The Old Gray Wolf (25 page)

“Uh … all I wanted was to—”

“Who is this—some butt-head from Boise City selling life insurance or dirty magazines?”

“Oh, no, ma'am. This is Ray Smithson from down by Plainview.”

Them Texans always like to tell you where they're from.
“Oh, I know Plainview—that's one of the nicest towns in New Mexico.” She waited. And not for long.

“Last time I checked the map,” Mr. Smithson said stiffly, “Plainview was in
Texas
.”

“It don't surprise me—when you rich Texicans want yourselves a town, you go buy it and haul it home.” She snickered. “I guess us poor folks in Colorado had better keep a close eye on Walsenburg and nail Trinidad to the ground with railroad spikes.”

Dead silence on the other end of the line.

Which served only to encourage the animated tribal elder. “So how's the weather down there where menfolk wear ten-gallon hats and the fancy ladies eat jackrabbit hash with fried armadillo eggs?”

“It's dry.” The retired lawman cleared his throat for a fresh start. “Is this Charlie Moon's ranch?”

“Last time he paid his taxes, it was. Whatta you want, Tex?”

“I'd like to speak to Mr. Moon.”

“I'd like to talk to Gary Cooper if he was here, but he's not—and neither is Charlie.”

“Oh. Well, then I guess I—”

“I'm Charlie's aunt Daisy, bub—you can talk to me. I know everything that goes on at the Columbine and what I don't know about my nephew ain't worth telling.”

“Uh, I checked with the Granite Creek police station and the dispatcher told me my granddaughter was staying there.”

Daisy's wrinkled face split in a wicked grin.
This is too easy.
“I'm sorry to hear that the girl's in the local lockup, but why d'you want to talk to Charlie about that?”

“No ma'am, you don't understand. My granddaughter's not in detention, she's—”

“So the jailbird's already got sprung, huh?”

The caller's flinty tone hinted that Ray Smithson might be getting a mite testy: “I was
told
that my granddaughter is staying out at Charlie Moon's ranch for a few days.” A belligerent pause. “Well, is she?”

“How would I know?” Daisy cackled a witchy laugh. “Does this habitual criminal write books about crooks?”

“That's her, all right.” Ray Smithson was suddenly hopeful. “Is Ellie at the Columbine?”

“Sure she is.”
Ellie?
Daisy frowned.
I thought she was Susan but sometimes I can't remember my own name. “
She's in her bedroom, resting, I guess.”

“Does she seem okay—I mean, Ellie's not feeling poorly?”

“Poorly?” Daisy snorted. “For breakfast, that young woman ate enough eggs and ham to founder a lumberjack.”

“Well—imagine that.” Ray Smithson chuckled. “Last time Ellie was at my place, she'd converted from being a red-blooded American meat eater to a vegetarian.”

“I'm sorry to hear it, Tex. This is a really interesting conversation—” Daisy faked a convincing yawn, “but I need to hurry off and count the flowers on my bedroom wallpaper. G'bye now.”

“Please don't hang up—can I talk to my granddaughter?”

“Sure—why didn't you say so in the first place?”
This is the most fun I've had all day.
“Hold on while I go get her.” Daisy left the phone hanging by its curly black cord and waddled her way down the hallway to bang her fist on Miss Whysper's bedroom door. “Hey—your grandfather's on the phone.”

The door opened a crack. “What?”

“Your Texican granddaddy wants a word with you, Ellie Mae.” Daisy pointed to the kitchen. “The phone's thataway.”

Miss Whysper shook her head.

“You don't want to talk to the old buzzard?”

“No, I don't. Please tell him that I just left.” Miss Whysper added in a whisper, “I'll call him after my business here is finished.”

“Okay.” Daisy waddled back the other way and picked up the telephone. “Ellie said to tell you she just hit the road, and she'll call you when she gets her business taken care of.”

“Oh.”

Daisy felt a pang of sympathy for the disheartened old man. “It ain't like it was when you and me was sprouts, Tex—young folk these days don't have any respect for their elders.”

“When do you expect Charlie Moon?”

“Soon as I see the big gourd-head come stomping through the front door, but he's gone off somewhere or other.”

“Does he have a mobile phone?”

“He does, but I can't remember the number. Anything else I can do to help you?”

“Uh—no, ma'am. I guess that's about it.”

“Goodbye, then.” She hung up the phone and turned to Sarah, who was scrubbing an iron skillet. “Did you already clean out the coffeepot—or is there still some dregs in the bottom I can drink?”

Sarah hadn't and there was.

FINALLY
,
A
BODY
CAN
REST

For those who prefer a degree of specificity, “finally” was five minutes later. Moreover, the atmosphere in the kitchen was serenely peaceful and, in Daisy's own words, “quiet as an abandoned badger's den under nine feet of snow.” Having no intimate knowledge of shadowy subterranean domiciles, we shall yield to the tribal elder's authority.

Sarah had wandered off to her bedroom to tend to whatever a lovesick young woman occupies her lonely hours with.

Miss Whysper was (Daisy presumed) busy with whatever people do who have nothing better to occupy themselves with than such foolishness as writing dopey books about slope-browed, back-alley criminals who pack blackjacks, brass knuckles, and switchblade knives.

Not that Charlie Moon's aunt gave either Sarah or Miss Whysper much thought as she sipped contentedly at the last three ounces of coffee in the kitchen. The old woman leaned against the cushioned back of her chair.
This is the life. Just sit on my butt with a cup of Folgers brew that's strong enough to grow hair on a dead man's chest and not worry about a thing in the world.
Which pleasant reflection was sufficiently soporific to cause her eyes to close, her old head to droop, her almost-toothless mouth to gape, and the almost-empty cup to begin slipping from her fingers.…

You can imagine what happened next. The cup crashed to the floor to shatter into a thousand and one smithereens, waking the old woman from her doze with a spine-jerking start and an oath that doesn't bear repeating.

Daisy was saved from the cup-shattering, oath-making scenario by—still another ring of the telephone. These confounded interruptions were getting to be somewhat tedious for Charlie Moon's cantankerous auntie. She banged the cup onto the table, pushed herself up from the chair, and stalked over to a great-great-grandson of Mr. Bell's invention, jerked the handset off the cradle, and shouted, “Well, who is it
this
time?”

The caller was one of those faultlessly polite souls who feels obliged to respond to all questions. “It's me, Daisy—Patsy.”

“Oh.”
I guess I ought to be nice to the woman Charlie's gonna marry.
“What can I do for you, toots?”

“Well … I'm expecting Miss Whysper this evening, but something unexpected has come up and I have to make a quick trip over to Colorado Springs.” Miss Poynter paused for a quick intake of breath and an admiring glance at her engagement ring. “I
should
get back home in time for my seven o'clock tea and cookies with Miss Whysper, but please tell Charlie's houseguest about my errand to the Springs … just in case I return a few minutes late.”

“Okay, I'll pass it on.” The tribal elder rolled her eyes.
All I am around here is a messenger.

“Oh, thank you
so
much.” Patsy made a kiss-kiss sound that nauseated the Ute elder. “Goodbye, now.”

The glum Indian hung up the telephone without a word, then toddled off down the hallway to knock on Miss Whysper's bedroom door and inform the tourist of this latest fast-breaking news—only to find the guest-bedroom door open and the inner sanctum vacant. Daisy snorted.
Well, I can't tell her if she ain't here.

True.

What the annoyed old soul
could
do was return to the kitchen and brew herself a fresh half pot of coffee. Which was her firm intention and the happy end upon which she focused her entire attention. But upon her arrival, Daisy Perika was highly chagrined to find out what was not in the red Folgers plastic canister. Ground coffee. There was nary a single, solitary grain. Nor was there a back-up supply of her favorite brand in the spacious walk-in pantry.
Well—ain't this is a helluva note!
All things considered (and from her Daisy-centered point of view), hers was an entirely justifiable complaint. After all, wasn't it Charlie Moon's legal obligation to ensure that a caffeine fix was always close at hand for his adorable auntie? (Check the box next to Yes!) And this oversight was no minor infraction. Indeed, his flagrant dereliction of nephewly duty was grounds for filing a lawsuit against her irresponsible relative. Enough said? No. As is her habit, Daisy was about to have the last word. As she slammed the pantry door:
Charlie is such a big gourd-head!

And her day had barely gotten started.

But as troubles are measured (on the logarithmic one-to-ten Perika scale), Daisy's vexations hardly moved the needle. Or, to put it another way: for other unfortunates hereabouts, the grumpy old woman's morning would have seemed like a June picnic in Granite Creek's U.S. Grant Park. Really. With the GC Kiwanis Club providing complimentary pulled-pork BBQ with iced lemonade and Charlie Moon's Columbine Grass making music lively enough to make a ninety-year-old cowboy kick off his boots and dance in the grass like all his toes was on fire.

 

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

A STRANGE GENTLEMAN IN TOWN (AND HE'S PACKING)

The descriptor (
Strange
) is not intended to imply that the newcomer was particularly odd or even mildly eccentric. In this neck of the woods, hard-looking characters who carry deadly weapons (concealed or in plain view) are considered run-of-the-mill until they employ said weapon in a manner that is deemed either unlawful (armed robbery of the Cattleman's Bank) or unseemly (shooting up a respectable pool room just for the fun of it). Nor is the gentleman characterized as strange merely because he was a stranger—though that is getting closer to the point. Surly passersby whose faces are unknown hereabouts are as common as blackflies in July.

His appearance was strange not so much because the gent was an unknown quantity in Granite Creek—but due to the fact that he was
deliberately
concealing his identity. Yes, like that Strange Lady in Town—and for similar reasons to those that motivated m'lady to assume the moniker Miss Whysper. (Which, in neither instance, deceives those happy few of us who are
in the know
.) This particular male tourist had slipped surreptitiously into Scott Parris's jurisdiction because he was concerned about being recognized—in this instance, by a particular young woman. If Miss Louella Smithson should spot him, his sensitive and secretive mission would be foiled. Thwarted. Stymied.

Which outcome would be vexing. Annoying. Aggravating.

So what was a professional gun toter to do? This one's tactic was to melt into the crowd of rowdy cowboy tourists.

Has his ploy been successful? Thus far, it would seem so.

He is practically invisible among the dozens of big-hatted stockmen in town for meetings of the Rocky Mountain Cattlemen's Association and the Western States Brand Inspectors. Indeed, had he been of a mind to, the Strange Gentleman could have insinuated himself into the intimate company of any of those cheerful souls who were enjoying a tasty T-bone at the Sugar Bowl, a cold brew in one of eleven local bars and saloons, or a serene stroll along Copper Street to soak up the high-altitude atmosphere of a sure-enough Colorado cow town where ranchers, miners, truckers, university academics, elected public servants, and other shady characters rubbed elbows and generally got along as well as might be expected, which is to say that most recovered from wounds inflicted.

But consider this aside: aside from helping themselves to a fried chicken blue-plate special and a chilled Coors, or doing some window-shopping on the town's main business thoroughfare—every once in a while one of those conference-attendee cowboys might feel the need for a sweet, high-calorie treat. Or even a morale-raising haircut and skin-scraping straight-razor shave. This is mentioned on account of the fact that when the stranger was purchasing a double-dip chocolate ice cream cone at the corner drugstore, he inquired of the friendly counter clerk, “What's the most popular barbershop in town?”

“That'd be Fast Eddie's—hands down.” The freckled youth, who had a gold-plated ring affixed to his left nostril (and spiked green hair), added a spatial dimension to his recommendation by pointing north. “Eddie's shop is about a block and a half up Copper. I get me a trim there once a month.”

Despite this dubious endorsement, the out-of-towner headed in the prescribed direction, licking the ice cream as he trod along Granite Creek's bustling, boisterous, bumper-to-bumper main street.

 

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

THE STRANGE GENTLEMAN IS NAMED

No, not identified.
Named.

Yes, there is a difference.

*   *   *

It was the busiest hour of a hectic day when Fast Eddie and his hireling barber looked up to see the slim, elderly figure push his way through the front door of the town's top-rate clip joint. Both barbers nodded politely at the newcomer and continued with their serious work—which was not what the casual passerby might think. An astute observer would conclude that cutting hair was merely a front, that honest trade practiced only to provide a cover for their actual, less admirable vocation: exchanging gossip with locals. Beyond a glance from one of a half-dozen benchwarmers and a couple of customers waiting for their turns in the chair, the stranger was barely noticed. Which was understandable, since there was little about him to attract attention in a county where skinny old men were outfitted in OshKosh B'gosh jackets, Dickies denim shirts with pearl buttons, faded Wrangler jeans, brown leather belts with shiny brass buckles, beat-up old cowboy hats, and scuffed boots. Such characters were as common as fleas on black alley cats. Except that this stranger had iron-gray hair with prominent sideburns and was outfitted in a perfectly pressed gray suit, shiny gray cowboy boots, and a gray London Fog trench coat (which he hung on a wooden peg provided for manly outerwear). His fine gray Stetson stayed right on his head, where it belonged.