Joining Longarm at the bar for a mighty early drink, Doc Forbes asked if he knew where Nurse Calder had gone off to.
When Longarm said he was almost certain she’d headed back to the Pawnee Agency, which was the simple truth no matter how anyone took it, Doc Forbes said it was just as well, explaining, “She’s right handy with a bone saw, but for no more than a practical nurse she seems inclined to grab the bit in her teeth and boss us mere menfolk around.”
Longarm said he’d noticed that, and added, “You don’t need Porky’s brains for anything, do you? I’m pretty sure I hit him just over the heart with my one round. He came way closer to a head shot, albeit he aimed a mite wide.”
Forbes said he’d noticed the doorjamb, and agreed there seemed no good reason to open the fat man’s skull because they’d already established you couldn’t tell how stupid a gent might have been just by gazing upon his dead brains.
Pronto Cross came to join them, saying, “All four of the old boys Porky was drinking with at the last have excuses for where they were when it appears Porky shot up that boardinghouse across town on his own and woke everybody UP.”
Longarm said, “I thought you said somebody tried to blast me out of bed with a Greener shotgun. So where is it and who might have been packing it?”
The town marshal shrugged and said, “Porky came over here alone, just as they were swamping up and laying new sawdust. What if some sidekick tore off into the dark with that Greener ten-gauge whilst a man who might have been more suspect came over here to establish an alibi.”
“Or a brag,” Longarm pointed out, reaching for his own beer as he added, “Porky was toasting my memory when I came through yonder door and inspired him to slap leather. He must have thought I lived through their fusillade by a whisker and knew who’d been shooting up through the floorboards at me. I’m always getting into fights with assholes saddled by a guilty conscience. More than once I’ve been credited with more smarts than I really had when some crook started up with me instead of leaving me the hell alone and just letting me ride on.”
Pronto signaled the weary-looking barkeep for a morning beer as well, saying, “I follow your drift. Porky never would have had to crawfish at the barbershop if he’d only kept his big mouth shut. Is it safe for us to assume you’d have left town on your own and saved Porky the sad results of not just waiting you out?”
Longarm said, “That’s about the size of it. I’m waiting on a wire from my boss, Marshal Billy Vail, before I can say for certain when I’ll be leaving. I don’t know how deep he might want me to dig into the lynching of that one federal prisoner. On the surface it seems highly unlikely members of his old gang had anything to do with his death, and we all know how tedious it could be to ask a Nebraska grand jury to indict a Nebraska lynch mob, even if I could get anyone to name anyone to me.”
Pronto Cross smiled boyishly and said, “Oh, I don’t know. I’d be willing to make an educated guess that the lard you just shot was the leader of the Minute Men the other night.”
Longarm sipped some suds as Doc Forbes looked uncomfortable. Cat-and-mouse games seldom paid off unless you had at least a few face cards to flash, and he knew that they knew that he knew, so what the hell.
Longarm took another swig, but put the schooner down for good half full. Like most old soldiers, Longarm could go seventy-two hours without sleep as long as things stayed interesting. But he was starting to feel the effects of no sleep and a heap of Nancy Calder as they talked in circles. So he said, “I have to get my livery mount back to its stall and some well-deserved rest. I’ll see you after dinner at that hearing, Doc, and by the way, could I have a carbon copy of all the testimony from the hearing on that Sunday school teacher?”
Doc Forbes looked surprised, but said, “I can rustle you up an extra carbon. But what use might you have for it? Mildred Powell was murdered by Howard Bubblehead Burnside at a time your federal want had an ironclad alibi. He was in jail, waiting for you to come pick him up, when the sheriff arrested that Mongolian idiot out at his sister’s hog farm. Dancing Dave was simply swept up in the generally festive mood when the Minute Men came for Bubblehead, see?”
Longarm said, “I’d see better if I had it all on paper to go over all at once. It would save me asking questions such as how far out of town that imbecile boy had to walk or run from First Calvinist, or who had proper jurisdiction over a crime committed in town by a kid with a more rural address.”
Pronto Cross started to repeat what he’d said about the township and county having a gentleman’s agreement. Longarm cut him off and said they’d talk about it later, after he’d had some sleep and read some testimony. Then he left before either the town or county could get around to arresting him.
As he dismounted out front of the red livery, he saw everyone was up early at the Widow MacUlric’s boardinghouse next door. He led the jaded chestnut inside and tipped the sleepy night hostler a dime to make sure his pal got a rubdown and fresh water in his trough for a tolerable ride with no shying or balking.
As he walked next door a female voice chirped like a bird, and then the more mature Widow MacUlric was off her porch and running to greet him, gasping, “Oh, Custis, we’ve been so worried about you! A maniac with a ten-gauge shotgun just tried to murder you in your sleep and where on earth have you been all this time?”
He answered in a calmer tone, “Hunting maniacs. They told me over to Main Street about the excitement here. Needless to say, I wasn’t where they expected to find me at that hour.”
The smaller Ellen Brent from the library came down the steps to join them as she chirped, “We thought you were dead at first. They made a dreadful mess of your poor bed and left the air filled with a blizzard of goosedown! You say it was more than one? Do you have any idea who’d do such a dreadful thing, Custis?”
Longarm nodded soberly and said, “The late Porky Shaw seems to have been at least involved. He announced my demise prematurely and panicked when he saw me still alive. We figure there was somebody with him who packed a shotgun.”
Mavis MacUlric declared, “That’s for certain! Thank God you were somewhere else when all that number-nine buck tore up through the floor and your mattress! We’re going to have to put you in that back room I first suggested until I can see about some new bedding and repairs.”
He started to ask where that might leave her sleeping. He decided it was up to the lady of the house to say in front of the others. Two of the men who boarded there were out on the porch now. Before Longarm could ask where that Preston cuss from the Advertiser might be, with or without a Greener, the skinny cuss joined the others up yonder in his bathrobe.
Longarm followed the two gals up the steps. One of the men near the front door said, “Welcome home and see what you just missed!”
Longarm strode into the front vestibule as another boarder raised a candlestick to show him the well-perforated pressed-tin ceiling. You could still smell the gunsmoke. Longarm nodded and said, “Ten or twelve pistol rounds and two shotgun blasts for certain. Have you ever had the feeling someone you’d never done anything to just didn’t like you?”
As he led a sort of promenade up the stairs, the printer from the Advertiser volunteered, “Everyone in town heard you’d made it plain that Pawnee Junction wasn’t big enough for you and Porky Shaw. Isn’t it obvious he didn’t want to leave?”
Longarm swung around the newel at the second-story landing as he replied in a disgusted tone, “Talking like that is talking like kids after school. He tried to back me down at the barbershop. I didn’t want to. I told him I was at his service. I never told him he had to leave town.”