He didn’t know whether to eat first or to bathe. Either his steak or his bath water would likely get cold. In the end, he took a very quick bath, soaping and rinsing as fast as he could, and then dried off thoroughly and slipped into a clean pair of his own jeans. He kicked Judge Harding’s pants and shirts over into a far corner. After that, he sat down at the table and ate the big steak and the potatoes and green beans and canned tomatoes that they had fixed for him.
When he was done with that and felt about half human again, he poured himself a generous amount of the Maryland whiskey, lit a cigarillo, and settled back to relax for the first time in a long while. He didn’t feel he could do any real thinking about the judge and his plan. First of all, he didn’t have enough information to know what the judge might have been up to or how far along he had come or what he might have accomplished. The telegraph clerk had said he’d heard that Judge Harding had arrived on the afternoon train. Longarm doubted that. A lot of well-meaning people were very anxious to help the law, especially a federal officer, but all too often their help came in the form of misleading information that they wished was true. Through his long years of experience, Longarm had figured out that there were a great number of people out in the world who wanted to be in the know, to feel self-important, to be a part of the action. They seldom were.
He didn’t spend much time ruminating about where Harding might be or what he might be up to. He needed good solid information and he needed some action on Billy Vail’s part. He didn’t think Harding would simply be allowed to depart with the prisoner, Earl Combs, on Harding’s say-so alone. As he told him from the very beginning, they didn’t swap embezzlers, especially ones that got away with $200,000, for United States deputy marshals that they paid $100 a month.
Longarm finished his drink and his cigarillo and realized how tired he was. It had not been a pleasant five or six days, or whatever time it had been. The days had run together so he wasn’t even sure how long it had been, but he had done one thing he hadn’t known he could do. He had made one hell of a bomb.
He took a quick look in on Sarah. She was sleeping peacefully under the dim glow of the lamp he had trimmed low for her. He didn’t want the room completely dark in case she woke up and was frightened.
He turned his own lamp out and climbed into bed, grateful to be in a room that wasn’t so damned white.
They ate breakfast together in Sarah’s room. He was not yet willing for her to be seen in public in case she would be recognized and word would somehow get to Harding, wherever he was. It was around nine o’clock. They had both slept late. Longarm had gone downstairs and sent a smart young man over to the federal judge’s office to inquire about Harding. He had come back to report that the people who worked in the judge’s office had said he was out of town and wasn’t expected back for several days.
Sarah was anxious to go out and buy some clothes of her own but she had understood when Longarm had explained why that wouldn’t be possible until the right time. Nevertheless, she looked very good in the clothes that Martin Silver had borrowed for her. Longarm had a pretty good idea that they were the property of some whore who worked around the hotel, but he wasn’t going to tell Sarah that. She had already commented on how fancy the underwear was that had been provided for her. Longarm had kept a straight face and said yes, that he reckoned that ladies in Laredo were given to that sort of garment.
They were eating eggs and ham and biscuits with a big pot of coffee. Sarah had just finished saying that she could have slept another ten hours as tired as she was.
Longarm said, “That’s what excitement and nerves and just plain old out-and-out fear will do for you. Also, I reckon that the horseback ride didn’t help too much. How are the insides of your legs?”
She said ruefully, “They are still a mess. Did you put something on me last night? They feel oily.”
Longarm laughed at that. He said, “Yes. I didn’t think you woke up. Yes, I got some … well, actually, it’s saddle oil. It was the only thing I could find. I figured it would keep the skin from drying out and cracking and maybe blistering. It was the only thing I could think of.”
She reached over and covered his hand. “That was very sweet of you,” she said.
He eyed her. The clothes, although they didn’t quite fit, certainly set off her figure, especially her bosom. He could envision those big white cantaloupe-sized breasts with their big strawberry tips nestling inside that silk and satin. It made his mouth water in a way that it seldom did at breakfast.
She wanted to know what he was going to do and he had to simply shrug, shake his head, and say he didn’t know. He said, “I’m waiting on information before I can act. What has me worried is that he got such a hell of a start on us, but I do believe that his business in San Antonio is going to take some time. I gave him some help last night, sort of greased the rails. Maybe it will work but maybe it won’t. The sticky thing is, can it be done without him being tipped off? If the wrong person gets hold of the telegram that I sent to my boss, it will blow the whole thing sky high.”
She asked, puzzled, “I don’t understand why you don’t just arrest Richard for what he’s done to you and for what he did to me. Isn’t that enough?”
He nodded. “Yes, that would get him some years in the Cross Bar Hotel, but that ain’t the way my job works, Sarah. A U.S. deputy marshal is supposed to throw a big net and make a big catch. I could reel the judge in without much trouble, but the idea is that I’m supposed to get the embezzler, whom we already got, but I’m supposed to catch him in the same net and get him to tell me where the two hundred thousand dollars is and then bring the whole bunch in along with the money.”
“That sounds like a tall order,” she said.
“It is, but I’ve got a boss who’s about as tall as a shot glass and damned near as smart. Certainly he is hardheaded and he thinks I ought to be able to do these things in my sleep, so if I come back without cleaning the plate, he ain’t going to be pleased and he’ll send me off to Montana or somewhere to find somebody who’s been stealing sheep in the middle of a blizzard. This is a tricky play, make no mistake, but it’s got to be tried.
She shrugged. “I’m quite sure I’ll never understand any of it.
Longarm was about to speak when he heard a knocking on his door. He got up, went through the connecting door, and answered the summons. It was a boy from the telegraph office. He handed Longarm a telegram and Longarm handed him a quarter. Longarm walked back to the table, tearing the envelope open. Inside was a message that was nowhere near as long as the one he had sent Billy but was a long one for Billy. It said:
YOUR URGENT REQUEST URGENTLY ACTED ON STOP HAVE YOU GONE INSANE STOP WAS VERY CAREFUL TO SEND YOUR INFORMATION TO A PARTY I TRUST STOP WHAT IN HELL ARE YOU UP TO STOP HAVE NOT RECEIVED WORD BACK FROM SAN ANTONIO YET STOP WILL ADVISE SOON AS STOP HAVE WIRED DEPUTY MARSHAL IN SAN ANTONIO TO PICK UP MOVEMENTS OF JUDGE HARDING STOP HE WILL ADVISE YOU BY WIRE STOP WHO ARE YOU CALLING AN OLD SON OF A BITCH STOP AM GOING TO BE VERY INTERESTED TO LEARN HOW YOU MANAGED TO GET YOURSELF TAKEN HOSTAGE STOP YOU BETTER NOT SHIP ANY HORSES BACK HERE AT GOVERNMENT EXPENSE STOP DON’T SEND ME NO MORE TELEGRAMS THAT TAKE HALF THE NIGHT TO READ STOP YOU WOKE ME UP STOP AM COMPLYING WITH YOUR REQUEST FOR $500 STOP YOU BETTER BE ABLE TO ACCOUNT FOR EVERY PENNY OF IT STOP YOU BETTER BE DEAD RIGHT ABOUT THIS FEDERAL JUDGE OR YOU ARE GOING TO BE DEAD STOP
It was signed Billy Vail, Chief Marshal, Denver, Colorado. Inside the envelope was a voucher from the Western Union Telegraph Company that was good at any bank in the country. The amount was $500.