Then he eased down the back steps and out by way of the stable to the sunny street.
He'd gone two city blocks before a hall porter on a landing he'd avoided asked an upstairs maid, "What's going on in two hundred eight and nine? They both have don't-disturbs out and it's barely afternoon."
The maid smiled dirty and confided, "Nobody's asleep in either room. I was just coming from a checkout down the hall when that one who says he's a lawman snuck his pretty boy up the back stairs."
The hall porter blinked and demanded, "Are you sure it was a boy? I've heard heaps of things about the famous Longarm, but this is the first I've ever heard of him queering young boys!"
The maid, a plain woman who might have felt left out, shrugged and said, "Have your own way. It was a girl with dirty bare feet, ragged jeans, work shirt, and straw hat. Those trash whites down along Crow Creek have adopted a new fashion. They've taken to wearing men's duds to make themselves more tempting."
The hall porter laughed, dirty, and decided, "Wait till I tell the boys the famous Longarm is a queer! I mean, I always had my doubts about Wild Bill's shoulder-length curly locks, but who'd have ever thought a gunslick with Longarm's rep as a lady's man would shack up with young boys for Gawd's sake!"
The lady's man they were gossiping about made it to the Cheyenne Federal Building before they were done with him. Once inside he found that the cuss who'd declared virtue was its own reward had never had to argue Federal Jurisdiction with Billy Vail's thoroughly pissed-off opposite number in Wyoming Territory.
The somewhat younger and leaner but just as crusty U.S. Marshal Winslow Morris, formerly of the Iowa Volunteers and mighty stuck up about that, too, told Longarm he was the victim of a cruel practical joke or riding for blathering assholes. Gritting his big yellow teeth on his own version of an expensive cigar in an oak-paneled office of his own, Marshal Morris insisted he's had his own deputies look into the rash of arrest warrants breaking out in Keller's Crossing. He said they'd gone over the township's voter registration and financial ledgers while they were at it.
Longarm, seated in a guest chair made out of elk antlers in this case, nodded soberly and said, "I've read your own reports. More than once. Anyone can see nothing cruel or unusual seems to be going on up here in Wyoming Territory, sir. Those lovely young things your lady J.P. keeps arming with dead-or-alive warrants have been gunning men down in other parts. As far south as Texas and as far east as Missouri. We make it eight such men, so far. Shot down like dogs without even the pretence of due process."
Marshal Morris grimaced and said, "I told Simp Glover it looked a mite neater when a deputy throwed a suspect's hat across an alley and ordered him to run and fetch it before he fired. But old Simp says-"
"Simp?" Longarm cut in, demanding, "Might we be talking about the county he-sheriff up yonder, name of Glover, now that I think back to my own notes?"
Marshal Morris nodded and replied, "We are. Simp's a good old boy with a herd of nigh two thousand head grazing alongside the North Platte. They elected him county sheriff because he scouted for the cav during Red Cloud's War north of Fort Laramie and kept his hair when all about him were losing their own. Like I said, I told Simp we were catching Ned from other parts when his shemale deputies got past three killings in one season. Simp says he never told nobody to shoot nobody, male or shemale. I told you he had to be elected up yonder, and Keller's Crossing is named after old Dutch Keller, founder of the considerable Keller cattle clan in them parts."
Longarm nodded soberly and said, "I was wondering how Edith Penn Keller of Keller's Crossing got appointed justice of the peace. What can you tell me about Rita Mae Reynolds, appointed undersheriff for her township by the doubtless grateful Sheriff Glover?"
Marshal Morris shifted the stogie between his bared teeth and told Longarm, "A heap of Keller's Crossing residents who ain't named Keller seem to be named Reynolds. I know what you're thinking. It's still the way things work in tight-knit rural townships. Boss Tweed took care of his kith and kin in New York City, and Boss Buckley is still taking care of his kith and kin out Frisco way. Neither you, me, nor nobody can reform such setups until and unless somebody in the catbird seat really fucks up."
"What do you call deputizing young gals and sending them clean out of the territory to shoot folk?" Longarm soberly demanded.
Morris shrugged and replied in an easy tone, "Good riddance? We ain't talking about young gals shooting folk! Every man jack of them eight wants was an outlaw with a rep who'd made the mistake of armed robbery in or about Keller's Crossing!"
"How come?" asked Longarm, mildly pointing out, "There's hardly anything up yonder but a bitty trail town surrounded by miles of open range. As far as I've been able to see from the onion skin reports I was issued, ain't one case of stock theft been reported. All eight of those dead outlaws were accused of taking cash and valuables at gunpoint."
Morris nodded, saying, "I read the same crime statistics. Keller's Crossing sits at the junctions of east-west and north-south trails. It serves as both a handy river ford and the best layover for travelers switching betwixt stagecoach and rail."
"Like a spider in the middle of its web?" asked Longarm dryly.
Morris shrugged and answered simply, "I suspect Dutch Keller had more honest profits in mind when he staked out his claims along the North Platte just south of what was then pure Sioux Country. In any case, there the town sits, and outlaws will fly in and out of the web for fun and profit. Undersheriff Reynolds, being a gal, herself, may favor gal deputies more than you or me might. Our own judges already warned Justice Keller not to put down dead-or-alive on those arrest warrants anymore."
"You mean she still gets to issue the dumb writs?" Longarm asked.
Morris said, "Sure she does. We told her she only has the power to order a suspect arrested and hauled in to be remanded to higher county authorities. Said authorities agree things might have gotten a mite out of hand. But, meanwhile, Undersheriff Rita Mae had the same right as any other peace officer to deputize pro tem under the old common law of posse comitatus."
Longarm grimaced and said, "Posse comitatus is one thing, and sweet young things executing criminals without a trial is another. Leaving aside the rights or wrongs under common law, what sort of paid-up peace officer would deputize an armed and dangerous young gal to... Son of a stupid cotton-picking bitch!"
"I hope you ain't talking about me," Marshal Morris said quietly.
Longarm sighed and said, "Nope. Talking about me! It's so easy to point out the mistakes of others until you catch your fool self in the very same mistakes!"
Morris asked, "Are you saying you've been deputizing and arming young gals, old son?"
To which Longarm was forced to reply, "Only one. So far. But a man can sure feel foolish when he looks in the mirror to see egg on his own face!"
CHAPTER 7
Longarm was grateful for his sensible denim jacket and open shirt collar as he trudged down Central Avenue with his brain chasing its own tail.
It was a typical summer afternoon on the high plains, with the thin air conspiring with the naked sun in a cloudless cobalt blue sky to surprise folk. It felt like someone had just opened a furnace door whenever he crossed a sunlit patch of plank walk or mummy-dust side street, but it was pleasantly cool in any shade, thanks to the way a body got to sweat so dry at this altitude.
His thoughts were in more of a whirl as he considered how easy, and how innocent, it might be for an undersheriff more sissy than his ownself to come up with the notion of recruiting a woman to aid and abet the law. It was easier for an innocent-looking gal to pussyfoot up to a suspect and ask questions, or pull triggers, than it might be for the least ferocious-looking boy. Since word had gone 'round about that harmless-looking Kid Antrim, Billy the Kid, or whatever the little shit was calling himself lately, a halfway-sober gunslick tended to think twice before he let down his guard in the company of a skinny little runt he didn't know right well. But gents who didn't grin like shit-eating dogs at pretty gals were seldom found along the Owlhoot Trail to begin with.