Sam Beckwith helped himself to a second bourbon and then resumed his explanation. “To return to the point at hand here,” he said, “at about that time, indeed some months before the tragedy involving Bill Fetterman, there was formed a Last Man Club among some of the younger officers assigned duties at the Bozeman Trail forts. And before you ask, Long, no, I myself was not a party to this. Although I would have been had things worked out a little differently. You see, we all—those young officers, myself, a few others—had been friends and comrades in arms since before the Southern rebellion. We, most of us, were classmates at the Military Academy at West Point. We served through the conflict and most of us were breveted to rather high rank. Then, of course, after the war the size of the army was reduced. We all reverted to our true rank, mostly that of first lieutenant, a few of us as captains. Most of our particular little group wound up in those Bozeman Trail forts. I myself took a different path. During the war I had had occasion to act as prosecutor, or in several instances jurist, on a number of courts-martial. I discovered an affinity for the law and if I do say so, an aptitude for it. The army granted me an extended leave of absence so I could read law and become qualified to join the Judge Advocate General Corps. Which I subsequently did, and served a number of years in that organization. Later on I resigned my commission to accept a position with the Justice Department, but that is neither here nor there at the moment.”
“Right,” Longarm prompted. “You were telling me about this Last Man Club your friends put together.”
“Exactly.” Beckwith tossed off his bourbon and looked around for another. Billy Vail obliged him while Beckwith resumed his story. “Where was I? Oh, yes. As you may appreciate, the group’s ranks began to diminish soon after the club was formed. The final member, the last survivor as it were, will be a wealthy man once all is said and done. There were twenty members in the club to begin with, each of them young officers of quality and breeding, and each man contributed one thousand dollars. Cash. The money was placed into a trust account, at a bank owned by one of the young gentlemen’s fathers, if it matters, and has been drawing interest ever since at the rate of one and seven eighths percent per annum. The principal amount has already become, well, to put it mildly, a sum of considerable substance.”
Longarm grunted. That was, like the gent implied, a hell of a bundle, all right. Twenty thousand. Plus whatever the accumulated interest was. And the interest on top of that interest. Anyway, he was sure it all added up to a snootful.
“In any event, the club was formed and the money put on deposit along with a letter of instruction that it be released to the last man living. It was to be this survivor’s duty to call together a group of young West Point graduates and tell them the story of these officers who had gone before them. Then all, including the last man, would raise their glasses in honor of the departed. It was intended that part of the money be used to finance the party. The rest, of course …” Beckwith shrugged. “I suppose it sounds rather sentimental now, but at the time …” Beckwith’s voice died away and he turned to cough into his fist.
When he turned back he said, “Bill Fetterman was a member of the club. I believe he was the first of them to die. Two more perished at the Little Big Horn. Another died with Crook on the Rosebud, and Joseph’s Nez Perce cut down another young and gallant officer. R.C. Queen succumbed to a fever in the jungles of Panama, and Harold Snow died in a mining accident in the Sierra Nevada. I knew them all. They were my brothers.”
Beckwith reached for another bourbon. Longarm shot a questioning glance toward Billy, but Billy pretended not to see it.
“To make a long story short, most survived until quite recently. Then there began a series of murders. It seems … oh, God … it seems someone is systematically going down the list of names, in the exact order as inscribed on the membership roll, murdering these fine and gallant men.”
“And you don’t know who is doing it or why?” Longarm asked.
“Oh, but that is part of the tragedy,” Sam Beckwith said. “I am sure I do know exactly who is doing this. And why.”
Chapter 3
“Tell me, Long, does the name Ellis Reese mean anything to you?” Beckwith asked. “Major Ellis Reese?”
Longarm fingered his chin and gave the name some thought—obviously this wasn’t any casual question the government lawyer was asking—but for all his cogitating he nonetheless came up empty. “No, sir, I can’t say that I’ve ever heard of the gentleman.”
“You are sure about that, Deputy?”
Longarm commenced to bristle just a mite. “I said so, didn’t I?”
Billy Vail gave Beckwith a look of warning and, perhaps pointedly, set his empty wine glass down with a clearly audible thump, as if maybe he was silently suggesting to Beckwith that the lawyer lay off the booze and pay attention to business. At least that was the way Longarm chose to read it. He could’ve been wrong, he supposed.
“Yes, well, Major Reese was the subject of a scandal some years back. This was a few months before the Rosebud and Little Big Horn battles, back in the late winter of ‘76. February, if it matters.”
“Yes, sir,” Longarm said in response to Beckwith’s stare. Apparently some form of response was wanted, although Longarm didn’t know what.
“You still don’t recall?”
“No, sir.” Longarm decided against telling this self-important lawyer that the army and its scandals simply weren’t high on his list of things to fret about. Not nowadays, and not back in February of ‘76 either.
“Yes, well, those who pay attention to events will naturally recall that this Major Reese was the subject of a Congressional investigation and the, um, resulting court-martial. Reese was in charge of the procurement of supplies for Indian reservations within General Terry’s command. It was discovered that payment was being made for hay, grains, and certain human consumables that were never delivered to the intended destinations. Invoices were presented and approved and payment was issued, but the supplies were never in fact delivered. Even transportation charges were paid on these nonexistent materials. The amount of loss very likely mounted into the tens of thousands of dollars. For the purposes of prosecution, however, specific accounts totaling slightly over seven hundred dollars were detailed and formal charges were filed against Major Reese.”
“You were a part of the prosecution?” Longarm guessed.
“I was not, sir. Now may I finish relating this, or would you care to turn it into a cross-examination?”
“Sorry,” Longarm said, not particularly meaning it.
“I see I am boring you, Deputy, so I’ll make this short. Major Reese was convicted of misappropriation of government funds, was stripped of rank and privilege, and was sentenced to a fifteen-year term of incarceration in the federal penitentiary at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.”
That sure sounded like the end of the yarn to Longarm. And a mighty uninteresting one at that. But he knew better than to say so out loud. Not that he gave a damn about making Lawyer Beckwith mad, but it wouldn’t reflect well on Billy. And Longarm would go a long way to keep from doing anything that would be disrespectful of Billy Vail.
“Between time off for good behavior and in view of certain, um, considerations of health, I am given to understand that Ellis Reese will be released from prison sometime within the next six months—that is to say, shortly after the next sitting of the Board of Pardons.”
“And that has something to do with the Last Man Club?” Longarm suggested.
“Of course it does, man. What the hell d’you think I’ve been getting at here?”