Longarm pulled his hat and gloves back on and headed for the door. He paused there for a moment. “Thank you for the button, sir. Good-bye now.”
Chapter 17
Stupid, miserable, sonuvabitching, stinking, damned SNOW! Longarm was tired of it. Days and days it’d been blowing now and no end in sight. He was tired of it, dammit. He’d had enough of it. He … he stopped practically in mid-stride, unmindful of the cold wind that was stinging his eyes and making his nose drool cold snot into his mustache. He grinned and snapped his fingers.
Nancy’s friend Dawn. He knew where she was. Or anyway, where she pretty much had to be right now.
Norma Brantley had gone and told him where to find her. It was just that neither she nor Longarm had noticed it at the time.
Longarm turned back the way he’d just come and angled across the street. He tried to whistle a light, gay tune. Unfortunately, his lips were so cold he couldn’t get them to shape the notes he wanted, and he ended up repeating the same weak tone over and over again.
“Marshal.” The woman greeted him with a pleasant enough nod.
“Ma’am.” He made a small bow and swept the fur hat off. And hoped the gesture was not ruined by icicles of frozen snot or anything of such an unsightly nature.
“Is there something I can do for you?” she asked.
“If you don’t mind, Mrs. Forsyth.”
The boss lady of the Old Heidelberg motioned with an upraised finger, and seconds later there was a glass of most excellent rye whiskey on the table in front of Longarm. He tasted it, smiled, and thanked her.
“My pleasure,” she said. “Now, sir … what is it that you require?”
“I believe you took on a new employee yesterday,” he said. “Calls herself Dawn, I think. Or anyhow, that’s the name she used over at, uh, the other place where she used to work.”
“You have excellent sources of information, Marshal.”
“No better than yours, I think.” The truth, of course, was simple enough. Yesterday the girl had quit Norma Brantley. And according to Brantley, Kittstown would not likely welcome one of Brantley’s girls in any other, more innocent capacity. If she intended to stay here it would have to be as a whore. And did she intend to stay here? Since it was yesterday when she quit, her intentions really didn’t matter; in the continuing snowstorm she had no choice but to stay. Hence there was only one other place where she could be, and that was here at the Old Heidelberg.
“Dawn will continue to use that name here.” Amanda Forsyth shrugged. “So many of the gents already know her by that name, don’t you see.”
“Sure. No sense in confusing anyone.”
“Exactly.”
“I’d like to have a few minutes of conversation with this Dawn girl.”
“Of course, Marshal. She is … never mind, I need to pass by that way anyway. I’ll show you where to find her.”
Longarm polished off the rye—it was much too good to waste—and followed Mrs. Forsyth upstairs.
“This way, Marshal.” The lady—she was an almighty fine figure of a woman—tapped lightly on a door that had no numbers or other distinguishing marks on it. “Dawn? Open up, dear.”
The girl who answered her employer’s summons was not much older than Nancy had been. Dawn, or whatever her true name was, was tall and slender, with black hair drawn back in a severe bun. With the bun and a pair of silver-framed spectacles, she had something of a schoolmistress look about her. Almost prim. Almost proper. Almost. The effect was somewhat hampered by the threadbare kimono that she held gathered in one hand at her waist, her shoulders, legs, and swelling breasts bare for all the world to see. “Yes, ma’am?”
“This gentleman is a United States deputy marshal, Dawn. He wants to talk to you. I expect you to answer whatever questions he may have.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Also, Dawn, I promised him the use of one of my girls. Do anything else he asks you to also. At no charge to him, of course.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Thank you, Dawn.” She turned to Longarm. “If you need me for anything, Marshal, I will be in my office. It is the last door at the end of the corridor.”
“Thanks.”
Amanda Forsyth bobbed her head in farewell and continued at what Longarm thought a rather regal gait off in the direction of the office. He watched the lady go, then turned back to the girl who called herself Dawn.
While his attention was elsewhere she had shed the kimono, and was now standing naked before him.
Chapter 18
“Pretty,” he said, allowing his gaze to run up and down the length of the naked girl.
“Thanks, but would you mind shutting the damn door.”
“Oh, yeah. Sorry.” He winked at her and stepped inside, closing the door behind him. “Now, mister …”
Longarm took out a cheroot, nipped the twist off it with his teeth, and took his time about getting it lighted.
“Do you just wanta look, mister, or do you wanta screw?”
“Neither one of those,” he told her, giving the coal and budding ash a critical inspection. “I think this one side of my smokes got a little damp somehow,” he mused aloud.
“Well, mister, I’m just real awful sorry about that. You know?”
“Thanks for the sympathy, I’m sure.”
“You don’t wanta look and you don’t wanta screw. So just what the hell do you want me to do anyhow?”
“Just like the lady said, Dawn. I want to talk to you.”
“That’s all? Just talk?”
“Just talk,” he affirmed.
“If you say so. You want me to cover up?”
He grinned at her. “Not particularly. The view is just fine from here.”
Dawn laughed, shrugged, and plopped herself down on the side of the bed, still quite fetchingly naked. He noticed now that she had a small, strawberry birthmark—or was it a tattoo; surely not—just at the top edge of her pubic hair, which was thick and dark and curly. Nice-looking tits. Flat belly. Small waist. When seen like this, there was not much chance that she would be mistaken for a schoolmarm. On the other hand … “Do you know what you look like?” he asked.
“Hell, yes, honey. And d’you know what? I used to be one. I taught the primary grades at … well, never mind where it was. But it’s true. I taught the little bastards … little darlings, that is”—she made a face, then laughed at herself—“for almost three years before I discovered there were easier ways to make a living.”
“Easier?”
“That’s the idea anyhow.”
“And is it easier?”
Dawn shrugged again. “When a girl is dumb enough to get herself knocked up by the president of the school board, she all of a sudden finds out that teaching can get real difficult. But shit, that isn’t what you wanted to talk about, I’m sure.”
“No, young lady, what I want is to learn about your friend Nancy.”
“She’s dead, isn’t she?”
Longarm nodded.
“Everybody in the bar is talking about it. They said some little boys found her all frozen and stiff. They said she was beat up so bad she died from it. They said she was all black and blue and ugly. Is that true, mister?”
“Yes, it is. I’m sorry.”
Dawn’s eyes filled, but she bit down hard on her lower lip and kept the tears from flowing. “She was a good kid.”
“Tell me about her. Please.”
“How come, mister? She wasn’t nothing but a whore. Nobody gives a damn when a whore gets beat to death.”
“Me,” Longarm said. “I give a damn. I intend to find whoever it was that killed her.”
“Something else I heard tell, mister, is that you’re a federal man and can’t do or say nothing about how the law is handled here.”