“I see on your board that room twenty-six is available. What’s it like?”
“Oh, I doubt you would like that one, Marshal. It looks out over the street. Very noisy.”
“I’ll take twenty-six, I think.” The little prick was trying to palm off the least desirable room in the place, Longarm was sure. Top floor, long climb to reach it each night and looking out onto a rooftop and a bunch of pigeon shit, most likely.
“Yes, sir. As you prefer.” The fellow handed over the key to 26. And made no offer to help Longarm with his carpetbag and saddle with the heavy Winchester hanging in its scabbard there.
It was a small and petty victory for the little shit, Longarm figured, and one the clerk was entitled to. Since he’d lost in all the other-equally petty-battles.
“G’day,” Longarm told him cheerfully and took his things up the stairs in search of room twenty-six.
Chapter 4
Longarm tugged at the gold chain that crossed the front of his vest, dragging a bulbous and somewhat battered but still entirely serviceable Ingersoll key-wind watch from the left-hand vest pocket. Instead of the customary ornate fob, the opposite pocket held a small and deadly brass-framed derringer pistol. All in all a satisfyingly useful pair of items were linked by the chain. At the moment the railroad-quality Ingersoll assured him that it was barely past three on a sunny afternoon. Plenty of time to find the local law and announce himself as a federal peace officer operating within the local’s Jurisdiction, a courtesy that he saw no reason to forgo here.
With a stifled yawn and a mild letdown into relaxation now that the difficulty of the journey from Denver was behind him, Longarm returned the watch to his vest pocket and carefully locked the hotel room door—Number 26 was every bit as pleasant a room as he’d hoped—behind him.
On an impulse driven by mild curiosity he took a detour on his way out, going downstairs by first going upstairs—in search of the room the desk clerk had intended him to take. He grinned when he found it. Room 32 was large enough to house an alley cat. So long as she didn’t have a litter of kittens with her. As a hotel room, the facility would have made a right fair custodial closet. And in fact may well have been intended for precisely that use—until incipient greed ruled otherwise.
Longarm found himself more amused than annoyed by the clerk’s attempt at one-upmanship. Chuckling silently to himself he nipped the end off a cheroot and spat the fleck of tobacco out, then lighted his smoke and headed downstairs again in search of the town marshal. Chief of police—not anything so old-fashioned and primitive as a town marshal here, thank you—J. Michael Bender was on duty at the small jail-cum-police station on the third floor of City Hall, which was one of several municipal buildings facing Addington’s town square. City Hall and its lawn occupied half of the block lying immediately east of the square. Behind it a hundred yards or so lay the willow- shaded banks of the Neches River. Massive oak trees and some flowering bushes were dotted here and there on the expanse of grass, presumably a public park, between the three-story city building and the river. It was a handsome scene when viewed from the heights of the police chief’s window, and Longarm said SO.
“I see,” Chief Bender mused. “You’ve come here at considerable trouble and expense to tell me you like the view from my office, is that it, Deputy?”
Longarm gave the local a tolerant smile. “Chief, what I came here to do is t’ look into the murder of an employee of the United States of America. Makin’ that murder a federal offense an’ putting it under my jurisdiction. I didn’t come here t’ step on anybody’s toes, least of all yours.”
“You said your name is Long?”
“I did.”
“Then let me tell you something, Deputy Long. You can stand there smug and smiling all day long while you tell me you don’t wish to step on my toes. The fact remains, this is my jurisdiction. Not yours. And I resent your presence here. The mere fact of you being here implies that I cannot be trusted to solve a serious crime. It implies …”
“But I-“
“Dammit, sir, you will not interrupt me when I’m speaking. Do you hear me?”
Longarm grunted. But did not speak. Lordy, no. If he said anything he’d no doubt be accused of interrupting again. Which of course he had done if the man wanted to get real technical about it. Which apparently he did.
One thing about Police Chief Bender, Longarm thought. The man couldn’t be accused of being too shy to speak his mind on things. Not damn likely.
“Now. As I was saying, or attempting to say … your presence is as good as a slap in my face. An implication that the damn-yankee politicians in Washington oppose me. And as I am quite sure both you and they are well aware, sir, we have county elections scheduled in five weeks’ time. I take this to be the first salvo of opposition to me and to my fellow party members. Well, sir, I, that is to say we, are not likely to accept this meekly. We will fight you to the last breath and to the last ballot. I can assure you of that much, deputy. Count on it.”
Bender looked about as belligerent as a bantam rooster strutting through a hen house. Cocky, full of himself, and damned well on the prod for any challenge that might come into view.
And to give the man his due, it could sure as hell look like what the police chief thought—if somebody didn’t know the truth and was so full of politics that he couldn’t see simple answers when the mind was so capable of conjuring up complications.
“Chief, I sure as hell would like t’ make a peace truce with you right here an’ now. I got no use for politics m’self. And I haven’t been told t’ mix into whatever you folks got going on down here. I didn’t know an’ frankly don’t care that you got your county races coming up. I got no idea how good a police chief you are nor what party you an’ your friends belong to an’ given the choice would rather not know. Me, I stay outa all that. All I want, Chief, is t’ do my job. An’ my job is just as simple as simple can be. I wanta find the man that murdered Postmaster Norman Colton. Quick as I got that man, or men, in custody, chief, I’ll be outa your jurisdiction an’ on my way home. An’ that is damn sure the only thing I’m s’posed t’ do here. I mean that. The only thing.”
Bender gave him a look of blunt skepticism, then cleared his throat and looked away.
“T’ help get me outa your hair just as quick as possible, Chief, would you be willing to show me whatever files or records you got relating t’ the death of Postmaster Colton?”
What the hell, Longarm thought. If you couldn’t expect cheerful cooperation, why not look for whatever sort you could get?
