“I tell you what, son. Let’s see if we can find any place out here where I might put up for a night or two. I, uh, I’d pay for the lodging, of course. Can you think of anybody that’d …”
“My ma would let you stay with us, mister. You could have my bed an’ I can make up a place on the floor. It wouldn’t cost you much. And my ma cooks real good. Honest. You’ll see.”
Rick, sitting on the spring seat of the buckboard nearby, sneered and in a nasty tone of voice said, “His ma is a whore, mister. Give her fifty cents an’ she’ll lick your dingus till you pee in her mouth.”
Longarm reached out in time to snag Buddy by the back of his britches and haul him back onto the seat of the cart. The much smaller boy had launched himself at Rick before all the words were even out of the older kid’s mouth. “That’s a lie, you dirty sonuvabitch, stinking bastard, yellow shitface dog screwer.”
Longarm admired the intensity of the emotion, but didn’t figure he could award Buddy very many points for class or imagery. “Whoa, dammit,” he ordered loudly. “Rick, I want you to apologize to Buddy.”
“But …”
“No buts, dammit. Even if you believe what you said is true—and mind, I’m not no way claiming that it is—but even if you believe it, Rick, it’s an ugly thing for anybody to say. A person has dignity and pride. I’m sure you want Buddy to respect yours, so you gotta show him you’re willing to respect his. So I want you to take back what you just said.” Longarm gave the older boy a hooded look, which got the kid’s attention.
“Yes, sir. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t say it to me, son, say it to Buddy.”
“Buddy, I’m sorry I said bad things about your ma.”
“All right. Buddy, tell Rick you accept his apology.”
“But …”
“Do it!”
“Yessir. Rick, I … you know.” he said.
“Tell him,” Longarm said.
Buddy sighed. “I accept you apologizing. An’ my ma ain’t no hoor.”
“I already said she wasn’t.”
“No, you said you was sorry you said she was. You never said that she wasn’t.”
“All right then, I say she ain’t. Is that better?”
“Yeah. That’s better.”
Longarm let go of his hold on Buddy’s britches and climbed down off the cart. “If we’re all done venting our spleens, boys, let’s see if I can hire that bed for tonight. You run on ahead an’ check on that, Buddy. Rick and me will bring my things along.”
Buddy hadn’t any more than gotten out of earshot than Rick put on another sneer and a swagger and said, “His ma really is a whore, mister. I know that for a fact. For a dollar she’ll …”
Longarm shut him up with a hard look, and this time the kid had sense enough to stay shut up.
Chapter 12
Longarm walked from the property line to the administration buildings of Cargyle. It was further than he’d expected, and he was glad he didn’t have to lug his gear all that way.
He’d passed row after row of tiny, pillbox houses, all of them with clotheslines strung outside and most of them with toys littering the front stoops as well. There was no sign of the barracks that would be provided for the single men. Apparently GWC&C kept them separate.
There was the expected company store and a rickety-looking school building—empty at this hour when from every side he could smell the scents of evening meals being prepared—and deep inside the narrow, winding canyon he finally caught sight of the complex of handsomely built native-stone structures that would be the GWC&C offices. A flagpole stood before the biggest of the administration buildings, but no flag flew from it.
In the distance to the west, walled in on north and south alike by the nearly barren slopes of the foothill ridges, he could see the first of the ironwork skeletons that marked the actual mining operations. Between those loading hoppers and the administration buildings were the single-story barracks where the bachelors would be housed. Large mess halls added their smoke and smells to the evening, but the food scents at this end of the company town were not nearly as tantalizing as those he’d smelled back among the family quarters.
Immediately beyond the administration buildings and conveniently close to the single miners’ barracks was a stone structure about ten by twenty feet in size and with iron bars covering the one window Longarm could see. Closer inspection confirmed the obvious. A sign over the door read: CARGYLE JAIL. The door stood open, and Longarm stepped inside without knocking.
The jail had been divided into three sections, each of more or less equal size. The middle was an office holding a desk, two chairs, and a small table. Either end of the place had been walled off with metal bars. Each cell held a steel cot. Period. No other provision had been made for the prisoners’ comfort. There was no thunder mug, no water jar, and no mattress or blankets on the cots. A lone window at either end of the building lent a bit of light and air … and in winter no doubt admitted a great deal of discomfort as well since there were no shutters or other means to cover the unglazed openings. Wind, rain, and snow were as free to enter as the air. Perhaps because of that, no heating stove had been installed, although a framework had been built into the ceiling where a stovepipe could be accommodated.
The central-office portion of the small building was empty, but the cell to the right of the door held a thin fellow with black grime trapped as if permanently in the wrinkles of his skin and under his fingernails. He had lank, once-blond hair and a pleasant grin.
“H’lo there. Be a chum, will you? Look in that desk, bottom left drawer, and hand me my box. It’s my chewing t’baccy I need out of it, that’s all. Go on now. You’ll see it. It’s the only box in there, a little thing about so big”—he motioned with his hands to indicate something about the size of a cigar box—“with the stuff from my pockets in it. Go on, chum. Nobody will mind.”
“Sorry,” Longarm said. “I’m just here looking for Harry Bolt.”
“Lucky you, eh? Or maybe you don’t know our Harry.” The prisoner laughed. “In that case lucky you, but this time I mean it, right?”
“Just tell me where I can find him, please.”
“First the box, chum. Then we’ll talk.”
“No, first you answer a civil question.”
“Screw you.”
Longarm shrugged, glanced once around the place again to make sure he hadn’t overlooked anyone or anything that might be helpful, then started back outside.
“Hey!” the prisoner howled. “You can’t just leave me here.”
“Watch me,” Longarm said.
“Then at least tell those bastards that I’m getting plenty damn hungry in here and I’m thirsty and I gotta take a shit.”
Longarm went back to the main administration building, the one with the flagpole out front, and mounted the steps to a broad veranda that stretched across the full width of the building front. Several tidy groupings of rocking chairs had been set out in pairs, each pair placed so they flanked low drink tables that had checkerboards inlaid into the tabletops in contrasting shades of wood. The chairs and the tables looked like none of them had ever been used. But they were decorative. He supposed that was what they were there for, so they were accomplishing their purpose.
“Can I help you?” a pale gent in sleeve garters asked from behind a low counter when Longarm came inside.
“I’m looking for Harry Bolt, friend. I’m told he’s town marshal here.”
“Chief of police, actually. We prefer that title.”
“Whatever. Point is, where is he?”
The little fellow with the crisp, unblemished collar Longarm would’ve bet half a month’s pay, maybe more, on the belief that this young yahoo drew his pay from the Great Western Coal and Coke company but hadn’t ever yet set foot underground in one of those filthy old coal mines, and furthermore wasn’t damn well likely to in the future smiled oh-so-politely and asked, “And just what business is it of yours, may I ask?”