Longarm and the Great Divide (10 page)

Longarm got the door open but there was no light burning inside. With no prisoners in the jail there had not been any reason to burn oil overnight. He turned to his prisoner and said, “Wait here while I find a match. I forgot t' grab mine when they rousted me out o' sleep.”

“I have some,” the man offered.

“Thanks.” Longarm accepted a pair of matches from the farmer and went inside, the prisoner close behind.

He felt his way to the desk and struck a match, pulled the lamp close, and touched the flame to the wick. A warm yellow light filled the small room.

“Back there.” Longarm motioned toward the cell at the back of the jail.

The prisoner walked inside docilely enough but when Longarm moved to close the cell door the man's eyes became wide and he shook his head vehemently from side to side. “No, sir,” he bawled.

“What?”

“Don't . . . don't close me in like that. I can't stand to be closed in.”

“Mister, you can see right past these bars. You shouldn't have a closed-in feeling about this.”

“No. Really. No.”

“I got to . . .”

Longarm did not have time to finish his sentence about what he had to do. The farmer stood up and bellowed, a roar that was not formed into words. And needed none.

Before Longarm could get the door latched shut the prisoner lunged, hands grasping, lips drawn back in a snarl.

And with a knife in his hand. Another knife that he had been carrying under the bib of his overalls.

Longarm had not thought to search the seemingly cooperative fellow. Now it was too late. Much too late.

Longarm swung the cell door shut in his face, but the man crashed through it, pushed it back into Longarm, who stumbled backward and nearly fell.

The prisoner lashed out with his knife blade, swinging and slashing crazily. It must have been the way he attacked those men in the saloon. Longarm did not want to wind up the same way—lying on the saloon floor. Not only did he not want to, he had no intention of it.

He sidestepped another swing of the knife blade and went for his Colt.

The sound of the big .45's muzzle blast filled the small jail building and momentarily destroyed Longarm's hearing.

A lead slug driven by forty grains of black powder struck the farmer in the brisket and knocked him to his knees.

The man looked up at Longarm. His mouth formed a wide O but no sound came out.

He looked down at the knife he still held in his right hand. Then he toppled forward on top of the weapon.

His feet drummed on the floorboards briefly and then he was gone.

“Shit,” Longarm muttered. He knelt beside the dead man and turned him over to retrieve the knife, which he put away on one of the little shelves built on the side of his desk in lieu of drawers.

He had not even gotten the man's name.

Longarm drew the dead man's legs out straight and crossed his arms over his belly, then pressed the eyes closed.

Finally he stood and went out into the pale starlight. He needed to go see to the situation at the saloon, see if the gutted man was dead and how badly the other two were hurt.

All that and he still had no idea what started the altercation. But then it was a saloon fight and the cause scarcely mattered anyway.

Longarm felt weary and a hundred years old as he walked slowly back toward Jason Potts's saloon.

“You had some trouble last night,” Jacob Potts said, sliding onto a stool at Longarm's side.

Longarm nodded. “At your brother's place.”

“Yeah, that's what I heard,” Potts said, “although I thought at first it was just a rumor. So there's a prisoner in our jail this morning?”

Longarm picked up an undersized pitcher of fresh milk and poured some into his coffee, then dumped the rest over his bowl of porridge, adding a generous measure of sugar on top of that.

“No prisoner,” he said. “Which reminds me. I need t' clean the floor in there, get rid o' all that blood if I can.”

“What happened?” Potts asked.

“I'm s'prised you ain't heard. You seem to get all the news from the other side of the line easy enough. Come t' think of it, how
do
you hear what goes on over there if there ain't no back and forth between you?”

Potts looked away. “A man just sort of hears things. Especially a man in my position. You know?”

“But how'd you hear this particular thing this mornin'?” Longarm persisted.

“Why, I think, um, I believe George might have mentioned it.” He paused for a moment, then nodded as if to himself. “Yes, I'm pretty sure it was George who said something about it.”

“And he would know about it how?” Longarm asked.

“I don't really know, but our customers, Jason's and mine, do sometimes cross the street.”

“I thought the cowboys were pretty much confined to one side or t'other,” Longarm said.

“They are, for the most part, but there is no law about it. And sometimes a man will want to come over to this side, like if he wants to change what brand he rides for or if he is just riding the grub line looking for work.” Potts smiled. “Not everyone around here works for one side or the other. Strangers passing through wouldn't know or care about our ways, Marshal. They could carry tales back and forth.”

“Or that old fellow selling water. He sells on both sides of the line, doesn't he?” Longarm said.

“Wallace Waterman, you mean,” Potts said. “Yes, he sells to both sides. We tolerate him.” Potts scratched the beard stubble beneath his chin. “Come to think of it, we could forbid Wallace to sell on the other side. The thirst might drive them away and then we would be left alone to do as we please.”

“How are the Nebraska people displeasing you as it is?” Longarm asked.

“Why, um, well,” Potts blinked rapidly, “they just sort of . . . do.”

“'Scuse me, Jacob. My porridge is getting cold.”

“Yes, of course.” Potts stood, hesitated for a moment, then walked out of the café. Longarm returned to his rapidly cooling breakfast.

Longarm spent the day being seen on both sides of the line, had supper on the Nebraska side, then paid Liz a visit.

“I was hoping you would come for supper,” she told him when he got there. “I had a place at the table laid for you.”

He smiled and took the lady into his arms. “Then how's about we settle for dessert instead.”

Liz's tongue fluttered inside his mouth as she reached for the buttons at his fly. And for what lay behind those buttons.

An hour later Longarm sat up and reached for a cheroot.

“Sleep here tonight,” Liz said. “I love sleeping next to you. Love the smell of you, the warmth. Please stay.”

He flicked a match aflame and used it to get the slender cigar lighted, then exhaled a cloud of aromatic smoke. “I better not,” he said. “If I happen t' be needed, like I was last night, it's best if they don't find me sleepin' in your bed. Besides, I got my rounds to make. Got to make sure all the proper doors are locked and there ain't no burglars about.”

“If you change your mind . . .”

“I'll know where t' come,” he said, leaning down to give the girl a kiss.

Longarm took his time with the cigar, then dressed and gave Liz one last kiss. Which threatened to last until morning, but he reluctantly pulled himself away and said, “I got to go now. Really, darlin'.”

He let himself out, knowing his way in the dark by now, and made sure the latch caught behind him. He paused for a moment on the porch, enjoying the cool of the night, then made his way across toward the jail.

The bright yellow of a muzzle flash blossomed in the night from beside the jail, and a bullet sizzled past his left ear like the buzz of the world's largest—and nastiest—bee ever.

Longarm hit the ground, Colt ready in his hand.

He heard the distant, muted thud of running footsteps.

Then the night air was silent but not so comfortably so as it had been just a few minutes earlier.

Some son of a bitch was gunning for him, seriously gunning this time, but he had no idea who. Nor why. He had placed only two men under arrest since he came to town and both of them were dead now.

But someone wanted him out of the way. He had no doubts about that. Someone wanted Deputy U.S. Marshal Custis Long dead.

He rose to his feet and made his way across the ruts of the central street. Checked the door of the jail. It was not locked, but then there had been no need to lock it earlier and he had left it that way.

A quick check inside found nothing out of place, at least nothing that was obvious.

There certainly was no one lurking inside with a gun in hand. He rather wished there had been. It would have been a pleasure for him to shoot the son of a bitch.

Lacking that, he walked back to the Nebraska side of the street and checked the doors along the sidewalk and around back through the alley. From there he crossed over to Wyoming and did the same on that side of the street.

The only businesses that were open were the Potts brothers' saloons, and those would stay open as long as there were customers. There was no law on either side to specify when a saloon could be open for business, so they were apt to stay all night if there was someone wanting to drink.

Longarm wondered if the unknown gunman had fled from beside the jail to refuge in Jacob's saloon. He very likely had, but customers were coming and going on a fairly regular basis at this hour so it would not be possible to identify the bastard that way.

Still, he gave it a try. George Griner could not remember the comings and goings of his customers.

“To tell you the truth, Marshal, unless I happen to know a man I don't pay any attention to their faces. They order a drink; I serve it, but I don't pay much attention to who's drinking what.”

Longarm grunted. He supposed that was possible. Although a genuinely good bartender not only knew the customers, he remembered what they drank. Longarm had known a man tending bar in Las Cruces, New Mexico, who served him a brandy flip one winter day. A year and a half later Longarm happened to walk into the same bar. The bartender immediately asked if he wanted another flip. Now
that
, Longarm thought, was a bartender.

George Griner was not in that man's league and likely never would be.

But he was what Valmere and Jacob Potts had so he would just have to do.

Just to be sure, Longarm walked across to Jason's place and asked the barman there the same question. He got the same answer from Revis as he had from Griner.

“I'm sorry, Marshal, but we've been busy this evening. There's been a steady flow. Fellas coming and going. I can't keep track of them. D'you want a beer or a whiskey or something?”

“I could stand a beer,” Longarm said. At least here on the Nebraska side he could get a good one, unlike across the street in Wyoming.

Revis drew one for him and Longarm took his time with it, standing with both elbows on the bar and facing into the room. He watched the crowd as they did indeed amble in and out, no one paying any particular mind to his presence.

Eventually Longarm gave up and headed for his bed across the way in Stella's.

At least this time no one shot at him.

It was pitch-black in his room when he wakened to a sensation of wet heat in his groin. His dick was hard so he must have been dreaming.

Then he heard a series of soft, slurping sounds to go with the sense of urgency in his cock.

Longarm smiled. And let himself relax to the sensations of a very deep, warm, wet, and experienced blow job.

He had no idea who had slipped into his room and started sucking him, but whoever it was was very good. Quiet, too, to be able to come into his room like that.

Longarm lay back and enjoyed what the girl was doing. Her touch was delicate, so soft he did not think she could bring him off. Especially after he was with Liz earlier in the evening. She had taken the edge off of his needs. Off his needs but not his desires.

He arched his back and pushed deeper into the girl's warm, wet mouth. Into the mouth and through to her throat, which he could feel tight around the head of his cock.

With a groan and a lurch of his hips, Longarm shot his cum, spewing hot into her throat.

The girl made a faint gobbling sound and grabbed at him so that for a moment he thought he must have hurt her, but she swallowed before she pulled away.

His cock felt cold when the night air found the moisture she had left behind. It sank back to its normal size, and he felt the girl kiss his dick and his belly.

“Thank you,” he said softly. “That was nice.”

“Good,” she said. “I wanted it to be.”

Longarm rolled onto one elbow and ran his hand over the back of her head.

“Do you mind if I light the lamp?” he asked. “I'd like t' see who you are.”

“No, it's all right.”

He felt on the bedside stand for his matches, struck one, and touched it to the wick of his lamp.

He smiled and caressed the side of the girl's face.

He could not remember this one's name but he had been seeing her daily—nightly, really—ever since he moved into Stella's. She was not pretty, a plump little thing with a bad complexion and small tits, but now he understood why she was so popular with the customers. The girl gave a blow job that was simply outstanding.

“I'd like t' ask you something,” he said.

“All right.”

“Why?”

The girl giggled and reached up to pet his flaccid cock. “You been here all this time, living right amongst us, but you never made a pass at any of us. We was beginning to think there was something wrong with you. Like maybe you got your dick shot off in a gunfight or something. So we was talking about this and decided one of us should come find out. We drew straws and I came up the winner.” She laughed and added, “Now I can go back and tell all the girls that there's not a thing in the world wrong with your dick. No, ma'am, there isn't.” She touched it again, lightly stroking it.

“Careful,” he said. “Keep that up an' you'll wake the wolf.”

“Promise?” she said.

“Promise.”

With a bubbly grin she began to suck him again. Once Longarm was erect she pulled away and said, “This time I'd like to feel it in my pussy if you don't mind.” With a sigh she said, “It's such a pretty thing.”

“I don't mind,” he assured her. “Now come up here beside me on this here bed.”

The girl threw her chemise aside and, naked, came to him.