“Don’t worry,” Longarm assured the upset man. “If I am wrong and Nathan Cox really is going to Flagstaff or Prescott to buy a ranch, then you’ll benefit from it. And if there is any money to be made for your information, I’ll pass that right along the proper channels. You know that it doesn’t matter to me one way or the other who collects the reward. It might as well be someone I like and who has been cooperative.”
Fosdick relaxed. “I’m sorry I just blew up. It’s just that I went and told the wife about all this, and now she’s really pressuring me hard for a reward. She’s even got another damned house picked out in the best part of town.”
“That’s unfortunate,” Longarm said, “but tell her that I don’t put much credence in those telegrams. From everything I’ve heard and seen so far about our counterfeiter, he’s very smart. Sending telegrams just doesn’t jibe with the kind of man who could pull off something as complex as stealing government property that could be used to create money.”
“Did he get the currency plates and everything?”
“I’m afraid so,” Longarm said. “Furthermore, Cox has the expertise to produce hundred-dollar bills that are identical to those in circulation.”
“How many?”
“Just as many as he can spend before I catch him,” Longarm answered.
“I can’t imagine how the Denver mint could have been so lax in their security to allow that to happen.”
“Well, John, someone has to be put in a position of trust, and Nathan Cox had earned it with years of excellent service. No one believed that he would ever risk a promising career and even go so far as to murder his federal accomplice.”
“He murdered his accomplice?”
“That’s right,” Longarm said. “We don’t know what happened between them. Perhaps his accomplice got cold feet and was going to turn them both in. Or maybe the accomplice even tried to murder Cox first, but whatever the reason, Cox broke the fellow’s neck and took everything before he vanished in Denver.”
Fosdick shook his head. “He was a very gracious and handsome man, Custis. I-I have to confess that he sure didn’t look like a murderer.”
“What exactly,” Longarm asked, “is a murderer supposed to look like anyway?”
When John Fosdick just shook his head, Longarm continued. “Murderers come in all shapes, ages, and sizes. I’ve even had to arrest some very sweet old ladies who killed their husbands or rivals. You just can’t judge someone’s mind or heart by their physical appearance.”
“I guess not,” the telegraph operator said. “Maybe I really wouldn’t make a very good federal law agent. Up to now I thought that I would and, if it hadn’t been for my wife, Irma, I’d have applied to become an officer.”
The man sighed. “But now I’m just not sure if I’m not a whole lot better off being content as a simple, underpaid Western Union telegraph operator.”
“I can’t answer that for you, John. But I do know this—I wouldn’t be in this line of work if I had your pretty wife and a fine bunch of children.”
Fosdick managed a smile. “Thanks. Now, I guess I better get back to work.”
Longarm nodded and went to talk to some other people whom he trusted and who might have some useful information. Because of the foul weather, it was a lousy day to be running around, but after several blind leads, Longarm found the rancher who had sold six blooded horses to Nathan Cox for a wad of worthless money. The man was hunkered up to a bar, nursing his misery. “I was actually coming to see you federal officers,” Dan Murphy said. “I want some government reimbursement for my three thousand dollars worth of racing horses.”
“That’s what the horses were really worth?”
“That’s right,” Murphy said, looking grim. “They were top-notch Thoroughbreds. One stallion, three mares … two of whom were in foal … and a couple of geldings.”
“They must have been pretty good horses to have had an average value of five hundred dollars each.”
“They were a bargain at that price!” Murphy snapped as he emptied his glass. “I was strapped for cash and sold them below their true value. Any one of those horses would have brought twice that much money at a Thoroughbred auction back in Kentucky. And, as it turns out, I should have shipped them back to Kentucky and had them sold.”
“But you didn’t have the money,” Longarm said, studying the short, heavyset man in a pale brown suit and coming to the conclusion that Murphy was probably fudging the value but not his dire financial circumstances.
“That’s right. So I let that fast-talking sonofabitch pass that bad money on to me.” Murphy wiped his lips with the back of his sleeve. “Marshal, you’d better catch him, or someone like me that he’s cheated will do it instead.”
“I understand,” Longarm said. “And I also understand that you saw Cox last and that he was heading southwest.”
“That’s right. He said that he wanted the horses brought out to him so that no one in Cheyenne would get any ideas about stealing, or ambushing him for them. It made sense to me, so I had them all roped together like they were on a picket line. I delivered them to Cox about three miles west of town, where the Union Pacific line spans a deep gulch. I got paid in that bad cash and he got my good horses.”
“I see. Did Nathan Cox mention anything that might have given you some indication where he was heading?”
“Sure,” Murphy said. “The bastard said that he was going to Arizona and that he’d probably enter a few of the horses down there in some local races. He asked me quite a few questions about which ones were the fastest, what kind of conditions they preferred to run in, and so forth. I got the impression that Cox liked to gamble and wanted to bet on his own horses for a change instead of the turn of a card or the roll of the dice.”
“I see.”
“So what do I do about the money I’m out?”
“Do you still have the three thousand dollars worth of counterfeit bills?”
“No, those other feds took them, but they did give me a receipt. Said that I’d be reimbursed.” Murphy looked desperate. “But when?”
“I can’t answer that,” Longarm said honestly. “But if I were you, I’d find some way to get down to the federal mint in Denver and be first in what I expect will become a very long line of victims.”
“Damn!” Murphy swore. “I know how slow the government is to release its money and how quick they are to collect. I don’t need this kind of grief!”
“I’m sure you don’t,” Longarm said. “And I’m sorry, but the sooner that I apprehend Nathan Cox and settle this trouble, the happier we’ll all be. Is there anything else that you can tell me about Cox and exactly where he might have gone?”
“Arizona. That’s all.”
Longarm sighed. “Maybe that’s where he went … but I doubt it. It would be too obvious.”
Murphy scratched his round cheeks. “He did ask me a question that I thought was odd.”
“What’s that?”
“He asked me if I’d ever crossed the Wasatch Mountains.”
Longarm was suddenly all ears. “The Wasatch?”
“Yeah,” Murphy said. “I told him that I had and he asked me what pass I’d used.”
“And you told him?”
“I told him that I’d forgotten its name but it was just west of a rough mining and logging town called Whiskey Creek over near Colorado’s western border.”
Murphy poured himself another drink and Longarm saw that the man’s hand trembled when he said, “I remember the name of the town across the years because I drank so much whiskey myself that I staggered out of a saloon, went around behind it to throw up, and fell in that damn creek and nearly froze to death! I suspect I would have if I hadn’t been so liquored up.”
“Whiskey Creek. I wonder why he wanted to know about the Wasatch Mountain passes? As you well know, he wouldn’t need to cross the Wasatch Mountains if he were really taking your horses down to Prescott or Flagstaff.”