Longarm waited until Barrett had finished writing. He had to admit that the man wrote a damned good hand.
When Barrett had finished the last sentence, he looked up. Longarm said, “Just sign your name. Archie Barrett.”
When the document was complete, Longarm took it up and read it carefully, looking for any tricks or hidden meanings. There were none. Barrett had taken it down exactly as he had spoken it.
Barrett said, a little croak in his voice, “Now, what about some water and some whiskey and something to eat?”
Longarm grinned at him. He said, “You know, Mr. Barrett, you expect us now to treat you fair and decent, like we’re going to keep our part of the bargain because you’ve kept yours. Well, I don’t think we’re going to do that, Barrett. We’re going to treat you the way you’ve been treating these folks around here for years. You can have some breakfast and you can have some water and you can have some coffee—you can’t have no whiskey—but you can only have it after we’ve had our breakfast. Mr. Hunter and Mr. Goodman, would y’all escort Mr. Archie Barrett back to his room?”
It gave Longarm a deep inside chuckle to hear Barrett scream and curse as he was thrown once again into the room and have the heavy door shut on him. When Hunter and Goodman came back, Longarm rubbed his hands together. He said, “Well, gentlemen, let’s get this thing started. Let’s have some breakfast. I believe we can even have some eggs, courtesy of young Mr. Goodman here and his endeavors. Mr. Goodman, if you’ll fry up a good batch of eggs and keep Tom out of the kitchen and make up some more of those baking powder biscuits, we’ll have a good feed.”
He glanced over at Hawkins. “Then Deputy George Hawkins will be off on his mission to carry this little missive to our good friend, Jake Myers.”
Hawkins just gave Longarm a sour look and got up to pour himself a cup of coffee. He said as he passed, “You know I wouldn’t do this, Marshal, if the pay wasn’t right. I’d do nearly anything for two dollars a day.”
Longarm smiled. He said, “That’s the spirit, Mr. Hawkins. By the way, do you know where this rocky hill is?”
Hawkins said, “Of course. If you recall, I was the one who suggested it. I probably know this country better than any one person around here. Lord knows I’ve been all over it.”
While they had waited for Barrett to agree to write the note, Longarm had questioned the others about a possible rendezvous point that would also give him a place of ambush. A small hill with rocky outcroppings had been chosen, mainly because about a mile farther north there was a small butte with some little caves that led into it. It would make an ideal place for Longarm to await the coming of Jake Myers and Hawkins.
From the kitchen, Hawkins said, “In that letter you got Barrett telling Myers to come alone. I can guarantee you, Marshal Long, that Jake Myers ain’t going to stir his fat old ass out into the open without a couple, three gunhands with him. That’s for sure.”
Longarm said, “Well, if that’s the way it has to be, that’s the way it’s got to be. You just make sure you ain’t amongst them, that you have business back in town.”
They ate their breakfast and then Tom Hunter and the elder Mr. Goodman went to get Archie Barrett out and feed and water him. While they were at the task, Longarm beckoned Hawkins out the front door. They walked a little way from the cabin, surveying the range that led back down toward the town. Longarm said, “Look here, George, if you’re really not of mind to deliver that note to Mr. Myers, I can understand it. I don’t want to ask you to do something you don’t really want to do, because I figure you’ve already done more than I could ask of any citizen, luring Mr. Barrett out from behind his fort where I could get my hands on him.”
George Hawkins smiled slightly. He said, “Well, that’s mighty kind of you, Marshal, though I think you’re just trying to salve your own conscience. If I don’t take that note, who do you reckon is going to take it? Tom Hunter? Rufus Goodman? Robert Goodman? I don’t think so. Why don’t you just take it yourself? It would be just about the same as if you sent one of them.”
“You could go into town and find some young boy and pay him a couple dollars to take it out there.”
Hawkins laughed. He said, “Yeah, and the first thing Jake Myers is going to ask that boy is, ‘Who gave you that note, son? I’m going to twist your arm off and shove it up your ass.’ And that kid would describe me and then Mr. Myers would know.” He shook his head. “No, there ain’t but one way, and that’s for me to stick my head in the lion’s den again, like it or not. Why all this, Marshal? Are you getting worried about me?”
“No, I can’t say that I’m getting worried about you, George. It’s just that you bitch such an uncommon much when you’re asked to do the least little old thing, like just make a short five-mile ride and drop off a note and come back.”
Hawkins looked Longarm steadily in the eye. He said, “You want this note put in Myers’s hands, don’t you?”
“Yep.”
“You don’t want it handed off to some hired hand and then I turn tail and run, do you?”
“Nope.”
“So, then I’ll be standing there while Jake Myers reads it. Right?” Hawkins said.
“Right.”
“And you reckon he’s going to let me take off?”
Longarm took a second to answer. Finally, he said, “I don’t see why not.”
Hawkins laughed. “Then you’re a bigger damn-fool than I thought. Listen, this time, don’t shoot so damned close to me. That’s all I ask.”
“You ain’t got no idea what I’m going to do,” Longarm said.
Hawkins spit on the ground and scuffed at it with the toe of his boot. He said, “Marshal, I’ve done seen you in action. I know how you do your talking. Now, let’s go back in. I could do with another cup of coffee.”
Longarm turned around and glanced inside the cabin. He could see that Barrett was still at the table. He said, “Let’s wait a minute until that pig gets out of there. I can’t stand the sight of him.”
Hawkins cackled. He said, “He is a sight, isn’t he. That’s the hairiest son of a bitch I believe I’ve ever seen. What we ought to have done, or maybe still could do, is hold him over a low fire and turn him and singe all that hair off of him. Wouldn’t do no good shaving it, it’d just grow back.”
Longarm said, “Mr. Hawkins, you do have the best ideas. Are you sure you want to do this?”
Hawkins looked at him with amazement in his face. “Want to do it? Hell, no, I don’t want to do it. But will I do it? Hell, yes, I’ll do it. You just be damned sure you do your part.”
Longarm said with a straight face, “I’ll go inside and get about a half of a bottle of whiskey in me so as to steady my hand. How’s that? That make you feel better?”
Hawkins stared at him with round eyes. He said, “Don’t be saying that to an old reformed drunk. My God, man. You scare me to death talking like that. I better not even see you near a bottle of whiskey.”
“Oh, I won’t be near a bottle. I’ll put it in a glass if that makes you feel any better.”
Hawkins said, “You are a rare son of a bitch, Marshal.”
Longarm answered, “No, I call myself more well done than rare.
Chapter 9
They had all calculated that it was about a two-hour ride for Hawkins to Jake Myers’s ranch and a little over an hour’s ride for Longarm to the butte where he could take up his ambush position on the northern side of the knoll they called Rocky Hill, the place the note suggested that Barrett and Jake Myers meet. Hawkins was fidgety and anxious to get it over with, so they sent him off at about eleven o’clock, allowing him to take it slow and easy so as to arrive around one o’clock and hope that he could get Myers started no later than two. Longarm planned to give himself plenty of time. He was going to start for his position no later than noon.