Then, before Ferris could answer, the wily manhunter nodded as if to himself and said, “That explains all those boat tickets. Your friends are doubling back to a hideout that would have been ideal if this Harmony Drake had only behaved himself. No Yanqui lawman knows of it to this day. Or should I say no Yanqui lawmen knew of it until he tracked you this far? El Brazo Largo had booked passage aboard that same night boat before he somehow slit the throat of the desk sergeant from an impossible distance.”
Ferris cried, “I told you some Mexicans came to bust him out. I can tell you where Harmony, Goldmine Gloria, and the boys are headed too!”
Gomez grimaced and coldly replied, “Is not important to me. I know it was El Gato or some of his people who helped a known friend escape. I have no jurisdiction in Arizona Territory. I intend to catch the one I am really after on my own side of the border. Whether your friends go to Yuma or to Hell is of no interest to me.”
As he started to turn away, Ferris pleaded, “What about me then? If you don’t give a shit about anyone but Longarm, what am I standing in this hole for?”
Gomez shrugged and quietly replied, “Is the best place for us to dispose of an unimportant stink. Is no reward posted for you on either side of the border, and you pests make so much noise at the Americano Consulate every time we bruise you just a little. So all in all, I feel this may be best for all concerned, eh?” Then he said “Ahora” in a conversational tone, and turned to leave as they shot Ferris to a bloody mess in the bottom of his shallow grave.
Once he got back to his headquarters, Gomez wired San Luis Rio Colorado for further news on that night boat, and ordered his men to keep the pressure on in the unseemly Parts of town, observing that low-lifes who were not being paid to hide wanted men were inclined to want them caught, if only so they could get back to their own shady business.
Then, after a tedious morning defending his country, the ponderous patriot enjoyed an early snack and waddled over to his favorite house of ill repute to enjoy a few hours of sensual siesta time.
As he was being serviced by a slender mestiza with hips that just kept moving and eyes that held no expression at all, the man he had his whole force searching for in other houses of ill repute was in the next room, pacing the floor and puffing furiously on the big claro cigar El Gato had brought him. The saturnine Mexican himself sat on the windowsill, idly staring down at the street through the slats of the blue pine shutters.
The walls of the solidly built chincheria were too thick for them to hear what Gomez was begging for next door. It was just as well for Gomez’s peace of mind that he couldn’t hear El Gato’s answer when Longarm asked why they were letting the fat lawman live.
El Gato said, “Is a matter of the devil we know against a new one who might be better. Gomez is good, but not as good as he thinks he is. Nobody could be. His weakness is that when the putas tell him how much everybody fears him, he believes them. But about that government payroll shipment my friends and me are here for. Do you wish for to be in on it or not? Your share would be better than ten percent, if you could spare a few extra days down this way.”
Longarm didn’t want anyone calling him a sissy. So he said he just loved to take part in payroll robberies as a rule, but had to get on down the road. When he asked again about any other boats headed north, El Gato said, “Patience, my idealistic youth. I told you there were boats and then there were boats. Would be suicide for anyone on our side to put out to sea before sundown. This tiresome government we’ve been suffering under has bought a fleet of steam cutters from that old cosita Queen Victoria for to guard our coasts against piracy. That is what El Presidente calls catching fish without paying him off, piracy.”
El Gato turned from the window, adding, “The streets below are now clear of friend and foe. Is too hot outside for anyone. After the woman of La Causa has learned more from our gallant Gomez, we shall perhaps be able to plan your mad dash up the coast with more certainty, eh?” Longarm smiled thinly and asked, “Does Gomez always blab all his plans to the ladies?”
El Gato nodded soberly and explained, “That is for why I asked them to give him a good price. When a man thinks he is getting it almost for nothing, he is inclined to think she must like him. Married men in the habit of patronizing putas are seldom simply oversexed. Women who make a business of pleasing men are inclined to let men talk, no matter how boring they may seem at home. I understand our gallant Gomez is saddled with a delicate faded rose who does not like for to hear about clever questioning or ingenious disposals, eh?” Longarm said he followed El Gato’s drift, then added, “No matter where he thinks I ran to, I have to get going if I mean to catch up with Harmony Drake and his pals. If I wait until dark, they’ll have put in at Yuma long before I can hope to get there!”
El Gato shrugged and suggested, “Forget about them and help us steal money instead. Is no way you could overtake that night boat before it puts in at Yuma. Not if you left this very minute. I told you the only vessels our side controls are fishing boats or, all right, smugglers, powered by sails in the fickle winds of this stagnant Sea of Cortez. Your prisoner and his blond puta will be back on shore, free for to run in any direction, long before we could hope to land you in Yuma. To begin with, is a guarded border crossing you would never get through if you followed the main channel of the Rio Colorado. The broad swampy delta provides many better, or at least less famous channels. But progress through that windless sea of tule reeds can be slow.”
“I don’t aim to catch ‘em aboard that infernal steamboat,” Longarm declared, snorting smoke out both nostrils as he explained. “The best I can hope for in Yuma is somebody who saw which way they were headed. Such witnesses get tougher to come by as time winds on. They know this. They figure they led me on a long ride around Robin Hood’s Barn, and I’m figuring they heard I’d been arrested before they ever boarded that side-wheeler. Even if they take some pains, it’s tough to cover your tracks when you get off a steamboat with a good-looking blonde. I only need someone who can say for certain they caught a train either way. I’m betting they never planned to.”
El Gato cocked a thoughtful eyebrow. “Par que? For why would anyone stay close to Yuma when he knew that was where the law expected them to hide out?”
“To hide out, of course,” said Longarm, taking pity on his pal’s bewildered smile. “Harmony Drake was the only member of the bunch anyone ever spotted in Yuma. Or should we say, the downtown parts of Yuma. I’m saying they must have been holed up somewhere good. Somewhere they felt safer than anywhere here in Mexico where nobody in possession of a U.S. federal warrant had just cause to look for them.”
El Gato nodded soberly and said, “Is agreed those two you tangled with in that cantina should not have been out drinking when they had reason for to be expecting someone like you to come along. But should the gang leave that boat for to go straight to some Yuma hideout, do you have any idea where such a secret lair might be?”
To which Longarm could only reply, “Upstairs or down, close to the center or way out on the outskirts of town. A hideout is by definition somewhere nobody else knows about. With any luck, I’ll be able to trace them as far as the depot, and we can wire an all-points on the sneaky sons of bitches. But with my luck, they’ll go to ground somewhere close to Yuma, where Billy Vail sent me to get old Harmony in the first damned place. How long does it take a sailboat to carry a lawman that far, old son?” El Gato said, “Twenty-four hours with a following wind. It gets to be more of a problem when the winds are calm or contrary. I think you have more fun helping us rob El Presidente Diaz. They gonna kill you if they catch you anyway. So you may as well have the game as long as you have the name, no?”