“I want Your boss, Mister Mull, to sign my road papers along with you. I want them signed by the both of YOU.”
Jay Caster stared at Longarm. “Have you gone loco? My boss is in Brownsville. This is Laredo, or have you lost yore way as well as your head?”
Longarm leaned back in his chair and stuck his boots out. “So what?” he said. “Hell, it ain’t but a three-hour train trip. Round trip six hours. You’re going to split it with him—hell, I know that. You couldn’t be running this business without his okay on the matter. And I can’t see anything but a fifty-fifty split. That’s twenty-five hundred dollars each. Hell, I’d spend six hours on the train for that kind of money.”
Chapter 6
Caster was quiet for a long moment. Finally he shook his head and said, “Well, I’ll give you this much, Long. You take the prize for out and out gall. Whatever in the world would make you think I’d try and get Mister Mull down here? What makes you think he’d even consider coming?”
“Same answer to both questions. Money. You and him both know this can’t last much longer. One of you will get transferred or something will happen. You both figure you’d better get it while you can. You the same as told me that when you raised your price.”
Caster stared at him. “Long, you are starting to give me an itch. Might be I’m going to remember any minute that I got police powers.”
“Oh, come on, Mister Caster. We both know you ain’t going to do that.”
Caster cocked his head. “I’m curious about something. You seem to have in mind what you want to do. Maybe you did when you walked through that door, and me and you have just been waltzing around without any music playing. But how come you need Mull’s name on yore quarantine papers, too? How come just mine won’t do?”
Longarm smiled just enough so that his lips weren’t dead straight. “I done a little looking into this before I come to Laredo, Mister Caster. I talked to a couple of stock contractors who had cleared your quarantine and had their road papers, signed by you. You alone. Theirs was a one week deal also. Only they paid two-fifty a head. Well, they commenced to try and drive those cattle straight southeast across the coastal plains, figuring to take them to Galveston and ship them out to Cuba or New Orleans or some other place. They knew they could get twenty dollars a head. Only problem was them ranchers along the coastal plains. That’s mighty rich range land. Them ranchers along in there raise some fine beef and they are mighty protective about it, especially when it comes to Mexican cattle might have tick fever.” Longarm paused. “They got turned back, Mister Caster. Turned back by the law and some armed citizens. Ended up driving to the northwest, and didn’t make enough to buy lunch.” Longarm paused again. “Seems like you got a bigger reputation than you’ve been letting on, Mister Caster.”
Caster studied Longarm for a moment. “Yes,” he finally said. “And it appears like you been playing dumb all along.”
Longarm gave him an innocent look. “Oh, sometimes I don’t have to play. Sometimes it just comes natural. But not this time. This time I have a pretty good idea what I’m going to need to get them cattle to the Galveston port. And it’s a little more than your signature on some papers. They know about you along the coast, Mister Caster. Those rich ranch owners. And they got the law in their pocket. And you and I both know that no cattle slip through quarantine in Brownsville. Mister Mull keeps his reputation slick as a whistle. Here in Laredo is where y’all do your business. We both know that. Don’t take a schoolteacher to figure it out. Of course you can tell me to take my cattle to Brownsville and cross them. You can tell me that, knowing I damn well will be obliged to hold them for ninety days.” Longarm nodded his head. “It’s slick the way y’all run it. I got to give you that. But I want Mull’s name on that paper and I want my port of entry to say Brownsville.”
“Long, YOU are either crazy or you think I am. I got half a mind to have my Mister San Diego pay you a visit.”
“You ain’t going to do that.” Longarm shook his head. “No, that is not something you would do.”
“Why not?”
“Because it is bad business. You can’t do business with a man who is halfway back to Oklahoma Territory.”
“You’d run?”
“I ain’t no gunfighter, Caster. I’m a businessman, just like you. And when you give this some thought you’ll see it’s a good deal. Like I said, this end of your operation is playing out. To drive cattle out of here a man has got to go to the northwest, and that’s too far. The ranchers along the coast have cut off any herds coming from here. You’ll have to do it my way or get out of the game. I figure you can get herds through with Mister Mull’s signature for at least another year. That’s a good chunk of money you can make between now and then.”
Jay Caster opened a drawer of his desk and rummaged around until he found a toothpick. He stuck it in his mouth and rolled it around, regarding Longarm all the while. Watching this made Longarm conscious of the dull ache in his own tooth. He needed to get some laudanum. Caster said, “Where you staying?”
Longarm told him. “If I ain’t there, I’ll be in a poker game at a saloon close by.”
Caster nodded. “Well, why don’t you get up and get the hell on out of here for the time being. I’ll give what you said a good thinking over.”
Longarm put on his hat and stood up. “Just remember,” he said,“my cattle are due in here any day now. We got to have a deal before I put them in quarantine.”
Caster smiled. “You don’t trust me, Mister Long?”
“Trust ain’t got nothing to do with it, Mister Caster. This is business. Trust is something you have when you loan somebody money. I ain’t proposing to loan no money I’m proposing to pay money for a service. You’re mighty sure about what you’re doing without no risk. I want to have the same feeling.”
“I don’t know if you’ll get to feeling that secure,” Caster said, “but we’ll see what we will see.”
Longarm turned toward the door, but before he’d gone but a few steps, he said, over his shoulder, “I’m obliged to you for telling me about my cattle gatherer trying to cheat me. Obliged, but not surprised.”
“Oh? How come?”
Longarm shrugged. “The last two tried the same thing. I done a little lying today but I reckon you can understand about that.”
