“Sure thing,” Longarm said, paying the man and then adding another dollar, hoping to grease the old liveryman’s tongue. The extra dollar worked, as it generally did.
“Stranger, where you from?” the liveryman asked.
“Cheyenne,” Longarm said. “I’m looking for a friend of mine. A fella named Nathan Cox.”
The liveryman shook his head. “Must be a stranger too, ‘cause I never even heard of him, and I know everyone in Whiskey Creek.”
Longarm described Cox and, as he did so, could see a change come over the liveryman.
“Sorry,” the liveryman said, abruptly turning to leave, “but I got work to do.”
“But have you seen the man I described? He had at least six blooded Thoroughbreds and I’m sure he would have had to bring them here if he was passing through.”
“Well, then I guess he wasn’t passing through!” the liveryman said, unwilling to meet Longarm eye to eye.
“I think he was,” Longarm said, having no choice but to drag out his badge. “And as a lawman, I’m strongly suggesting that you be honest and tell me what happened here. Otherwise I might have to take you back to Denver.”
“On what charge?”
“Withholding important information relating to an outlaw wanted by the federal government.”
“All right,” the liveryman, Waite, finally said, looking whipped. “But, Marshal, I had no part in any of this and I want that understood from the start.”
“Fair enough. I just want to find Nathan Cox.”
“He’s gone,” the liveryman flatly stated. “He came in here with another young fella named Rolf Swensen. Swensen is just a would-be cowboy. A nobody. They were travelin’ together and the pair seemed friendly enough toward each other, though you’d be hard pressed to find bigger opposites.”
“Go on.”
“Well, Clyde Zolliver came in a couple days after they hit town and hooked up with a pair of whores.”
“Clyde, or Nathan Cox and this Swensen fellow?”
“Nathan and Rolf Swensen,” the old man said. “The dandy seemed to have all the money in the world. He wanted the best that Whiskey Creek could offer, which ain’t much. But the whores whose names were Teresa and Carole, they were pretty slick for a place like this and there were a lot of cowboys that got upset when all their time was bought up by that pair.”
“Then what happened?”
“Clyde Zolliver arrived and went after ‘em. The next thing I know, everyone was gone.”
Longarm thumbed back the brim of his hat. “What do you mean, gone?”
“Just what I said, Marshal! There was a big gunfight over at the Paradise Hotel. People ain’t saying much about it, but I gather that the kid gunned Clyde down in the hall. They say he was naked as a snake when he got drilled about five times. I guess it was a hell of a bloody battle.
Longarm hadn’t expected to hear anything like this. “So the kid killed Clyde Zolliver?” he asked.
“That’s right! The witnesses say that they were ordered back into their rooms in no uncertain terms. When they came out the next morning, Cox, the kid, and the two whores were all gone. Their horses were gone from this barn too.”
“They just … just vanished?”
“Sure. Why not? There’s no law in Whiskey Creek, and the weather was so bad that nobody even thought to go after them. I was well paid and they left a hundred dollars extra for a buckboard and a set of old harness. Must have harnessed one of their saddle horses and all skedaddled in the storm just before sunrise.”
“Well, I’ll be damned!” Longarm said.
“You may be damned,” Waite said, breaking into a self-satisfied grin, “but I’m happy. You see, I made two hundred dollars! ‘Course, some of it was for hay and grain. I fed them Thoroughbreds more than any animals had a right to eat while they were here. But the buckboard wasn’t worth but about fifty dollars and the harness another ten. So I made forty dollars clear profit on that deal and some extra on the horses. I hope Cox and the kid ride through again and we do the same thing all over.”
Longarm didn’t have the heart to tell the old man that his two hundred dollars were probably counterfeit. The hell with that. Longarm knew that he had enough trouble without upsetting everyone who had been slicked by the Denver counterfeiter.
“Where would you guess that they were heading?”
The liveryman spat a stream of tobacco juice at the dirt. “You know something, Marshal, Buck Zolliver seemed almighty interested in my answer to that very same question.”
“He’s still here?”
“That’s right. But I’d sure give Buck a wide berth. You see, he’s lookin’ for his brother’s body. Been lookin’ for a couple of days now. He’s drunk and crazy with anger. This is a real rough town, and there are some bad men in Whiskey Creek, but they’re staying out of Buck Zolliver’s way. I’d advise you to do the very same.”
“Thanks for the advice,” Longarm said. “It doesn’t make any sense that they’d take Clyde’s body too far.”
“I can’t figure that either,” Waite said. “Even in this cold weather, it’d get to smellin’ real rank in a couple of days.”
“So where would you go to dispose of a body?”
“Like I told Buck, I’d dump it down a mine shaft so that no one would ever find it. Marshal, there are at least ten deep shafts within two miles of Whiskey Creek. My guess is that Clyde’s body is floating at the bottom of one of them and that it will never be found.”
Longarm shook his head. “Looks like both Buck and I have come to a dead end.”
“I kind of liked that Cox fella. I don’t understand why he let the kid do his killing up in that hotel, but YOU might want to give that one some thought. Also, women don’t travel this hard country too fast, and they’ll be riding in my old buckboard.”
“Good points to remember,” Longarm said.
“You gonna pay me another dollar for the extra information?” Waite asked, spitting tobacco between their feet.
“Nope,” Longarm said, “because it sounds like you are one hell of a lot richer than most of us poor working folks.”
“Yep,” Waite said, hooking his thumbs into the top of his dirty bib coveralls, “I expect that I am.”
Before Longarm stepped outside, he turned back to the liveryman and said, “I ain’t going to pay you extra, but do you know where I can find Buck Zolliver?”
“Any saloon where other people ain’t,” Waite told him. “Buck is in a killin’ frame of mind, and people are scattering when he comes around. You just peek inside a few saloons, and when you see an empty one, that’ll be where you’ll find Buck.”
“Thanks,” Longarm said.
“You gonna try and kill Buck?”
“Nope,” Longarm said as he headed into the muddy street, “not unless he tries to kill me first.”
“He will!” Waite called. “The Zollivers hate lawmen!
“I’ll keep that in mind!” Longarm called back as he marched back toward the hotel with his hand not far from his gun.
Chapter 12
“I’m scared,” Diana said, watching as Longarm checked his gun. “What if you get killed?”
“Then make sure that the federal government gives me a decent burial,” Longarm said, trying hard to sound lighthearted. “But don’t let them bury me in this hellhole of a town.”
“I’m serious!” Diana wailed.
“So am I.”
Satisfied that his gun was ready and that the derringer he kept attached to his watch chain was also in good working order, Longarm went to the woman and tried to calm her fears.
“There’s no real danger in this,” he began, “because-“
“No danger! Custis, you said that entire saloons full of hard men emptied at the mere sight of Buck Zolliver.”
“All right, so he’s on the prod,” Longarm conceded, “but I have all the advantages because he doesn’t know that I’m a lawman. And besides, all that I really want to do is question the man. I mean, to my knowledge, he hasn’t done anything wrong.”