Longarm said, “To give everyone more time than they’d have had if Heger had wired Dodge the way he should have. The money the poor sucker had in his vault was windfall. Sattler could have only had one good reason for slowing down any outside help from arriving. Old Heger really must have been on to something. Wolf Ritter was a pal Sattler was covering up for. I mean to ask him why as soon as I catch him. I only know Sattler had no other reason to delay the search for a federal want. Wiring Denver instead of Dodge or, hell, Kansas City gave them an extra day or better to decide what to do.”
Kurt Morgenstern said, “I vote we ride for the county seat. Even if he’s not going for that other bank account, we can pick up more riders when you tell the sheriff about all this, ja?”
Longarm said, “Nein. You send a rider to tell the county law if you like. Sattler’s just as likely to double back to Sappa Crossing if he means to risk a bank withdrawal at this late date. Besides, they never sent me after him. That sheriff you just mentioned has more jurisdiction over local robberies and killings. Wolf Ritter is the son of a bitch I’m after, and that wasn’t him I was chasing just now!”
As he wheeled his borrowed pony, Morgenstern stayed with him, gasping, “Herr Gott! You mean that killer is still hiding somewhere among us, like a wolf in sheep’s clothing?”
To which Longarm could only reply, “Don’t know. Aim to find out. I showed Werner Sattler a list of possible suspects. He naturally vouched for every one of ‘em. He may have been fibbing. So I aim to ask others about the same gents, and this time I might have better luck.”
Chapter 18
He didn’t. Everyone he talked to in Sappa Crossing, from the one barber to the Mennonite preacher, seemed to agree with their fugitive town law about such names as they recognized on Longarm’s list. Few knew all the names. The clannish Mennonites could only vouch for their own brethren. Longarm hadn’t expected a renegade Prussian Lutheran to pass for an all-out Mennonite. But as much as a fifth of the Dutchmen in those parts were from other sects entirely, and there were tradesmen and cattlefolk like the MacSorleys who weren’t any sort of Dutch, High or Low.
Longarm considered more than one apparently plain American that barber recalled as bearded, of average height, with blond hair going to gray. But men who’d answer to that description were hardly as rare as virgins in a whorehouse. The barber said he’d have noticed if anyone ever sat in his chair with dyed hair or beard.
Longarm sighed and said, “I reckon I could tell, close enough to peer close at the roots of dyed hair or whiskers. You ain’t a Dutchman, are you?”
The barber laughed and said, “Bite your tongue. I can manage a few words of the lingo. In this town you have to. But my people were from Welsh Wales, look you, if we want to go back far enough. I consider myself a plain old Ohio boy, if any of this conversation means anything.”
Longarm said, “It might. Nobody on this list described as any breed of Dutchman has left town since my office got that urgent message from the late Horst Heger. But some other bearded faces ain’t been seen at the saloon and such of late. You talk to these squareheads more than most of us, pard. Do you reckon an educated Prussian officer might be able to speak English with no accent if he put his mind to it?”
The barber thought and decided, “Everybody has an accent. I can tell you’re not from Ohio just by listening to you. Neither one of us speaks English like a York Stater. Your sneaky Prussian officer would have to speak anything with some accent, see?”
Longarm did. He nodded gravely and said, “I follow your drift, and I’m glad I was smart enough to come to you for advice. Now that you mention it, I have noticed an educated furriner sounds as if he has to be speaking with an accent, even if you can’t place it, because he speaks with no accent at all, pronouncing every word exactly the way they tell you to in Webster’s Dictionary!”
The barber smiled smugly. “So you could be looking for a bearded blondish man who speaks such perfect English he annoys folks, who left town after you got that telegram from our poor gunsmith.”
Longarm sighed and said, “I would if I could. But there ain’t no such person, as far as anyone I’ve talked to can tell. Can you think of any customer who’d answer the overall vague description jawing at you in a noticeable American accent? I mean a thicker than usual Texas twang, a shut-my-mouth-you-all Dixie accent, or-“
“I know what you mean,” the barber said. “Real folks don’t lay it on the way vaudeville comics might. I can always tell a real Welshman from a teasing Englishman because my late Uncle Dai, from Cardiff you see, never in his life spoke half as Taffy. But I’m afraid you’ve come to the wrong barber for help with Prussians pretending to be from Texas or Welsh Wales. I’ve been wracking my brains all the time we’ve been talking, and I just can’t come up with anyone I can fit in that slot with a hammer!”
They shook on it and parted friendly. Longarm got a cool beer, at least, at the Gansblumchen saloon. Nobody there could put him on the trail of Wolf Ritter, and more than one suggested he’d been sent on a wild goose chase. Had anyone but the late Horst Heger ever seen anyone in these parts who answered to the description on those wanted flyers?
It was a good question. All bets were off if the real Wolf Ritter didn’t fit his official description. Such things happened. Witnesses gave conflicting accounts or just guessed at details they didn’t really remember. There was still some argument as to whether Henry McCarty, alias Billy the Kid, was right-handed or left-handed. So what was a few inches either way, or a saber scar on the right or left cheek, to an owlhoot rider wanted for everything but the blue ribbon at the county fair?
Longarm had returned that cordovan cow pony, and said he was sorry as all hell. But he still had some horseflesh to reshuffle, Iona MacSorley had issued a standing invitation, and that paint would still be out at the Lazy B. So he went back to that carriage house, found Helga didn’t live there anymore, and saddled old Rocket, telling her, “Seeing I’ve been left in the lurch by one maiden fair and invited to sup with another, we’d best see about getting you on home.”
He stopped by Morgenstern’s smithy to pick up that gelding as long as he was at it. It was better than even money he was through in Sappa Crossing. It made more sense to ask some more around Cedar Bend.
“You just want to get laid,” he warned himself as he considered how much good old Dad Jergens and pretty Olive Red Dog likely knew about the sons of bitches he was after. It made little sense for Werner Sattler to run for a nearby town where he was known, or for Wolf Ritter to try and blend in with native Americans, red or white. The renegade had only come to this broad land because there was a whole lot of it to run off across.
Longarm didn’t see how one lawman was supposed to track at least a couple of crooks who had all that damned grass to ride across. But it happened that way at times. He didn’t know where Frank, Jesse, or The Kid were planning to spend the coming night either.
He rode into the Lazy B dooryard late that afternoon. Iona MacSorley came out on her veranda to declare it would soon be supper time. Then she yelled until the ramrod, Martin Link, came running to see what she wanted.
She told him to take care of the two ponies, of course. So Longarm felt obliged to say, “I know the way to your stable, Miss Iona. Why don’t you both let me worry about these brutes and then I’ll wash up out back and join you?”
The pretty but pouty Iona said, “Marty’s going to do as I say because he knows I mean what I say, Custis.”
So Longarm dismounted and handed the reins to the foreman as he murmured, “I work for the same sort of boss. Only he ain’t as pretty.”