For a change, Billy Vail looked almost sympathetic. He said, “Custis, I do hate to do this to you. If the truth be told, I really hate it. In fact, I came near to hesitating about picking you for this job, but I’ve got no choice. There’s big trouble down there, big enough that a local congressman got involved and he went to pestering a United States congressman and the United States congressman came to the marshal service in Washington and now they’ve contacted me and put the heavy load on my shoulders.”
Longarm looked at him disgustedly. He said, “And naturally, you knew right where to transfer that heavy load, didn’t you? Billy, if it weren’t for friends like you, I couldn’t afford enemies.” Billy said, “Now, Custis, that’s no way to talk. This ought to be a pretty easy job for you. You just go down there, talk that slick talk of yours, get those folks to understand that there won’t be a profit to objecting to what you have in mind, and everything will come out fine.”
Longarm sighed and looked away. He’d had a very satisfying week or two of vacation planned, most of it built around the several ladies of his close acquaintance. He said, “How soon do you need me to go whipping off on this important mission?”
Billy Vail looked down at his desk. “Well, I reckon you ought not try to leave tonight. I’d imagine that it might be tough to get train connections heading in that direction.”
Longarm threw his hands up in the air. He said, “Well, you old son of a bitch, I don’t believe this. And what’s more, I can’t see where it’s any of our damned business. Sounds like to me that it’s local law’s business. Why doesn’t the sheriff tend to it?”
“Well, this little town is set way out the hell away from nowhere and it’s sitting right astride the line between two counties. One sheriff can’t handle the whole mess and the other can’t handle the whole mess and they can’t seem to get together and cooperate.”
“What about the town marshal? Don’t they have one?”
“Nope. Anybody that’s smart enough for the job is smart enough not to take it.”
Longarm took his hat off and scratched his head. He said, “Hell, Billy, what’s going on down there?”
“There’s killing going on, Custis. There’s some serious trouble down there. The big problem is the new settlers that have come in there have run afoul of these two old nester families who have some big holdings around there.”
“What are their names?”
“One family is named Barrett and the other …” He paused while he shuffled around some papers on his desk “… and the other bunch is named Myers.”
“Which one of them is in the right?”
Billy Vail shook his head. “Neither one of them. The problems with the newcomers is that the Barretts say that if you ain’t on our side, then you’re on the Myerses’ side and that makes you our enemy and the Myerses say the same thing. I tell you, Custis, I think they’re running out of room to bury folks. I think they’re starting to have to bury them in stacks.”
Longarm shook his head slowly. “Billy, you wouldn’t exaggerate every now and then, would you?”
“Well, I ain’t exaggerating about the pressure I got from Washington, and if I’ve got to have some strong words directed at me from them, then I reckon I’m going to redirect them at you. So get down there and clean that mess up. The name of the town is Grit. It’s about fifty miles west of the town of Junction and about forty miles east of the town of Brady. It’s beautiful country, from what I understand, unless you’re six foot under it.”
But Longarm was not quite ready to give up. He said, “Billy, let’s don’t get so damned hasty about sending me off to Texas. In the first place, why don’t the famous Texas Rangers do something about this matter?”
Billy Vail shook his head. He said, “They claim to be stretched too thin with trouble along the Mexican border. But that ain’t the main concern here that makes it federal business. There’s squabbling about free federal government grazing land. That makes it federal business, and that makes it our business.”
Longarm said, “Hell, there’s government grazing land all over this country. We don’t have to go down there and divvy it up. Everybody can graze on United States free land.”
Billy Vail ran a hand through his thinning white hair. He looked every bit of his sixty years of age. He said, “Well, that’s just it. The Barretts and the Myerses are the ones doing the deciding who’s going to graze cattle on that free land. They’re pretty hard-pressed to even let one another get a cow on it, much less anybody else. It’s serious, Custis. I wouldn’t be sending you out this quick if I really believed it didn’t need tending to.”
“You are telling me that there is killing going on over this matter?”
Billy Vail shrugged. “Well, that’s what I’ve been given to understand. I don’t think it’s been anything big thus far, not the way I was describing it earlier. The word I get is that it’s a powder keg with a lit fuse and the faster you get down there, the better off you’ll be.”
Longarm pulled a face. He said with disgust, “Damn it, Billy, I’m give out. I’m as tired as hell, and I deserve a little whiskey and women and some good times. I ain’t taking off tomorrow and I ain’t taking off the day after that. I ain’t going to take off until I get good and rested.”
Billy Vail looked up at Longarm, his washed-out blue eyes going hard. He said, “Naturally, I want you to be as rested as you can be, but I don’t figure you need more than forty-eight hours’ rest. Anybody that needs more than forty-eight hours to rest up don’t need to be working for me.”
Longarm stood up. He said, “All right, you old son of a bitch. One of these days, your sins will catch up to you and I’ll be right there to shake hands with the devil while they shovel dirt in your face.”
Billy Vail sat back in his chair. He smiled pleasantly and said, “Yeah, and from where I’ll be laying, I’m not too sure I can tell which one of you will be the devil. Now, get on out of here and get some work done. Or at least let me get some work done.”
Longarm put on his hat and opened the office door. He gave Billy Vail one last look and then said, “I hope you’re proud of yourself, Chief Marshal William Vail. I was the only friend you ever had. I’ve got to tell you, I’m getting damned sick of Texas. I’m going to come back a changed man. By the way, how many guns am I going up against down there?”
The chief marshal shrugged and said, “I don’t know. What do you care? Just take them on one at a time.”
Longarm stared at him for a long moment and then shook his head and closed the door behind him.
A new lady boarder had moved into Longarm’s boardinghouse just before he had left on the long trek to track down the escaped convicts who had fled into the snowy Rocky Mountains. The young lady, who was named Betty Shaw, he guessed to be in her mid-twenties. She was a comely young thing with blond curly hair and a very interesting figure. He had not really gotten to know the young woman before he had left, so he had been surprised the night before when she had knocked on his door only an hour or so after his return from the hard trip. He had been unshaven, dirty, and generally a mess.
It had surprised him to see her standing there in a trim-fitting white gown that had displayed her hips and bosom to an appealing degree. She had come, she said, to welcome him back and to invite him to take coffee with her one evening after supper.
The somewhat forward invitation had surprised him, but it had naturally given him a great deal of delight since Miss Shaw was quite a treat to look upon. She acted demure and modest, though Longarm sensed something more than smoke rising from the embers he detected inside her. He had been told that she had worked for a time for a tent evangelist and then, for reasons known only to herself, had left his employ as the crusade left Denver. He’d never gotten it straight what she was doing for a livelihood while she remained in Denver. But as he walked home from Billy Vail’s office in the late-afternoon sunshine, he decided that it might not be a bad idea to see if the young lady would care to extend the coffee invitation for that evening.