“I give you my word that that is what I was thinking.”
Davis gave a little laugh. “And you said that the woman called you handsome?”
“That is exactly what the lady said. Her very word.”
Davis put his head back and laughed out loud. “I’ll never believe another word you say, Longarm. If Dulcima said that, then that means the woman is near blind—and I never seen nobody leading her around.”
Longarm leaned back and folded his arms. “I did not intend to tell you about all that for the very way that you are now acting. I told you what happened. You can believe it or not.”
Davis reached out for the whiskey bottle and poured more of the amber liquid in both their glasses. “Right now,” he said, “I ain’t real interested in that. What I got my mind on is what I can do here at the tail end of the business. I’m the one throwed the loop, I’d shore like to be there to see what it snares.”
Longarm held his hands out helplessly. “Hell, Austin, I’ve laid it out for you. How in hell am I supposed to explain you being around?”
“That ain’t fair, Longarm,” Davis said quietly.
Longarm stared at him. “Fair? Fair? You sound like some schoolboy. The only thing I know about fair is that every county has one, but that ain’t until fall. Fair. You are in the wrong business you looking for fair. We got a job and we do it fair or not. You savvy?”
“How’d you like it if the shoe was on the other foot?”
“I wouldn’t. I’d be mad as hell. But I’d do what had to be done to get the job done.”
Davis looked away and shook his head. “Sheeeeet!” he said in a long, peeling burst. “Damnit damnit damnit!”
“I’m sorry, Austin—I don’t see no other way for it.”
Davis shrugged. “It can’t be helped. What you say makes sense. When you want me to clear out?”
“Well, not right away. You still got to move those cattle from the Mexican side over here to the quarantine pens. I reckon that would be in the morning. Can you manage that by then?”
“I don’t see why not. We’re holding them close-herded on some good grass.”
“What kind of shape are they in?”
Davis glanced at him. “What the hell do you care! These ain’t your cattle, Longarm. Remember?”
Longarm laughed slightly. “Guess I got carried away.” He lifted his glass to his lips and took a drink. “I guess the next step is for me to go see Caster and let him know the cattle have arrived. We’re going to have an argument. He’s going to want me to give him the money right now, and I ain’t willing to do it before the cattle are in his pens.”
“He ain’t going to want the money before then.”
“Why not?”
“Because. Once he’s got your cattle in his pens, he knows damn good and well that you have to pay him.”
“I reckon you’re right,” Longarm agreed. “I hadn’t thought of that.” He lifted his glass and finished the rest of the whiskey. He stood up. “I reckon I better get on over and see him.”
“You better watch out for San Diego. Either one of them. I hear that little one who acts like a dandy is meaner than his brother. Raymond? Is that his name? I hear he’s a back-alley bushwhacker. Uses a shotgun.”
“Right now I ain’t too worried about either one of the San Diego brothers. I figure Caster don’t want nothing to happen to me until he’s got my cash in his hands. Say, I got the feeling that the cafe owner, Raymond, and Jasper White are on some kind of dodge. Are they smuggling?”
Davis shook his head. “I don’t know for sure. But if it’s illegal, they’re doing it. I heard they were smuggling gold. But then I also heard they were smuggling peons up to big cities like Chicago and New York City to work as street cleaners at two bits a day. You can get nearly any kind of gossip around this town that you’re looking for. I ain’t really been concentrating on them.”
“I reckon I better get,” Longarm said. He put on his hat and walked across the room. With his hand on the knob he stopped and said, “By the way, what did you have to pay for those cattle? Jay Caster might ask. And if they were my cattle, I’d know.”
“Right close to seven dollars a head, depending on the final count. I spent six thousand nine hundred and some odd dollars for the herd, buying it in different lots, first one place and then the other. By the time I’m through, I’ll have spent about seventy-five hundred of the coastal cattlemen’s money.”
“Are the cattle worth it?”
Davis shook his head. “Not within a mile. They won’t bring them in like they are now, and they sure as hell ain’t going to want to pay to take them through regular quarantine. The only thing they can do is turn them back and sell them in Mexico. They’ll lose two or three dollars a head doing that.”
“It appears they’re buying justice pretty dearly.”
Davis disagreed. “Not when you figure it costs them a fortune when they lose a herd of beef worth thirty dollars a head to Mexican tick fever. We get this operation shut down, or run clean, and it will have been worth the price. Though I do think it is a poor comment on the state of government when a citizen has to go out and pay to have the law enforced.”
Longarm smiled thinly. “You mean you don’t think it’s fair, Austin?”
“Go to hell, Longarm. Just go straight to hell. I hope that half-breed blows a hole through you that a small horse could get his head into. Just get on out of here. Go collect your glory. Go set it up so you look like the hero.”
