Longarm and the Daughters of Death

Davis shook his head. “No. And I want to tell you something right now. There was no Lester Gaskamp or any other Gaskamp killed there. The only man killed in that robbery was a lad identified as Willy Bower, and nobody had ever heard of him. There was a man down along the border named Gaskamp done some robbing and rustling, but he disappeared.”

“Well, this Lester Gaskamp was supposed to have been a Mason County boy, but I can’t find anyone who ever heard of him. I asked the hotel keeper, Jim Jacks, and he’s lived here for the last ten years and he don’t know who he is.”

Davis said, “There was a Archie Bowen killed in a robbery at Brady. That was about a year ago. I had paper on him and I seen the body. The description matched him. I guarantee you he wasn’t no Mason County resident.”

Longarm took another drink. “Then there was a Jim Squires who was supposed to have run off from a stage holdup on the road from Austin. He married one of Diver’s daughters named Salome, but like all the rest, got the ceremony but not the honeymoon.”

Austin Davis suddenly laughed. “Jim Squires? Run off from a robbery? I need to go down to my room and get the poster on him. He’s wanted for everything but singing too loud in church. I can’t imagine him running out on a job.”

Longarm made a face. “I’ll take your word for it. Hell, if I had a hard, cold fact I wouldn’t know what to do with it.” He held up a hand and ticked off fingers. “We got Bowen, Gus Home or Gus White. We got Gaskamp, we got Squires, and we got Dan Hicks and Vince Diver. All of them known bandits. Then we got this Amos Goustwhite who had money and a check on him from the auction house robbery just as Gus White did. That’s enough professional bandits for a town this size, wouldn’t you say?”

Davis said, “Yes, considering they must have a crew goes around and collects the bodies, like Goustwhite.”

“So we got to figure that some of them ain’t bandits, at least not full time. We got to figure that some of them are decent citizens right here in Mason County who only slip out every once in a while to hold up the odd bank or stage. Hell!”

“It’s a slick little proposition,” Davis said. “I don’t see no way to get a knife blade in edgewise and peel the cover off the damn thing. Like you say, knowing what’s what and proving it are two different matters. And you ain’t even named this Shaker fellow you say folks claim is the boss.”

“Wayne Shaker.” Longarm shook his head. “Hell, I don’t even know if he exists.” He looked over at Davis. “But one thing I know exists is this gang of outlaws, be they Mason County goat herders or border bandits who have shifted their operations. Before I got sent down here we had better than fifty complaints and requests for help filter down to our office. Letters, telegrams, reports from deputies in the field. Mostly we were hearing from officials and law officers from the towns and counties surrounding this one. Best we can figure, they have robbed somewhere in the neighborhood of over two hundred thousand dollars. You can run a county pretty good on that kind of money.”

Davis got up, put the palms of his hands in the small of his back, and stretched. He said, “Well, that’s fine and dandy knowing what they done. But who is they and how are you going to bring them to bay? You got damn few names, none of which you are sure about, and no faces except a couple of dead ones and my memory of what Vince Diver looks like. And Dan Hicks. How you going to herd them up?”

Longarm shook his head. “I don’t know.”

“You need a soft spot.”

“I got a soft spot, but I can’t be the one pokes it with a sharp stick.” He glanced up at Davis. “I kept wondering what I hired you on for. Now I know. I reckon it’ s got to be you puts the squeeze on.” He stared at Austin Davis.

Davis put his hands on the back of his chair. “Now wait a minute. You going to have to tell me a little more about what you mean by squeezing. I ain’t planning on killing nobody if that is what you mean.”

Longarm gave him a sarcastic look. “How the hell would you get information out of a corpse, Davis? Use some of that stuff you got between your ears.”

“Listen, don’t get insulting with me. I hired on, but I can quit just as fast.”

“You can’t quit.”

“Why the hell not?”

“It’s against the law. Federal law.”

Davis stared at him for a moment. He finally started laughing. “Longarm, you are full of it; you know that? I see you are not above a little bullying to get your way. Pray tell who is it you intend I should squeeze.”

“The sheriff. Bodenheimer.”

“Oh, the sheriff. That’s different.” Davis walked around his chair and sat down. He picked up the bottle of Maryland whiskey and poured a generous amount in his glass. “Don’t flinch like that, Longarm. Dirty work requires good whiskey.”

Longarm sat down. “It ain’t like you could appreciate it. Hell, if I hadn’t told you you’d have been just as happy with rotgut. You are just drinking that up to spite me.”

Davis drank from his glass and then set it down on the table. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Aaaaaa!” he said with satisfaction. “That is mighty goooood. I reccon I need the rest of the bottle for this dirty work.”

“Like hell!” Longarm said. He reached out and pulled the half-empty bottle to his side of the table. “You got a mean streak in you, Davis. You know that?”

Davis laughed. “Here’s a man talking about squeezing some poor old fat boy till he pops and he accuses me of having a mean streak. You are a stretch, Longarm. A real stretch. By the way, how come you can’t do the squeezing your ownself?”

Longarm grimaced. “Because when you make a threat, the party that is being threatened has got to believe you’ll do it or else it ain’t no good. And Bodenheimer will know I will only go so far. He won’t be scared enough. He’s got to be more scared by what you are going to threaten him with than he will be about what he thinks that gang will do to him.”

“And how come that lets you out?”

“Because I’m a deputy U.S. marshal.”

“Well, hell. I’m supposed to be one too. At least a provisional one.”

“Yeah, but Bodenheimer don’t know it. Besides, I got a kind of reputation. He’ll take that into account.”

Davis chortled. “I’ll say you got a kind of reputation. I’d hate to tell you what kind I’ve heard you got.”

“Will you take my point?”

Davis waved a hand. “All right, all right. You want me to squeeze the sheriff. How we going to do it?”

Longarm thought a moment. “I figure to take that money and checks over to the Ownsbys’ auction barn. I’ll get Bodenheimer out of jail. I’ll have him in manacles. I don’t want you to be seen with us in town, so you join up about two or three miles up the road. I’ll just ride on, leaving him in your hands.”

“I take it you want him to tell everything he knows.”

“Everything. But especially how Dalton Diver and his daughters tie into the midst of this thing.”

“How far you want me to go?”

“Well, don’t kill him. Maybe back him up against a tree and see how close you can place a bullet next to his head. Now Austin, this is going to take some play-acting. I figure you ought to be pretty good at that.”

“Well, if you can play-act at being a marshal, I reckon I can handle my end.”

Longarm gave him a sour look. “Listen, I’m trusting you with an important job. Quit trying to be cute.”

“I’m just trying to find out how to go about this. Can I shoot off a finger or two? I hear that works pretty well. Shoot a couple of fingers off the grub hand of that fat boy and I reckon he’d try and turn inside out. Probably confess to anything.”

Longarm shook his head. “I wish you had a little better attitude toward this, Austin. I said threaten him, not half-kill him.”

Davis turned suddenly hard, cold eyes on Longarm. “I don’t know about you, pard, but if someone keeps threatening me with his mouth and ain’t doing nothing but tongue-whipping me, I’m going to get the idea pretty soon that I ain’t afraid at all. I think you better leave this part to me.”

Longarm stared at him, startled by the change in the man. He said slowly, “All right. Do what you have to. Just save me enough to occupy a federal cell in Leavenworth, Kansas.”

Davis’s face relaxed a little. “Maybe I won’t have to do nothing to him. But I got to know that I can if I have to. That’s the way I bluff a threat. There ain’t no bluff to it at all. That’s what convinces the other party.”

Longarm shook his head. “You are a curious duck. There for about a second or two you looked about half mean.”

Davis didn’t smile. “I am. I just don’t show that half unless I really have to.”

Longarm lit a cigar and looked at him and suddenly laughed. “Austin Davis, you are a fraud. I cannot believe I let you beat me playing poker. Them antics of yours ought not to fool a stepchild.”

Davis said, “You just keep thinking that way, Marshal. I’m anxious as you are to get this business over with and get you back to the poker table. I lied to you about bounty hunting. The real reason I’m here is that I heard you were in town and had some money for a change.”

Longarm stood up. “Let’s go. I don’t think I can support much more of this kind of talk from you. The floorboards are starting to creak from the load.”

“When are we going to do this?”

“Right now. I’ll get the money and checks from the desk clerk and try and learn you your part while I’m at it. Then I’m going to get the sheriff and meet you about two miles out on the Llano road. Try and keep your nerve. This Bodenheimer will be manacled, but he might still be more than you can handle.”

Davis gave him a dry look. “Talk about a load. I can’t wait to get shut of this job. The wages I’m drawing, I could starve to death just listening to you talk.”

Longarm thought that Bodenheimer sat a horse like a sack of flour. Or a sack of lard, if there was any such of a thing. They rode out of town on the Llano road, heading for the auction barn. Of course Bodenheimer didn’t know he wasn’t going to go all the way.

Longarm had taken him out of the jailhouse with his hands manacled in front of him. Bodenheimer, after an early protest and a repeated demand to be set free, had retreated into a sullen silence. Before heading out of town Longarm had ridden him on a circuit of the courthouse square.

As the townspeople had stopped to gawk and to stare, Longarm had said, “Look at that, Otis. They see you cuffed. They knew you were in jail, some of them, but now they see you in chains. What do you reckon they are thinking, Otis? Well, I’ll tell you. They are thinking that the barn dance is over. They are thinking that the chickens have come home to roost. You are the ring-leader of that thieving gang that has been using this county for a hideout and now that is all over. Those people are seeing the ring-leader in chains. That means all that fresh money coming in has done dried up. They won’t support you, Bodenheimer. Ain’t a one of them will back you.”

But Bodenheimer hadn’t responded. He didn’t speak until they were on the road out of town, and that was only to ask Where they were going.

Longarm had said, “I ought to be taking you to a hanging party, but I’m only taking you over to the sheriff in Llano. Of course he might hang you. But I got no say about that.”

Bodenheimer had said, “He ain’t got no jurisdiction over me.”

Longarm had replied, “Well, you can certainly take that up with him when he takes you over. Might be he’s a reasonable man and will only break a couple of your arms.”

Now they rode along in silence, Bodenheimer sullen and stolid, Longarm wondering if Austin Davis was going to show up at the right time and have his part down and not mess things up by making a fool of himself.

Longarm had called Davis’s attitude frivolous; Austin Davis had replied that Longarm didn’t know lighthearted and carefree when he saw it.

Longarm was hoping that Bodenheimer was brooding about his trip around the town square. He had done it deliberately, not to ridicule Bodenheimer, though he was willing for that to happen, but to soften him up for what was to come from Austin Davis. Bodenheimer had to believe that the bandit ring was finished and that he was finished and had nothing to lose by spilling what he knew. He’d been kept in the jail for the past forty-eight hours, so he could have no idea what had been the extent of Longarm’s investigation. And now Longarm was taking him to the sheriff of another county. Or at least that was what he was supposed to believe.

They’d been riding for about three quarters of an hour, and Longarm was beginning to wonder where Austin Davis was. By his calculation they’d come closer to five miles than two. He wondered if Davis had run into a bottle of whiskey or a poker game he just couldn’t pass by.

Maybe the damn fool thought Longarm was playing at some sort of game and that he just gave orders for the pleasure of it. He was starting to get a little hot under the collar when he saw his provisional deputy suddenly burst out of a mesquite thicket and come riding straight for them. Longarm stopped his horse, stopping Bodenheimer at the same time.

Bodenheimer just stared at Davis as he came riding toward them. Davis jumped his horse up on the road and then reined him in and came to a sliding, rock-scattering stop. He had his revolver drawn. He said, “Hold up there, Marshal.”

Longarm said, “Who are you and what do you want?”

“Never mind who I am. What I want is this man. He gestured with his revolver toward Bodenheimer. “I hate to do it, Marshal, but I am going to have to take your prisoner.”

Longarm said, “You can’t do that. He is a federal prisoner. I can’t surrender him.” He was noting with approval that Davis was staring at Bodenheimer with that cold, black-eyed look he’d shown Longarm in the hotel room.

Davis said, “I will have this man, Marshal. He is responsible for the death of my wife in a neighboring town when this man’s gang pulled a daring daylight robbery.”

Longarm thought that “daring daylight robbery” was laying it on a little thick, but then Bodenheimer was a little thick, so it probably didn’t matter. Longarm said, “I won’t surrender the prisoner.”

Davis said, “You have to. I have the drop on you.” Longarm glanced at the barrel of Davis’s gun. The front sight, called the drop, had been filed off flush with the top of the barrel. It was a practice followed by most men who did business with handguns because a revolver was never aimed so much as instinctively pointed and the front sight was useless and might get hung up as you drew. Longarm had always disagreed with calling the front sight a “drop” after its resemblance to half a raindrop or teardrop. Longarm always thought it looked more like a half of a penny. But then, he supposed, you couldn’t go around saying, “Hands up! I’ve got the halfpenny on you!”

Now he said, “All right, stranger. I have no choice. You do have the drop on me. There is nothing I can do.”

Davis said, “Ride on ahead, Marshal. Your work with this man is over. I’m taking on his future.”

“You mean just ride off and leave him here with you?”

“That is what I mean, Marshal. You have no choice.”

Longarm had been watching Bodenheimer. The sheriff had been glancing back and forth between them as they had enacted their little drama. Other than looking mildly surprised when Austin Davis had first ridden up, he had not shown any emotion. But now, as Longarm started his horse off, he suddenly cried out, “Marshal, what are you about here?”

Longarm turned and looked back at him. “I’m about to ride off and leave you in the hands of this man whose wife was killed as an innocent bystander in one of those robberies you arranged.”

Bodenheimer glanced at Davis and then back to Longarm. He said, “You can’t! I’m yore prisoner! This man is liable to do me serious harm. You can’t leave me!”

Longarm said, “You should have thought of that, Otis, before you started all this mess. If I were you I’d just pray he gives you a quick end. He looks pretty damn vicious to me. Lord knows he is ugly enough.”

He put spurs to his horse before Bodenheimer could reply or before Austin Davis could rise to his last remark. He rode at a gallop for a quarter of a mile before he slowed his horse and looked back. He could see Austin Davis taking Bodenheimer off the road and into the thickets and hills of the rough country.

They had decided between themselves that it should take Longarm about two hours to make it to the auction barn and then back to meet Austin Davis and Bodenheimer. Of course that didn’t allow for any time talking to Ownsby, who Longarm knew would want to discuss the latest developments in his robbery. But since there hadn’t been any developments Longarm was willing to talk about, he didn’t reckon to spend much time at the auction barn. Consequently, he had urged Austin Davis to get right to work on Bodenheimer. “It will take you half an hour to get through the fat so you can find a nerve to twinge.”

But Davis had claimed he was going to spend the first hour just staring at the sheriff. “You’ve seen that look of mine. Makes women melt and strong men seek shelter. You may not believe this, but I one time killed an entire field of knee-high cotton with this very look. And done it in less than five minutes by my watch.”

Longarm was looking forward to finishing the job, and not just so he could go home to Colorado. He was seriously interested in getting shut of Mister Davis and his “lighthearted and carefree” ways. He was also, if matters worked out the way he planned, looking forward to giving Mister Austin Davis quite a shock at the conclusion of the affair. He didn’t know how Mister Davis felt about surprises, but he was looking forward to having the opportunity to see if he took it in his lighthearted and carefree fashion. He doubted that he would.

It was close on to the two hours as he approached the stretch of road where Austin Davis had intercepted them and taken Bodenheimer off his hands. He was very hopeful that Davis had managed to turn the sheriff around and get something useful out of him, something he could use.

He slowed his horse to a walk and began looking for Davis. If he didn’t see him soon, he planned to stop and wait on the road. The country was thick with brush and slashed with cuts and draws. He had no intention of going off the road to try to locate the pair in such country.

His wait was a short one. Within five minutes Austin Davis and his prisoner emerged from the tangle of bushes and weeds that lined the road. Longarm was startled to see that Bodenheimer looked almost exactly the same. He didn’t appear to have even picked up any extra dust as a result of his ordeal. And from what Longarm could see, he was certainly not missing any fingers or any other body parts. As they rode up Austin Davis said, “Had to make sure it was you. Can’t be too careful in these parts. Lot of road agents about, the sheriff was just telling me.”

Longarm gave him a fierce glare. “Well?”

Austin Davis rode his horse up close to Longarm’s so that he and the marshal were facing each other. Davis said, “He’s willing to tell us what he knows, but he needs a guarantee. I told him I thought we could work something out.”

Davis had left Bodenheimer sitting his horse some ten yards away. The horse’s head was drooping and so was Bodenheimer’s. Longarm said, “Hell, I didn’t send you into that brush to bargain with the sonofabitch! What the hell did you and him do, have a game of cards?”

Davis said patiently, “I seen right off that he was a good deal scareder of the folks he was in with than he was of us. Wasn’t ten minutes before he seen through our little ruse. He knows we won’t kill him, but he also knows that the other side will kill him. So I set in to see if we couldn’t arrive at a mutually satisfiable arrangement.”

“You did what!”

“I set out to horse-trade with him.”

“I see.” Longarm was still glaring at Davis, who was pretending not to notice. “I take it you never pulled a gun on him, never dirtied your fists, never threatened to skin him alive, never even showed him a knife, and didn’t build a fire and take his boots off and hold his feet close?”

Davis looked away. “Didn’t see no need.”

“Then what in hell did I hire you for? Hell, I could have gone back there and tried to reach a mutually satisfiable arrangement with the bastard. Davis, I’ve half a mind to lock you in jail and half a mind to drag you behind my horse for a mile or two. What the hell kind of guarantee does he want?”

Davis pulled a face. “He wants safety. He wants you to get him out of here.”

“Is that all?”

“Just about.”

Longarm glanced over at Bodenheimer, who was sitting placidly on the back of his horse. “Did you tell him our little plot?”

Davis shook his head. “Didn’t have to. You’re right. You have got a reputation, only this time it didn’t serve you so well. Old Bodenheimer ain’t as dumb as you think. He said you would have never have let me approach with a drawn gun. That you’d have done something before I ever got close.”

Longarm gave his provisional deputy a sour look. “How does that make you feel? A man like the sheriff seeing something you ought to have known. What came over you to come riding up here with a drawn gun? Hell!”

Davis took a small cigarillo out of his pocket and lit it with a big match. He said, “Wouldn’t have made a damn bit of difference. Bodenheimer told me straight off he knew I was in with you. He said you would have never surrendered a prisoner so easily. Now who’s so damn smart? Seeing this whole matter was your idea. He told me point-blank he didn’t think I’d do much to him, but it didn’t matter because he wasn’t going to open his mouth so long as he was in Mason County. Said he’d rather I killed him outright than left him for the dogs that would have got after him. Custis, this is the situation. Can’t be changed.”

“And he wants out of here?”

“What he says.”

“Bring him over.”

When he was facing Bodenheimer Longarm said, “What have you got to tell me?”

Bodenheimer shifted his eyes back and forth from Davis to Longarm. He said, “I ain’t got nothin’ to tell you without you give me your word to see me safe out of here.”

“All right. I’ll send you to Kansas. You ever been to Kansas?”

Bodenheimer said stolidly, “That there is where the federal pen is. Leavenworth. I ain’t wantin’ to go to no prison.”

“Then what do you want?”

Bodenheimer’s eyes shifted again. “I want you to get me out of here and turn me loose. Out of this county. My life ain’t worth a plugged nickel as it is. Soon as you throwed me in jail I was expectin’ to be killed at any hour. Then you rode me around the square. That done it.”

Longarm thought a moment. “Have you got enough to trade for that? Me turning you loose?”

Bodenheimer licked his lips. “You want who be behind this, don’t you? Behind the thieving an’ whatnot.”

“Yes.”

“I can tell you that. And I can tell you how it started and how they do it.”

“That’s pretty good trading material. Start telling.”

“I want your word you’ll see me safe out. Safe out of Mason.”

Longarm shrugged. “You got it. I give you my word I’ll see you safe out of Mason.”

“And no federal prison.”

Longarm smiled slightly. “No federal prison. Unless you ask for it.”

“What’s that? Unless I ask for it?”

Longarm nodded. “Yeah, you never know. It might be just the place you’ll want to go.”

Bodenheimer still looked puzzled, but Austin Davis patted him on the back, winking at Longarm as he did, and said, “Now Otis, me and you done got to be pretty good friends in a pretty short time, ain’t we?”

Bodenheimer nodded dumbly. “I guess,” he said hesitantly. “You said I could trust Marshal Long. You said it was the only way out for me.”

“Well, can’t you see that? You don’t want to get hurt. You don’t want to have that bunch tear you in two between a team of horses, do you? Now you already told me a good bit of it. Whyn’t you go ahead and unburden yourself to the good marshal here. He’ll see you right.”

Longarm stared at Davis. He thought that next he’d be offering Bodenheimer a shoulder to cry on.

Longarm said, “If you got anything worth telling, now is the time to do it. I want to know who is behind all this robbery. It’s organized. Don’t take no U.S. senator to know that.”

Bodenheimer glanced over at Austin Davis. Davis nodded. Bodenheimer said hesitantly, “Well, I guess you’d have to say that the mayor and the president of the bank and Dalton Diver was at the bottom of it.”

Longarm stared at him. “The mayor? The president of the bank?”

“Yeah, it was them two come to me and said what they had in mind. Said it was Dalton Diver’s idea to help the county with some fresh money. But they said it wouldn’t work if the gang couldn’t count on a safe place to light between robberies. They said it was going to be a pretty rough bunch and I’d be a lot better going along with it rather than getting killed. They said that would happen for shore, and they’d just put somebody in my job who would carry along, so what was the use of my battling agin it.”

Longarm said dryly, “Naturally you saw the sense in going along with that.”

Bodenheimer said, a whine in his voice, “I couldn’t fight all of ‘em, could I?”

Longarm gave a disgusted snort, but Austin Davis patted Bodenheimer on the back and said, “Marshal, let him get it out. Be good for him. This man has had a hard row to hoe. Go light on him.”

Longarm looked up at the sky and shook his head, but didn’t speak other than to tell Bodenheimer to get on with it.

Davis said, “Now when was this, Otis?”

Bodenheimer shrugged. “Little over two year ago. The mayor said the way it was going to work was they’d bring in some pretty tough boys to do the actual work, but they’d get some Mason County boys as part of it so the home folks would feel like they was a part of the doings and wouldn’t kick up no sand.”

Longarm said, “Who was going to bring in the professionals?”

“That would have been Mister Diver’s doin’ on account he knowed some.”

“Who is Vince Diver?”

The sheriff hesitated for a second, and then looked down at the ground and shook his head. “I don’t know. Never heered the name.”

“Then what were the names of some of the toughs they brought in?”

Again the sheriff shook his head and studied the ground. “I don’t know. They thought it best if I wasn’t on to the name of nobody.”

Longarm made a disgusted sound. “Oh, bullshit! How was you supposed to know who to leave alone if you didn’t know who they were?”

Bodenheimer looked up. “They just said to leave everybody alone. Just go on like I had been.”

“Which hadn’t been much to begin with.” Longarm stared at the man a moment more. Finally he said, “What about the Mason County boys? Who are they?”

The sheriff shrugged. “Nobody much. Just ne’er-do-wells that mostly hung around town and played cards and drank whiskey. The Goustwhite brothers, Amos and Emit. Then there was Ernie Abshier and Lester Gaskamp, though it be hard to say if Lester was a Mason boy or not. His folks had moved away a long time ago. Then there was Bolton Surges and Tom Wilton. Wilton got kilt. And I think Surges didn’t care for the business. But none of them amounted to a hill of beans. They was all in the back and never took no hand in the planning of matters.”

“What about Wayne Shaker? He is supposed to be a Mason boy as well as the leader of the bunch.”

The sheriff shook his head. “I’ve heered the name, but I’ve never clapped eyes on the man.”

“What’s the banker’s name?”

“That would be Mister Crouch, Mister Ernest Crouch. He’s the president of the bank, the Mason State Bank.”

“What in the hell is a banker doing mixed up in this?”

Bodenheimer looked up surprised. “Why, how else would we spread the money around so it would do ever’body some good? Folks go to the bank an’ Mister Crouch, he loans ‘em money against hard times, like we been havin’ lately. Or he loans some to the city and the mayor sees it gets spread around. You see how it works? Makes it good for ever’body. That’s plain as paint.”

Longarm said, “How about the folks in the other towns where the robberies took place? Does it make it good for them?”

Bodenheimer frowned. “Well, that would be their lookout, wouldn’t it.”

“Yeah. And mine. What did you get out of this, Otis? I’m about to figure out who the big winners were, but what about you?”

Bodenheimer shrugged. “They let me keep my job. An’ the mayor let me put two of my kinfolk to work.”

“That all?”

Bodenheimer looked uneasy. “Well, they did gimme a twenty-five-dollar-a-month rise in my salary. An’ they started furnishin’ me an’ my two deputies with horses.”

Austin Davis laughed. “I bet that wasn’t no hardship—the horses, I mean. Probably had more stolen stock than they knew what to do with.”

Longarm said to Bodenheimer, “One thing I ain’t exactly clear on. The money went to the bank, to Mister Ernest Crouch. But I don’t believe that he talked a bunch of hard men into giving him the proceeds from their robberies. Most robbers are stupid, but I can’t believe anybody is that stupid.”

Bodenheimer looked startled. “Oh, no, Marshal. Them robbers taken their cut. Land-a-mercy, naturally they did. What the mayor and the banker done was to charge them for hidin’ out in Mason County. Sort of a fee or a rent. Don’t you see?”

“How much was it?”

Bodenheimer shook his head. “Now that I don’t be knowing.”

Austin Davis said, “Otis, one thing as has puzzled me is where the Diver girls come into this business. They kept marrying into the gang, but the marriages never come to nothing. What was that all about?”

Bodenheimer shook his head again. “I couldn’t tell you that, Marshal Smith. That was ol’ Dalton Diver’s work. Didn’t have nothin’ to do with our arrangement. I’d reckon that was just his way of making a little something on the side. We all thought it was pretty fine because it took more of the money out of the actual robbers’ hands and kept it here.”

“What do you know about a Mister Summers drowning?” Longarm asked. “About two or three months ago? That was handy as hell for Dalton Diver and his daughter Hannah.”

The sheriff was defensive. “Now I don’t know nothin’ ‘bout that and I don’t want to know. I tol’ my deputies to steer clear of the business and that is a fact. What they wanted to do amongst themselves was no affair of our’n.”

Longarm thought for a moment, and then he glanced at Austin Davis.

Davis just made a shrugging motion as if that was all as far as he was concerned. Longarm said, “All right, Bodenheimer, get off your horse.”

Chapter 8

The sheriff stood there uncertainly, looking as if he were waiting for further instructions. None came. Austin Davis rode over, gathered up the reins of Bodenheimer’s horse, and turned back toward town. Longarm wheeled his mount and started off in company with Austin Davis. The sheriff watched them dumbly for a few seconds, and then he said loudly, “Wait a minute! Wait a minute! What are you doing?”

Longarm was about ten yards away. He turned in his saddle and looked back at the fat man wearing manacles. He said, “Why, what you asked, Otis. I’m seeing you safe out of Mason. You’re out of Mason and you’re safe. What else you want?”

Bodenheimer had a stricken look on his face. “But you can’t leave me afoot out here like this! Somebody will come along and kill me. I can’t walk in these boots, and you still got me chained!”

Austin Davis said, “There is just no pleasing some people. Hell, Marshal, it doesn’t appear that Otis is grateful to you for his freedom.”

Bodenheimer said, “You can’t leave me afoot!”

Longarm said, “Bodenheimer, you the same as told me the horse you are riding is stolen. As a law officer I can’t let you ride off on a stolen horse.”

“But you promised you’d see me safe. Didn’t he, Marshal Smith?”

Longarm turned and looked at Austin Davis. “Did I promise that, Marshal Smith?”

Austin Davis did not even have the good grace to look ashamed. He said, “Well, maybe in a way you did. But he looks pretty safe right now. And he is free and he is out of Mason.”

Bodenheimer’s voice rose in a kind of wail. “I meant see me safe someplace else than Mason County. Hell, I ain’t even out of the county! I meant see me safe someplace I can stay! I can’t stay on this road.”

Longarm turned his horse around so he was facing the sheriff. “Listen, Bodenheimer, what am I supposed to do with you? I ain’t got time to carry you to a place where you can be safe. I don’t know what safe is for you. I told you earlier that you might want to go to prison, might ask to go to Kansas. Is that what you want? Because that is about the only safety I can offer you.”

Behind him Austin Davis said, “Marshal, I’ve had a thought.”

Longarm looked back. “And what would that be, Marshal Smith?”

“Well, why don’t you let him go back to sheriffing?”

Longarm was startled. This had been no part of their plans. He said, “Marshal, why in hell would I want to arrest a law officer for being a crook and then give him his job back?”

Davis said, “Well, perhaps he’s learned his lesson. And perhaps he could be of some help to us. Maybe he’d like to redeem himself and be an honest sheriff.”

Longarm looked at Bodenheimer and then back at Davis with amazement clear on his face. He said, “One of us is talking like they’ve been eating loco weed, and I don’t think it is me. Why in hell would you want me to let him come back as sheriff? He ought to be a sheriff, all right, in a cell in Leavenworth. Malfeasance in office is a federal crime that will get you ten years breaking rocks.”

Davis said, “Yeah, I know you got him dead to rights, Marshal Long, but hell, everybody makes a mistake now and then. It ain’t like he was one of the ones with a gun in his hand, shooting up towns. And it ain’t like he made a big profit. Twenty-five-dollar-a-month raise? That ain’t exactly high cotton.”

Longarm looked at Bodenheimer. The sheriff was standing there, anxiety on his face, wringing his hands together in spite of the manacles.

Longarm said, “Hell, he’d give us away in a minute. Look, I’m trying to put people in jail, not let them out. Hell!”

Davis said, “Look at it this way, Custis. You may have already spooked that mayor and the banker. But you let ol’ Otis here come on back in his job—and in your company, why, that ought to sooth some ruffled feathers right there. Remember, we still got quite a few quail to flush yet.”

“Yeah,” Longarm said thoughtfully. “But I don’t know if I want old Otis here flushing them for me. He is likely to flush them way before I’m ready.”

“I got a feeling old Otis here will do just about what he’s told. That and nothing more. Ain’t that right, Otis?”

Bodenheimer’s mouth was hanging open and his eyes were wide with hope. He took a step forward. “Oh, yessir! Yessir! Marshal, I’d give anything fer another chance. I know I done wrong, but I didn’t see no way out. You could give me one.”

Longarm sat, thinking. On the one hand he hated to see Bodenheimer get off with nothing more than a few days in jail. But he still did have quite a few chickens yet to get in the henhouse, and the sight of Bodenheimer returned to good standing might ease some of the fidgets he imagined were running through certain quarters. And in the end, his real interest was in stopping dead the gunhands who had actually done the robbing and killing. Of course he meant to get Dalton Diver and the banker and the mayor in the same net. Maybe Davis was right, much as he hated to admit it. Longarm said, “What if I set him back up and he betrays us?”

“Then gut-shoot him. Give him a couple of days to die slow and painfully. That will teach him not to suck eggs.”

Longarm looked back at Austin Davis. “Thank you, Marshal Smith. By the way, since we are new on this assignment together, I never did get your first name.”

Davis gave him an innocent look. “It’s John.”

“Honest John, no doubt.”

Davis looked modest. “They mostly call me that.”

Longarm said, “Well, Honest John, I hope for your sake that you are right about this matter, because it is going to be your nut in the wringer if something goes wrong and it leads back to old Otis here.”

Bodenheimer said, “I swear it, Marshal. I swear you can set store by me. I won’t let you down.” He was so agonized that drops of sweat were standing out on his big forehead even with a cool breeze blowing.

Longarm looked at him sourly. “One thing I ain’t heard about as much as I want to, and that is your deputies. How deep are they in this?”

Bodenheimer took another step forward. “Marshal, I can nearly swear that the two what is blood kin to me ain’t in none of it. They ain’t smart enough. And I made sure they never come close to being exposed to it at all.”

“They ain’t smart enough?” Longarm leaned out of the saddle toward the sheriff and put his hand to his ear. “Come again? You are talking about how smart someone is? Otis, that has got to make me ask you how you would know.”

The sheriff looked down. “I know how it looks. But it’s hard makin’ a living around here, and I just put them boys to work kind of for no reason. They ain’t really deputies. They don’t know nothing about the law.”

“But they carry guns.”

“Yeah, but they ain’t mean or nothin’ like that. It’s just a job for them. It was part of the deal for me keeping my eyes and ears closed. Of course I can’t say about Melvin Purliss. I don’t know all that much about him. He was kind of part of the deal. Now he is a capable hand. He’s been in law work before.”

Longarm glanced at Austin Davis. “Little Melvin Purliss? He’s been a lawman? Hell, I thought he was another one of your charity cases.”

The sheriff shook his head. “Nosir. The mayor and the council thought I ought to have one deputy capable of keeping the peace and they give me Melvin, oh, a year, year and a half back.”

Longarm nodded at Austin Davis. “Well, at least we got a little help. But I never thought it would be Purliss.”

Davis said, “Well, what are you going to do? It’s getting on toward noon. We need to get moving.”

Longarm dug in his pocket and found the key to the manacles. He pitched it in the dust in front of Bodenheimer. But before the sheriff could lean over to pick it up Longarm said, “Get one thing straight, Otis. And remember it. If you forget everything else in your life, you had best remember this.”

Bodenheimer straightened up. “Yessir.”

Longarm’s words were even and low. “You break my trust, you betray me in any way, you upset the apple-cart in the slightest, and I will make you sorry you were ever born. Do you understand that?”

“Yessir.” Bodenheimer was trembling.

“Do you believe it?”

“Oh, yes, sir. Yessir, I shore do.”

Longarm turned to Austin Davis. “Give him his horse, Marshal Smith. And then let us me and you ride on back into town. Bodenheimer, you follow at about a mile.”

As they rode the several miles back to town Austin Davis said, “Cap’n, they is a few things you ain’t exactly explained to my satisfaction. For one thing, we have got an awful lot of beaver to trap at the same time. There’s the mayor and the banker and especially Dalton Diver. But that ain’t mentioning the ones we really want, the gunhands that have done the actual work. We don’t know what most of them look like. We know damn few names, and we don’t even know if them are the right names. And we sure as hell don’t know where to find these folks. Never mind how we are going to take them, first we got to find them. How is all of that supposed to happen?”

Longarm glanced over at Davis. “Well, Marshal Honest John Smith, the knowing and the doing of this proposition is why I’m the boss and you are a provisional deputy. You just keep doing what you are doing and leave the thinking to me. I’m afeared you might hurt yourself if you went to studying on matters. And you better damn well pray that you are right about Bodenheimer.”

“Well, what else were you going to do with him? You damn sure didn’t have time to take him to Austin where the nearest federal court is. Leave him out there on that road afoot? Hell, somebody might have come along, and then he damn sure would have gotten back into town and warned everybody he named.”

“All right, all right,” Longarm said. “Let’s say that for once you were right. I don’t understand how it happened, but I guess it did.” Then he glanced over at Davis, taking in his flat-crowned, stiff, wide-brimmed black hat. He said, “What are you doing up here wearing a border hat? I been meaning to ask you that the first time I laid eyes on you in that poker game at the saloon. You figure it makes you look tough? Makes you look like you don’t know how to buy a hat, is what it does.”

Davis looked unconcerned. “At least I ain’t called Longarm because my first name is Custis. Lord, what a burden that must have been to you as a child.”

Longarm said, “I wouldn’t be talking about names, Marshal Smith. Do you know what the penalty is for impersonating a federal officer?”

“No, but I bet you do. Lord knows you’ve been getting away with it long enough.”

“Me and you,” Longarm said grimly, “are going to play some head-up poker when this is over. Maybe for your life.”

“You just can’t admit I done a good job with Bodenheimer, can you. It’d kill you, wouldn’t it. You’d fall off that horse and drop down dead in the road if you had to admit to such a thing, wouldn’t you?”

Longarm just gave him a look.

When they were a quarter of a mile out of town, Longarm pulled them up. They stood in the middle of the road waiting for Bodenheimer to catch up. Longarm said to Davis, “Soon as we get squared away I am going out to Hannah’s house and bring her into jail. You are going out to fetch that Rebeccah in.”

Davis’s eyes got wide. “Are you crazy? Hell, send me after Billy the Kid. I’d much rather take him on. Custis, that woman is a wildcat.”

“I don’t care what she is. You bring her into town. She is going to jail. And I’m going to send the sheriff and his deputies to fetch in Salome and the other one, Sarah. Then tonight, me and you is going to see Dalton Diver. I got to get this thing brought to a head. And in a hurry. I’m tired of fooling with it.”

Davis looked back down the road where Bodenheimer was coming at a trot, bouncing up and down in the saddle. He said, “You ain’t no more ready than I am. I swear I don’t believe I ever fetched up in such a town like this afore in my life. Look at the sheriff. That poor pony of his is going to be swaybacked before the week is out.”

Longarm didn’t speak again until the sheriff had joined them.

Bodenheimer, even though it was too cool for sweat, pulled a big bandanna out of his pocket and swabbed his face. They all could see the tops of the town buildings just around a curve. Longarm said, “Now Otis, I want you to get it straight in your mind that you and I have come to an agreement that you are innocent of any wrongdoing and I have turned you loose. That is what you are to tell anyone who asks you. But don’t volunteer nothing, understand?”

The sheriff nodded.

“And you avoid the mayor and the bank president as if they were carrying the plague. I got a feeling you ain’t a very good liar, Otis, so you keep temptation out of your way. You understand?”

“Yessir.” The sheriff nodded again.

Longarm looked at him for a long moment. Finally he said, “I ain’t never done nothing like this before, Bodenheimer. You understand?”

“Yessir.”

“Now I have warned you about giving us away in any way. Any loose talk, any thought of betrayal will spell your end. You understand?”

“Yessir.”

Longarm was still staring at him. “Your life is literally in your mouth. Keep that in mind.”

“Yessir.”

Davis said, “Sounds like he’s got his part down. Yessir. Yessir.”

Longarm ignored him. He said to Bodenheimer, “Now, we are going to start this thing off as soon as we get into town. I am going to go out and bring Miss Hannah in. Marshal Smith is going to fetch in Miss Rebeccah.” He jabbed Bodenheimer in the chest. “You and your three deputies are going to go out and fetch in Miss Sarah and Miss Salome. You are to bring them in and put them in jail.”

Bodenheimer’s eyes got as round as his face. He said, stuttering, “Wha-wha-what? Bring in Dalton Diver’s daughters and put them in jail?”

“Yes.” Longarm looked at him hard. “And this is something you ain’t going to do halfway or mess up, Bodenheimer. You don’t bring those two women back to town, it will be better for you that you don’t come back at all.”

“But-but …” Bodenheimer blinked his eyes like he was about to get tearful. “But how am I supposed to do that? Dalton Diver will have my hide nailed to his barn door! I’m scairt of that man, and so is everybody else.”

“You better be more scared of me, Otis. Now. What you do is, you go to Miss Sarah’s house and tell her that Miss Hannah is at the jail with their father, Dalton, and you and your deputies have been sent to fetch her and Miss Salome. If they ask, and they will, what it is all about, you just tell them that you don’t know. Tell them you are doing what their daddy told you to do. Say you think it has something to do with their half-brother. But don’t explain any more than that.” He gave the sheriff a sardonic look. “Remember, they will still think you are a crooked lawman running an errand for their daddy.”

Bodenheimer nodded slowly as he took it in. “Just tell them their daddy wants them in town.”

“At the jail.”

“At the jail.” He nodded slowly once more. He looked at Longarm. “What do I do then? They’ll see that their daddy ain’t there.”

“You put them in a jail cell. You tell them they are under federal arrest. You tell them I have ordered their arrest.”

Bodenheimer leaned backward so far he almost fell out of his saddle. He said, “Put them in a jail cell! Dalton Diver’s daughters!”

“Yes.”

Bodenheimer was visibly trembling. He said, “I ain’t sure I can do that. How we supposed to get them in there?”

Longarm said, irritation in his voice, “Bodenheimer, if four strong men can’t put two women in a cell, then you’d better get in it yourself and throw away the key. You got this one chance. Screw it up and you’ll be doing twenty-five years in Leavenworth Prison. Do you understand me?”

The sheriff’s face worked for a moment, but then he finally nodded. “Yessir. Tell ‘em they daddy wants them at the jail and then put them in a cell. Yessir. I don’t know how my deputies is going to feel about this.”

“They better feel the way you tell them. Now let’s get into town.”

As they rode toward the jail Austin Davis said, “Well, I’m glad to hear I’m supposed to get Miss Rebeccah in here by sleight of hand. I thought you meant for me to manhandle her.”

Longarm gave him a look. “Why, Marshal Smith, I’d never give you a job I knew you couldn’t handle. And in your case the word is boyhandle.”

Austin Davis nodded placidly. “Go on with them kind of remarks. I think it is pretty clear who has done the most to get information about the way this gang works. Had been you, you’d still be back there torturing and threatening Otis.”

They pulled up in front of the jail. Bodenheimer dismounted and looked questioningly at Longarm. The marshal said, “Go on in and let your deputies loose. Send Melvin Purliss out right now. Next time I see you, you’d better have them two women in jail cells.”

Bodenheimer ducked his head and said, “Yessir.” After that he stepped up on the boardwalk and disappeared into the jailhouse.

Davis said, “If Bodenheimer wasn’t so pitful he’d be funny. You want me to take on off and get Rebeccah?”

Longarm nodded. “You might as well. And once you get back, stay here at the jail until I get in. After that we’ll wait for Bodenheimer and his party, and then me and you are going to go see Dalton Diver.”

Austin Davis was wheeling his horse away from the hitching post. He said, “That ought to be right interesting.” He left, riding northeast out of town.

Melvin Purliss came out the door and walked hesitantly over to Longarm. “Sheriff said you wanted to see me, Marshal. Is Otis sheriff again?”

Longarm nodded. “Yes. For the time being. Listen, Purliss, you and him and the other two deputies are going out to get two of Dalton Diver’s daughters and bring them back to town.”

Purliss looked slightly startled. “We are?”

“Yes. At my orders. Now, there can be no slipups on this matter. I want you to keep a close eye on the sheriff. He knows what to do and I want you to see that he does it. If anything goes wrong, I will hang the four of you from the tallest tree I can find. And if there ain’t a tree tall enough, I’ll drag you behind an ox. You understand me?”

Purliss looked uncertain still. But he said, “I reckon so, Marshal. How we supposed to do this?”

“Dalton Diver is coming in and he wants to see his daughters in a bunch. I’m going for one myself and so is the other marshal. Listen, how many men does Dalton Diver have working for him at his place?”

Purliss shrugged. “Not many. A couple or three. They are just general hands.”

“How come you never told me you had law experience before you came here?”

It took Purliss by surprise. He said, “Why, why, why, I never knowed it mattered.”

“Where were you? What town?”

Purliss blinked. “Uh, here and there.”

“Here and there where?”

Purliss looked everywhere but at Longarm. He finally said, “Well, Denton. That’s up in North Texas.”

“I know where Denton is. Who was the sheriff there?”

“Uhhhhh-” Purliss blinked. “Uh, George Wright.”

Longarm looked at him, frowning slightly. There was something wrong with the answer, but he didn’t quite know what it was. Neither did he have time to study on the matter. He said, “You see to the sheriff and those other deputies. You understand me?”

“Yessir. Yessir, Marshal.”

Longarm nodded, and turned his horse out into the street. He calculated it was pushing for two o’clock in the afternoon. Neither he nor Davis had had any lunch, but that would have to wait. He had Hannah Diver to worry about first.

She had the door open and was standing in the doorway almost before he could dismount in front of her cabin. Behind him he could hear the rush and roar of the river as it banged and tore against the rocks and the sandbars and banks. He reckoned there were probably trout in the stream. It looked like one of the little rivers he was used to seeing in Colorado.

He walked up to her. She was wearing the same wrapper she’d had on before. It had been hastily and carelessly donned. Some of her was in it, but not all. He could feel a swelling in his groin, but he had no time for that. He was here to take her to jail and he had to keep reminding himself of that.

She said, “Laws, I’ve had me an itch I can’t scratch ever since you left! Where you been?”

He said, “Now, Hannah, we can’t do-“

But he got no further. She grabbed him by the front of the vest, pulled him through the door, and then threw her arms around his neck and fastened her mouth to his. He resisted her probing tongue for as long as he could stand it, but rising desire finally made him join with her, his own mouth covering hers and forcing it open wider and wider. But when he could, he came up for breath and pushed her back gently. He said, “Hannah, we can’t do this. We got some business to tend to.”

She said, “Mister, I’m all the business you can handle right now.” With a quick move she undid the sash of her wrapper and then shrugged it off her shoulders and stood before him naked. He stared at her, unable now to control the desire that was racing through him like a fever. He stared at her belly, noting how the lightness of her skin muted into the light brown hair of her bush, growing darker as it wove its way toward the thatch that sprouted at the joining of her legs. She came toward him and he said, a little breathlessly, “Hannah, now wait …”

But she was tearing at the buckle of his gunbelt. Before he realized what she was doing, he felt the weight leave his hips and heard the clump as his gun kit hit the floor in its holster. He said, “Hannah! That’s a good way to explode a gun.”

She had fallen to her knees, working at his pants belt buckle. She said, “The only gun I want to explode is in here.” Then, faster than he would have thought possible, she had opened his belt, unbuttoned his jeans, and jerked them down around his knees. He felt a shiver of sheer pleasure run through his whole body as she took him in her mouth and began making little sucking sounds. He said, “Oh, oh, oh! Hannah! Be careful! Wait a minute, wait a minute!”

With all the strength he could manage, he reached down, took her by the shoulders, and pulled her up. For a second he bent his mouth to her two erect, hard nipples, the caressing bringing little sounds of pleasure from her. Then he turned her around, facing away from him, and bent her over at the waist, spreading her legs with his hand. She had long legs and was easy to reach. He guided himself into her, surprised at how open and wet she already was. She seemed to get ready faster than any woman he’d ever known.

He held her at the abdomen with both his hands and pulled her buttocks back into him. As he penetrated her, going deeper and deeper with each thrust, she cried out in unison with the movements.

She was leaning forward, her hands on her knees, pushing back at him. As their excitement mounted in tandem, she began letting out little cries that gradually began to run together. He tried to hold himself back, and could feel her begin to tremble. Then it seemed as if they both exploded at the same time. He was dimly aware of a loud screaming and of his own breath and pulse pounding in his ears. He could feel her violent maneuvers, and then his legs turned to jelly and he crumpled, pulling her down with him. He landed on his back on the hardwood floor of the cabin, and she landed on top of him. He was still inside her.

He rested for a moment and then, when he could, lifted her gently off him and set her on the floor at his side. Then, awkwardly, he struggled to his feet, pulled up his jeans, and buttoned and buckled himself as fast as he could.

From the floor Hannah said, “I want some more.”

He shook his head and bent down to retrieve his gunbelt. As he buckled it on he said, “Honey, we can’t. I just come to get you. We’ve got to go into town.”

“Into town?” She frowned. “Whatever for?”

“I don’t really know. But your daddy and your other sisters are at the jailhouse. The sheriff just asked if I’d come escort you in.”

“Whaaat!” She scrambled to her feet and put her hands on her hips. “What do you mean my daddy and my sisters are at the jailhouse! What in hell is going on?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. It’s something about your half-brother. That’s all I know.”

“Half-brother?” Her eyes got cloudy and suspicious. “I ain’t got no half-brother.”

He shrugged. “Then don’t go. All I know is your daddy wants you there. You want me to tell him you ain’t coming?”

She bit her lip. “My daddy is at the jailhouse? My daddy?”

“Dalton Diver. Ain’t he your daddy?”

“Weeell, yes. But what is he doing at the jailhouse? If he’s in any trouble I’ll kill that lard-butt sheriff.”

Longarm shook his head. “He’s not in any trouble. Like I say, I don’t know anything about it. I just happened by and they asked if I’d take word to you. I understand your other sisters are either there or are on the way.”

“What other sisters? You mean the ones still at home?”

Longarm shook his head. “No. I think it’s Rebeccah and Sarah and Salome. You want me to saddle you a horse? Or hitch up a buggy?”

As they were getting ready to leave, Longarm tried to make small talk to keep her mind occupied. He said, “You know, funny thing. You don’t sound like you are from Texas. You got an accent like you hear up north.”

She said, “Naw, I’m from Texas. It must have been from hearin’ Daddy all them years. He used to live in Michigan. That’s way up north.”

“I know where it is,” Longarm said. “What in hell was he doing up there?”

“Aw, him and his church was runnin’ from religious per-persah … Something.”

“Religious persecution?”

“Yeah, that’s it. They couldn’t practice their own religion where they was. Folks wouldn’t have it. So him and the whole bunch of ‘em up and moved to a place in Michigan that nobody else wanted.”

Longarm frowned. “What was his religion that he was persecuted?”

“They was Shakers.”

“Shakers?” Longarm thought for a moment. “I don’t reckon I ever heard of them. “What set them off, say, from Baptists or Lutherans or whatnot?”

She was busy brushing her hair. She said into the mirror, “Well, they believed in share and share alike. But what got ‘em into trouble was they carried that over about wives and such.”

“You mean they could have more than one wife?”

“They could have a bunch, I think. Anyway, Daddy didn’t mind that sharing all around so much, though he felt they was a bunch didn’t come up with their fair share. But then they went to poaching on his wives, so he just took him one and come to Texas. That’s what he said. He said he just grabbed up a wife and what kids there was and come to Texas.”

“Were you born in Texas?”

“Aw, yeah. This was all some years back. Better’n twenty I would reckon. My momma wasn’t a Shaker. Daddy come acrosst her here in Texas. I think his Shaker wife passed on over while I was a little girl. I don’t recollect her.”

“I see,” Longarm said slowly.

He didn’t say any more about it until they were mounted and riding into town. Then he said casually, “Anyone in your family got the given name of Wayne?”

“Wayne?” She looked at him and laughed. “Marshal, we is all girls. Wayne is a boy’s name.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Guess you’re right.”

When they walked into the jailhouse only Austin Davis was there. He was leaning up against a desk with his arms crossed. Longarm looked at him.

“Nobody here yet?”

Davis coughed slightly and signaled Longarm with his eyes. “Just Mister Diver. He’s back in one of the cells resting.”

“He ain’t sick, is he?”

Davis shook his head. “No, no. Not sick. That cell on the left as you go through is open. Door is open. He wanted it that way so he could get some air.”

Longarm stared for a second before he realized that Davis was telling him that the door to the first cell on the left was open. It was good information to have, Longarm thought. Miss Hannah was liable to turn into a handful when she realized she had been tricked and was about to occupy a jail cell.

She was looking Austin Davis over. “Who be this?”

Longarm said, “That’s another federal marshal, Marshal Smith. Honest John Smith.”

“Howdy do,” Hannah said. Austin Davis doffed his hat. “How do you do, Miss Hannah.”

“I hope my daddy ain’t ailing.”

“No, he’s just resting.” Austin Davis looked over her head at Longarm. “But I’d hurry on back. The other sisters might be getting here any minute. Might get crowded at the door.”

Longarm said, “I better take her in to her daddy.”

Davis said, “I’ll get the door.”

With Davis holding the big, heavy door that separated the cells from the office, Longarm took Hannah by the arm and escorted her through the door just as it opened. He saw the empty cell on his left with the door standing open, and was immediately aware of a sharp outcry to his right. Hannah tried to look around him toward the cell on the right, but he unceremoniously shoved her into the open cell and, while she was still startled, closed the barred door and locked it. As quick as he could, he jerked the key free and stepped back through the big door as Austin Davis shut it behind him.

The thick door cut off most of the screams and cries, but they were both aware of the tumult coming from the cells. Longarm ran his sleeve across his forehead. He said, “Wheee, I don’t much care for that brand of work.”

“About like putting a bobcat in a burlap bag. And nearly as noisy.”

Longarm said, “I got a little glance at Rebeccah. She’s as pretty as Hannah, though in a darker way. How’d you make out?”

Davis shrugged. “About like you, except I didn’t have nobody to open the big door for me and the cell door was locked.” He showed Longarm the side of his neck where it was severely scratched. “I had to hold her whilst I unlocked that cell door. She seen my intent and didn’t care for it. By then, of course, she knowed her daddy wasn’t here. But it was fine up until then.”

“You got here ahead of me.” Longarm was thinking guiltily of what had delayed him. “Guess you didn’t waste no time.”

Davis said, “I got lucky. She was just coming in from a ride when I got there. We just turned around and come on in, though she was suspicious as hell about what her daddy was doing at the jail.”

“So was her sister.”

Austin Davis reached in his pocket and came out with a cigarillo and a match. He lit the black little cigar and got it drawing. “We going to see ol’ Dalton Diver?” he asked.

Longarm nodded toward the cells. “I’d feel better if we waited and made sure we had all our chicks in the coop before we left matters to the sheriff and his boys.”

Davis said, “Am I right in thinking why you want the daughters penned up before we see the daddy?”

Longarm nodded. “I would reckon you are. Lord, I am hungry. Are you?”

“We ain’t ate since breakfast. But maybe Dalton Diver will give us some supper.”

Longarm looked grim. “I would doubt it. This could be a little rough, Austin. He’s got three hired hands out there.”

Davis was busy looking through the drawers of the sheriff’s desk.

“Aaah, I figured he’d have a little liquid courage in here.” He came out holding a bottle of whiskey. He uncorked it and gave it a smell.

“Ain’t too bad. Of course it ain’t that fancy whiskey of yours.” He put the bottle to his lips and took a short drink. He coughed a little and held the bottle out to Longarm. “Ain’t the smoothest I ever drank. You want me to hold a gun on you?”

Longarm took the bottle. “Naw, I reckon I can get a swig down on my own.” He took two quick swallows out of the bottle and then lowered it. He breathed out, “Aaaaah! For heaven’s sake, don’t strike an open flame. Whole place will go up.”

Austin Davis suddenly looked toward the door. “Sounds like our party has arrived.”

“It’s going to be a party, all right. I reckon we better get ready to help them. Though I ain’t sure if the six of us can manage it.”

Davis said, “I just wish I had me some little corks to shove in my ears. It is going to be a powerful racket when we shove two more in there.”

Chapter 9

They rode out of town through the gathering twilight. Longarm calculated it would take them three quarters of an hour to a full hour to reach Dalton Diver’s place. He said, “I doubt we’ll get there before seven.”

Austin Davis said, “After supper. Hell, my stomach thinks my throat has been cut. Maybe they’ll have some left over.”

Longarm glanced sideways at him. “I doubt you can expect Mister Diver to extend us much hospitality when he finds out what we are there for.”

“You reckon he’ll crumble?”

Longarm made a shrug. “I don’t know. That’s up to him. With the evidence I got I can send a number of people to jail. It’s all up to Diver what their names are gonna be.”

“How many girls left at home?”

“What I understand from Hannah, there are four. I think the oldest is around seventeen, maybe eighteen. The youngest is maybe twelve.”

“Then there’s four married, or kind of married, around here.”

“And the other two have married and moved off. I don’t reckon they count. Maybe Rachel, the one living at Rock Springs.”

Davis said, “That Shaker business is cute as hell, ain’t it? Who would have ever thought of such a thing. I never heard of no Shakers, had you?”

The road narrowed and then forked. Longarm bore them to the left. They were in a grove of mesquite and post oak and it made it seem darker.

Longarm said, “Watch out for that limb on your right. No, I had never heard of no Shakers, though I don’t doubt that there are such. But if using that name was Dalton’s idea of a little joke, he is going to have a hell of a hard time explaining his way out of it.”

“I guess they got kind of arrogant.”

Longarm glanced over at his riding mate. “Hell, why shouldn’t they? They were like the local sawmill or a silver mine. They were a business, bringing money into the town and the county. Never mind it was other people’s money. Hell, they were popular around here. Arrogant? Hell, they were proud. Everybody in this county thanks them. By rights I ought to put every citizen over the age of twelve in jail. That would interfere with their daydream and maybe teach them the difference between right and wrong. I don’t ever remember getting so down on a place in all my life.”

“So I take it you are agin this scheme?”

Longarm gave him a sour look, but he doubted Davis could see it in the dim light. “We’re a long ways from wrapping up this particular matter. I’ll be glad to joke with you later. Right now I’m tired and hungry and just a little pissed off.”

It was close to an hour later when they spotted lights through the sparse trees. Within another quarter of a mile they could see a big, two-story whitewashed house standing atop a broad little hillock. Behind were several barns and sheds and a few corrals. As they neared, Longarm could see that the central part of the house had once been a simple two-story frame, and that with years and children, wings and such had been added on. It was a common enough practice in the South and the Southwest. They rode directly up to the front steps that led to the big porch running across the front of the house. From the back Longarm could hear a pack of dogs suddenly break into voice. He figured they were coon or fox dogs, and therefore penned up and not likely to come flying around the house to make their horses jump by nipping at their heels. Austin Davis hello’d the house as was the custom. They could see lights on in several rooms, but you didn’t dismount in backcountry and go up to the door. It was a quick way to get a belly full of buckshot. You stayed mounted and called out to the house until you were invited to step down.

Finally Longarm could see a light coming to the door from inside the house. The door opened and a Negro man stood there holding a kerosene lantern in his hand. He raised it until he could see their faces. He said, “What you gennel’mens be wantin’?”

Longarm said, “I’m Deputy U.S. Marshal Custis Long. I’d like to see Mister Dalton Diver. This is an official call.”

The servant said, “Why bless you, suh, he be right glad to see you. Ain’t had no company all day an’ he in heah drinkin’ whiskey by hisself and jus’ wishin’ fo’ some company, don’t you know. You jes’ step on down an’ I take you straight in to him. He in de parloah.”

Dalton Diver was a ruddy-complexioned man of medium height and weight, though Longarm noted as he got up to greet them that he had powerful-looking shoulders and arms. The top of his head was bald, with just a fringe of light brown hair mixed with gray encircling the rest of his head. He got up from a big leather easy chair to greet them as the servant showed them into the room. There was a small fire burning in a big fireplace, even though the night was not really chilly enough to warrant one.

Diver came forward with his hand outstretched. He was wearing a linen shirt with the collar open and a serge vest and serge pants. His black plantation boots were highly polished, and the chain that hung down from his vest watch fob was gold and heavy. He said in a hearty, welcoming voice, “Come right in, men. Did I hear one of y’all say you was a U.S. marshal?”

Longarm figured him to be five feet nine, maybe ten, shorter than himself. He said, “Yessir, Mister Diver, you did. But it’s deputy marshal for both of us. My name is Custis Long and this is, uh, Marshal John Smith.”

Dalton shook hands with both of them, and then indicated the sideboard, where there were a number of bottles of whiskey and spirits of different kinds. “What kind of poison will you take?”

Longarm hesitated. He said, “Mister Diver, this is by way of being a official call. You may not want us drinking your whiskey after we get down to our business.”

Dalton Diver waved away the thought with an airy movement of his hand. “One ain’t got nothing to do with the other. Besides, I couldn’t sit here drinkin’ alone in front of you, and I’m a man needs a few about this time of the evening.” He glanced at the Negro. “Robert, you left your manners outside again. Draw these gentlemen up a chair apiece right close to me so we don’t have to yell across the room. Then see what they will have to drink. My goodness, Robert, sometimes I despair of you.”

Longarm and Austin Davis waited while the servant put forward two comfortable-looking cloth-covered chairs placed to face Dalton Diver. Then he brought a Small table and set it between the chairs. After that he brought a tray and set it on the table. The tray contained glasses and bottles of whiskey, rum, and brandy. There was also an opened box of cigars on the tray. Longarm sat down in the left-hand chair, feeling slightly uncomfortable.

Diver motioned with his glass. “Fill ‘em up, gentlemen. Hell, don’t keep me waiting.”

Austin Davis poured himself a glass of brandy, and Longarm took a little whiskey. Diver said, “Them’s good cigars.”

Longarm shook his head, and Austin Davis got out one of his little black cigarillos and said, “I reckon I’ll have one of these instead.”

Dalton raised his glass and said, “To your health.”

They went through the motions, mumbling, “And yours, sir.” Then they all had a drink. Longarm was pleasantly surprised at the quality of the whiskey. He was regretting taking so little.

Dalton said, “Take a cigar, Marshal. Hell, that’s what they are there for.”

Austin Davis said, “Mister Diver, you may not enjoy our company so much in a little while.”

Dalton Diver had a big, hearty voice. He said, “Then so much the better we enjoy the time while we got it. Marshal, you look like a cigar-and-whiskey man. Quit piddling around with it. If you’ve got hard work ahead of you, why, it will go better with a good drink of whiskey and a cigar.”

Longarm stared at him for a second, and then nodded his head. “Fine. If that’s the way you’ll have it, so be it.” He turned to the table and poured himself a full tumbler of whiskey, and then took one of the cigars, bit off the end, spat the end in his palm, and dumped it into an ashtray.

Dalton Diver winked. “That’s the way. You gentlemen don’t happen to be hungry, be you? I just got up from the table myself. Got a fine ham and some other good vittles.”

Longarm was lighting his cigar, getting it drawing good. But he stopped to answer Diver before Austin Davis could say anything. “No, thanks, sir. We don’t want to draw this out any longer than necessary.”

Diver settled back in his chair. “Fine, fine. Well, I’m here. What have you come to see me about?”

Longarm took a long drink of whiskey. He said, “I will get to that presently, but I wonder if you might not have a family Bible about. I understand you are a religious man. Most such are in the habit of keeping a family Bible.”

Diver nodded. “Yes, sir. Certainly do. Started by my great-grandmother.” He motioned with his hand. “Right over there against the shelf of books. On the Bible stand. Thing is too big to hold in your lap. Nearly have to stand up to read it.”

Longarm looked over and saw a big book lying open on a wooden stand. He put his cigar in the ashtray, crossed the room, and came around behind the big bible. He saw that it was opened to Isaiah. He didn’t know if that was a coincidence or if it had been on Dalton Diver’s mind. But it didn’t matter to him. He turned the pages of the Bible back to the front, back to where families kept records of births and deaths and marriages and other special events. The first few pages were devoted to relatives of Dalton Diver who were long gone. Finally Longarm found the genealogy for Dalton and his immediate family. Opposite Dalton’s name were the names of two wives, and below them the children they had borne.

Under the name of Lavinia were ten children, all girls. Hannah’s was the sixth name down, and he noted that her full name was Hannah Rose. Her date of birth showed her to be twenty years old.

But it was the children of the other wife, the Shaker wife, that Longarm was interested in. Her name had been Ruth and she had died some six years past. She had had six children, the first two being male. The first was Dalton Diver, Jr., and his birth date would have made him thirty-four years old. The second name was scratched out with a careless pen, but Longarm could just make out the first name of Vincent. He would be thirty years old. The rest of the children on Ruth’s side were marked as deceased. But the most interesting thing to Longarm was that Dalton was listed as Wayne Dalton Diver and that he was fifty-four years old. Longarm could not be sure, but it appeared that the second oldest boy, Vincent, had had the middle name of Wayne. He turned away from the Bible, reopening it to its place in Isaiah, and went back to his chair.

Dalton Diver said, “See what you was seeking?”

Longarm took a drink of whiskey and then a draw on his cigar. He nodded. “I would reckon so. I must say, Mister Diver, you look much younger than your fifty-four years.”

Diver nodded in receipt of the compliment. “Hard work, Marshal. Hard work and a lot of kids. It will keep you spry having the young ones around.”

“You’ve still got four girls here at home.”

Dalton Diver’s eyes suddenly got wary. “That’s correct, sir. They are upstairs attending to their schoolwork. I believe in an education.” He made a wave toward the wall of books. “It’s an ignorant man who don’t take advantage of the knowledge so many who have come before him have labored to make available.”

Longarm looked at the end of his cigar, and took a half a minute to tamp it off carefully in the ashtray. He had the feeling that Austin Davis was about to speak, and he gave him a warning look. When he looked back at Dalton Diver he said, “Mister Diver, I’ve come to do a little trading with you tonight.”

“Horse trading?”

“No, I reckon you’d call it children trading. They ain’t children anymore, but they are your progeny.”

Diver frowned. “I don’t understand you, sir.”

“You will presently.” Longarm finished the whiskey in his glass and set it on the tray, then leaned forward toward Dalton Diver. “Sir, I’ve got four of your daughters in jail in town. If You don’t do as I ask, I intend to bring federal charges against them.”

Diver stared at him for a moment and then chuckled. “Marshal, are you having a little joke with me? They don’t put women in jail in this state.”

“Maybe not. But they got a women’s federal prison, and that is where they will end up. And for quite a long while if I’m any judge.”

Diver frowned. “Just what in the hell are you talking about, Marshal? What have my girls done?”

“Between me and you, not a hell of a lot. But I can make a pretty serious case against them for accessory, aiding and abetting, and several other things I can think of, including knowingly harboring a felony fugitive.”

Diver stared at him for a moment and then lifted his head. He said in a loud voice, “Robert!”

For a moment Longarm thought he was calling for the servant to throw them out of the house, but when Robert appeared he only said, “My glass is empty. Ain’t you ever going to learn your job? My lands!”

Diver waited until the servant had done his work and left the room before leaning toward Longarm. He said, “You mentioned you wanted to trade. For my daughters. What are you asking?”

Longarm said carefully, “Your son, Vince Diver.” He let the name hang in the air a moment before he added, “And others.”

Diver stared for a long moment. Then he shook his head. “I don’t believe I know that name.”

“Maybe you know him by another name. Wayne Shaker.”

Diver shook his head again. “Don’t think so.”

Longarm said, “It strikes me as a little arrogant of you, Mister Diver, to choose that particular name. Wayne Shaker. Wayne is part of your name. So is it part of Vince’s name.”

Diver nodded slowly. “I see why you wanted to look in the family Bible. Don’t strike me as playing quite fair.”

“And it strikes me as being just a little smug to call Vince, or the head of the gang, by the last name of Shaker, considering that you used to be a Shaker and considering they believe in share and share alike. Is that how you figured to divide up other people’s property? Under the Shaker method?”

Diver had a naturally genial countenance, but Longarm could see he was struggling to keep the anger out of it. He said in a stiff tone, “Marshal, by what authority and what right do you come down here interfering in our business and putting innocent women in jail? Where is your power to do that and your power to come here threatening me and bullyragging me into doing your bidding?”

Longarm took the cigar out of his mouth. “Mister Diver, my authority comes from the government of the United States, which charges me with enforcing the law in all its states and territories. My job is to protect the lives and property of the people of the United States, and my right to do it comes from my commission as a police officer, which comes directly from the executive branch of the government, namely the President. So you might say that the President sent me on this thankless job. As for my power to see that right is done, that pretty well comes from the folks in your neighboring counties who are damn sick and tired of your gunmen coming into their towns and robbing and stealing and killing.” He sat back in the cloth-covered chair. “As to bullyragging you, well, I ain’t seen no sign of that. At least not yet.” He glanced at Austin Davis. “You seen me doing any threatening or bullyragging, Marshall Smith?”

Austin Davis said easily, “It appears to me that you’ve been working your way around to giving Mister Diver a choice. I believe the first thing you said to him on the matter of the business at hand was that you were here to do some trading. I don’t see no threat in that.”

Diver stared hard at both of them. Finally he looked away. “All right. I’m a little overwrought. I made a poor choice of words. However, we are used to settling our disputes among ourselves and not having outside interference.”

It was Austin Davis who answered. “That’s the point, Mister Diver. The differences ain’t between yourselves. Your differences are with Llano County and Kimble County and San Saba County, to name a few, and towns like Junction and Llano and Brady and Fredricksburg. Y’all are getting along fine here. But you are bleeding your neighbors dry. The Shaker share-and-share-alike plan might be good for y’all, but your neighbors are going broke sharing with you because ain’t none of it coming back.”

Longarm said, “Look, Mister Diver, I’m going to tell you straight up front what I’m after. And there won’t be no use you lying about the affair because I’ve already got the straight of it. Was you and the banker and the mayor and the sheriff put this deal together. I want some of y’all—though not real bad. Mainly who I want is the hot hands that were pulling the triggers. I don’t get them, then there’s going to be an awful lot of old men doing some real hard time in prison. Not to mention your daughters.”

Diver sat staring at Longarm while he sipped at his glass of whiskey. Then Diver said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I ain’t got no son and I ain’t in cahoots with the banker or the mayor or anybody else about robbing and thieving. I run a little cattle and goat operation and that’s the extent of it.”

Longarm stood up. “All right. Have it your own way. But it is a long trip to visit relatives in prison in Kansas.”

Austin Davis put out a hand to stay him. “Marshal Long, why not be patient with Mister Diver. I think he is at heart a good man. It may be we come at him a little sudden and he’s still trying to take it all in.”

Ignoring Diver, Longarm said to Austin Davis, “What’s to take in? It’s a straightforward choice. I’m offering to give him four daughters for one son. Hell, a child in school can understand that. Four for one. You know of a better swap? I’ll even throw in about half of what I was going to do to the son in the bargain. Hell, that’s four and a half to one. You ain’t going to pick up a better day than that, not even on Trades Days with the village idiot.”

Austin Davis said to Dalton Diver, “What about it, Mister Diver? It seems to me that the marshal has gone a long way out of his direction to be fair about this. I understand a son is worth more than one daughter. But four of them? And as pretty as they are? Hell, I know what kind of business you been doing on the bride price. And now you can sell all four of them again because they are all widows. And you can thank the marshal for Gus Home. Actually, his name is Gus White, but you probably knew that. Anyway, it was the marshal made a widder woman out of Hannah and her still a fresh flower.”

Dalton Diver opened his mouth, but Longarm spoke before he could get out a word. He said, “Now, Mister Diver, you go ahead and be as stubborn as you want to about this matter. But I do have your daughters and they will go to trial for consorting with known criminals. They-“

Diver half rose out of his chair. His face was anguished. He said, “They never consorted with them. They was married to ‘em, but dammit, they never done no consortin’ with them.”

Longarm said, “That’s your story. But the jury that tries them is going to hear a different one. I don’t know how much money you got, but you ain’t going to have nowhere near as much after you get through paying their legal fees to try and keep them out of prison.”

Austin Davis suddenly stood up. He said in a disgusted voice, “I don’t know why you are fooling with him, Marshal. Hell, we got the sheriff. He’ll testify against the banker and the mayor. And they damn sure will testify against Mister Diver here. We know damn near everything. What do we want to keep fooling with him for?”

Longarm said, “I’ll just take the Bible.”

Dalton Diver stood up to his full height. His mouth worked. He said, “Now wait a minute, wait a damn minute.”

Longarm stabbed a finger at him. “What for? We know the whole plan was yours. Marshal Smith here has seen Vince Diver in Rock Springs and around. He knows his reputation.”

Austin Davis said, “And Dan Hicks.”

Longarm said, “And Jim Squires.” He shook his head. “Who in hell you trying to fool, old man? We know the whole thing was your idea. Hell, we even know about the paint horse.”

Dalton Diver seemed to collapse. He sat down heavily in his chair and took up his drink, gulping at it. When he lowered it he said dully, “All right. What is it you want? How will you trade?”

“For the truth. I want to know how all this got started.”

Dalton Diver looked resigned. He said, “Then I reckon you better sit down and pour yourself another drink. It takes a little telling.”

Chapter 10

Dalton Diver scratched his ear and said, “You’ll have to kind of forgive me, gentlemen, if I get this kind of bass-ackwards and turned around in places. It started better’n two years ago, and like Topsy, it just kind of growed. But you are right about one thing—it had to do with the bride price I was getting on my daughters. But that was just one part. The main part, the robbing part, that started a little bit later, and it wasn’t my idea and it wasn’t Vince’s. It was the banker’s, the president of the Mason State Bank, Ernest Crouch. Was him got the biggest part of it started. Though how you figured out about that pinto horse beats me. But then you are federal lawmen, and I reckon they hire fellows like you ‘cause you can figure such things out.”

Longarm and Austin Davis glanced at each other, both shrugging with their eyes. They both wished Diver would hurry up and tell them what they’d guessed about the paint horse. Longarm had only made reference to it with the idea that it was the horse Vince Diver rode, but Diver had made it sound more complicated than that.

Austin Davis prompted Diver. “Now what about your daughters?”

Dalton Diver rubbed his chin. “Well, I had married off my two oldest daughters and got a pretty good price for ‘em. All my daughters is swell-looking girls. ‘Course I didn’t get near what I could have got if we’d still been in the Shaker community. But I done about as well as I could around here. Anyway, I was grousing to Vince about it and he said he might think of something. I was just about to marry Sarah, that was the next one, to this Lester Gaskamp feller. Now I knew Vince was doing a little outlaw business, and though I was agin it, I knowed he had to make his way the best he could. Well, he got this Gaskamp feller in with him, and soon as Sarah and him was married, Vince carried him off and got him kilt. So there she was, still an unspoilt flower, and my wife—she was still alive then—said I ought to marry her off again. So I did. Vince found the feller and he had the price and the mayor done the ceremony and she was a widow again.”

Longarm stared at him and said, “Now that is one I hadn’t heard about. Sarah has been married twice?”

Dalton Diver nodded. “Yeah, but it didn’t amount to much. The mayor kind of done it on the run, so to speak, as Vince was taking his bunch over to Brady to rob a cattle buyer they knew had a big chunk of money on him. I don’t know how Vince got him kilt, but he managed, and that is the way it kind of started.”

Longarm frowned. “I think I need a few more details than that.”

Dalton Diver shrugged. “I told you I wouldn’t tell it good. Well, you got to go back a little ways and understand that the county was in trouble. Ernest Crouch said that with no more money than was coming in, the bank just wasn’t going to make it. You’ve seen our courthouse, us being the county seat of Mason County. Well, we thought that would bring in quite a bit of business, but it didn’t. Mason is nearly the only town of any size in the county, and we ain’t got more than two thousand souls even counting Mexicans. Other than that, there ain’t another town with more than fifty people in the whole damn place. Besides that, there wasn’t no land deals being made or deeds recorded or nothing. No courthouse business. I was talking to Vince about it one day, and he said if the county could guarantee him a safe place to hole up after a robbery, that he’d be willing to split. Take the money right to the bank and give them their share. Well, Ernest Crouch jumped on it like a mockingbird on a June bug. Thought it was a capital idea.”

“And the mayor was already in by this time?”

“Aw, yeah. Fact of the business is, he got in on the marrying the second time he married Sarah. I wish to hell I could think of the name of her second husband. Yeah, the mayor was all for it. Everybody was. Hell, wasn’t a soul on the street didn’t know what was going on.”

Longarm glanced at Austin Davis and nodded as if to say, “I told you so.”

“So we roped in the sheriff and sweetened him up a little. Didn’t take much. And that is pretty well the way she got started.”

Longarm frowned. “I still don’t understand how you could be sure and get the man on the paint horse, or pinto as you call him, killed.”

Diver was about to speak when Austin Davis said, “Excuse me, Mister Diver. I got a feeling this might go on a little. You made the offer of some vittles a while back. Does that still stand?”

Longarm shot him an irritated glance, but Diver heaved himself up out of his chair. “Oh, hell, yes. Two things we ain’t ever been short of, vittles and children. We might as well be sociable about this matter.” He took a step or two toward a door and hollered, “Robert! Robert! Get in here!” Then to Longarm and Austin Davis he said, “I’ll get Robert to lay out some supper and we’ll eat in the kitchen. Be shore and bring your whiskey.”

Robert laid out slices of ham with green beans and mashed potatoes and gravy. They did not talk while they ate. Even Diver allowed as how he hadn’t quite gotten his fill the first time around and he’d give it another go. But finally they finished. Robert brought cups and the coffeepot, set them on the table, and then left the kitchen.

Longarm said, “Dalton, I still don’t understand how you managed to be sure the man you wanted killed would get killed. Did Vince shoot them in the back?”

Diver waved his hand. “Oh, no. Vince would never do nothing like that. Naw, what he done was he sent Dan Hicks in ahead of time to the job. Then when the party rode up Dan done his work. It was good for the place they was robbing. It would make the local law look good. They’d always take credit for the kill. Made the folks that was robbed feel like they’d got something in return.”

“I see,” Longarm said dryly. “But what about the local boys? How come you started using them?”

Dalton Diver shrugged. “Well, hell, they was wanting to marry my daughters too. Only they didn’t have no money. So I said to Vince he ought to give the home folks a chance, and he did.” He suddenly frowned. “That reminds me about Amos Goustwhite. He owed me some money. He was set on marrying Rebeccah and had been paying a little as he went. They robbed the auction barn and he was on his way over here to give me three hundred dollars when some sonofabitch shot him.”

Longarm looked at Austin Davis and smiled grimly. “Yeah, I reckon it was a sonofabitch that shot him. Mister Goustwhite had the bad luck to get in an altercation with Marshal Smith here. Next day he tried to bushwhack him. Didn’t work.”

Dalton Diver glanced at Austin Davis and frowned slightly. “Well, I guess if it was in the line of duty … Guess I ain’t got no complaint.”

Longarm said, “But that don’t explain Gus Home, or Gus White. I killed him, and he had some of that score from the auction barn robbery on him. How come he didn’t get killed right after he married Hannah?”

Dalton Diver paused to pour some whiskey in his cup. “Well, that was a kind of strange circumstance. They was heading for the town of Miles to do a robbery when Gus got throwed by his horse and broke a leg. A nearby family took him in and he was laid up quite a spell. I told Vince I needed more money from Gus on account of the delay. Hell, I could have had Hannah married twice more in the time he was laying up. So Vince let him in on that auction robbery. You say he was going to Hannah when you killed him?”

“He was right in the middle of the river.”

Diver shook his head. “Well that just wasn’t right. He should have come by here and paid what he owed before he went near her. And he knew it too.”

Austin Davis said, “I don’t understand Vince robbing the auction barn. That involved a lot of folks from Mason. I would expect that stirred up a hornet’s nest.”

Diver made a face and shook his head. “That was all Vince’s doing. I done my best to talk him out of it, but he wouldn’t have it. He had it in for Ownsby, and the man is dead lucky he wasn’t in that office when Vince walked in to rob it. And I mean dead lucky.”

“What did Vince have against Ownsby?”

“Well, I’ll tell you. Some few months back Vince carried a bunch of horses to the barn and wanted to sell them. Ownsby said they was stolen and he wouldn’t touch the deal. Well, of course they was stolen. Every damn one of them had a different brand. Man acted like he didn’t know what was going on. The upshot of it was he took the horses and notified their rightful owners. Made Vince good and mad, I can tell you that.”

Austin Davis said, “Nobody was killed there. In fact, the lady claimed it was Vince riding the paint.”

Diver nodded. “Yeah, he done that. He didn’t want everybody getting on to the fact that that was a hearse horse. So sometimes, when it was a short haul and nobody to be left behind, either him or Dan Hicks would ride the horse.”

“Which brings up something I don’t understand, Mister Diver.” Longarm took a moment to figure out what he wanted to ask. “You only had four daughters getting married. But there were a lot more men got killed on the jobs than just them.”

Diver nodded vigorously. “Yessir, and that is a fact and one I’m more than just a little proud of. See, word was getting around about what a good thing Vince and Dan had going. So some of them border ruffians got to insisting they be brought in on the jobs. Well, Vince seen he couldn’t refuse them without raising hard feelings. So he took ‘em in—one at a time. Naturally, they got to ride the pinto. Wasn’t long before them trashy felons wasn’t so all-fired interested in joining up. I figure we done the whole country a good service by ridding it of some mighty undesirable folks. Wouldn’t you say that was a fact?”

Longarm glanced away and shook his head. He said, “Mister Diver, some of your reasoning just gets right on by me.”

“Yeah,” Austin Davis said. “What about this Jim Squires? He married one of your daughters, and I’d bet you horseshoes to half-dollars he ain’t dead.”

Diver’s face suddenly went beet red. He pointed an outraged finger at Austin Davis and said, “Now there, if there ever was a case called for law work, he is one! I let that young villain marry my daughter Salome without payin’ the full bride price. Put half down. The understanding was he was to go off on a job and bring me the balance of the money, but that hellion never even meant to stick to his bargain. Right after the marriage ceremony the gang took off for Fredricksburg, and that scalawag peeled off from the bunch and hurried right back to Salome and went to dipping his biscuit in the gravy! Now, tell me that ain’t crooked! An’ I ain’t got my money yet. That damn fool daughter of mine up and fell in love with the fool, and I might as well consider her just a dead loss. I’ve complained about it to Vince, but he just laughs. Now, if you are here to bring justice to this affair, I’d like to commend your eyesight to that bit of thievery!”

Longarm and Austin Davis tried to keep straight faces, but it was hard going. Longarm cleared his throat and said, “Mister Diver, let’s get back to this other business. I take it that some of this money was being brought back to the county. Other than what was given you for your daughters, how did the county get any good out of the robbery proceeds?”

“Why, through the bank. I thought you was on to that.”

“How did that work?”

“Well, Vince give Ernest Crouch part of every job, and Crouch put it in the bank and then distributed it around the county by making loans.” He shifted his eyes around as if to keep from being overheard and said furtively, “Though I got to tell you there has been more than a little dissatisfaction on that score. Lot of folks think Crouch has been charging some mighty high interest rates, up to eight percent. It’s left some ranchers and farmers where all they can do is pay off the interest, let alone touch the principal on their loans. But I reckon costly money is better than no money at all, which is what we had before this scheme got started.”

“How much has Vince turned over to the bank so far?”

Diver frowned. “Well, I ain’t exactly sure, but Vince says it is somewhere about fifty thousand dollars.”

“is that half of what the bunch has robbed and stole?”

Diver gave him a sly wink. “If you was Ernest Crouch asking me, I’d say yes, because that was the deal as was struck in return for Vince and the boys having a safe haven. But I know my own son. If you was to hold my feet to the fire, I’d say Vince give the bank closer to a third.”

Longarm stared at the man a moment, took a sip of his coffee, and then glanced at Austin Davis. Davis shrugged. “I ain’t got no more questions.”

Diver said, “That’s pretty much all I know, Marshal. Only question is, what will you give me for it?”

Longarm sat thinking for a moment. He said, “How long will it take you to get in touch with Vince, Mister Diver?”

Diver shook his head dismissively. “An hour at most. He stays pretty close ‘round here. All I got to do is give a note to Robert and, unless he’s out hooting and hollering, he’ll be along Johnny quick.”

“Today is Monday. I want his bunch to rob the Mason State Bank on Wednesday morning at nine o’clock. I believe that is when the bank opens.”

Diver stared at him for a moment, horrified. “Rob our own bank? Hell, that don’t make no sense. I’ll never be able to convince my boy of that.”

Longarm took a drink of coffee. “Explain it to him this way. Tell him it’s a way of throwing the law off the track. Tell him there are a couple of federal marshals nosing around and they are coming to the conclusion that the gang is part of Mason County. Tell him that a robbery of the bank, especially with that pinto horse right up front identifying them, would make the marshals think that the gang ain’t Mason County grown. Tell him it would take a lot of the pressure off.”

Diver looked worried. “I don’t know about that.” He rubbed his chin. “Vince might see the sense in that, but it would upset the hell out of Ernest Crouch. He wouldn’t take kindly to having his bank robbed.”

Longarm said, “They ain’t actually going to rob it, Mister Diver. But it will look like they have. Tell Mister Crouch it will make it very convenient for him to fix up his books for the bank examiners.”

Diver still looked dubious. “What are them?”

“Mister Crouch will know. And I guarantee you he will think it is a good idea, especially if no money leaves his bank but he can claim he was robbed of twenty-five or thirty thousand. I would imagine that will fill in a lot of holes he’s got in his accounting.”

Diver looked thoughtful. He said to a far corner of the kitchen, “What are you aiming on doing, Marshal?”

“I’ve told you from the very first that my main intent is the gunhands, the hot triggers. That includes your son, Mister Diver, along with the rest of them. Dan Hicks, Jim Squires, the other Goustwhite brother.” He looked at Austin Davis. “Who am I leaving out?”

Davis shrugged. “We need to make a list, there’s so damn many of them. And they keep switching around.”

Longarm said, “What I want is as many men as your son can round up coming in to rob that bank Wednesday morning.”

“You going to gun them?”

Longarm shook his head. “No. I will have it so arranged that they won’t have a chance. There will not be a shot fired unless they force it.”

Diver let out a long breath. “You shore ask a lot. Man turn in his own son.”

“You want your daughters back, Mister Diver? You want to rot in jail with them? You don’t cooperate with me, you will get twenty-five years for conspiracy.”

It startled Diver. “At my age? Hell, Marshal, at my age I can’t do no twenty-five years.”

Longarm said steadily, “Then you’ll just have to do the best part of it you can, Mister Diver.”

Dalton Diver grimaced and squirmed in his chair. “I never expected nothing like this. I don’t know if Vince will do it.”

“You better see to it that he does,” Longarm said warningly. “If you give this away, to Vince or to anybody, you will go to jail along with the banker, the mayor, and your girls. And I will bring in a half-dozen more deputy marshals to scour this area until we bring your son and his gang in. You had better listen to me, Mister Diver. Your son is going one of two places. He is either going to prison or he is going six feet under. And that is not a promise, not a threat, that is a guarantee.”

Austin Davis said, “Better go along with Marshal Long, Mister Diver. Prison is better than dead. Men have been known to escape. As long as he is alive there is hope.”

Diver rubbed his face again, looking worried. “I don’t know, I just don’t know. I don’t see how I can lie to my own boy. My face will give me away.”

Longarm stood up. “That’s up to you, Mister Diver, how you do it. You do it my way and I will release your girls and see that you get off pretty light, maybe mighty light. You try and pull something, like telling Vince all about it and maybe trying to break your daughters out of jail, well, it will get pretty bad. You tell the banker or the mayor, well, it will get pretty bad. Your best chance is to go along with what I’m willing to do.”

Austin Davis stood up alongside Longarm. He said, “Mister Diver, what it comes down to is that you can wiggle, but you can’t get off the hook. Wrong has been done here, and your son is in the big middle of it.”

Longarm said, “Mister Diver, I will see order and law brought back to this county. You can bet your best horse on that.”

Diver stood up. He seemed somehow smaller than he had been. “It’s a hard thing you gentlemen ask.”

Longarm said grimly, “Your son is caught. He is caught right now. You want him dead or alive?”

Diver hung his head.

Longarm said, “He better come in Wednesday morning with his gang, and he better come in no wiser than he is now. I’m obliged to you for the drinks and cigars and vittles.”

Diver nodded. “You are more than welcome.” He sighed. “Well, when all the cattle are counted, I reckon you’d have to say he done wrong and now has come the time to pay.”

“That’s it,” Longarm said. “You keep thinking like that and you’ll be all right.”

Diver walked them out to the porch. His voice was mournful and worried as he said, “Is that it? Ain’t there no other way?”

“Not that I can think of, Mister Diver.”

“I just hate to see it happen in town. Couldn’t we all meet someplace?”

Longarm shook his head. “I need them in one place, in one bunch, and at the same time.” He didn’t add that he also wanted them in the act of committing a robbery.

Diver shook his head. “It’s a terrible bad thing you are asking me to do, Marshal.”

Longarm was swinging up on his horse. He said, “It was some terrible bad things your son did. Him and the others. And that includes you. Good night, Mister Diver. If you don’t keep your word about all of this, I will be back and I will be angry.”

They rode away leaving the old man standing on the dark porch. Austin Davis said, “It’s kind of pitiful. Makes me feel right sorry for him.”

Longarm gave him a glance. “Davis, that is the difference between a real law officer and a half-ass bounty hunter. You see the man now and feel sorry for the trouble he’s got. I think about the people his son robbed and killed. That’s who I feel sorry for.”

It was late when they got back into town. Austin Davis headed for the saloon and the poker game while Longarm went by the jail. Melvin Purliss and one of the deputies were on duty. They reported no trouble.

The deputy said, “Not as long as we keep the door closed back to the cells. Open that up and you never heard such a racket in your life.”

“Are they eating?”

Purliss said, “I guess they eat some. Mostly they save it to throw at us when we go back there.”

“Well, you haven’t got any business back there.”

The deputy, the one Longarm thought was Bodenheimer’s nephew, said, “Whyn’t you stick yore head in back there, Marshal. They been askin’ after you.”

Longarm looked around. He said to the nephew, “Go get the sheriff. I want all four of you up here night and day. I got reason to believe somebody might try and break them out.”

The nephew had been sitting behind a desk. He said, “Uncle Otis ain’t going to like that much, Marshal.”

Longarm jerked his thumb. “Get. Before I decide to turn you in with them.”

Purliss said nervously, “You ain’t serious about maybe somebody trying to break them girls out, be you?”

“You mean like Wayne Shaker?”

Purliss said uncertainly, “Well, yeah, him or they daddy.”

“You just stay awake, Purliss. Leave the thinking to me.”

The next day Longarm did not do much. He got up and ate breakfast and then went back to his room to think. He had lunch with Austin Davis. He asked Davis again if he could shoot. Davis said, “I’ll tell you again. I’m alive, ain’t I? And I ain’t a coward.”

Longarm said, “It comes down, really, to just you and me. I wouldn’t give you four bits to the dozen for the sheriff and his deputies.”

“Purliss don’t seem all that bad.”

Longarm frowned slightly. “Something about Purliss worries me. He is supposed to have worked as a lawman before, in another town. He said Denton and he named the sheriff, but it didn’t sound right. I don’t know what it is. Probably nothing.”

“Hell, you ain’t from Texas. How are you supposed to know who is who?”

Longarm shrugged. “I guess I ain’t.”

That afternoon he walked into the bank and looked around. It was about as he’d expected it to be, a line of tellers’ cages behind a marble counter. He could see offices behind the long counter, and he asked if the president was in. He was told that, yes, Mister Crouch was in but was busy. Would he like to wait? He shook his head and left.

Austin Davis said, “When you going to give the sheriff and his boys the good news about their part?”

“I was going to tell them tonight, but I’m afraid it will interfere with their sleep. The less time they have to worry about it the better. I’ll go over early in the morning and get them lined out. I reckon you better come with me. In fact I want you to go over to the courthouse with the sheriff and make sure the mayor is manacled and secured. There’s no room in the jail for him or the banker, so we are just going to have to tie them down in their offices. So you make sure about the mayor and I’ll tend to the bank president. And be sure and have plenty of ammunition.”

“I thought you told ol’ Dalton Diver wouldn’t be a shot fired.”

Longarm gave him a look. “I said we wouldn’t fire the first shot.”

“You playing poker tonight?”

Longarm shook his head. “Naw, and you ain’t either. Be just like you to get in a fight and lose, just when I need you. I’m going to rest and think and clean my guns. I recommend you do the same.”

Austin Davis whistled. He said, “For a peaceful surrender, you shore act like you’re getting ready for a war.”

Longarm said, “Being ready is the best way to avoid one.”

Chapter 11

The bank was directly across the street from the entrance to the courthouse. It was right next to a cross street. Longarm had stationed Austin Davis at its corner. He had good cover and an open firing field, and was no more than twelve paces from where the bandits should arrive.

Longarm had put Melvin Purliss, armed with a rifle, behind a big pecan tree on the grounds of the courthouse. He was some twenty-five yards from the front of the bank and had specific instructions not to fire unless fired upon.

Sheriff Bodenheimer and his other two deputies had been placed inside the bank, behind the long marble counter where the tellers otherwise would be. Longarm had made sure they were armed with double-barreled shotguns. They were not to fire unless plans went awry and the bandits forced their way into the bank. Then they were to let loose with every shell in their shotguns. In his office, the president of the bank, Ernest Crouch, was manacled to his chair and gagged. During his arrest he had threatened Longarm with every type of lawsuit in the books, and had even claimed he could and would have Longarm’s badge. He had been in an apoplectic rage until Longarm had wondered mildly what the bank examiners were going to say about one of his depositors, a Mister Vincent Diver, or as he was sometimes known, Wayne Shaker. After that Crouch had shut up and simply glowered. The rest of the bank employees had been crowded into another office and locked in.

There was a mercantile next door to the bank, and Longarm had set up shop behind some sacks of feed that were out on the boardwalk. He was armed with his two revolvers and his Winchester. Both of his revolvers were .44-caliber Colts, but one of them had a six-inch barrel and the other a nine-inch one. He expected he would be doing his work, if there was any to do, with the nine-inch model. The Winchester was a model 1873 that fired the same cartridge as the revolvers. He calculated he was about fifteen yards from the front of the bank. It was a long pistol shot, but the nine-inch revolver was very accurate up to twenty or twenty-five yards.

Austin Davis had said, “You are setting up here like you are trying to stop a bank robbery rather than an arranged surrender.”

Longarm had said dryly, “That’s right, Marshal Smith.”

“It looks a little to me like you have set this up so that you will be apprehending them in the commission of a robbery.”

“That’s right, Honest John.”

Davis had said the mayor had reacted pretty much like the banker until he had heard the magic words about Vince Diver. “After that he shut up and was as docile as a little lamb.”

Longarm had put them all in position by half past eight. They had shooed away the whittlers and spitters, and turned back people from approaching the front of the bank. Now a fair crowd was gathered on the other three sides of the square. They were, Longarm thought, damn fools. Anyone dumb enough to risk catching a bullet just to see a spectacle either led a damn boring life or had gone completely loco.

Austin Davis had offered to bet Longarm fifty dollars that the outlaws never showed up. Longarm had studied on the bet for a moment, and then declined on the grounds that it might bring bad luck. “I don’t bet on what the other fellow might do. Especially when I got a lot riding on it already.”

He looked at his watch. It was ten to nine. He noted, with satisfaction, that some of the people along the sidewalks were starting to wander off to attend to their own business. He was glad, not only for their sake, but out of fear that they might spook Vince Diver. He could only hope that Dalton Diver had done as he had been directed. If he hadn’t, Diver and his son and daughters were going to be the losers. Longarm had meant every word that he had told the man.

At nine o’clock there was still no sign of the bandits. Longarm was beginning to despair, and already thinking of the time-consuming work that would be involved in hunting down the gunmen and bringing them to death or justice. Then, just as he was thinking that, he saw a party of men suddenly appear on the north road, the road to Llano. They came on, heading straight for the center of town. As they got closer he could see that every one of them had his face covered with either a blue or red bandanna. But more importantly, the man in the lead was riding a paint horse. The hearse horse, as Diver had called it.

Longarm had his six-inch revolver in his holster. The gun with the nine-inch barrel was stuck in his waistband. He pulled it free and cocked the hammer. The feed sacks were only about three feet tall, so he was crouched down in an uncomfortable position. As the riders came on, he was able to count seven. He wondered if Vince had included any of the county boys. Dalton Diver had said they liked to give the home folks their chance so they’d feel a part of the doings. Well, if they were among the seven, they were going to get a chance to see what federal prison felt like.

The riders came on, pulling their horses down to a walk. Longarm saw them glance toward where Austin Davis was lounging around the corner. He hoped his “deputy” had the good sense to have his rifle out of sight and to look casual.

But other than that they seemed to pay no attention to anyone. Perhaps, Longarm thought, they felt their numbers were great enough to handle any force the town could muster, or maybe they felt like they were among friends. He reckoned the latter was more likely the truth than the former. As they came, he examined the man riding the pinto, guessing that he was Vince Diver. The man was stockier than Longarm would have expected. He also seemed older.

But Longarm had no time for such speculation, for the bandits were suddenly wheeling their mounts straight toward the boardwalk in front of the bank. Longarm tensed his muscles, making ready to rise slightly and advise the men that they were under arrest and that they were to dismount and surrender themselves. But in the instant before he could do so, he heard several rapid shots and the sound of yelling. He saw the horsemen stir and look over their shoulders. He turned his gaze to the right. Melvin Purliss had come out from behind the pecan tree, firing shots into the air from his revolver. The words he was yelling came clear to Longarm’s ears: “Run! Run! It’s a trap! Run for your lives!”

It was too long a shot for Longarm’s revolver, and he was scrambling to pick up his rifle when he heard a single shot ring out. He turned toward Purliss just in time to see the deputy clutch at his chest and fall over backwards. Down the street he could see the barrel of Austin Davis’s rifle.

There was no time now. He stood up and yelled at the bandits. “I’m a federal marshal! You are surrounded! Throw up your hands and surrender!”

But instead, they had guns in their hands and were firing in all directions. Longarm ducked down just as a slug whizzed over his head.

There was nothing for it now but to fight. He came up over the feed sacks, the Colt revolver out in front of him. The man on the paint horse was wheeling around. As he turned away from the bank, he presented himself full face to Longarm. Longarm squeezed the revolver carefully and fired. He saw the bullet take the man and knock him off the back of his horse. But Longarm had no time to look for there was wild firing from all directions. He saw a man go down, obviously from Austin Davis’s gun, but then Longarm was sighting on a man in a red bandanna whose horse was rearing up. The bunch had packed themselves in so close they were having trouble separating. Longarm fired, but the man’s horse jumped just as the hammer fell and he saw he’d only hit the robber in the arm. He thumbed the hammer back as the bandit turned toward him, raising his own revolver. Longarm fired an instant before the robber, and the man lurched backwards and then fell off the side of his horse.

The melee was clouded with smoke and dust and noise, but it seemed to Longarm he could still see three bandits atop their wheeling, pitching horses. He was trying to find a target in the confusion when, of an instant, the door of the bank suddenly flew open. Sheriff Bodenheimer filled it, a shotgun in his hand. He was just bringing it up to aim when Longarm saw a flutter of his shirt at his shoulder, and then the sheriff was suddenly whirled around and shoved backward into the bank as if someone had given him a hard push. Longarm turned back to the men in front of the bank. One of the three had disappeared, and the remaining two had freed themselves from the tangle of bodies and riderless horses and were spurring their horses across the street to cut across the courthouse grounds. Longarm shoved his revolver into his waistband and jerked up his rifle. He sighted on the back of the right-hand rider and followed him a few steps before he fired. Nothing happened, and he jacked another shell into the chamber and fired again, taking a quick shot just before the robbers could disappear into the pecan trees. The rider went a few more strides with his horse, and then slipped down the side and went rolling over and over along the edge of the courthouse lawn. The last man disappeared from view, spurring his horse east as fast as he could go. Longarm slowly stood up, the sound of the gunshots still ringing in his ear. It had suddenly gotten very quiet. He thought of the sheriff. He hoped the man wasn’t dead. He needed him for a witness. He also wondered what had made him decide to become brave and a law officer all at the same time.

Longarm walked out from behind the feed sacks toward the bodies that lay on the ground. Austin Davis came up just as Longarm stepped off the boardwalk. He said, “Well, so much for a peaceful surrender.”

Longarm gritted his teeth. “That damn Melvin Purliss. What did you shoot the bastard for?”

“Did you want a gun at your back? I didn’t.”

“No, but I would have liked to have roasted that treacherous bastard over some slow coals.”

“It’s over, Longarm. Forget it.”

“Yeah,” Longarm said. He knelt down over the dead figure of the stocky man who’d been riding the paint horse. He pulled down the bandanna. He said, “Aw, hell. Look here. It’s Old Man Diver. Sonofabitch!”

Austin Davis said, “Damn! He must have come along to make sure it went smooth. Then that bastard Purliss put his two cents worth in.”

Longarm straightened up. He looked at Austin Davis. “We didn’t have no choice, did we? Could you see where we could have done aught else?”

Davis shook his head. “No. They had their guns out. If we hadn’t cut down on them, who knows how many of these townspeople would have got shot.”

Longarm was about to speak when he became aware of the crowd that was building around them. With hard, flat eyes he spun slowly on his heel, staring at them. The people fell back a step. He said harshly, “Damn you! Get the hell out of here! You all knew about this. You’re all crooks. I’ve a great mind to lock the bunch of you up! Now move!”

They found the bodies of Vince Diver and Dan Hicks and a man that Austin Davis guessed to be Emil Goustwhite. “Looks like his brother.”

“I guess Squires got away.”

“Unless he’s that one you knocked off his horse over yonder.”

Longarm stepped up onto the boardwalk. “I better see about the sheriff.”

He went inside the bank and found that his two deputies had the sheriff sitting up in a chair. The man was pale and there was a crimson blotch on his right shoulder, but he looked as if he would live. Longarm said to the deputies, “Dammit, get out there and run that crowd off. And one of you have sense enough to get a doctor over here for the sheriff.”

A few of the bank employees were venturing out, and Longarm called for one of them to fetch a bottle of whiskey. “And be damn quick!”

He looked down at the sheriff, a slight grin at his mouth. “Otis, what came over you to suddenly start acting like a sheriff?”

The sheriff looked down. He mumbled, “I don’t know, Marshal. I just had this sudden over-powerin’ feelin’ to do my job.”

Longarm laughed without humor. He said, “Otis, first rule of being a good lawman is always be sure you have the advantage over the bandits. There are a lot more of them than us. Stepping into an open doorway in front of a bunch of men with drawn revolvers ain’t exactly the best way of getting the advantage.”

“I’ll shore keep that in mind, Marshal. If I get me another chance.”

Longarm patted him on the shoulder. “You’ll get another chance, Otis.

You done yourself a whole lot of good today.”

The next day Longarm and Austin Davis sat at a table in the saloon, each of them nursing a whiskey. Austin said, “Well, looks like that wraps it up. You even got Squires. I wonder who the one was got away.”

Longarm shrugged. “I don’t know and I don’t care. I reckon these folks are out of business. I feel bad about old Dalton, though. But then, you set out to do rough work, you better expect some to come back your way.”

“The daughters. Hannah say anything to you when you let her out?”

Longarm laughed. “Aw, yeah. She said a bunch. I never knowed a girl that young could know so many words you couldn’t print in a newspaper.”

He glanced over at Davis. “I ain’t sure that Rebeccah knows you were part of this. That door might still be open.”

Davis nodded. “I had considered having a look inside. See how matters fall out. I don’t know how they are going to take it about their daddy getting killed.”

“I think they understood the risks of the business. All of them girls was older than their age. They knew what was going on. They knew all about Vince. They also knew why I locked them up. Hannah told me in no uncertain terms that it was a lowdown trick and that the only way she’d ever have me in her bed again was if I was to get back in it.”

Davis smiled. “What’s next?”

Longarm pulled a face. “I got to transport the mayor and the banker all the way to Austin and turn them over to a federal court. I expect the court will send down an examiner to have a look at Crouch’s books. Ought to be pretty surprising.”

Davis pulled several papers out of his pocket. He said, “These here are wanted circulars on Hicks and Vince Diver and Squires. I know you popped Squires off but you can’t take a reward, so I wondered if you’d just Put your John Henry on these and the date and place. There’s five hundred dollars a head on each of them.”

Longarm looked at him and then at the pencil in his hand. He said, “You just noted that I couldn’t take a reward because I was a deputy marshal. What the hell you think you are? You can put them posters and that pencil away.”

Davis blinked. He said slowly, “You are joshing me. Say you are joshing me. Don’t tell me I went through all this for three dollars a day.”

Longarm nodded. “That’s a fact. You didn’t earn it, but I figure you got five days coming. You turn in a voucher, in triplicate, to the headquarters in Colorado, and you ought to get your fifteen dollars in, oh, two or three months.”

Davis sagged back in his chair. “I don’t believe this. You’re joshing?”

Longarm gave him a blank look. “I don’t understand, Austin. Where is the carefree, lighthearted man who made fun of me for taking matters too seriously? Where is that devil-may-care lad? What happened to him?”

Austin Davis leaned his head back. “He got buried under fifteen hundred dollars he didn’t get.” Then he sat forward and laughed ruefully. “What the hell, I took the job. It ought to have dawned on me you was dying to have the last laugh. Well, have it. But let’s have another whiskey.”

“I can’t,” Longarm said. He stood up and took a stub of a pencil out of his pocket. He added, “Don’t never say I never done nothing for you.” Then, on each of the posters, he wrote his name and his commission and his federal district, and certified that each of the wanted men had been killed by Austin Davis. He put the pencil back in his pocket. “That suit you, Marshal Smith?”

Davis looked at the papers and then up at Longarm. “You didn’t have to do that. I made a deal. I’m willing to stick by it.”

Longarm laughed. “There was no deal. There ain’t no such thing as a provisional deputy marshal. I made that up. Now I got to get going. It’s a long drag to Austin.” He was turning for the door when Austin Davis stopped him. Longarm said, “What?”

“What’s it take to be a federal marshal?”

Longarm gave him a sardonic grin. “Why? You thinking of applying?”

“I might. What does it take?”

Longarm thought for a moment. He said slowly, “Well, first of all you got to get yourself in a frame of mind where you ain’t surprised by how mean and lowdown people can be, what meanness they can get up to. After that, you got to like to be hungry, thirsty, lonely, shot at, shot at and hit, and do all that for poor pay and no thanks. But the last part is the hardest. You got to make yourself believe you are actually doing some good, changing things.” He gave Davis a look. “Sometimes that is real hard to believe.”

“You think this town will change now?”

“Sure. For a little while. Until somebody else comes along with a way to make some quick money. I got to go.”

Davis got up and came around the table and put out his hand. They shook, and Davis said, “I was just kidding about you being an easy poker player. You ain’t. You are one of the toughest I ever run into.”

Longarm gave him a crooked smile. He said, “There is one other quality you got to have to be a marshal. You got to be able to tell bullshit a mile off. I’ll see you, Austin.” He walked out of the saloon, giving a little wave as he went through the batwing doors. Right then all he wanted was to go back to Colorado and a few of the comforts even a deputy marshal was allowed to have.

But as he walked toward his horse he had the strangest feeling that he’d be seeing Austin Davis waiting for him in Denver, chomping at the bit to become a federal marshal. The thought made him smile. Here you took a man for a fairly smart fellow, and he turned out to be a damned idiot after all. Longarm looked around as he got to his horse and mounted. He’d done a pretty good job and he knew it. Old Billy Vail might piss and moan about him not cleaning the streets before he left, but he was happy with himself. He began to whistle. It wasn’t very tuneful, but it was a whistle.