Longarm carefully placed his load in the bottom of the tub and stepped back and sipped at his drink. He still felt thirsty, though he thought it was more in his mind than his body. He said, “Looks about right to me. I figure to hitch to the low end, however we do it. And I want to snub it up pretty close so the front end will actually rise up a little. Won’t be as much drag that way. So, yeah, I’d say it’s sitting about right. Might swing that front end a little more toward the stage tracks. I got an idea that when we leave here those mules ain’t going to be all that easy to guide.”
Higgins rolled his eyes and said, “You ain’t jus’ whistlin’ Dixie, Marshal. I don’t quite know how those mules are gonna take to this contraption.” But then he spoke to the Mexicans, and they swiveled the bathtub around so it was lined up with the stage tracks.
“Where are the mules?” Longarm asked.
Higgins jerked his head. “The boys got them tied to the corral fence.”
“They rested?”
Higgins leveled his eyes on Longarm. “Them mules is got as much go in ‘em as a steam locomotive leavin’ a lumberyard. I ain’t envyin’ you this little ride you are fixing to take.”
“Well, have you figured out a way to hitch them up?”
Higgins frowned and crossed his arms and stared at the tub. He said, “First thang that come to my mind was we might’s well forget ‘bout the trace straps. Ain’t no place to hook ‘em. Best I can figure is knock a little hole in the front of that tub with a hammer and chisel. Then take and run the trace chain through it and stick a big nail or bolt through a link of the chain so it can’t go back out the hole.”
Longarm said, “Hell, Herman, you are a figgerin’ man. That will work. Hell, yes, that will work. Let’s get it done. By the way, I want you to put a spade bit in at least one of them mules’ mouth.”
Mister Higgins nodded and spat. “Done thought of it. Be your near mule. The mule on yore left-hand side.” He spat again and looked at the tub and shook his head. “Beats the hell out of me what a man gets up to in the law bid’ness.” He turned and gave the Mexicans a volley of instructions in Spanish. They immediately took off for the back.
Longarm said, “I know how much your wife is giving up here. But I’ll see she gets a new bathtub.”
Higgins snorted. “I didn’t know what I was sayin’ thar in the bathroom. Hell, yes, we want to catch them crooks. I taken a look at my telegraph wahr. Hell, they done tore it all to pieces. Gonna take some fixin’ to get it back up an’ workin’. I tell you, Marshal, it makes me feel plumb lonesome with that telegraph wahr cut. Never knowed how much I depended on it. Was like a neighbor to me.”
Longarm said, “I forgot a bottle of whiskey. I guess I better take some.”
“Snakes out thar,” Higgins said.
When Longarm came back, the Mexicans had brought the team around. The mules looked contrary and suspicious and spooky. A Mexican had one each by the head harness, but they were still having trouble controlling them. They got the mules up in front of the bathtub, and then tried to back them into place, but the mules weren’t having any of it. They snorted and reared and kicked out with their hind legs.
Higgins said matter-of-factly, “Them mules ain’t never seen no bathtub before, let alone set in to pull one. Mules as a general rule don’t like new thangs, and that bathtub is mighty new to them.”
Longarm could see bandannas hanging out of the Mexicans’ pockets. He said to Higgins, “Tell them to blindfold them.”
Higgins spoke to them in Spanish and they nodded in agreement and said, “Si, si. Es bueno.”
Working with one mule at a time, they were able to cover their eyes with their big handkerchiefs. As soon as the mules couldn’t see, they got quiet. Higgins laughed. “You must be an old mule man yoreself.”
Longarm shook his head. “Never handled one in my life. This will be the first, heaven help me. But it works with horses.” He nodded at the hammer and chisel one of the Mexicans had given Higgins. “Hadn’t you better knock a hole in the front before we get the mules too close?”
“That’s good thinkin’, Marshal. Right good thinkin’.” He stepped to the front of the tub and measured with his eye. “Say you want the front to ride off the ground a mite?”
“I think that would be good,” Longarm said. “But I think we are guessing here. You ain’t never hooked mules up to a bathtub and I never drove mules before, bathtub or not.”
Higgins said, “I figure about here.” He put his finger on a spot about five to six inches down from the top of the lower end.
“Looks fine to me,” Longarm said. “Like I say, I think we are guessing.”
Higgins set his chisel point and then struck the other end with the hammer. The galvanized tin dented, but it didn’t break. “Tougher than it looks.”
He set the point of the chisel in the dent and then hit it another blow. A small hole appeared in the surface of the bathtub. Higgins leaned around to look inside. ‘Bout one more ought to do her.”
With the next blow, a hole about the size of a quarter appeared on the inside wall of the bathtub. Higgins looked at it. “That ought to ‘bout do it. Trace chain will go through there right snug like.”
Longarm watched as he took the end of the trace chain, a linked chain with links about an inch and a half long and three quarters of an inch wide, and ran it through the hole. When he had about a foot inside the tub he looked at Longarm. “Now you got to say how close you want the front of this tub to the end of them mules.”
Longarm frowned. “Hell, Herman, I ain’t got the slightest idea. Have your men start backing the mules up and you take up the slack while I see.”
Higgins spoke to the Mexicans, and they urged the mules backwards. The animals stepped backward trembling and reluctant. As they came closer, Higgins pulled on the trace chain that ran to the singletree, a wooden device that kept the mules spaced apart, taking up the slack and letting it lay in the bottom of the tub. Ordinarily, if they had been hitching a wagon or a buckboard, it would have been done with leather straps. The trace chain was only a safety measure in case one of the traces, or leather straps, should break. But since there was no other way to attach the bathtub, they were using the chain only, which gave Longarm very limited control over the team.
When the mules were about three feet from the front of the tub, Higgins told the Mexicans to stop. He said, “I wouldn’t jam ‘em up any tighter than that.”
“Have they got room to run snubbed up that close?” Longarm asked.
Higgins spat. He’d said he always got a mouthful of saliva when he was nervous and the entire affair was making him nervous. “Most folks get a dry mouth when they get jittery. I get spit.”
Now he said, “They got just about the right amount of room to run. You get any further back and they likely to sling you around like a turnip on the end of a string.”
Longarm shrugged. “Hell, I’d rather go by train, but it don’t look like I got much choice. Hook ‘em up.”
Higgins took a big nail out of his pocket and ran it through the link just inside the hole in the tub. Then he took a pair of pliers out of his back pocket and bent the nail so it couldn’t slip out of the link. He gave a yank on the chain from the outside of the tub and pronounced it solid. “That chain won’t break and that tub won’t break. These here mules is hitched to this tub until somebody comes along and unhitches ‘em.” He peered at Longarm. “Course I ain’t promising that you is gonna stay part of the outfit. Right now these mules don’t know what they hitched to. I ain’t right shore how they gonna react once they find out. You better go ahead and get in there and I’ll hand you the reins.”