Longarm #398 : Longarm and the Range War (9781101553701) (6 page)

“Benjamin, this is the gentleman I told you would be coming,” Tyler said.

The oldest of the three workers, a slender man with thinning, gray hair, looked up from his ledgers and smiled. He rose and came to the counter, where he extended his hand. “Benjamin Laffler,” he said.

“Custis Long,” Longarm said in return, taking the man's hand to shake.

“What can I do for you gents?” Laffler asked.

“I want to swear Custis in as a McConnell deputy, Ben. We need for you to witness the oath and record it.”

“Can we afford . . . ?”

“He will serve without pay,” Tyler cut in.

Laffler said, “In that case, Long, welcome to our county. Wait just a moment while I fetch a Bible and we can do this.”

Three minutes later, having affirmed his fealty, Longarm was a duly sworn officer of McConnell County, Wyoming Territory.

“There are some badges in my desk downstairs,” Tyler told him, “or you can just continue to use your own. Benjamin, do you have any extra keys to the sheriff's office?”

“I do. I'll get one for you.” He turned away and went to the back of the room, to a file cabinet, where he began rummaging inside a lower drawer. A minute later he was back with a key for the new deputy.

“Do you want to go down to your office?” Longarm asked when they were again in the hallway outside the clerk's office.

Tyler shook his head. “That would be too much, I think. I'd have to go down the steps outside then all the way around the building and down those steps too. It's just . . . Not until I get off these damned crutches, if you don't mind.”

“Makes no nevermind t' me, John, and in that case let's get you home. I'll beg one more cup o' Nell's good coffee and then go see what I can do toward having a saddle horse.”

“Fine,” Tyler said. When he was again settled onto the seat of the buggy, he grumbled, “These crutches might not be so bad except the damn things cut into my armpits no matter how Nell tries to pad them. Lordy, I will be glad when I can get rid of them.”

He drove to his house and as close as he could get to the front gate, then said, “If you don't mind taking it from here, this is the shortest way into the house.”

“Don't mind at all,” Longarm said.

Longarm secured the mare to a hitching weight, then helped Tyler down from the buggy and back to his chair on the front porch. He tapped on the door and told Nell they were back, then returned to the buggy and drove it around to the little barn in back of the house.

He stripped the harness from the mare and hung it, secured the horse in her stall, and parked the buggy under an overhang at the side of the barn. By the time he returned to the front of the house, there was a cup of steaming hot coffee waiting for him.

“Herself wants to know if you will be back for lunch,” Tyler said, inclining his head toward the house—as if there were any question just who he meant by “herself.”

“No, I expect not,” Longarm said, taking a swallow that quickly turned into a careful sip of the very hot coffee. “I'll get me a horse an' then see how things go from there. Any idea where I can find these sheepmen an' goatherds?”

“Easy enough. Just ride up the valley. You'll see their camps and their flocks scattered every damn place you look. There isn't any one person in charge of either bunch, though. They are all independent as hell. And twice as ornery.”

“All right then.” Longarm sat until he finished the coffee, then got up and excused himself. “I'd set an' visit awhile, but what I come here to do is serious stuff. Reckon I shouldn't keep it waiting for my laziness.”

“We'll expect you back when we see the whites of your eyes,” Tyler said, “whenever that might be.”

“Fair enough.” Longarm shook the man's hand and headed for Dwyer's livery.

“I'm looking for a fella name of Anthony,” Longarm said to the young man who was busy braiding horsehair.

The young fellow looked up from his work. “That would be me,” he said.

Longarm was surprised. Hostlers were generally older men who had decided to retire from the rugged work of a cowhand or wrangler but could not stand to completely give up the game. Anthony DeCaro was anything but that stereotype. He looked like a city boy—with the emphasis on “boy”—yet John Tyler had vouched for DeCaro's knowledge and abilities.

“I' m the . . .”

“I know who you are,” DeCaro said with a grin. “The whole town does. Probably the whole county by now.”

Longarm could only shake his head in wonder. The town of Dwyer seemed to have faster communications than Denver's telephone system could have offered. “I need . . .”

“I know what you need,” DeCaro said. “You'll be wanting a saddle horse to use while you're up here.”

“That's right,” Longarm said. “The sheriff said you know your horses and you're honest. He suggested I get you to pick something out for me.”

“I'll be happy to do that,” the young livery stable owner said. “First though I have a question for you. Are you looking for a horse that's fast or one that's steady? That is, do you expect to be chasing after someone or will you be riding off the road and want a horse you can count on to not stumble?”

“Steady,” Longarm told him. “If I do my job right, I won't have t' be running no horse races across bad country.”

“Then I have a good one for you. He won't win any races if you do get into any, but you can count on him to take you wherever you want to go without getting busted up like John was.”

“Then drag him out here, son, and let me take a look at him.”

The horse DeCaro brought in from a corral behind the barn was a light-bodied dun, perhaps fourteen hands tall or a finger less, with brown points and a small muzzle. The feet were so small and delicate Longarm wondered how the little horse would manage over rough ground.

“Don't be put off by his looks,” DeCaro said. “His blood is some foreign breed . . . I'm not sure exactly what . . . but he's tough as whang leather and twice as steady. Smart too. I saw him get his foot in a wrap of loose wire once. Most horses would panic and try to pull away. Pull their feet clean off if they tried that. This little guy stood there like a rock, like he had as much sense as a mule. He waited for someone to come and unwrap that wire from around him. Right then and there I decided to buy him, and I'm still glad that I did. If it tells you anything, he's the horse I ride myself when I go up in the hills hunting.”

“Your recommendation is good enough for me,” Longarm said, going around the horse and checking his feet one by one. The little dun gave his feet without a fuss and stood steady until Longarm was done with each.

“Turn around,” DeCaro said.

“All right, but why?” Longarm asked as he turned to face away.

“I'm not trying to admire your butt, marshal. I'm trying to decide what size saddle will you need.”

“Oh, I won't be needing a saddle from you. I brought my own. Left it at John's place, though, to avoid havin' to lug it over here. But I will be wanting the use of your bit and bridle. Whatever the horse is used to.”

“He has a soft mouth. A snaffle is all I use on him, though some customers demand a curb bit. No spades though. I won't permit a spade bit on any of my animals.”

“A snaffle is fine,” Longarm said. He normally used the army's tack on borrowed remount horses. The army used fairly harsh curb bits on all their horses. But then nearly all of their horses were rough and needed the extra control that the curb gave.

“Let me get one.” DeCaro stepped into the tack room of his barn and emerged moments later carrying a very handsome bridle and bit made of a deep red cordovan leather and decorated with German silver brightwork.

“You give your customers fine tack to use,” Longarm observed.

DeCaro smiled. “It's my own,” he said. “He's used to it.”

“Thanks for trusting me with it.”

The hostler shrugged. “John sent you. If he trusts you, so do I.”

“I'll give you a voucher redeemable from the federal government for the use of him. He'll be stabled behind the sheriff's place. I'm sure you know it.”

DeCaro nodded. “That's fine. I'll bring over some feed for him. That will be on my bill too. That way he won't be eating up what John has there.”

“Fair enough,” Longarm said.

DeCaro slipped the bridle over the dun's head and let him mouth the bit for a moment before he turned the reins over to Longarm. “I named him George, but of course he doesn't come to it no more than any other horse would. One thing he does well is ground rein. I wouldn't do that with any other animal I got here, but you can trust George on a ground rein.

“That's good to know,” Longarm said. He arranged the reins, then sprang onto the little horse's back. Touching the brim of his Stetson toward DeCaro by way of a salute, he nudged the dun in the side. As soon as they were out of the barn, he touched the horse again and lifted it into an easy trot back to the Tyler house to pick up his gear.

It was still fairly early in the day, plenty early enough to begin speaking with whatever herdsmen he could find in the valley.

A wisp of pale smoke was visible above a fold in the land about halfway up the west side of the valley. Longarm reined the dun away from the stream and nudged it into a trot. The horse crested the top of the rise, and Longarm could see a moving sea of woolly sheep—albeit a small sea—white against the brown and green of the rocky hillside.

A wagon, covered with canvas but with tall, wooden sides, sat on the uphill side of the sheep. A clutch of men squatted around a fire beside the wagon, while farther uphill there were three horses grazing. Two of the horses were heavy-bodied animals with broad butts and cropped tails. The other looked like an ordinary cow pony.

The sheep were under the watchful eyes of perhaps a dozen dogs that lay in the grass nearby, ready to fend off predators. Longarm saw a small bunch of ewes try to escape the flock. Instantly there was a dog racing to head them off and turn them back to the group. One of the men beside the fire stood and gave a series of whistles that seemed to mean something to the dog, which instantly charged the lead ewe, nipping and barking until the shepherd's commands were obeyed. Once the sheep were back in the flock, the dog lay down while the man resumed his seat by the fire.

Longarm kneed the dun ahead. When he was within a hundred yards of the fire, the men spotted him. Moving almost as one, they stood and picked up rifles that he had not noticed from a distance.

Well, Tyler's wire to Billy Vail had said there could be a range war brewing up here. These boys looked like they were ready to start the fight right here and now.

Longarm continued his approach at a slow walk, and as he neared the Basques, he held a hand up palm outward to show he posed no danger.

“Anybody here speak English?” he called.

“I do,” came an answer in a voice that sounded more Texas than Spain.

The speaker stepped forward. He was a lanky fellow with a mustache that drooped a good couple inches south of his chin. He wore a black hat with a Montana peak and a flat brim and sported a pair of revolvers, one hung at his right side and the other rigged for a cross-draw much like Longarm's outfit. Even from a distance Longarm got the impression that this fellow could be salty.

“Stop right there,” he said in a husky voice once Longarm was within a dozen yards of the fire. “State your business.”

“United States deputy marshal,” Longarm said, “so stand your men down or get ready to have hell come calling.”

The Texan turned and said something to the others, who quickly dropped the muzzles of their rifles. Several resumed squatting beside the fire and went back to a meal that Longarm seemed to have interrupted. To Longarm the English-speaking man said, “Come ahead, Marshal. We heard there was a federal man coming. Didn't know you was already here.”

Longarm approached the group but stopped the dun and dismounted a little way downwind so he would not kick up dust that could get into the pots of food dangling over the fire.

He dropped the reins, hoping DeCaro was right and the dun would stand to the rein without wandering off to graze, then he approached the Texan and stuck his hand out to shake. “Custis Long,” he said, “out of Marshal William Vail's Denver office.”

The gent shook and said, “Eli Cruikshank.” He added a small, slightly twisted grin that twitched the dangling ends of his mustache, and said, “Out of my daddy's balls in Bee-ville, Texas.”

“Pleased t' meet you, Eli. What's your deal in this? I hope you ain't here t' be part o' the war I heard was coming to a boil up this way.”

“No, not really. The bossman hired me 'cause I got a way with languages. Pick them up pretty easy. Good thing too because none of these boys can speak much in the way of English. I'm here to interpret more than anything else.”

“But if there was to come a shooting war?” Longarm asked.

Cruikshank's answer was a shrug. Which told quite enough. He was there to ride for the brand, so if things came to a fight, he would be in the thick of it. Looked like he could handle himself too. Longarm hoped he would not have to face the Texas boy across the barrels of their pistols . . . all the more so because Cruikshank seemed a likeable fellow and Longarm would hate to have to kill him.

“Come set,” Cruikshank said. “We're having a bite of dinner. You're welcome to share.”

“Thankee kindly.” Longarm fetched a tin plate and a cup out of a bucket close to the fire and helped himself to coffee, beans, and a chunk of some sort of meat. The Basques shifted somewhat away from him, as if he were contaminated with some disease that they did not care to catch.