t’ do with it, Amos. It just happened that some of the fellows of that age and social background grew into positions high on the social ladder around here. But hell, that’s only natural considering who them and their families were, most of them, and the time that’s passed since. If this Matthews hadn’t gone to prison, with his record as a war hero and being from an old family, he prob’ly would’ve been he-coon of one party or another around here his own self. But think about it. The first fellow to be killed, Wil Meyers, he wasn’t anybody of consequence in the community. We been overlooking the implications o’ Meyers’ death an’ concentrating on the positions o’ the later victims like Norman Colton an’ Deel and now Chief Bender. But they were all of an age and all from pretty much the same background. An’ the lucky fella that just left here, a mule trader name of Peabody, confirmed to me just now that every one o’ those ol’ boys took part in a silly damn shivaree years an’ years ago. One that went wrong when some tempers got outa hand that night. Tempers that aren’t all under control even yet.”
“What does Peabody have to do with it?”
“He would have been the next victim, I’m sure, except Herbert Matthews’ sister stopped him. I don’t have witnesses to that. Not yet. But I’d just about swear to it. She stopped him on Peabody’s porch before dawn an’ then she took off after him. Wanted to keep him from disgracing the family any further, I suppose. My guess is that the woman caught up with him down along the river and either he killed her outright or she got so worked up she had a heart attack or maybe just fell in the water and drowned. Whatever, our boy Buddy Matthews is out there somewhere not far away. It won’t be any great trick t’ find him and put him back behind the high walls.”
“You want me to back you up, my friend?”
“No need, Amos. That’s what I wanted t’ tell you here. This whole thing is simpler than we thought. I want you t’ concentrate on cleaning up your Ranger Company F—Braxton for sure but who knows who else might’ve been in on this deal—and making sure the Texas First party does everything nice an’ legal.”
“Even though they are trying to secede from the Union?” Amos asked.
“Shit, my friend, if they can do it legal, it wouldn’t gravel me none t’ be without Texas as one o’ the states. Be just that much less for me t’ worry about policing. Y’know?” He grinned.
“Do you need those ledgers you confiscated from Braxton?”
