“Harry used to be an officer, you know. An officer and a gentleman.”
“Yes, Emmy, I know.”
“He had a ring, you know. West Point. And he was a federal deputy too, you know. Before he became the marshal here.”
“Yes, I know that, Emmy.”
“You were never an officer, Custis. Though you were a gent, hee-hee. Just not by an act of Congress like Harry was.”
“That’s right, Emmy.” It was so silly for her to go on now about inconsequential things like that. Yet the fact of Harry Bolt’s having been an officer and a gentleman by act of Congress apparently meant much to Emmaline Bertolucci. Lord, but she was shallow. So much more so than he’d ever realized in the past.
“And you aren’t just trying to trick me, are you, Custis? You don’t have a warrant for Harry, do you?”
“No, Emmy, I swear to you, it’s just the way I said. I need to find him so I can help him, not so I can take him in.”
“All right then, Custis. Let me think about this. Maybe I will tell you.” She drew back and cackled. “And maybe I won’t.”
Longarm felt an urge to slap Emmaline across the face, to bring her back to the here and now. Except, in a manner of speaking, he doubted that she even had been here and now with him. Emmaline seemed to live in her own blurry sphere, and that was a place Longarm did not want to share with her.
“You can call on me again later, Custis.” She batted her eyes at him. “We’ll talk then. And maybe I’ll tell you, maybe I won’t.” Her laughter was as loud as a crow’s cawing. And held just about the same amount of human warmth or caring.
Longarm shuddered. But this was Emmaline’s mad game. It would be played out by her rules or not at all.
“I’ll call on you again later, Emmy. We’ll talk again then, yes?”
“Yes, my dear. We’ll talk later.” Emmaline made cow’s eyes at him and twisted about on her chaise so that her pendulous, sweat-shiny breasts were put on display, presumably to arouse his passions.
Longarm felt a great welling of pity for this woman. And a great distaste for her company as well. He managed a smile, however, bowed low as if paying her court, and backed out of the darkly curtained room.
Jesus, he thought. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.
Chapter 6
“I hope you’ll be leaving now, Long,” the bartender said when Longarm came back out into the public room.
“For a bit, Gregory, but I gotta come back again later,” Longarm said, explaining as briefly as possible.
The barman grimaced and stood there for a moment staring bleakly off into space. Finally he said, “She wants time to get herself prettied up.”
Poor Emmaline was far past the point where any amount of repair would do much good, Longarm thought. But he wasn’t cruel enough to say so to this long-suffering sonuvabitch who still loved her.
“Come back in, let’s say three hours, maybe four. I’ll … go help her. Make sure she’s feeling at her best. You know.” Gregory wasn’t looking at Longarm while he spoke. He held himself stiff, as if he were as fragile as a cold cigar ash and might crumple clean away if he was to make a sudden move. “Have yourself some supper … whatever … an’ come back later tonight, why don’t you?”
“That’ll be fine, Gregory.” He paused for a moment. But hell, there really wasn’t anything more to say. Sadly he made his way back outside, into the waning afternoon.
His hope of making this stop in Picketwire a quick one was shot to hell and gone by now, so he walked back to the stage station. The pleasant clerk he’d spoken with earlier was nowhere in sight. But the cantankerous coach driver was.
“Excuse me,” Longarm said. There was no immediate response so he tried again a little louder. After all, the fellow might be going deaf or some such. Longarm figured that even could explain the sourness of his disposition. “Excuse me?”
The jehu looked up and scowled. “What’d you do, pass wind or something’?”
There was something Longarm would like to pass. His fist clean through the cartilage in this idjit’s nose, for instance. But he put on a smile anyway and said, “I’m just wanting to pick up my gear.”
“Gear? What gear?”
“My saddle and bag. You remember. You took them down off the stage your own self a little while ago.”
“Mister, I handle two dozen pieces o’ luggage every day. I sure can’t call one from another. An’ don’t tell me what I should oughta remember. All right?”
“Fine. I apologize. Now if you’d just give me my gear.”
“You got a claim ticket?”
“Pardon me?”
“A claim ticket. Every passenger gets a claim ticket for his things. Where’s yours?”
“I don’t have a claim ticket.”
“If you rode my coach you did. It’s part of your passage ticket. Right there at the bottom.”
“But I wasn’t issued a regular ticket. As you know perfectly good and well. I traveled on a government pass.”
“Mister, if you ain’t got a claim ticket then you don’t get no baggage. That’s the rules.” Longarm’s patience was just real close to being used up. He could feel the heat in his cheeks and the tightness across his shoulders and down the back of his neck, all the signs that warned him to keep a tight rein on or else he was going to end up hurting this miserable excuse for a …
“Tom!” The voice was sharp. And feminine.
Longarm’s attention was drawn to the doorway leading into another room. A woman stood there. A young woman. And a damned pretty one. Longarm snatched his hat off, the frustrations of trying to speak with old Tom put completely aside already.
“Why ever are you acting so snappish with the gentleman, Tom?”
The jehu growled and glowered. “The son of a … I mean t’ say, Miss Lucy, the gentleman here beat you outa the fare down from Trinidad. Flashed some cheap tin instead. It strikes me wrong when somebody thinks he’s got the right t’ take something for nothing. That’s all.”
“But he hasn’t taken something for nothing, Tom. The government pays us quite well for our express service. If we didn’t want the job, and at that price, we didn’t have to bid on it. And we all—you included, Tom—knew to begin with that the mail contract includes passenger privileges for anyone traveling on official business.” She smiled. “Tell me, Tom. This gentleman would be—what?—the fourth passenger we’ve had to carry without charge since we won that contract?”
“Um, something like that. Too many, anyhow.”
“Get the gentleman’s luggage, please, Tom.”
“But Miss Lucy, without a claim tick-“
“Tom!” Her voice was no louder this time than it had been before, but now there was an edge in it sharp enough to slice post oak.
“Yes, ma’am.”
The jehu gave in and went grumbling out of sight while the young woman came the rest of the way into the station lobby. “I’m sorry, Mister …?”
Longarm remembered his manners and quickly gave her a little bow. “Long, miss. Deputy U.S. Marshal Custis Long.”
“A marshal. Really. That’s very exciting. I believe we’ve had a surveyor before and two postal inspectors, but never a marshal before now.”
“Only a deputy, miss. A marshal is somebody way up the ladder. Me, I’m just a hired hand trying to do a job.”
She smiled again. Longarm wasn’t sure, but he kinda thought the room got brighter when she smiled like that.
“What was it you said your name was, miss?”
“I don’t believe I did say,” she responded with a twinkle in her eyes—and damn pretty eyes they were, Longarm noted, big and bright and gold with green highlights in them—pretending that was all she intended to divulge. After a moment’s teasing she added, “If you must know, for your official reports of course, I’m Lucy Watson. I own the Watson Express Company.”