"Maybe you should also let your prisoner stretch," Miss Noble snipped.
Longarm ignored the woman's suggestion. Always suspicious that a prisoner might have friends waiting for an unguarded moment to act, he surveyed the coach, eyes skipping over every single passenger. None seemed to be the type that would pose a danger. Unfortunately, this train was packed, every seat filled. And although the wind was finding cracks to seep into the car and cause it to become decidedly chilly, there were so many bodies crammed into the coach that the air was stuffy.
"We're really starting to climb now," Eli said. "I don't think this old train is going to make it over the summit in this storm."
"It'll make it," Longarm said, knowing that it would be a slow and difficult pull over the 8,600-foot Laramie Summit. If the snow was really heavy, they might even be forced to attack it with snow shovels or plows.
"Even if we do, it'll still be the longest sixty miles you ever rode," Eli predicted. "Sixty miles doesn't seem like much, but a lot can happen."
"Shut up," Longarm growled, dropping back into his seat, "or I'll part your hair permanently."
Eli smiled, but there was no warmth in it. He was a hatchet-faced man, lean and muscular. Dressed in a heavy woolen jacket and baggy pants, and slumped down next to the window, he looked deceptively mild and even vulnerable.
Longarm knew better. Eli was a dead-eye shot. He probably stood about five feet ten and weighed less than 170 pounds, but every pound was bone and muscle, and he was as quick with a gun as any man that Longarm had ever crossed. Facing a gallows in Denver made him capable of any act of murder and desperation.
Miss Noble climbed to her feet. Shooting a look of pure venom at Longarm, she squared her shoulders and rummaged around in a brown paper sack. After a moment, she extracted an apple and a sandwich wrapped in crisp brown paper. Longarm knew at once that it was not a peace offering.
"Deputy," Miss Noble said, "perhaps I was a little harsh in my criticism of you. That doesn't mean that, for even a minute, I believe this man is capable of the heinous acts you say he committed, but-"
"He shot the sodbuster in the face with his own scattergun," Longarm said in a clipped, uncompromising voice. "Then my prisoner used that same scattergun to brain the oldest son, who was about eighteen."
"Stop it!" Miss Noble cried, shrinking away in horror.
But Longarm was angry. This woman hadn't been invited to interfere, and she needed to have a lesson in reality so that the next time she saw a lawman and his prisoner, she might be a fairer judge of who deserved her acid tongue.
"After he killed the father and oldest son," Longarm continued, "my prisoner went into the house and when the fifteen-year-old son attacked him, my prisoner used his knife. It wasn't much of a fight because Mr. Wheat is very, very good with a bowie. The boy had no chance at all."
Miss Noble paled. The sandwich tumbled from her grip, and Eli reached out and snatched it up. He stuffed it whole into his mouth and began to engulf it like a snake swallowing a big gopher.
"I'm not going to tell you the details about how this prisoner killed the wife and mother," Longarm said, taking pity on Miss Noble. "But I will tell you this much, it wasn't pretty and it wasn't a quick, merciful death. And so you see, I don't care if this man hangs or I have the pleasure of killing him before we reach Denver."
Miss Noble swayed as a sudden and powerful gust of wind rocked their coach. She appeared faint, and could not seem to tear her eyes off Eli as he licked his thin lips.
"Miss Noble, you look unwell. Why don't you take a seat?" Longarm said, feeling a little guilty because he had been so forthright in his account of the murder.
Another passenger who had also been glaring at Longarm now turned his icy gaze on Eli, who seemed oblivious to everything.
"Deputy, how did you ever manage to capture that... that monster?"
"He made the mistake of stealing the sodbuster's horses and cutting southwest toward Utah. Eli didn't realize that country is damned rocky and neither of the sodbuster's horses were shod. They went lame up in the Unita Mountains, and I was able to overtake Eli and catch him asleep right at dawn."
Eli's face turned bitter. "Damned sonsabitchin' plow horses!"
The other man introduced himself. "My name is Edward Ashmore and I'm the president of the Bank of Wyoming with headquarters in Cheyenne. We're opening a second branch in Laramie and I'm constantly traveling back and forth between those places. Fifty miles doesn't seem like a long journey by rail, except that it's all up and then down a mountain. It's a tedious and even dangerous roadbed."
"I know that," Longarm said. "There are a lot of switchbacks, and I've been over this stretch in winter when the trains had a terrible time crossing."
"I'm hoping that, it only being November, we won't get the kind of snowstorm we might get a month or two from now."
"I hope you're right," Longarm said, looking out the window and seeing that the snow was thick now and visibility was just forty or fifty yards.
"I for one," Ashmore said, "understand that there are such men as your prisoner. I've never witnessed a killing or been to war. But I've lived in Wyoming more than ten years now and I know that there are desperate and ruthless outlaws. Men perfectly capable of murder. Deputy Long, you're to be congratulated for taking every precaution against allowing this man to escape and attempt to murder one of us."
"I appreciate your support," Longarm said, loud enough so that Miss Noble could not possibly fail to hear. "A lawman never seems to get much respect, and we damn sure don't get much pay either. But someone has to track down fugitives of the law and bring them to justice."
"Tell me, have you ever considered some other occupation?"
"Such as?"
The banker shrugged. "The Bank of Wyoming could use an ex-lawman to guard shipments between Cheyenne and Laramie. I like your no-nonsense style. You strike me as a true professional, sir."
Longarm warmed to the praise. "I sincerely appreciate your kind and flattering words. But the fact of the matter is that I like my work. Oh, I grumble about the hours and the bad pay. I sometimes even envy a sheriff or town marshal who can go home to a wife and children. I'm constantly being sent hither and yon after escaped fugitives. But I'm good at it, and in fact I think there are few better."
The banker smiled. "Yes, yes, I'm sure that's true. You're exactly the kind of a man that we could use to protect our interests. There's a bright future in Wyoming banking for a steady man who can handle himself. I'm sure that we could offer you a salary that would make you give up that badge."
"Thanks, but I'm just not interested."
Ashmore looked genuinely surprised. "I'm not used to being turned down when I offer a man an exceptionally well-paying job. Is there... is there something personal you have against me, sir?"
"Oh, no! I just like my work and right now I'm trying to keep my mind on my prisoner. Maybe the next time I come through Cheyenne I can look you up and we can talk."
"By then the position might be filled."
"That's a chance I'll just have to take," Longarm said, trying but failing to sound concerned because he doubted that he'd have any real interest in being a bank guard no matter how good the pay.
"I'm going to raise hell with our conductor for letting this coach get so frigid," the banker said, rubbing his hands briskly together. "It's outrageous!"
Longarm glanced around. "I haven't seen him for quite some time."
"I'll go look for him," the banker said, loud enough for everyone to hear. "I'm not about to let these good people, many of whom are undoubtedly faithful depositors at the Bank of Wyoming, suffer because of a dereliction of duty."
"Good idea," Longarm said, noting how the storm and the train had finally met so that visibility outside was reduced to nothing.