Longarm took two steps forward, his eyes still on the man behind the table. The man had not spoken. In the dim light, Longarm could not tell if he was Mexican or Anglo. He was about to say something about the horse when he suddenly felt something very hard, very much like the barrel of a gun, being pressed against his spine in the small of his back.
The voice of the Mexican who had followed him in said, “Be very careful, senor. Tiene quidado. Have care. This pistol, she explodes very easy.”
Longarm stood stock-still, making no motion with his hands. He had no doubt that he was about a hair trigger away from having his backbone blown in two. He felt a hand at his side and felt the weight of his revolver being removed.
The Mexican said, “Now, put your hands high, senor. Very high.”
Longarm lifted his hands to the height of his head. He said, “If you’re planning on robbing me, mister, you ain’t going to get very much.”
The Mexican said, “Now, senor, it is necessary that you lay down on the floor. I am sorry it will get you dusty, but you must lay facedown on the floor. Do you understand?”
“I understand, but that don’t mean that I’m much going to do it,” said Longarm.
The response brought a sharp jab with the barrel of the pistol. The young man said, “Senor, there are two guns pointing at your back. Now lay down on your face on the floor and put your hands behind your back. This is necessario.”
Longarm’s mind was racing but he wasn’t coming up with any answers. He said, trying to see just how determined the men were, “I’ll be damned if I’m going to lay down in this dust and put my face in it.”
The words were no sooner out of his mouth than a loud explosion filled the air and he felt a rush of heat and powder go past his ears. The sound of the shot rang so loudly that, for a second, Longarm felt deafened.
The voice behind him said quietly, “Senor, the next time you don’t move, I’m going to hit you over the head very hard and then you will be on your face.”
Chapter 2
Longarm said, “Well, hell, if you’re that damned set about it, I don’t want you to go wasting any more ammunition shooting holes in the ceiling. I’ll get down.” As carefully as he could with his hands still up, he gingerly lowered himself to his knees and then went to all fours and then lay prone on the dusty floor.
A voice above him said, “Now, put your hands behind your back.”
It was an effort lying as he was, but Longarm managed to get both hands to his back. Instantly he felt the steely clamp of a pair of manacles being fastened to each of his wrists. He wondered vaguely if they were the same irons he had used on Earl Combs coming back from Mexico City. He doubted it since they were in his room, as far as he knew, at the hotel that he had never stopped at, the hotel where he was going to get that much-needed sleep. Well, here he was on the floor of a cabin in Mexico. Maybe he’d just sleep there. But he said, “Boys, I don’t know what you want with me, but I only have about fifty bucks on me. Now, if you want the money, take it, but it ain’t worth killing me over.”
Longarm heard a sudden laugh—it was different from the Mexican’s,—and then a voice said from somewhere else in the room, “Oh, we have no intention of killing you. You’re much more valuable to us alive.”
It was clear to Longarm the man who had just spoken was not a Mexican. He had a Southern accent, but other than that, Longarm could make nothing more of the man’s voice.
Longarm said, “I don’t know who you are, fellow, or who these other fellows are and I sure as hell don’t know what you want with me. I’m just an ordinary shit-kicker passing through your part of the country. A man in town hired me to come out and fetch back a high-priced horse for him. Said he was scared of the fellow he had bought the horse from.”
By now, Longarm could tell from the direction of the laugh that it was coming from the man seated at the table. The man said, “Oh, now, Mister United States Deputy Marshal Custis Long, better known as Longarm to his friends and enemies alike, I think you can do better than calling yourself just another shit-kicker cowboy, don’t you reckon?”
Longarm felt himself go slightly cold inside. In his years as a lawman, he reckoned he had made more than his fair share of enemies. The only question in his mind was just how deadly this particular one was. There was little doubt in his mind that he’d walked into a carefully planned trap, but lying facedown on the cabin floor with his hands manacled behind his back left him with very few options. He could only wonder what the man at the table’s intentions were. He said, “Look here, mister. I don’t know what you’re up to but I can guarantee you that mishandling a United States deputy marshal ain’t exactly the way to guarantee yourself a long life, if you take my meaning.”
The man at the table laughed pleasantly. He said, “Oh, Mr. Long. Let’s don’t kid each other. No one knows where you are. You haven’t even reported in yet. The last people who saw you were the lawmen you handed Earl Combs over to. Since then, you’ve been out of sight. You haven’t sent a telegram, you haven’t written a letter. All you’ve done is go into a hotel, get a room, and then go over to the saloon and dig into a bottle. Nobody knows where you are, what you’re up to, or who’s got you. Now, to use your expression, isn’t that about the size of it?”
Longarm raised his head as best he could under the strain his body was in and turned it toward the table. All he could make out in the dim light was the outline of the figure. He asked, “Mister, what have you got against me, exactly? Have I done you some wrong you think was unfair? I’m a deputy marshal and my job is to catch folks who break the law. Now, if you’ve been in the law-breaking business, and certainly you are breaking the law right now by what you are doing to me, then I don’t see where you’ve got any kick coming if I threw you in the clink. But have I ever treated you unfair?”
The man said, “Marshal, that’s a very nice speech and I’m not going to answer the question for you.”
Longarm said, “You are making a mistake here. You just don’t handle a deputy marshal like you’re handling me. What makes you so damn sure that I am Custis Long, Longarm as they call him?”
That brought a laugh from the man at the table. He said, “Chulo, check his pockets and locate his badge. I’ve been told he carries it in his shirt pocket when he’s not wearing it.”
Longarm felt rough hands suddenly at work around his shirtfront. He felt a hand dig in between his chest and the dirt floor, the fingers going inside his left shirt pocket where he carried his badge. In a second the badge was out. He could hear the mumbling. He said, “You better damn well be careful with that badge. I’ve been carrying it a good long time and I don’t expect to lose it in some damn shack outside of Nuevo Laredo, Mexico. You got that?”
The man who had a surprisingly cultured voice said, “Now, Marshal, you shouldn’t concern yourself about such matters. I can see that this is the famous Longarm badge. Of course, we never had any doubt that it was you, you understand? We’ve had our eye on you for a good long while. Let me compliment you, Marshal. You’re a man who strictly sticks to his job. You’re a dutiful man, Mr. Long. A credit to your service.”
Longarm raised his chin and said, “Well, I wish I could say the same for you, Mister … whatever your name is. But I can guarantee you one thing. You’re inviting the whole of the United States government to come looking for you. You don’t capture deputy marshals and get away with it.”
The man laughed slightly again. He said, “Oh, Marshal Long. The last time you were seen was at the Customs Service and all they saw was you heading south into Mexico. Where you were going or what you were up to, they won’t be able to say, and neither will anyone else. But don’t worry, your absence will be reported shortly.”