Longarm and the Dime Novelist (11 page)

Longarm arrived at the Pennington house about seven o'clock that evening after the winter sun had set and everything was clothed in darkness. He studied the two-story Victorian only a moment and then opened the gate and walked quickly up to the front porch. He knocked and when there was no answer just as he'd expected, Longarm moved around the house looking for an easy entry. He found it in the back where a door to the kitchen had a latch and lock. Using a rusty shovel, it took him only a few minutes to pry the latch away and then he moved inside.

“Anyone home!”

He didn't expect an answer and didn't get one, but it didn't hurt to make certain that the house was empty. After a few minutes of fumbling around in the dark, Longarm found a kerosene lantern and moments later he was moving room by room through the house, looking for evidence of murder in the form of bloodstains or bullet holes. It took less than five minutes to cover the downstairs carefully enough to know that whoever had last been in the house had liked their liquor. There were whiskey and wine bottles stacked up on the kitchen table and remains of old, moldy meals along with dirty dishes.

“Pigsty,” Longarm said to himself as he headed for the upstairs bedrooms.

The second room that he entered was the spacious master bedroom with a large window that offered a view of the city lights just down the hill. The bed was enormous and unmade. Longarm slowed his search, looking very carefully at the bedsheets and pillows. He saw lipstick and a woman's rouge on the pillowcases and there was a big mirror suspended on velvet cords from the ceiling directly over the bed. Piled on the floor in a corner near the bed were expensive women's nightgowns and underwear; most interesting because they were of all different sizes. There was an ashtray spilling over with cigar butts, all Cuban. On the walls were some very good nudes including one with a grinning man with a huge erection standing next to a smiling girl spread-eagled on a bed who looked to be about fourteen. The girl was blond and buxom.

“Delia would have appreciated this seducer's lair,” he said with a trace of amusement.

On the other side of the bed were a man's rumpled clothes and a bathrobe with Oriental designs that still reeked of cologne. Two empty bottles of champagne lay on a Persian carpet and in the closet were a dozen silk shirts and eight pairs of shoes and boots. Everything was in disarray and the room gave Longarm the impression that it had been hastily vacated. Longarm also found a couple of opium pipes, which told him even more.

He bent down and studied the Persian carpet, finding a few strands of long blond hair but no bloodstains. What it looked like, Longarm decided, was a bedroom you would expect to find in a very expensive New Orleans whorehouse.

Longarm scowled and held the lamp up overhead taking one last look around and trying to gauge Maxwell Pennington. It wasn't hard to deduct that the man was something of a pig and a wastrel . . . someone drawn to debauchery and sexual orgy.

A pure hedonist.

Longarm could find nothing else of interest or evidence of foul play. He frowned with disappointment and headed for two more bedrooms across the hall. One of them was large and neat. The walls were filled with bookshelves stocked with tomes mostly relating to American and English history. A heavy leather chair looked well used, and there were notes on a desk table along with writing materials. Longarm set his lamp down on the table, took a seat and thumbed rapidly through the papers, quickly learning that they were banking, mining, and assay reports. And although he was unfamiliar with such reports, it was easy enough to see that the accounts painted a very bleak financial picture for the Empire Mine.

Two letters were from creditors demanding payment and threatening lawsuits if money was not immediately forthcoming.

Longarm surveyed the room, noting the oil paintings of well-recognized American landscapes, the neatly made bed, the lack of empty liquor bottles or overflowing ashtrays. This room could not have been more different from the one across the hall and, if he had to guess, it had belonged to the elder and missing Mr. Pennington.

Longarm was about to leave when something on the floor caught his eye. It was the rug and it was pushed up against a wall so that it was slightly bowed. Normally, such a small thing would not have caught his attention, but the rest of the bedroom was so orderly that it seemed odd.

“Hmmm,” he mused aloud, staring at the round rug, which was roughly six feet in diameter, and then on impulse tugging at it. It seemed to be cemented to the floor, and he had to put the lantern down and really put his back to it to tear the rug up from the floor. He tossed it aside and then picked up the lantern for a closer look.

“Oh, my,” he said, taking in a sharp breath, because under the rug and no doubt causing it to feel pasted to the floor was a very large, crusted, and blackened pool of blood.

“Murder,” he said to himself as he found his pocketknife, unfolded the longest blade, and began to scrape at the blood. “Someone was murdered right here in this room and the rug was either pulled over to conceal the stain, or else dragged in from another part of the house. Not that it matters.”

Moments later, he was digging a misshapen lead bullet out of the hardwood floor. “Forty-five caliber.”

Longarm refolded his knife and dropped it along with the bullet into his pocket, and then he looked around for a few more minutes finding nothing.

“So where is the body?” he asked, before briefly checking the last bedroom and finding nothing.

Downstairs, he walked around for a few moments lost in thought and then he remembered that rusty shovel that he'd used to pry off the back door latch. He also remembered he had seen a miner's pick.

Longarm hurried outside and searched the backyard, looking for the sign of a recent burial. It didn't take him long to see where the hard, rocky ground had been overturned as evidenced by clods. Longarm toed the dirt and thought it felt spongy and loose, unlike the surrounding yard dirt.

He studied the ground and considered attacking it with the rusty pick or shovel and immediately rejected the idea. In the dark with only the lantern, he might overlook or disturb something important. Better, much better to wait until tomorrow and then return with at least one or two observers.

Dan DeQuille immediately came to mind along with Delia.

“Yes,” he said, “and besides, I'm hungry and Delia is waiting. Tomorrow we will find out what is buried in the Pennington backyard.”

Would it be poor, foolish Miss Emily Pierce, or would it be the senior Mr. Pennington? Or maybe it would be one of the Virginia City ladies of the night that made had the fatal mistake of coming to party with Maxwell Pennington before being brutalized, perhaps even sodomized, cruelly tortured, and then sadistically murdered.

“So,” Delia said, wringing her hands together with ill-concealed excitement. “It looks like we are going to find the body of either Emily or the senior Mr. Pennington.”

“It could be something or someone else,” Longarm told her. “We'll just have to wait and see. But I want Dan DeQuille to be there with us when we dig so that we have a reputable witness.”

“To murder.”

“I wish it were that simple.”

“What do you mean?”

Longarm paused. “I mean that even if it
is
a body and we can identify it as belonging to Emily or the senior Mr. Pennington, it's going to be a difficult to prove that the person was murdered by Max Pennington.”

“But you just showed me the bullet and told me that a rug had been . . .”

“I know,” Longarm said. “But let's suppose it is the father. And let's assume that Maxwell Pennington isn't stupid. So if you or I were Maxwell, would it really be that hard to claim that his father or the girl had perhaps gotten a hold of a gun and a bottle and gone crazy? Crazy enough to have committed suicide?”

Delia's eyes widened. “What?”

“Suicide or an accident,” Longarm told Delia. “That's what any reasonably intelligent lawyer defending Maxwell Pennington would claim. And how in the world could that be disproved?”

“But why would a beautiful girl or a decent, respected man like Mr. Pennington shoot themselves?”

“Let's just suppose I am the lawyer defending charges against the younger Mr. Pennington. I'd most likely say that the girl was lovesick and when Maxwell made it clear that he was just using her for sex and was going to cast her aside, she shot herself.”

“Oh, come on!”

“And if we exhume a corpse and can actually prove it is the elder Pennington, a defense attorney would likely claim that the man had committed suicide because of impending financial ruin and humiliation. It happens, Delia. And that would be enough to get Maxwell off free and clear.”

Delia threw up her hands. “I can't believe that you're telling me this.”

“I am because I've seen it happen time and time again. A man with money hires a good defense attorney and then spins a tale that can't be proven or disproven. Because of the doubt, a jury has no choice but to come to a verdict of not guilty.”

“But . . . but we both know that Maxwell Pennington is a vile womanizer and probably has been cheating his father on the mine income for years.”

“Yes, but being a womanizer isn't the same as a murderer nor is cheating one's father out of money.”

Delia's fists balled in frustration. “Custis, you and I both know that Maxwell Pennington is behind the disappearance of both Emily and his father.”

“We
suspect
he is, but we aren't completely certain.”

“Then how—”

“I don't know,” Longarm interrupted. “But what I do know is that we have to go to Fallon and meet the man and then figure out some way to get evidence of murder . . . one murder, preferably two.”

“I won't sleep tonight thinking about what we might dig up tomorrow in that backyard.”

“Do your best, Delia.”

“I'm going to take some notes after we eat. Any problem with that?”

“None at all,” Longarm replied. “What I do know is that tomorrow . . . unless we dig up a dog or something completely unexpected . . . we are going to give Mr. DeQuille one of the best stories he's had in years.”

Longarm slept well that night but Delia had not. There were dark circles under her eyes and she was out of sorts. “I swear I don't know how you can sleep so soundly when there is so much on the line today.”

“Why worry about it?” Longarm asked. “Either we find a body or we don't. And like I said last evening, even if we can identify them, that doesn't offer proof that Max Pennington will be convicted of murder.”

Delia turned away from their upstairs hotel room window. “I'm ready to go and find Dan DeQuille.”

“It's only seven o'clock. I'm sure he isn't in his office yet.”

“Well, can't we find out where the man lives and hurry this along!”

“Take it easy, Delia. Let's have a good breakfast and then we'll go find the editor.”

Delia was ready to go and when they went downstairs, the surly old guard from the Empire Mine was sitting in the lobby with his rifle resting across his knees.

“Uh-oh,” Delia said. “I think we've got a problem.”

“Stay back and let me handle this,” Longarm ordered.

Pete stood up and it was clear by the look on his face that he was furious. “I hear that you were snoopin' around the Pennington house last night.”

“Who told you that?”

“It's a small town and there aren't many secrets.”

“All right,” Longarm said, “I was at the house last evening. I'm a United States federal marshal and I don't have to explain my actions to you.”

Pete's mouth twisted and he spat, “Mr. Pennington pays me not only to watch over his mine, but also his house when he's gone. Did you break into it?”

“Yes, I did.”

Pete swore and tried to yank his rifle up, but Longarm was ready and drove a wicked uppercut into the man's stomach. Pete folded up and collapsed to his knees, sucking for air. Longarm grabbed the man's rifle and tossed it aside.

“Get up!” Longarm commanded, grabbing Pete by the collar and jerking him to his feet.

“I'll get you for that,” Pete managed to wheeze.

Longarm propelled the man over to a corner away from Delia and two other gawking guests. “Pete,” he said in a low voice, “I found a lot of blood in an upstairs bedroom covered by a rug. And in the backyard there's fresh evidence of a grave. You are coming with me to the house this morning and if I find a body or even suspect that you've had anything to do with murder, I'll take you down to Reno and put you in their jail. You'll be charged as an accomplice to murder . . . and I suspect you were paid to do the job all by yourself.”

“What!” Pete's jaw dropped. “I ain't ever killed someone except twice when it was in self-defense.”

“You can tell that to a judge and jury. Now where can I find the editor of the
Territorial Enterprise
, Dan DeQuille?”

“He lives alone in a room behind the newspaper office. What has he got to do with anything?”

“He's going to be a witness and get a story . . . one way or the other.” Longarm collected Pete's rifle and motioned for Delia to join them. “Pete is coming along with us this morning. In fact, he's going to do the digging.”

“The hell you say!”

Longarm drew back his fist. “You'll dig, and you better hope that we don't find a body or you're under arrest.”

“I didn't kill anyone!”

“If we find a body, you can tell that to a Reno judge.”

 • • • 

Forty-five minutes later, Longarm, Delia, DeQuille, and Pete stood in grim anticipation behind the Pennington house.

“Right there,” Longarm said, pointing. “Start digging, Pete.”

DeQuille said, “I'd like to go upstairs and see that pool of dried blood.”

“Go ahead,” Longarm told the man. “Delia, you came with me wanting some ‘real' crime to inject into your dime novels. Maybe you'd like to accompany Mr. DeQuille for a few minutes?”

She gave him a quick, emphatic shake of her head. “No. I can imagine what a big pool of dried blood looks like.”

“It also has a smell,” Longarm informed her. “But you'd have to put your nose closer to it because it isn't fresh.”

Delia blanched and looked like she was going to get sick.

“It's one thing to spin a yarn with a lot of blood and guts being spilled,” Longarm said, intent on driving home a point to the intrusive dime novelist, “but quite another to actually see the real thing.”

“I . . . I never had a real stomach for seeing death,” Delia admitted. “And if there's a decaying body under this backyard, I don't even want to be near it.”

“Maybe you should go back to the hotel and wait.”

“I'll wait off a ways,” she decided.

“Pete, start digging.”

The man grabbed the shovel that Longarm had used the night before to pry off the latch to the back door. “I ain't got anything to do with no murders,” he declared.

“Just dig!” Longarm ordered.

In less than five minutes, they uncovered a corpse and it was easy to see that it belonged to a man. Longarm grabbed the corpse by the ankles and with Pete's help, they pulled it out of the shallow grave. It looked even worse than it smelled and Delia rushed down the hill toward town, a handkerchief pressed to her face.

“Mr. DeQuille, you can see the suit and tie and there is an expensive ring on the finger. Is this the body of Mr. Pennington?”

“Yes,” DeQuille said quietly. “There's no doubt about that.”

Longarm took a deep breath and quickly examined the decaying corpse. “The back of his head was smashed in so we know for certain that he was murdered.”

“It must have been Maxwell,” DeQuille said quietly. “He and his father were very much at odds for the last few years.”

Longarm quickly searched the man's pockets. It was a grisly task but one that had to be done. He found a wallet and some change along with a pocketknife and little else.

“Well, Pete,” Longarm said, quickly finishing this work, “as of right now you are a suspect in the murder of Mr. Pennington.”

“Why me? I had nothing to gain by his death!”

“I'm not so sure of that,” Longarm said, walking away with the others following. “You might have been working in cahoots with Maxwell because it's clear that you were being paid by the son and not the father. At the very least, you might have been the one who helped Maxwell bury his father.”

“And why would you think that?” DeQuille asked, notepad out and scribbling furiously.

“Because this ground is as hard as a rock. It would have required a great deal of effort to dig . . . to almost chisel . . . that grave. I have never met Maxwell but from what I've heard and seen in the house he doesn't seem like the kind of a man who would go to that much hard physical effort. It would have caused blisters on the palms of his hands and a great deal of exertion.”

“That's a good conclusion,” DeQuille mused. “Even trying to plant a small rosebush in this flinty ground is a major undertaking.”

“So,” Longarm said, turning back to Pete, “that means that Maxwell Pennington had to have had some muscle and you are the prime suspect.”

Pete backed up against the house, eyes flicking from Longarm to DeQuille and then down to the corpse. Suddenly, he screamed an oath and came at Longarm with the shovel.

Longarm wore his Colt on his left hip, butt forward, and his hand shot to the weapon and yanked it free when Pete was almost on top of him. He fired and the shovel sliced down and hit him on the left shoulder. The pain was instant and intense, but Longarm fired once more and Pete went down twitching, one leg dropping into the newly unearthed grave.

“You helped Maxwell Pennington bury his father!” Longarm shouted at the dying man. “Go out with a clear conscience, damn you! Admit that it was you or Maxwell who killed that man!”

Pete's eyes were glazing over and there was a bloody froth on his lips. They moved and Longarm bent close to hear the man's last words of confession.

“Fuck . . .
you
!”

The pencil and notebook slipped from DeQuille's hand and fell to the earth. He shook his head and studied the two bodies. “This is going to be a great story, but one I'd rather not have written. Mr. Pennington was a good and decent man and he sure didn't need to die like that and be buried in a shallow hole in the ground.”

“I know he was your friend and I'm sorry.”

DeQuille sighed. “I guess the thing to do next is for us to walk back to town and find our only remaining undertaker. I really don't have the funds to give Mr. Pennington the burial he deserves and as for Pete . . .”

“The ring,” Longarm said, removing a ring from Pennington's finger. “It's gold with a large diamond. I'm surprised that Maxwell didn't take it before he buried his father. I guess he decided that it would link him to the murder and it was a risk he couldn't afford to take. Use it and whatever money is in the wallet I retrieved along with the value of the ring to pay for an impressive funeral.”

DeQuille agreed. “I'll do that and if there is money left over, I'll give it to a worthy charity. But I'm curious about something.”

“What?”

“How can you disprove that old Pete didn't murder Mr. Pennington and bury him with the same shovel you made him use to unearth the poor man?”

“I can't,” Longarm confessed. “But I'm going to Fallon and I'll find Maxwell and play the best hand I can think of in order to get a full confession.”

“You'll run a bluff,” DeQuille guessed.

“Yes,” Longarm admitted. “Because it's really all I can do.”

“I don't think Maxwell will bluff. He's not one to scare or panic and he's smart.”

“Then there is always torture,” Longarm said quietly. “If he is guilty of killing the entire Pierce family and then his own father, you can bet your bottom dollar I'm not going to let him get away with it.”

“I'm never going to tell anyone what you just said about torture,” DeQuille said quietly. “But in this case, justice must be served and I wouldn't hold it against you to use whatever force was necessary.”

DeQuille looked at Pete's body. “Did he really say what I think he said with his dying breath?”

“Yes. Pete was a hard and dangerous man. He said he'd never killed anyone except in self-defense, but I don't believe that even for a moment.”