“All right,” Longarm told him. “One last thing then. I’ll need some of these cheroots. You got them in stock?”
“Sure thing.”
“Give me twenty of them, please.”
“That will be everything?”
“I reckon it will have to do.” It was either that or go back to the livery and hire another packhorse, Longarm knew. Besides, this one load would use up just about all his available cash. He made a mental note to find a bank when he left the mercantile. Maybe between him and his badge he could convince someone there to honor a draft against his account in Denver. He hoped so.
“I’ll have my boy package everything for you and bring it out to your horse,” the storekeeper said. “In the meantime, if you don’t mind, I have a few errands to run. Would that be all right?”
“Sure, mister. I reckon your boy can handle the rest of it.” Longarm paid the man for his purchases and stood idling about the store while the storekeeper disappeared briefly into his back room, then emerged once more to remove his apron and put on a suit coat and narrow-brimmed hat before going out onto the street.
The boy, a fat kid in his teens with approximately equal amounts of pimples and peach fuzz on his cheeks, came out and began assembling Longarm’s purchases into small bundles suitable for lashing onto a crossbuck packsaddle.
“Let me know when you’re ready with all that,” Longarm told him. “I’ll want to do the actual packing my own self.” He knew better than to allow a stranger, any stranger, to make up a pack. Some people just never could get the hang of making up a proper pack. In fact, Longarm suspected, most people wouldn’t know how to make up a balanced, durable load, and anything less than correct was a certain-sure recipe for trouble. “Five minutes, mister.”
“That’ll be fine, son.” Longarm stepped outside to wait on the sidewalk out in the clean, fresh air and sunshine.
He wasn’t out there alone for very long, for within a minute or so the storekeeper hustled past, and practically treading on the man’s heels, a fellow wearing a soiled blue coat with copper buttons on it and a black-beaked blue cap, with a six-pointed star prominent on his chest, confronted Longarm.
“Afternoon, Officer,” Longarm said. He reached into his pocket for a cheroot, and couldn’t help but notice that the policeman flinched when he did so, then visibly relaxed when Longarm’s hand came out with nothing more threatening than the cigar. “Is something wrong?”
“Could be. For openers, I want you to keep your hands well clear of that pistol on your belly.”
“That sounds reasonable,” Longarm said mildly. “Just to let you know, I’m fixing to reach into my vest pocket here for a match. Is that all right?”
The policeman nodded. “Do it then, but slow.”
Longarm shrugged, got his match, and thumbed it aflame. He took his time building a decent coal on the cheroot before he shook the match out and flicked it into the street. He was not feeling especially inclined to offer the copper a smoke. “So what’s on your mind, Officer?”
“You’ve been buying the makings of trade whiskey,” the policeman said.
“That’s right. Anything wrong with that?”
“You’ve also been buying trade goods for Indians.”
“Is that a fact?”
“You know it is.”
“No, sir, what I know—as opposed to what I might or might not surmise if our situations was reversed—is that I’ve bought a bunch of goods that are every one legal to sell an’ legal to own. Beyond that, friend, you’re only guessing.”
“Don’t sass me, mister, or I’ll have your ass behind bars so fast you won’t know what hit you.”
Longarm smiled. But there was no trace of warmth in the expression. “Is that a fact now?”
“Damn right it is. You’re intending to sell whiskey to some Indians. That’s against the law.”
“Is it really?”
“You know it is as well as I do. That’s a federal law, mister. You can’t sell whiskey to Indians.”
“You know something about federal law, do you?”
“Everybody knows about that federal law.”
Longarm pursed his lips in thought for a moment, then nodded and blew a thin stream of smoke. Direct into the copper’s smug face.
“I’m warning you.”
“Real big on warnings, ain’t you?” Longarm offered.
“If it’s trouble you’re looking for, I can damn sure give it to you.” The cop backed away two steps and put his hand on the saw-handle butt of a large, somewhat rusty revolver at his waist.
“Before you pull that thing an’ get yourself shot full of holes,” Longarm said, “I wanta show you something. But I got to reach inside my coat to get at it.”
“Keep your hands right where they are, damn you,” the policeman croaked, his voice tight and hoarse with fear. Sweat beaded his forehead and trickled out of the headband on his cap.
“I am a federal officer,” Longarm told him, “and I do not have any desire to start anything with you, friend. But I damn sure do not intend to stand here an’ let you get crazy.”
“You’re a liar is what you are,” the copper responded. “You’re a whiskey runner and God knows what else, and I’m taking you in. Now turn around and put your hands behind your back so’s I can cuff you.”
Longarm thought about it. He did not want to shoot the man. After all, his only offense was that he was an asshole. And if you once started trying to wipe out all the assholes you encountered, why, you’d hardly know where to start nor how to finish. Still, Longarm did not think he could trust this fella to restrain himself, even if—or especially if—he ever had Longarm in irons.
“I have a better idea,” Longarm said, taking his cheroot out of his mouth and giving it a critical inspection. “Just a second.” Longarm reached again into his vest pocket. But a different vest pocket this time. He came out not with a match, but with the brass-framed little .44 derringer he carried there.
“What we seem to have here,” Longarm said, “is a Mexican standoff. Sort of. So whyn’t you take your hand off the grip of that hog-leg—unless you think you can draw an’ fire quick before I have time to pull this trigger—an’ then I’ll show you my credentials, because y’see, I really am a United States deputy marshal an’ if I get any more pissed off at you, friend, you’re the one going behind bars. On a charge of obstructing a federal officer in the pursuit of his duties. Do we understand each other? I hope we do.”
The policeman’s eyes had gotten so wide they practically bulged clean out of his skull, and the sweat was pouring off him now.
“Please,” Longarm urged.
The cop nodded, his face gone white with fear, and carefully held his hand well clear of the butt of his revolver.
“Thanks,” Longarm said. “Now let me offer you a cheroot, friend, whilst you look over my badge an’ stuff.” Still holding the derringer, he reached inside his coat. He had never gotten around to cocking the small but viciously effective little weapon; after all, he hadn’t wanted to risk an accident if the Colorado City policeman did anything truly stupid like try to jump him.
Chapter 10
Longarm couldn’t believe he’d done that. It was stupid. Worse than stupid. It wasn’t like him to make dumb plays like that. For crying out loud … taking out a gun and waving it around at a local copper. Jeez, he wouldn’t have so much as had grounds for complaint if some local Good Samaritan had come along and back-shot him in an effort to help the copper out of a jam. Like, for instance, the storekeeper who’d turned him in to the police. Of course the man had done that. He was being a good citizen, that was all, reporting what he figured was a crime about to happen.
Hell, Longarm practically deserved the whole thing. For sure he knew better than to act like a crazed kid. He could have taken time to go to the damn jail with the policeman and establish his bona fides there. It wasn’t like there was any huge urgency for action here. Billy Vail was dead and gone. Nothing was going to change that. And no passage of time, not years and not decades, would keep Longarm and the other boys from hunting down and finding every last son of a bitch who had anything to do with the assassinations. Longarm decided he needed to put the damn brakes on and start thinking like a grown-up instead of charging off with his head up his ass.