The two-striper nodded and replied, "You noticed right, and the old man was sort of pissed that you hadn't made it back yet. Him and the First Battalion just rode out to track down them painted Kiowa."
Longarm sighed and said, "Aw, shit, I'd best switch this saddle and bridle to that bay I rode in on and see if I can catch up with Colonel Howard before he hurts somebody, or vice versa! They took the post road north, right?"
The man they'd left behind nodded and said, "Headed up Anadarko way. Somebody said something about them wild Indians crossing the post road or following it one way or the other. They never came this way. The agency guns around Anadarko are forted up and ready for the red rascals, of course. The army and the B.I.A. have been burning up the wires, trying to figure which way the rascals went."
Longarm started to lead the two jaded ponies inside as the remount man tagged along, volunteering, "That Colorado pal of yours is with the column driving a buckboard."
Longarm handed the reins to another remount man dressed in faded blue fatigues as he asked with a puzzled frown, "Pal of mine, you say?"
The noncom said, "A Mr. Homy-something. Said he'd driven all the way up from Spanish Flats looking for you."
Longarm knew it was useless to hope. But he still made sure they were talking about Attila Homagy, from Trinidad, Colorado, before he decided, "I might not ride after that column just yet. Got to send me some telegrams first. Where might I find your signal officer at this hour pard?"
The army regular looked awkward and suggested, "You might find the liaison office less busy, Deputy Long. They got their own telegraph setup, and with Agent Ryan over by Fort Smith, his breed clerk can't have all that much to do.
Longarm didn't ask whose wife the signal officer might be with as so much of the outfit rode off to glory. But that reminded him of the other night and so, seeing the enlisted men always knew, he asked what the colonel had decided about those two officers who'd been fighting in the hall at the hostel.
The remount man grinned lewdly and said, "Long gone. Colonel Howard rides with fairly easygoing reins, but he won't put up with downright stupid. Both officers were transferred out the next morning, one to Fort Douglas in Mormon Country and the other down to Fort Apache. We all felt the sassy wife on her way to Fort Apache got off lucky, once she'd been caught with the regimental Romeo."
Longarm nodded and agreed it seemed rough on the innocent wife of that Romeo.
The remount man nodded, but said, "That's how come he was only sent to Fort Douglas, despite his wayward dong. The colonel's lady, Miss Elvira, said they had to consider the innocent victim of the untidy triangle. Fort Douglas ain't much worse than here for the wives, and her horny husband deserves the slow rate of promotion over yonder in the Great Basin."
Longarm didn't ask how they'd learned this much tending to the regimental riding stock. He knew senior-grade officers rated lots of household help, and he hadn't even had to serve breakfast to the older couple himself to learn old Elvira tended to call the shots about social matters on or about this post.
He agreed she seemed an understanding old gal, and left the two army ponies in the care of the army as he ducked out and circled the parade the less muddy way until he came to Fred Ryan's liaison office near the Headquarters and Headquarters building. He'd never figured out why the army felt you ought to say "Headquarters" twice. But he didn't really care.
Finding the door of the B.I.A.'s more modest doghouse unlocked, he went inside, where a baby-faced breed wearing a white shirt and shoestring tie looked up from a desk behind the counter and primly told him the boss wouldn't be back until later in the week, if then.
Longarm nodded and said, "I know Fred Ryan rode the mail ambulance east. We waved to one another in passing. I'd be Deputy U.S. Marshal Custis Long, and I'm sure old Fred would be proud to let me use your telegraph key, seeing the army signal officer seems away on serious business as well."
The young breed rose warily to come over by the counter as he confessed to being Hino-Usdi Rogers of the Cherokee persuasion. When Longarm bluntly asked him what a Cherokee might be doing here in Kiowa-Comanche country, Rogers looked embarrassed and explained how Ryan had brought him along to a newer post after hiring him and training him at the Tahlequah Agency in the Cherokee Nation. Longarm didn't care. Ryan had obviously been with the B.I.A. longer than the Kiowa or Comanche had been with this agency.
Rogers opened a flap at one end of the counter, but warned Longarm, even as the far taller deputy stepped through it, that he wasn't half as fast with a telegraph key as the Signal Corps crew next door.
Longarm said, "I can send and receive Morse pretty good. Used to tap into enemy wires during the war. I hope you've some connection with the Western Union grid so's we can get off wires to Denver and such?"
The Cherokee breed ran fingers through his thick black hair and looked as if he'd been caught with them in a cookie jar as he told their visitor he wasn't sure. He said his boss, Fred Ryan, usually made the long-distance connections and let him do the more routine sending and receiving.
By this time he'd shown Longarm to a table in the rear where a telegraph key and some writing material waited under a shelf of wet-cell batteries. Before he sat down, Longarm casually asked if Rogers or the army had wired those orders for police uniforms from Saint Lou.
The breed kid brightened and said, "Oh, that was us. It was exciting to chat by wire with big-city folk. Agent Ryan patched us through to the Western Union office in Saint Louis, and then handed the task over to me. You see, he makes the important decisions while I keep the files in order, do the routine typing, and-"
"We got a young gent called Henry clerking our Denver office the same way," Longarm said. "You told me Ryan broke you in a spell back at the Cherokee Agency. Now I'd best contact the central Kiowa Comanche agency at Anadarko and see if they can shed any light on Colonel Howard's campaign plans."
They couldn't. No army messages were on the line at the moment, and it only took a few minutes for someone at the B.I.A. in Anadarko to hear their own key clicking and ask who in thunder wanted what.
It seemed nobody in Anadarko knew why Colonel Howard was headed their way in battalion strength. Longarm started to send something dumb about Attila Homagy. But he never did. With any luck the fool immigrant would never think to ask questions about telegraph messages, and even if he did, it was going to take him yet another full day to get back here, giving him at least two on the trail if everyone pushed hard.
Anadarko lay a tad farther away than the thirty miles a cavalry column averaged in a day's ride. Even if Howard got there well before sundown and Homagy heard right off, there was no way he'd be able to drive a jaded team directly back alone, at night, even if the army would let him. Longarm knew they wouldn't even let a lone civilian drive by day before they had a tighter grip on this current Indian scare. Colonel Howard never would have led that big a force out chasing after a few dozen at the most if he hadn't been taking the situation seriously.
Once he'd figured how much time he had to work with, Longarm made a few penciled notes to compose the longer message he had to send his Denver office.
Before he could, Hino-Usdi Rogers shyly marveled, "You surely send and receive good! You've a faster fist than Agent Ryan, and I can't keep up with him half the time!"
Longarm got out a brace of smokes as he explained, "The trick is not to think in dots and dashes. It takes a spell to think and then send dit-dit-dah-dit for the letter F. If you remember it sort of sounds like 'Get a haircut!' and move the key in time with the words, you've sent your letter F already."
The breed kid laughed, and asked if there were any other silly ways to bring Morse to mind. Longarm offered a couple that were sort of dirty, if effective. The young breed blushed like a gal, and declared he'd never forget the letter V sounded like "Stick it in deep!"