Or then again, Longarm speculated, both those possibilities could be true. One would not necessarily rule out the other. The “hunters” could have failed to recognize Longarm and Cloud Talker could have taken advantage of Short Tail Rabbit’s wearing of Longarm’s Stetson to shoot him and divert suspicion from himself.
And Hell might freeze over before tomorrow’s sunrise too. Sometimes a man could think so damn much that all he accomplished was to tie himself in knots, Longarm knew.
The one thing Longarm was sure of right now was that he wanted to locate Cloud Talker and have a word with the man.
“You boys need to change to fresh horses before we start out? No? Then let’s ride, fellas. Let’s see can we find Cloud Talker before nightfall. Tall Man, I’ll be back to spend tonight in your lodge if I can. If not, then I reckon I’ll see you tomorrow.” Longarm touched the brim of his old Kossuth—the thing didn’t seem quite so nasty-looking in comparison with the current state of his Stetson—as an informal salute to Reverend MacNall, and swung into his saddle again.
He did want to have a word with Cloud Talker. And quick, before there were any more bodies around here, what with first John Jumps-the-Creek and now Short Tail Rabbit dead.
Very many more bodies and the Piegan nation, or anyway this band of it, would find itself without leadership altogether.
Chapter 33
It occurred to Longarm—somewhat too late to do anything about it—that he should have asked MacNall to send along someone who spoke some English. As it was, it looked like none of his escorts could speak a word of it.
They were making themselves clear enough in spite of that. What with gesturing and jabbering and pointing the way, they made it plain that they wanted Longarm to go with them to the spot where they’d found Short Tail Rabbit and then start the search for Cloud Talker from there.
It wasn’t exactly the way Longarm might have chosen to handle it. But it could have been worse, he supposed.
And since he couldn’t argue with them anyway, neither side being able to understand a word of what the other was saying, he gave in and went where the three Piegan policemen indicated.
They rode west from the agency, crossed the creek and the adjacent drainage, and entered a chain of low, grassy hills. In the distance Longarm could see the dark humps of some pine-covered bluffs reminiscent of the Black Hills. Except these hills up here did not have gold in them. Longarm was damn well positive about that. They wouldn’t have been given to the Indians if they were worth anything.
They had gone seven, maybe eight miles when the Piegan cops pointed down to a thin trickle of water gleaming bright silver in the slanting afternoon sunlight. Again using broadly dramatic gestures, the tribal police indicated that this was where Short Tail Rabbit had met his demise.
The Piegan fell into single file behind Longarm as he let the chestnut pick its way down the shallow slope toward the murder site.
As they came close the horse began to fidget and blow snot, no doubt smelling blood there. Longarm shortened his rein and slipped his feet back in the stirrups until he barely had his toes on the irons.
It was not, however, the chestnut he was thinking about.
As Longarm’s mount reached the tiny rill and gathered itself to jump across, Longarm heard the sound he’d been expecting.
He threw himself off the chestnut, striking the ground already in a roll and coming up with his Colt in his hand.
Behind him—behind where he’d just been actually—a .50-70 Springfield roared, and a slug the size of a grown man’s thumb sizzled a foot or so above Longarm’s saddle. His empty saddle.
The sharper, lighter bark of Longarm’s Colt followed so fast behind the report of the rifle that the two sounds were almost as one, the six-gun’s fire virtually an extension of the sound of the rifle shot.
One very amazed Piegan warrior took Longarm’s bullet low in the throat. The policeman had time for his eyes to flash wide open in horror. Then he was driven backward off the seat pad of his pony to fall with a drenching splash into the creek, Springfield flying in one direction and his cavalry-style campaign hat in another.
Longarm did not take time to admire his work, however. He swung the muzzle of the Colt toward the next man in line, but before Longarm could pull the trigger that policeman too was driven backward off his horse.
The third warrior was unseated almost in the same instant, and Longarm of a sudden had no more targets. All three Piegan policemen were down, either dead or dying, the last two having been practically cut to ribbons by half-a-dozen bullets or more.
Longarm climbed to his feet and looked up toward the ridge he and the Piegan had vacated minutes earlier.
Tall Man showed himself on the skyline there. Tall Man and at least a dozen of his Crow warriors.
Under the circumstances, Longarm decided he would not complain about the Crow killing their old Piegan enemies, even if they were all supposed to be friends and neighbors nowadays.
No, sir, he wasn’t going to fuss at them even a little bit for shooting down their agency neighbors like that.
Instead he pulled out a pair of rum crooks—he did wish Tall Man would get around to sharing some of those good cheroots he’d won off Longarm—and hoped he had enough of the vile things left in his saddlebags to properly reward the warriors Tall Man brought with him.
Chapter 34
“You already knew,” Tall Man said, mouthing his words through a dense curtain of smoke from the crook Longarm had given him. Longarm thought the Crow sounded disappointed.
“I knew,” Longarm agreed.
