"Yeah," Longarm said, "but the rub is that some poor deputy like me has to transport them to hell and back."
"I'm sorry," Billy said, not looking a bit sorry, "but I've given this matter some very serious consideration and you are definitely the best man for the job. In fact, you're the only one that I have complete confidence in regarding this particular prisoner."
"Is this prisoner a one-man army?"
Marshal Billy Vail had a cherubic face and a boyish grin that often won him an argument, and he used it now. "Actually, the he is a she."
Longarm collapsed into his chair. "The prisoner is a woman?"
"That's right," Billy said. "And she is quite young and beautiful."
"Well, hell," Longarm blurted out in confusion. "Why do you want me?"
"Because you know all the tricks that a beautiful woman will use on a man to get her way. And this woman is clever as a fox. Why, if I gave her over to the care and protection of a younger man, she'd have him wrapped around her little finger before they got beyond the city line. And she'd have him helping her escape before they were out of Colorado."
"Maybe you aren't giving your men enough credit."
"Oh," Billy said, "I don't mean to belittle our newer deputy marshals. We've some very good ones. But this job definitely needs a man like you who is well seasoned. Someone who has enough experience and maturity to handle bad women."
"How do you know I have that?"
"Come on, Longarm. There isn't a decent woman in Denver safe from your line of malarkey."
"Pure poppycock!" Longarm snorted. "I've never had anything to do with married women, or those that were fat, old, or ugly."
"How gentlemanly of you," Billy said, voice now dripping with sarcasm.
"Who is this woman that you want me to take to Yuma?"
"You'd know the answer to that if you'd read yesterday's newspaper," Billy said. "Her picture was even on the front page. Want to see it?"
"No," Longarm said, "I'd rather take one week vacation starting today and forget about this woman and about the territorial prison at Yuma."
Billy's smile melted. "Well, Deputy, I'm afraid that you do not have that choice. I need you to take Mrs. Lucy Ortega to Yuma as quickly as possible, stopping off at the town marshal's office in Prescott."
"Why the stop?"
"There's some question of exactly how Mrs. Ortega murdered her husband and where she hid the body. I'm hoping that the boys in Prescott will have filled in some of the pieces of this puzzle so that, by the time you get Mrs. Ortega to Yuma, there is a clear-cut case against her."
"You mean, there's some doubt if she killed her husband?"
"Not much of one," Billy said. "Just yesterday we caught Mrs. Ortega trying to board the train north to Cheyenne. She'd bought a transfer ticket to Omaha, and would have vanished into the East if we hadn't gotten a little lucky."
"I see," Longarm said. "Where's that newspaper with her picture on the front page?"
Billy reached down into his desk and opened the bottom drawer. He drew the newspaper out, unfolded it, and turned it around so that Longarm could see Lucy Ortega.
"Beautiful, isn't she," Billy said, craning his neck to see the picture he had already stared at longer than he cared to admit.
"Quite," Longarm agreed. "For a woman named Ortega, she doesn't look Mexican or Spanish."
"That's because she isn't. She's Irish. But her husband was a very wealthy Spaniard, son of a grandee or some such thing. Lucy was educated at an exclusive ladies school in the East. She went west, met this Spanish nobleman, and they were married. They were on their ranch in Prescott when they got into a loud argument and she killed him, then vanished. It was just luck that we snared her at our train station."
Longarm stared at the picture. Lucy Ortega was a real beauty, with long, dark, and lustrous hair. Her face was an oval, and Longarm could see that the picture must have been taken at her wedding because of her dress. She appeared as radiant as expected for a virgin bride.
"What kind of evidence is there against this woman?"
"There were witnesses," Billy explained. "Three of them that said they were just outside the room when they heard Mrs. Ortega shoot her husband during a violent quarrel."
"Heard?"
"That's right. They didn't actually see the shooting."
Longarm shook his head. "To tell you the truth, Billy, Mrs. Ortega sure doesn't look like a cold-blooded murderess to me."
"Do beautiful young women ever look like killers?" Billy asked softly.
"No," Longarm admitted. "I suppose not." He tore his eyes from the picture. "Is there anything else that you have to tell me about this miserable job?"
"Yes, I'm afraid so. This is going to be a prisoner exchange."
"A what?"
"A prisoner exchange," Billy repeated. "You'll be bringing back some female prisoners from Yuma."
"Damnation!" Longarm swore. "How many?"
"I'm not sure," Billy said, trying to smile. "Probably only a few, no more than... oh, at last count, a dozen."
"Jezus, Billy! A dozen women inmates! I quit!" Longarm jumped for the door, but Billy called out, "Wait. I've been assured that you'll be given more than enough help by the Arizona Territory officials. Please, be reasonable and hear me out, Custis. That's all I'm asking. Hear me out."
Longarm hauled up at the door and turned around. "When you say 'help,' how much and who?"
"I can't tell you for sure. I can promise you, however, that the Arizona Territory is footing the bill for a prison wagon in addition to a couple of their own lawmen who will accompany you and the female inmates back to Denver."
"Great," Longarm said with complete disgust. "I'm supposed to haul a wagonful of wicked women clean across a thousand miles of burning sand and sage then over a mountain range. Are you folks out of your minds!"
"Perhaps," Billy confessed, "but I have every confidence that you'll do just fine."
"Easy for you to say," Longarm growled.
"All right. I admit that this is not going to be entirely pleasant. That's why I've gotten permission to reward you with two full weeks of paid vacation beginning on the very day that you return."
"A month," Longarm said between clenched teeth.
"I beg your pardon?"
"This is going to be a murderous job and you know it, Billy. I want a full month."
"Out of the question!"
"I have it coming!" Longarm stood up and he was angry. "Look at me, dammit! I'm whipped. I haven't had a single day off in over a year! I'm getting burned out and I'm just about ready to quit."
"You wouldn't!"
"I would," Longarm said, his voice hard-edged. "This Central City job was close, Billy. Real close. You sent me into a hornet's nest with all them brothers, and it was only luck that kept me from getting gunned down."
"it wasn't just luck," Billy argued. "A man like you makes his own luck."
"Maybe, but it was close," Longarm said. "Now what's it to be? Do I get a month's vacation with pay or am I supposed to turn in my badge?"
Billy stood up and began to pace back and forth between his desk and the back wall. Longarm just waited. He figured he had Billy over a barrel and he wasn't about to let him slip off the hook.
"I'll tell you what, Custis. I might be able to get you three weeks. Might. How would that be?"
"Three weeks? All right," Longarm said after a few moments of hard deliberation. "But when I get back, if that three weeks isn't approved, I'm handing over my badge. Do you understand me?"
"Of course," Billy said, looking slightly offended. "I don't see how you could make it any clearer."
"Good," Longarm said. "Now, is there anything else I should know about this Mrs. Lucy Ortega that you've neglected to tell me? Anything at all?"
"No," Billy said, pursing his lips in concentration. "I think that it's all pretty well spelled out. She's young, beautiful, smart, and probably devious. You'll need to be on constant guard. She'll probably try to win your favor, playing to your manliness. But you can't let yourself get personally involved. Consider her to be like... like a coral snake."