When he got back to his hotel room Longarm knew that he was filthy, and not wanting to get the bed or Miranda dirty, he returned to the lobby and asked a sleepy night clerk to send up some hot bath-water.
“The Chinamen have gone for the night and I’m afraid that bath time is over. However, I will personally deliver you a couple of pails of room-temperature water.”
“Just give them to me now.”
“What happened?” the clerk asked. “How did you-“
“Don’t even ask.”
“I heard gunfire. Was someone killed?”
“Almost.”
Longarm took the water upstairs and washed by candlelight. Then he climbed into bed. Miranda was sound asleep, and although he was exhausted, it took him a good hour to fall asleep. Mostly because he was wondering who in the deuce had tried to ambush and kill him … and why?
Someone has recognized me and knows that I’m a federal marshal. Someone who wants me dead.
There could be no other possible explanation, and that meant that he had lost the element of surprise. That was bad. Very bad indeed.
Chapter 11
“Custis, what happened to your clothes?” Miranda asked him the following morning when they awakened. “Did you get drunk and fall over into a horse’s watering trough?”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Well, then, did you try to drink a pail of beer?”
Longarm saw no point in telling Miranda that he had nearly been ambushed. It would only upset her for no good reason. So he just laughed and kissed her, saying, “There are some pretty wild saloons in this town.”
“What did you find out?”
He told her everything he had learned, even about Candice Mason and the feeling by most locals that the killings on Mesa Verde had been committed by renegade Ute Indians.
“Do you believe that?” Miranda asked him.
“I don’t know,” Longarm admitted. “It’s possible. I know that Indian peoples are very touchy about their ancestors and their old burial grounds—just as we would be if someone tried to dig up our grandfather or grandmother. So, it could be that the Utes are behind the killings, but I’d say that the odds are definitely against that.”
“Why?”
“From what I could learn, the bodies were never found. If you were trying to warn the whites to stay out of your ancestors’ homes and burial grounds, wouldn’t you leave the bodies for everyone to see? And another thing, Indians aren’t generally that devious. They are expert at stealing horses, but when it comes to killing, generally they are pretty straightforward.”
“So what do we do now?”
“Well,” Longarm said, “we need to talk to Matt Horn about guiding us up to the ruins so I can meet those archaeologists and try and figure out if they are legitimate or if their work is just a cover for the grave robbers. So let’s get dressed and get busy.”
They dressed and went downstairs for the breakfast meeting with Matt Horn. The man was in his early thirties, handsome and rugged-looking, with big hands, a lantern jaw, and penetrating blue eyes. Longarm liked and trusted him immediately, and they quickly came to terms about their trip up to the Mesa Verde ruins.
“It’s a two-day ride each way,” Matt told them. “I mean, you could make it in one day, but it would be rough. My brother says that you have two good horses and a burro.”
“That’s right.”
“Fine with me,” Matt said. “I’ll pack everything we need on my own animals and we can leave whenever you say.”
“How about we go on Tuesday,” Longarm told him. “I’ve some matters that I want to attend to.”
“That suits me just fine,” Matt said. “I heard a rumor that you were involved in some kind of shooting last night. Is that true?”
Miranda’s eyes widened. “Custis? Is that true?”
“I guess I should have told you,” Longarm said. “But yes, someone did take a shot at me.”
“Who would do a thing like that?” Matt asked.
“I have no idea,” Longarm replied, avoiding Miranda’s troubled gaze. “But the most likely explanation is that it was a case of mistaken identity. Either that, or some drunk shooting off a stray bullet that happened to come in my general direction.”
“Boy,” Matt said, shaking his head, “I don’t know what this country is coming to these days.”
After Matt left, Miranda said, “Why didn’t you tell me that someone took a shot at you last night?”
“I didn’t want you to worry.”
Her eyes flashed with anger. “If someone took a shot at me, don’t you think that I’d tell you?”
“That would be altogether different,” Longarm said. “And besides, maybe it was just a stray bullet.”
“You don’t believe that and neither do I,” Miranda told him. “Someone has recognized you, and maybe they’ve even heard that you’ve been asking questions about Mesa Verde and the Anasazi artifacts.”
“All right,” Longarm said, “I think that is the most likely explanation for what happened last night, but it is by no means the only one. For example, that bullet might have come from someone who holds a grudge against me for something I’ve done to them in the past.”
“I see. You probably have made plenty of enemies over the years, haven’t you.”
“Yes, I have. Miranda, let’s go to the local museum and see what we can find out from Mr. Laird.”
“All right.”
They got their directions on the street, and the museum was easy to find. They sat under a cottonwood tree for a half hour until a man in a gray, pin-striped suit and a black bowler appeared and began to unlock the front door. Longarm judged Laird to be in his early sixties and fairly well-to-do by the look of his clothes.
“Mr. Laird?”
The man turned. “Yes?”
“My name is Custis and this is my wife Miranda. We are quite interested in Anasazi history and looking forward to visiting your museum this morning.”
“Well,” Laird said with an affable smile, “it’s not all that much of a collection, but I am adding to it steadily. The charge is fifty cents each, and I’ll be available to answer any and all questions pertaining to the cliff dwellers who lived at Mesa Verde.”
“Thank you,” Longarm said, ushering Miranda inside to see displays of pottery and stone relics, including ax heads and metates used for grinding corn. There were also many photographs and drawings of the cliff dwellings, as well as placards that explained the Anasazi story.
“This is wonderful!” Miranda exclaimed as she moved about, reading and studying the artifacts.
Longarm also found the displays fascinating. He put off questioning Laird until he had studied everything, and then he went to the back of the room, where the museum curator was using a very fine dental pick and some paintbrushes to clean the orifices in an old Indian skull.
“That looks like painstaking work,” Longarm said.
Laird glanced up at him. “Yes, it is, but well worth the effort.
“I wonder what killed that man whose skull you are holding.”
“Well,” Laird said, “it could be most anything. I’m not a professional archaeologist, but I can tell you a few things about this individual. He was probably a man, because the bone is thicker than that of a female skull. And judging from the teeth, he was quite old. The teeth are badly worn, and you can even see that several had abscessed away jawbone. Most of the cliff-dwelling peoples ate corn that they harvested on the mesa-top. It was their primary food, and after it was ground up on the metate, there were so many rock particles in their food that their teeth were ground away at what we think was a relatively young age.”
“I see.” Longarm leaned over and studied the skull. “And when a man gets bad teeth, he can’t eat very well.”
“That’s right, and that would have been the beginning of the end for a cliff dweller. Stop eating and you lose weight and strength, both of which would have been very necessary for a long and difficult winter survival.”