Longarm and the Crying Corpse

Then once again he went shivering back into the teeth of the storm.

By now it was much too late to meet the barber/ undertaker at Darby Travis’s cabin, so Longarm looked for him at the barbershop as before.

The door was unlocked, although there was no sign of life in the shop. Once inside, however, Longarm could hear sounds of someone stirring around in a back room.

“Hello. Is anybody here?”

The barber came out, his shirt sleeves rolled to his elbows and a smile on his face. The shirt cuffs stayed where they were, but when he saw who the visitor was, his expression fell on the double quick. “Oh. It’s you.”

“Sorry, but someone tried to shoot me on my way to meet you.” Longarm shrugged. “It’s what you might call an occupational hazard.”

“Did you hear the livery burned down?”

“Yeah, I did.”

“Someone really shot at you?”

“Is your concern professional? Or personal?”

The barber grinned just a little. “So maybe business hasn’t been all that great lately.”

“I’ll let you give me a haircut if it will help out, but I draw the line at volunteering for your other services.”

The barber’s grin got bigger. “Speaking of which, and no help from you, I might add, I got the girl loaded onto the sled and brought her back. I was starting to work on her just now.”

“Good.”

“Incidentally, it was a good thing you made me get out there when you did. There were some kids in the cabin, just like before. They had the covers off her and were doing God knows what before I got there and scared them away. Probably having a circle jerk, the little bastards. Fortunately, I know who they are. I’ll tell their daddies, and I can pretty much promise you that those boys will be making some woodshed visits. And taking their meals off their mantels for a while.”

“You can’t blame them, I suppose,” Longarm allowed. “God knows I was a horny little shit my own self when I was young. But you can’t let it go on either. It isn’t right, never mind what Nancy did for a living.”

“Come on into the back if you like,” the barber offered. From the way he said it, with an exaggerated normalcy that suggested a shyness that the man would rather not admit to, Longarm suspected it was highly unusual for anyone to be invited to look in on that side of his livelihood. A professional courtesy perhaps, acknowledging Longarm’s livelihood, which also dealt with death? Naw, probably not. He was just reading stuff in where it didn’t belong. “Glad to,” was all he said, and the barber led the way.

The room was small and kept toasty warm with a coal-burning stove. Nancy’s slim, pale form was laid out on a broad, very heavy table.

“I built the fire high so she’ll thaw out,” the man said. “She has to be thawed completely or I can’t pump the embalming fluid through the arteries.”

“I thought you wouldn’t have to embalm her. I thought you’d just use a lead-sealed coffin and send her the way she was.”

The undertaker gave Longarm a sheepish look. “When I saw her like this … I don’t know that I can explain it. But … I didn’t want anything more to happen to her to … well, to take any more dignity away from her. If you know what I mean.”

“I know,” Longarm said in a small voice.

“She had … maybe I shouldn’t be telling you this, but if you think I’m a fool because of it, so be it … the thing is, when I was trying to pick her up and get her out to the sled, the light was slanting across her cheek and I saw … what I saw was a tear, frozen there on her flesh. It may sound silly, but when I saw that …”

“I saw it too, friend. That’s why I want so bad to find out who killed her.”

“You do understand what I mean then.”

“Yeah,” Longarm said. “I surely do.”

The undertaker cleared his throat. Then smiled. “You concentrate on doing your job, Marshal. I’ll do mine. I’ll embalm her the very best I know how and put her in the best coffin I have. Then I’ll let that stove go out and keep her safe here as long as need be. Whenever there’s a train ready to carry her … and once you decide where you want to take her … I’ll have her ready to travel.”

“Do whatever you think best, my friend, and give me the bill.”

The undertaker shook his head. “Not this time. No charge. I … just consider it a gift from me to a girl I kinda think of as a friend.”

“I tell you what, then,” Longarm said. “Let’s you and me split the bill.”

“I can go along with that.”

Longarm sighed and walked across the room. He stood over the dead girl, looking down on the undamaged and still quite lovely side of her young and pretty face.

She had been something, this child of sorrow and pain. And whatever she might have done in the past, she never deserved to end up here on a wooden slab far from her family and those who loved her.

The tear was still there, he saw. The tear that affected him and that likewise affected the Kittstown undertaker.

It was thawing now, that tear, the ice turning soft and commencing to sag lower on her cheek.

On an impulse Longarm collected the bit of moisture on the ball of his thumb and, before he consciously gave thought to it, tasted of its tart and salty flavor.

The gesture was a vow of sorts, a taking into himself of something of this dead and abused girl-child.

Whoever had done this to her had done it also to him.

And for that there could be no mercy.

“Reckon I’d best get to work now,” Longarm said, “and leave you to yours.”

“If there is anything I can do …”

“I’ll call on you. And thanks.” Longarm gave Nancy one last look, then spun on his heels and strode out to face the storm and whatever else might be hidden inside the white curtain of blowing snow.

Chapter 31

He wasn’t sure, but when he went outside he thought the wind had let up just a little. Maybe.

Still cold as a witch’s tit, though. Still blowing snow. But maybe just the least little bit less snow moving around in the air. Visibility seemed a tiny bit better. If there was anything they needed, it was a break in the weather. To get the trains moving again. To get some food stocks and other things coming in again. Those things were sorely needed.

On the other hand, once the railroad tracks were open Nancy’s killer, or killers, would be free to leave Kittstown. And if there was anything Custis Long did not want, it would be for him/them to get away. That was just plainly not acceptable.

He tugged his fur hat low and turned his coat collar high, and made his way almost comfortably back toward town.

The livery stable was gone, he saw. Charred beams and black rubble, not a stick of any of it standing more than waist high, were all that was left. The snow downwind from where the barn had stood was gray from windswept ash and soot, but he was pleased to see that the townspeople had been able to keep the adjacent buildings from catching fire. The only damage was to the livery. And that could be rebuilt if the owner wanted. The corrals were intact and the well would still be good. A couple of hayricks had burned down with the barn, and of course whatever tack and feeds were stored inside. For the sake of the innocent owner of the business, Longarm hoped he’d been well insured against fire loss.

Longarm hurried on by and turned down the main street toward the mayor’s general mercantile.

Perhaps because the excitement of the fire had forced so many people outdoors, the store was busy. Longarm couldn’t recall seeing anyone else in the place, on his previous visits, but now there were several ladies and three men browsing through the merchandise.

None of them seemed to be having much luck finding the things they wanted.

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Corbett,” Parminter was saying to a buxom matron with a bun so tight the corners of her eyes were pulled back to make her look Chinese. “We don’t have any meats at all, not even bacon. No wheat flour, no tinned fruits, and no sugar left either. I still have some cornmeal and a good supply of rice. Still have some raisins and plenty of that awful pemmican I was foolish enough to buy off a passing Shoshone a while back. Oh, yes. I still have near a whole crock of sauerkraut. I keep forgetting about that. But then it smells so bad that I keep it in the storeroom and never think to mention it.”

“How much cornmeal did you say you have, Mr. Parminter?”

“About ten pounds or a little better, Mrs. Corbett.”

“I will take it all off your hands, sir. And raisins and some of that rice and-“

“Leandra!” the other lady gasped.

“Something wrong, dear?”

“You could share that cornmeal with me, you know.”

“How much do you want, dear?”

“Half.”

“I would give up two pounds. No more.”

“Half,” the other woman insisted. “And the rest of those raisins, Mr. Parminter. And …”

The list was impressive. Parminter jotted it all down, added up the ladies’ bills, and informed them of the totals. The Corbett woman sniffed and made an imperious little waggle of her finger advising Parminter to put the amount on her account. The other lady pulled out a coin purse and counted out the exact amount for her purchases.

“I’ll see your orders are delivered no later than noon tomorrow,” the mayor told them.

“Very well. Good day, sir.”

“Good-bye.”

Longarm touched the front of his hat and hurried to hold the door open for them. When he got back to the counter he had to wait in line while a couple of gents made minor purchases of woolen stockings and the like. When the store finally cleared, Longarm observed, “Funny thing about those women that were in here.”

“How’s that?”

“It’s the one that asked for credit that I would’ve taken for the better off of the two, seeing how they were dressed and everything.”

Parminter grunted. “You weren’t wrong. Ben Corbett is one of the wealthiest men in this county. Likely in this end of Wyoming, for that matter.”

Longarm shook his head. “Then why’d his missus want credit while the poorer one paid cash?”

“Didn’t you know? The rich don’t need cash. Handling it is a nuisance. It’s only us poor folks that have to worry about paying up on time.”

Longarm chuckled a bit, and would have said something more, but the street door pushed open and four snow-covered figures came tumbling in, bringing a flurry of laughter along with them. Longarm recognized the friendly young cowboys he’d played poker with earlier. “Hello, Billy. Jason. Carl.” It took him a moment to remember the fourth one’s name. “Ronnie.”

“Hello, Marshal. Mr. Mayor.” The young men stamped snow off their boots and whipped it from their clothes using the brims of their hats, and in general filled the store with their clatter. “We’re needing tobacco, Mr. Parminter.”

“Matches too,” one of them put in. “And some groceries. We need bacon, lard, flour, coffee.”

“And salt. Don’t forget we’re about out of salt.”

“Sorry, boys, but I’m almost cleaned out.”

“Of what?”

“Of everything.”

“But you have to have some of the stuff we need. Surely you can’t be out of it all.”

“Sorry. No, wait. I have salt. And let me see what else you might be able to use.” Parminter went through his list, and the boys decided on an order that was fairly extensive considering that they likely wouldn’t know what to do with most of it.

“We’ll take the stuff with us, Mr. Parminter. On tick like usual.”

“You’re running up a pretty good-sized bill, fellows. Especially for so early in the season. I don’t think …”

“You know we’re good for it, Mr. Parminter.”

“Soon as the spring gather starts we’ll be drawing pay again.”

“We never let you down before.”

“I know that, but you’ve never spent this heavy before either.”

“We had a run of bad luck, that’s all.”

“Some damn sharpies like to cleaned us out a couple weeks ago. A pair of them acting like they didn’t know each other.”

“They seen us coming and they whipsawed us before we knew what they was up to.”

“They left us short for the year.”

“But smarter. We won’t be taken like that again, Mr. Parminter.”

“And you know we wouldn’t leave you holding the bag for us, sir. We’ve always been straight with you before now, haven’t we?”

Parminter frowned and pulled at his lip some, but after a few moments he sighed and brought out his accounts book. “I’ll mark this down along with the rest. But mind you, don’t abuse the privilege.”

“Yes, sir.”

“No, sir, we won’t.”

“We’ll take care, sir, honest.”

“Wait here while I get some sacks for you to carry your things in.”

When the mayor turned his back and stepped into the storeroom, Billy Madlock winked at Longarm and grinned. “Gonna come over to the saloon later and give us some lessons in poker, Marshal?”

“You’ll be playing tonight?”

“Hey, we got to make some money somehow. It might as well be yours.”

Longarm smiled. “If I can, boys, I might sit in for a few hands.”

“You’re always welcome. You know that.”

The mayor returned and assembled the purchases into four packages. “Mind what I said now,” he warned.

“Yes, sir, we will.” The boys, grinning and poking at one another, took their things out into the gathering dusk.

“Where were we?” Parminter asked. “Oh, yes. I was going to ask you about the arsonist. You said earlier that you had a line on him. May I assume that you’ve arrested him by now?”

“Yeah, well, um …”

Chapter 32

There was something terribly wrong, and it took Longarm half a dozen strides down the middle of the street before he realized just what it was that was so odd here. It was silent.

For the first time in days, for the first time since they’d all stumbled off that Union Pacific coach and made their way to the Jennison Arms, there was no wind blowing.

None. The air was still and silent.

Oh, the cold was as bad as ever. The snow squeaked beneath his boots with every step he took, and that meant the temperature was either below zero or very near to it.

But without the wind to drive the cold through cloth and deep inside the flesh, even a zero-degree temperature reading felt damn near toasty.

And he could hear what was going on around him. Up the street, in the direction of the Old Heidelberg, Longarm could hear the rattly jangle of a badly played piano. Somewhere inside the narrow alley separating two nearby store buildings he could hear the scratching and whining of a stray dog trying to paw a meal out of the refuse it found there. And from somewhere else, Longarm had no idea where, he heard a child’s laughter.

The moan and shriek of a vicious wind were the only sounds of Kittstown he’d had until now. This change was mighty pleasant indeed.

Longarm felt positively jaunty as he tilted the fur hat onto the back of his head—next time he came out he could go back to wearing his favorite Stetson if he liked and the hell with this second-hand soldier-boy affair—and tried to whistle his way along to the railroad depot. But it was simply too damn cold to manage a proper pucker, and his attempts to whistle came off as more of a hiss than a tune. Kind of like blowing out birthday candles in rhythm.

Still, it was almighty comfortable outdoors for a change, and that was enough to boost Longarm’s spirits.

He ambled down the middle of the street. The wind had piled deep drifts most everywhere else, so that unless the shopkeepers had already begun digging paths to their doorways, it was a helluva lot easier to stay far away from walls and buildings, to stay out where the earth had been swept free of snow while the wind was so harsh. Soon he reached the railroad station, hoping by now he might have answers to some of the telegraph messages he’d sent earlier.

No such luck. The telegraph operator was gone again, this time leaving a note saying he would be back at seven in the morning.

Longarm scowled but didn’t bother to snarl. After all, there was nothing he could do about it, and complaining would not bring the man back. Nor was there any real emergency that would justify Longarm going off to drag the fellow back to his key. Best just to accept things the way they were and check again in the morning. In the meantime Longarm celebrated the improvement in the weather by bringing out a cheroot and lighting it. Why, he didn’t even have to cup his hands around the match to keep the flame alive. There was no breeze whatsoever.

All day long he’d been hoarding his smokes, holding back whenever he felt the desire to light up because there was no telling how long it might be before fresh supplies began to reach Kittstown.

Now, if the wind remained calm, it looked like the rails should be open again in … what? A day or two? Likely, Longarm thought.

The railroad would be more anxious than anyone else to get the line clear and functioning once more. After all, their profits came from what they hauled from one place to another, not from what they had loaded onto idle cars.

As quick as they could punch the plows through, they would be moving freight again. And passengers.

Longarm thought about that for a few moments while he stood in the waning sunlight and savored the taste of his smoke.

People would be able to leave Kittstown by rail again. They could leave right this minute if they wanted to go on horseback and trust that the wind would not resume.

That meant Nancy’s killer, or killers, might already be out of reach.

The thought was sufficiently unpleasant to wipe the satisfaction off Longarm’s face and bring a tight-knit scowl back.

Dammit, there had to be some fucking thing he could do to smoke those killers out.

Killers. Plural. That was how he persisted in thinking of them. There almost had to be more than one of them, he figured. Surely no one man would stay in the icehouse cold of that unheated cabin long enough to be able to repeatedly rape the girl. The sheer volume of semen found on and in her body was enough to convince Longarm that more than one man used her. Took turn and turnabout with her, whether with or without her consent at that moment. And then, for whatever reason, whether from anger or an inability to pay as promised, or simply for the pleasure of causing pain to someone who could not defend herself, when they were finished the sons of bitches killed her.

They. Whoever. And now, dammit, they could get away if they wanted.

Longarm figured he needed to come up with something—he had no idea what—to prevent that from happening.

Damn them!

Chapter 33

“You wanted to see me, sir?”

Longarm looked up from a three-month-old copy of the Police Gazette that he’d found lying about in the lobby of the Jennison Arms. He was waiting, with more resignation than relish, for the call to supper. A waiter had already told him what to expect on this day of short supplies and makeshift menus. Supper for everyone would be ham broth and baking powder dumplings. The menu choices were limited: take it or leave it. At least, thank goodness, the price was right; the railroad would be paying for it.

Supper would come shortly, though. At the moment young Jim Jennison Junior was standing there. Longarm had left word at the desk that he wanted to speak with the boy.

“Sit down, Jim. I wanted to ask you about one of the guests here.”

“Oh, sir, I can’t gossip about-“

“This is official business, son. Not gossip. I already know the answer I expect you’ll give, but I have to ask it anyway. It’s about George Mabry and his friend. They said you can confirm that they haven’t left their room since sometime last night.”

The youngster made a sour face. And vouched for Mabry’s story. Both men, he said, had been deathly ill the whole night long and all morning too. Neither could possibly have gone outside without someone knowing it. He personally had been in and out of their room half a dozen times or more trying to keep their bedding fresh and the chamber pot emptied. It was not the sort of chore he enjoyed doing.

Once that formality was out of the way, the boy stood to take his leave, but hesitated for a few seconds before doing so. “Can I ask you something, Marshal?”

“Of course, Jim. Ask whatever you like.”

“How is your investigation coming into … YOU know.”

“The girl Nancy?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Not as well as I would like,” Longarm admitted. “I can’t find anyone who saw or heard a thing, and without that …” Longarm shrugged and shook his head.

“Sure is a shame, ain’t it, that criminals don’t leave a mark when they go and do something rotten like that,” the youngster sympathized.

“It surely is,” Longarm agreed.

“Well, if you’ll excuse me, sir, I have work to do.”

“Thanks, son, you’ve been a big help.” Longarm hesitated. Then smiled. And finally laughed out loud. “In fact, Jim, you’ve been a whole lot more helpful than you can imagine.”

“Sir?” But Longarm did not explain further, and after a moment the boy turned and trotted off toward the kitchen and whatever it was that needed doing there.

Longarm sat on the lobby sofa and continued to chuckle and snort long after the boy was out of sight.

Chapter 34

Longarm took a sip of the rye—it was good but not from the tiptop-quality bottle the bartender had poured from before—and waved to the cowboys at the corner table who were motioning for him to join them. He paid for his drink and started through the crowd toward Billy Madlock, Carl Benson, and the others.

“Marshal?” He felt a light touch at his elbow, and looked down into the bright, inquisitive eyes of the girl called Dawn.

“What can I do for you?”

“Could I talk to you for a few minutes, please? In private?”

“Sure thing. Just a second.” Longarm got Jason Tyler’s attention and held up a finger to say he would be just one minute, then pointed upstairs. Jason, and soon after him all the other cowboys, grinned and nodded. Hell, yes, they understood if a man wanted to take a trip up those stairs before settling down to a game. Of course they did.

Dawn led the way, and Longarm followed docilely along behind her. He suspected most of the men in the place would be watching his progress and assuming he was going with the girl to get laid. But what the hell. He didn’t have to answer to anyone here, and it wouldn’t matter if that really was what was on his mind.

Dawn took him into her room and closed the door behind them, sliding the bolt to lock the rest of the world outside. “Over here,” she said.

Again Longarm followed. But this time he was becoming just the least bit suspicious. If Dawn wanted to talk, why was she taking him to the bed? She

…

She wrapped her arms tight around his neck and pressed her lips to his. Her breath was warm and quick, and he could feel her tongue probing his mouth. It was not an unpleasant sensation. Not at all.

“Look, Dawn, if you …”

“Shh! Please. I … need you.”

“I don’t understand. What would you …” Again she hushed him, her mouth hot and eager on his.

“Please.” Her hands were busy undoing the buttons of his shirt. And then of his fly. She reached inside his trousers and had no difficulty finding his cock. He was already hard as a tent pole in natural response to the pretty girl’s attentions.

“You’re so big,” she whispered. “And handsome and clean too.”

“Look, I think …”

“Shh! Please. Please.” She spread his shirt open and pressed her palms warm and soft on his chest. She dipped her head and gently, slowly began to lick Longarm’s nipples.

The sensations of it tingled all the way down into his crotch, drawing his balls tight and driving him half mad with pleasure as Dawn alternately suckled and licked at masculine nipples turned suddenly hard and as erect as a pecker.

“Does that feel good?” she asked, a coquettish smile curling and twisting at the corners of her mouth.

“You know damn good and well that it does.” Dawn giggled. And licked him again and again. “Why?” Longarm asked.

She ignored him.

Still busy sucking and licking his chest, she began at the same time to disrobe him, pulling articles of clothing away and tossing them aside. His coat and vest and shirt first.

She fumbled with the buckle of his gunbelt. Longarm handled that for her, and draped the big Colt over the bedpost at the head of the narrow bed where Dawn worked.

“Oh, my,” she whispered when she pushed his trousers down and knelt to pull them off him. “It’s so pretty. So nice.” She affirmed that opinion by running the tip of her tongue lightly along the underside of his cock. The thing jerked and bounced in response, and Dawn laughed happily at the reaction she caused there. “So clean. It smells nice. You know?”

Longarm suspected he did not appreciate the significance of that half as much as the girl did.

Dawn peeled his clothes off for him right down past his socks, then shed the abbreviated dress she’d been wearing downstairs.

She really was a pretty girl, he thought. Her hair was pinned back in a tidy bun and she still wore her spectacles. Nothing else now, just the glasses. They made her look bookish and prim.

Prim? Naked and yet prim? Dawn managed to make those two seeming opposites compatible.

“Fuck me now?” she said. “Please?”

She lay on the bed and held her arms up to him.

Longarm knelt between her thighs and looked down at the girl who was smiling up at him.

“Please?” she asked.

His erection was so powerful he was throbbing and bouncing, and it was no great chore for him to comply with the girl’s repeated requests. He leaned forward, and Dawn reached down to capture his cock in both hands and guide it into her moist and ready depths.

Hot flesh enveloped and delighted him, and he held himself still once he was socketed deep inside Dawn’s slim body.

He held himself motionless, poised there while her vaginal walls pulsed and clenched to give a sense of movement where there was none.

She lay as still as he was, and yet the feeling between them was as if her hips were pumping and her body writhing.

“Good?” she asked.

“Better than good,” he acknowledged. “You already know that.”

“I like to hear it anyway.”

“All right. You are good. Very good.”

“Do I please you?”

“You please me very much.”

Dawn smiled. And began to rotate her hips in a slow, circular pattern that had his cock doing a most delightful dance within her.

“Shall I …?”

“No,” she said. “Hold still and let me do this.”

Longarm nodded. And did as the girl asked.

Her movements were subtle. Soft. Marvelously calculated to please.

Much of the feeling came from the unseen but maddeningly powerful contractions inside her. She had a degree of muscle control that went beyond reason. But then logic and reason were not what this was about. “You like it?” she asked again.

“It’s wonderful.”

The compliment seemed to be what she wanted most. She smiled and sighed. And moved beneath him.

“Hold still,” she warned. “I can feel you moving.”

“I can’t hold still no more, dammit.”

Dawn tried to frown at that, but he could see the pride and the power in her eyes. She was proud of her ability to take him past his ability to control himself. It seemed to be what she wanted. “Hold still,” she ordered. But he could see that she knew he could not and that she was glad that he could not.

“Now!” he cried out, lunging forward. Impaling her on the hard spear of his pleasure. Driving bone-deep inside her body.

He bucked and shuddered and was sure he could feel a quick, convulsive response in Dawn’s flesh as his own climax spilled beyond containment and his seed spurted hot and milky into her womb.

The girl cried out at the same time he came, and her nails dug hard into Longarm’s shoulders. She wrapped her legs around his waist and rode him like a bronc-buster breaking a strong colt to saddle.

Longarm stiffened, his wild plunging halted along with the flow of his juices, and after several tremulous moments collapsed on top of her.

He felt drained, utterly spent and exhausted. “That,” he said slowly, “was damn fine.”

Dawn sighed, her expression languid and dreamy, and pressed her face against his neck. Her breath was warm and soft there.

“Thank you,” she said.

He thought about asking her. First the other day. And now this time. She was a whore. She screwed God knows how many men every day of her life. And yet she was the one who wanted, insisted, that he take her.

And not for money. She had not been paid either time he was with her.

There had to be a reason why, of course. He could not begin to understand what that reason might be. A resemblance to a loved one in her past? A fantasy figure that took her into a better world of make-believe? He did not know except to know there had to be a reason, whatever that reason might prove to be.

But to ask her outright? He decided not to. Talking about it would only confuse him. And possibly cause pain to Dawn. She might not even consciously know herself what it was that impelled her to seek pleasure in this stranger’s arms.

Whatever it was, she was a joy to be with. And that, after all, was all he really had to know about it. He had pleased her quite as much as she pleased him. That was enough.

He kissed the girl’s forehead, her eyes, finally the softness of her mouth. “Thank you,” he whispered, and for whatever reason he could see small tears well up jewel-like in her eyes.

He hated to leave her now, but he would have to go soon. He had work to do downstairs. Serious work. A few minutes more and then he would go. But not quite yet. For this quiet, gentle moment he would continue to hold and to stroke and to reassure her that she was not alone, that he was with her and appreciated her and was pleased with the great gift she had given to him.

“Thank you,” he whispered again, and received in return a hug and the spill of her tears.

Chapter 35

“And the dealer takes three,” Longarm said, tossing his discards aside and sliding three cards off the top of the deck that rested on the table in front of him. “What’s your bet, opener?” he asked without looking at his draw. “Check,” Ronnie Gordon responded. “I bet a dime,” Carl Benson put in. “See your ten and up five cents.”

“Call,” Longarm said.

“I’m out,” Billy Madlock decided after a pause for deliberation. “Call,” Ronnie said. “Call.”

“Is everyone in?” Benson laid down a full house, eliciting a round of groans.

“This is your night, Carl,” Longarm told him.

“About time too. Speaking of time, I suppose you’ll have to hurry to catch your man now.”

“Why is that?” Longarm asked.

“You know. The tracks will be open again soon. Whoever murdered that whore can get away.”

“No, he can’t,” Longarm said as he pitched a nickel into the center of the table to ante.

“No? But I thought … I mean, you haven’t arrested anyone. Have you?” Madlock’s young face twisted with consternation. “Surely someone would have said something about big news like that even if you wanted it kept quiet for some reason.”

“Nope,” Longarm agreed. “No arrest yet.” He cut the deck for Billy’s deal, and leaned back in his chair while he took a cheroot from his pocket and began to trim the twist with exquisite care. “Tomorrow morning,” he said as he struck a match and applied the flame to the blunt end of the cheroot.

“What about tomorrow morning?”

“Tomorrow morning I’ll nail down the fellows who killed that girl.”

“There’s more than one?” Ronnie asked.

“I’m sure of it,” Longarm told him.

“And you’ll catch them tomorrow morning?”

“That’s right.” Longarm gathered in his cards and tipped them up so he could see. Two pair, kings and sevens. It could have been worse.

“I’ll open,” Jason Tyler said. “Five cents to get this game rolling.”

“Who is it, Marshal?” Benson asked. “C’mon, you can tell us.”

“Who killed her? Oh, I don’t know that yet. Won’t until tomorrow morning, like I said.”

“I’m confused. If you don’t know now, what makes you think you’ll find out come morning?” Benson persisted.

Longarm smiled and gave the boys a wink. “Can you fellows keep a secret?”

“Of course.” The four pals leaned expectantly forward, all ears now, their poker hands forgotten in the excitement of the moment. The marshal was about to let them in on a secret of his trade.

“Now that the storm has eased off, I can apply a new technique the Secret Service has come up with.”

“What d’you mean, Marshal?”

“You’ve heard of the Secret Service, I suppose? Properly speaking, they fall under the Treasury Department, while my boss and me work for the Justice Department. Same government, though, so they shared this technique with the rest of us. They worked it out as a tool they can use if somebody ever again tries to assassinate a President of the United States. That’s what the Secret Service does, you see. They protect the President. Other stuff too, I suppose. As for my crowd, it’s their newly developed technique that interests us.”

“Technique? What kind of technique would that be.”

“I can’t explain exactly how it works. We aren’t allowed to do that. But the upshot of the deal is that they’ve worked out this technique … it’s real scientific … that identifies each individual human being. You can use anything of his. Or hers. Works just as good on women as it does on men. They tell me it’s foolproof. And it works on any part of the person too. Hair, spit, fingernail cuttings, anything at all.”

“You’re kidding.”

“No, I most certainly am not. You examine any tiny particle of … well, of any damn thing. You have to examine it close, see, under a microscope. And the instrument has to be absolutely stable. It can’t wobble or vibrate even the least little bit or this technique won’t work. That’s why I couldn’t do it so long as the wind was blowing like it did. Even a house with a perfect foundation might wobble enough to throw everything off. But now that the wind is quiet, I can bring out my instruments and take readings off all the samples I can find out at that cabin where the girl was killed. It don’t matter what I examine. If the guys left a speck of pecker cheese behind, a pubic hair, if one of them took a piss or spit on the floor, just anything at all … I got ‘em cold. I can not only identify them, I can get the evidence to stand up in a court of law. Think of it, will you. One unnoticed hair picked up off the blanket that girl was wrapped in and some dumb son of a bitch will go to the gallows.”

“The gallows, Marshal? For killing a whore? Come on now. We all know better than that. It isn’t like it was a regular person that died. The girl wasn’t but a lousy little whore.”

“We all know better, do we?” Longarm scowled. “It might’ve worked like that. If the killers hadn’t been so god-awful stupid. I mean, right in the beginning, just after the girl died, whoever done it could have gone to Mayor Parminter and confessed. Claimed she died by accident. You know there wouldn’t have been any fuss, likely not even any formal charges. He’d of had an inquest, if that, and let it drop. But whoever did it, they walked away and tried to hide what they done, and that made things serious. Then they compounded their stupidity by trying to kill me. You may not realize it, but that’s a federal offense. The government takes a kinda dim view of anybody that tries to kill a federal officer. And then, if all that wasn’t bad enough, the dumb sons of bitches went and burned down that livery stable. Endangered the whole town when they did that, and broke a good half-dozen state and local laws in the process. No, boys, whoever is on the string for this thing is more than likely gonna hang for all the trouble they’ve caused. And I will get them started on their way to the gallows myself, personally, come daybreak tomorrow morning when I collect my samples from that cabin.”

“Why don’t you go get them tonight?” Billy Madlock asked. “Wouldn’t that be the sensible thing to do?”

“It might, except I wouldn’t be able to see everything as good by lamplight as I can in natural daylight tomorrow. Besides, the microscope requires an awful lot of light to work right, and I have to be able to testify in court that I conducted the examination right by the book and that every tiny detail was followed. There can’t be any mistakes allowed when it’s a man’s neck on the line. I owe that much consideration to whoever the dumb bastards are that are gonna swing for these crimes.”

“Damn, Marshal, that’s really interesting.”

“Yes, but mind, you promised me to keep this just amongst ourselves. Don’t go whispering it around, not even to your very best friends.”

“No problem about that with us, Marshal. We all are our very best friends, all of us right here together.”

“All right then. Uh, where were we in the card game?” Longarm puffed on his cheroot and leaned forward, trying to concentrate on his play.

Inside, though, he was about to get a bellyache from having to hide his laughter.

Good Lord, these dumb kids were buying it. He couldn’t believe it. Gullible? He reckoned. Surely anyone with half a grain of sense could recognize that there wasn’t, there couldn’t be, any such “scientific technique” as what Deputy Marshal Custis Long was describing. Individual identification. What a dumb fucking idea. Hell, anybody knew that blood was blood and spit was spit and peter fuzz was just all peter fuzz.

But these boys were buying the yarn lock, stock, and barrel, and Longarm thought that was one of the funniest damn things he’d come across yet.

He’d made the whole thing up himself, starting with the germ of an idea planted by way of Jim Jennison Junior’s innocent comment about criminals leaving an identifying mark behind. And before midnight, Longarm figured to spin his windy tale not just for these happy-go-lucky—and hopefully loose-lipped—cowboys but for every bartender, rummy, or talkative salesman whose ear Longarm could find and bend.

Yes, sir, before long he expected most of the population of Kittstown to know that a brand-new advance in science would be applied come daybreak and that tomorrow there would be arrests made for the murder of the pretty little whore named Nancy.

Chapter 36

Shit, he wanted a smoke. Bad. It was bad enough being cramped and cold and miserable. But the worst thing was not being able to smoke. Dammit.

He’d been huddled inside a nest of blankets borrowed from the Jennison Arms for—what? Three hours maybe? Two at the very least. And it was getting to him that he couldn’t risk the smell of the smoke or the bright pinpoint of light that the coal would give off. Not if he wanted his prey to come to the bait.

Longarm was situated well inside the wispy, ghost-like screen of winter-naked crackwillows that grew near Darby Travis’s cabin.

From this hiding spot he could see both the front and the rear of the place. And one of those, he figured, should pay dividends before the dawn.

His reasoning when he made up that wild tale about a newly developed scientific technique was that he probably could rely on Nancy’s killers to run true to form.

And what little he knew about them so far included, along with a willingness to commit murder, a penchant toward arson as a means of resolving their difficulties.

So what better method of destroying the “evidence” Longarm claimed would be collected at daybreak than to burn down the cabin where that evidence was to be gathered.

Longarm figured he had way the hell better than even odds that sometime before first light his killers would mosey by and torch the Travis place.

Or try to.

Longarm might have something to say about their likelihood of success.

But then they wouldn’t know that.

In the meantime, though, well, it was pretty damned uncomfortable sitting motionless through the night, surrounded by snow and with air temperatures somewhere south of zero.

Worth it, however, if Nancy’s killers dropped by as planned.

Longarm stifled a yawn, and made some faces to try to keep himself awake. It would have been a hell of a lot more convenient, he bitched and groaned to himself, if the sons of bitches had been considerate enough to put in an early appearance.

Longarm sat bolt upright, jarred wide awake by the presence of a new sound. Then, grumpy and frowning, he slumped back low to the ground once again. He could hear footsteps approaching, all right, but not from town. Something was wandering slowly along to his right, toward the empty plains north of Kittstown.

The sounds of snow crust crunching underfoot were clear as bells ringing in the snow-muffled silence of the night. Step-step, pause, step, pause, step-step. It was most likely a deer browsing the willow shoots for bark, he suspected. Not likely an elk, not down this low and this far from the safety of the high country. And not likely a strayed horse or cow either. Either one of those would be smart enough to stay close to home and a feed trough in weather like this.

Longarm shifted in search of a more comfortable seat—but not a warmer one; he’d long since forgotten what warmth felt like—and worked up some spit to swallow in the hope he could ease his scratchy throat and avoid coughing. A cough would be as bad as a cigar to warn off the killers—or spook passing deer—and alert the whole damn neighborhood to the fact that things in this vicinity were not as lonesome as they seemed.

He ducked his head and rubbed the tip of a nose that had lost feeling more than an hour ago. Before long, dammit, he would have to start worrying about the first blush of dawn creeping up behind his back.

If this made-up ploy of his didn’t work, what the hell was he going to do next to try to work out who it was that murdered the girl?

The sad truth was that he didn’t have the least idea what to try if this failed.

Damn it!

He scratched his nose again, tried to rub some feeling back into his ears … and stared open-mouthed and incredulous when he realized that it wasn’t some wandering buck he’d been listening to for the past couple minutes.

Under the black velvet canopy of the night sky, lighted almost to brightness by the wide and gleaming swath of the Milky Way and with the three jewels in Orion’s belt sinking low to the horizon, he could see dark shadows moving over the stark white of the snow to his right.

And it wasn’t any deer he was looking at.

There were two distinct forms. Man-shapes both of them. Skulking along slow and coming from the exact opposite direction from what Longarm would have expected.

If he had set himself to guard the front of the place he never would have been able to see them.

As it was, however, they were clearly outlined in silhouette against the pale background.

Two men, he saw.

One of them, the one in the lead, carried a stubby weapon that had every appearance of being a short, double-barreled shotgun. Now where had he encountered anything like that before, eh?

And the other man, following close behind and moving in virtual synchrony with the other, as precisely as infantry marching at drill, was burdened with something that surely did look like a two-gallon coal-oil can.

Well, my, oh, my, Longarm thought with considerable satisfaction. What do we have here? And just what might these gents be doing tonight? Out for a moonlight stroll? Just happened to pass near to the Travis cabin? Sheer coincidence, their lawyers would claim. Hell, yes.

Longarm’s lips thinned in a grimace that held no mirth whatsoever.

He sat silent and still. Content to bide his time and let these jehus demonstrate their intentions beyond the possibility of reasonable doubt.

Chapter 37

The two dark figures, each bundled heavily in coats and gloves and mufflers, made their cautious approach to the back of the cabin. The one with the shotgun, slightly the shorter of the two, stood facing outward to keep watch, while the other one went about the business of dowsing the logs of the wall with coal oil, starting about waist high and letting the volatile fluid pour over the logs thoroughly.

Actually Longarm was not sure that would be enough to destroy the place even if he left them alone with their task. The thing was, Darby Travis, or whoever it was that built this cabin, had used thick, unsplit, but completely peeled logs for his construction.

With no bark to act as tinder, and as difficult as it is to set a thick chunk of wood aflame, there was some doubt—in Longarm’s mind anyway—as to whether these fellows were very adept when it came to arson. Like as not, he figured, the coal oil would burn itself out harmlessly on the surface without getting the logs started. Not that he was going to offer any helpful suggestions for improvement, of course. All Longarm needed for his purposes was to see a match flame. From there on, any court in the country would be forced to conclude that conflagration was what these gents had in mind.

And sure enough, there was the fire as the one with the scattergun said something to his partner, and the taller one struck a match.

Longarm was thirty, forty feet away, and could hear the sounds of the whispered conversation without being able to make out the words.

He thought the voice was familiar, but could not have sworn to that.

And anyway, he had everything he needed now.

Staying low behind the screen of willow withes, he first took aim with his .44 and then announced, “Don’t neither one of you move. You’re both under arrest. You with the gun, drop it. You with the match, hold still.”

Dammit, that was what a peace officer was supposed to say. Billy Vail drilled that into all his deputies often enough.

But just as pretty nearly always happened, the book that said an officer was supposed to announce himself didn’t get around to guaranteeing that the asshole idiots would go along with the instructions.

Hell, they almost never did.

And these fellows were no exception.

The one holding the match dropped it. The one with the gun held onto it.

The taller one quite naturally tossed his match onto the coal oil he’d just finished pouring, and a gout of bright flame leaped up the wall, illuminating the men and everything for a dozen yards around them.

The shorter one brought his shotgun to bear, searching in the sudden flash of light for the source of Longarm’s voice.

Longarm didn’t know for sure if the guy with the gun could see him or not, but he was not much inclined to take chances with a man who’d tried several times already to shoot him.

Longarm’s Colt barked, and a slug took the one with the shotgun high in the middle of his chest. Just about at the point where his heart ought to be.

The man teetered backward, righted himself, and went down face-first in the snow, the shotgun discharging harmlessly into the ground as a convulsive grasp of dying fingers closed on the triggers.

“You! Hold still, dammit.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Hands up.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Now kick some snow onto that fire and knock it down.”

“Yes, sir.” The man held onto his oil can with one hand and bent to sweep some snow onto the fire.

At least that was what Longarm thought he was doing.

Instead the fool grabbed for the shotgun his partner had dropped.

“Dammit!” Longarm snapped.

He thought the dead man had already tripped both triggers of the scattergun. He thought the thing was empty and harmless. He thought.

The problem was that he did not know that for certain sure. And he wasn’t willing to bet his life on it. The man picked up the shotgun. Longarm put a bullet into his forehead. The man dropped like a marionette with its wires cut. “Shit,” Longarm growled, stumbling forward on legs numbed by the combination of freezing cold and long inactivity so he could dowse the coal-oil fire and remove the threat to Darby Travis’s home.

Only when he was done with that did he take time to see just who it was he’d shot and killed this frosty morning.

“Aw, God damn it!” he complained once he saw.

Chapter 38

Back-trailing the two dead men to where they’d started from was about as difficult as following a pair of streetcar tracks down the middle of Colfax Avenue.

Longarm didn’t know what the hell they’d intended to do about the deep set of footprints they’d left behind with every step they took. Pray for more wind and snow? Could be. The truth, of course, was that they really hadn’t had much choice about it.

Not if they’d believed Longarm’s lies about that new scientific technique that would finger them as murderers. Believing that, they’d had to go through with trying to destroy the evidence and save their necks, and never mind small details like leaving footprints behind.

As it was, of course, the trail in the snow was so plain Longarm didn’t even have to wait for daylight to follow it. He simply ambled along in their path, not even having to break trail for himself. They had already gone and done it for him.

The path led a half mile or so to a small dugout gouged into the side of a low hill. The dugout looked old. It might have been someone’s line camp at one time, or even the site of a failed homestead.

Whatever it used to be, now it had been fixed up with some fresh sod on the roof and a windbreak of piled stones in front of the leather-hung door.

A plume of smoke lifted into the sky from a sheetmetal chimney at the back of the low roof. A lean-to had been built to serve as a storage shed. Longarm took a look inside—surprises were not something he craved at the moment—and found it filled with saddles, bridles, and similar gear waiting for springtime.

Longarm sighed. There wasn’t any point in screwing around here. Better to get it over with.

And there wasn’t any need to be subtle either. The men waiting inside would be expecting someone.

It was just that it was not Longarm whose entrance they anticipated.

He made sure there wasn’t anyone outside in the crapper. Again, no surprises were wanted. It wouldn’t much do for someone to come up behind him with a gun in hand, say, or even a billet of stove wood that could be used for altering the shape and the contents of a man’s skull. Then he simply walked over to the door and let himself in, Colt already in hand.

“How’d things … Jesus! You.”

“Uh, huh. Me.”

“But where …?”

“Madlock and Benson are both dead. I was waiting for them at the Travis place. They were stupid. They tried to shoot it out with me. I suggest neither of you boys makes that same mistake. I do this for a living, remember. You’d be in way the hell over your heads.”

Jason Tyler was lying on a bunk with a pile of blankets tucked chin high. Ronnie Gordon had been feeding wood into the stove when Longarm interrupted the chore.

“Did you … I mean, how’d you know it was us?”

“You want the truth, Tyler? I didn’t. Oh, you boys were on my list of possibilities. Naturally, you all being young and horny and broke until you could start drawing pay again. But I tell you true, son. I didn’t think it would be you four. I thought better of you than that.”

“But how …?”

“Why was I laying in wait this morning? Son, I told that story all over Kittstown so anyone interested in keeping track of the rumors would know I was gonna make my arrest today. And whoever was guilty … I didn’t have to know who that was … whichever sons o’ bitches was guilty would just naturally figure they had to come out and destroy the evidence before I could get to it.”

“You trapped us.”

“I did that for a fact, yes.”

“That isn’t fair, you know.”

“Neither is murder. Nor the assorted other things you’ve done.”

Ronnie Gordon stood and shook his head sadly. “I can’t … I can’t face going to the gallows, Marshal. That would purely kill my folks. They’re decent people. They wouldn’t understand.”

“Rape. Murder. No, those things are kinda hard for decent folks to accept. Maybe you should of thought of that before you killed that girl.”

“I didn’t … me and Jason didn’t have nothing to do with that, Marshal. It was all Billy and Carl. They’re the ones raped her. It was Billy Madlock that beat her to death. I’ll swear to that, Marshal.”

“So will I,” Tyler put in.

“Reckon you can tell that to the judge. Mayhaps he’ll even believe you.”

“You don’t, Marshal?”

“I told you, son. I do this for a living. Do you think I’ve ever once arrested a guilty man? Of course not. They’re every one of them innocent. Pure as the driven snow, like the saying goes. Just ask ‘em. They’ll tell you.”

“Marshal, I mean it. I can’t hang. I just can’t.”

“That ain’t up to me, Gordon. A judge and jury will take care of that.”

“I just can’t. I really ca-“

Gordon whirled and grabbed for a battered old Sharps carbine that was leaning against the wall beside him.

It was a crazy thing to do.

But then the choice was clearly his. And he did indeed mean that he couldn’t stand to swing. He would rather accept the alternative than the disgrace.

Longarm obliged the young fool with a bullet that hit him high in the throat and sprayed the hot stove with fresh blood. The blood sizzled and stank, filling the dugout with a sickening stench.

Longarm scarcely noticed. Jason Tyler was still alive. And Tyler’s hands were underneath his blankets where Longarm could not see what they might be busy doing.

The muzzle of the big Colt was aimed unwavering on a spot just about a half inch above the bridge of Tyler’s nose.

“God, don’t shoot me, please don’t shoot me, Marshal, please.”

“Stick your hands out from under those covers,” Longarm ordered.

Tyler’s hands appeared with a magician’s speed. They were empty. And shaking.

“Now kick the covers back.”

“Anything you say, Marshal, just please God don’t shoot, don’t shoot.”

The smells of saltpeter and sulfur from the burnt gunpowder fought to overcome the equally strong stink of the scorched blood.

Longarm felt a mite queasy himself under those combined influences. And they were too much for Jason Tyler. The terrified cowboy puked all over the front of his long underwear. But he didn’t take his hands down even then.

“Why’d you kill her?” It was probably a stupid question. Shit-for-brains criminals virtually never told the truth. Not about hardly anything, including their own right names. But it was a question Longarm had to ask anyway.

“She … it was an accident, like.”

“An accident?” Longarm moved close behind Tyler, clamped one steel cuff onto Tyler’s left wrist, and jerked the arm down so it was held at the small of the cowboy’s back.

“We were on our way to town. For a drink, play a little poker, you know.”

“Uh, huh.” Longarm brought Tyler’s right hand down as well and snapped the other cuff in place, securing his hands behind him.

“We saw her coming toward us. Just walking slow and looking all around. Kind of … enjoying things. You know?”

“Yeah. I know.”

“We’d about used up our pay already … a run of bad luck … but the last we went over to Norma’s place Billy’d had this Nancy, and he liked her real well. He said we all ought to have a go at her, so we stopped her and asked. She got all snotty with us. She said no, it was Sunday and she wasn’t working. If we wanted to fuck we could come to the whorehouse later on sometime and she’d give us whatever we wanted. Well, what we wanted was to have some pussy right then. And we didn’t like some little bitch whore like that saying no when Billy’d already fucked her once and she said herself she’d take us on another time. I mean, that made us mad. And Carl, he grabbed her first. I think it was him anyway. It was kind of like once we got started, we all got into the spirit of it.”

“Uh, huh,” Longarm said again, restraining an impulse to kick Tyler in the back of the head. It was easy to kill someone that way. Real easy.

“And we were right there close to Old Man Travis’s place and we knew he wasn’t home and … well, we dragged her in there. So nobody could hear her shouting, see. She was screaming her stupid head off. And it’s not like she was some damn virgin faced with a fate worse than death. She was a whore, for God’s sake. A lousy stinking whore. Where did she come off telling us we couldn’t have any.

“So anyhow, one thing led to another. We all of us screwed her. A couple times each, I guess. But she wouldn’t shut up. So Billy hit her, to get her to quiet down, like, so we could leave. But she wouldn’t leave it be. She was hollering crazy stuff, like how she was going to have the law on us for rape. Well, that was a laugh. We all knew better than that. But then she did a really dumb thing. She kicked Billy. Square in the balls. God, that pissed him off something awful. I mean, it would have made me that mad too. So he punched her. Just as hard as he could. And then he hit her again, and Carl hit her and Ronnie and … and I kicked and hit her some too. I mean, we all did. We just … forgot, kind of, what we were doing. And the next thing you know, she was dead. We hadn’t meant for her to be. Honest. It just … happened.”

“Yeah, sure.”

“We laid her out on the bunk, and Ronnie was the one that closed her eyes and folded her hands and tried to make her, like, presentable. Then Carl took her handbag. She had some money. We spent that, of course.”

“What did you do with the bag?” Longarm asked.

“We burned it. We didn’t want … you know.”

“Sure. Evidence.”

“That’s right. We didn’t want any evidence around. I think Ronnie kept the little coin purse she had with her. We shared the money, but he liked the coin purse. Said it would make a nice tobacco pouch. So he kept it. It’s, um, in the saddlebags under that bunk in the corner there.”

Longarm took a look. The coin purse was there, all right. Just as Tyler said, whatever money it had contained was gone by now. What the purse still held were a St. Christopher’s medal and a scrap of paper folded into a small wad and tied with a bit of string. Longarm untied the paper and spread it open: “IN CASE OF ACCIDENT PLEASE NOTIFY …”

“Come along, you piece of shit,” Longarm instructed.

“What about … you know?”

“Your buddies? Shit, I dunno. Maybe somebody will come along and bury them. Or maybe the buzzards and the raccoons will get to them first. I don’t much care either way.”

Jason Tyler shivered. And he did not so much as ask for a coat or blanket to cover himself before he hurried out into the cold dawn of his first day of incarceration, the first day of the rest of his life.

Chapter 39

“Afternoon, marshal.”

“Good afternoon, Mr. Bonner.”

The Union Pacific conductor touched the brim of his cap deferentially. “Off to Denver, is it, sir?”

“Not this time, Mr. Bonner. I’ll be staying with you all the way to Omaha.”

“Is that so, sir. Well, we will have to see what we can do to give you a nice trip the rest of the way.”

“Thank you, Mr. Bonner, but it isn’t a pleasure trip.”

“No?”

“No, I’m … you might say that I’m taking a friend home.”

“I see, sir.”

Longarm rather doubted that the gentleman did see. But there was no point in explaining.

The thing was, Nancy would be going home.

Nancy Anastasia Gruenwald. Loving daughter of Hans and Hilda Gruenwald of Fremont, Nebraska. He’d already wired them. They would be waiting in Omaha. Waiting to take Nancy back into the arms of her family.

The pity—one of many, actually—was that they were doing it now.

The pity was that they hadn’t done it when it might have meant something. The pity was that Nancy herself would never know.

Or would she?

Longarm frowned and swung up the steel steps into the coal-heated warmth of the U.P. passenger carriage. He selected a seat and reached for a cheroot, forgetting for the moment that none had yet been shipped in over the newly opened tracks and that he would not be able to buy any more until they reached Laramie, maybe even Cheyenne. He did not look back to Kittstown.

There was, after all, nothing back there that he cared to remember.