Longarm and the Yuma Prison (12 page)

It was a very good thing, Longarm thought, that there were
two
liveries in Yuma because he was very sure that the man who had rented him the good blue roan gelding wouldn't be inclined to renew their relationship.

“Howdy,” the man at the Rolling River Stables said sticking out a hand that closed around Longarm's like a bear's paw. “You're that new marshal from Denver!”

“That's right. How'd you know?”

“Yuma is not all that big and those two deputies you beat the hell out of bought one of my old buggies and left town just a while ago. My gawd but they were in terrible shape! I told 'em they should be in a hospital instead of heading out of town over potholed desert roads but they wouldn't wait.”

“They were both rotten to the core.”

“I know that,” the liveryman said. “My name is Buck. Those deputies were a terror and people feared them. They tried to extort money from all the small businesses in Yuma and when they come around here they made it clear that they would start poisoning my rent horses, and if I
still
wasn't willing to pay, then they'd kill me!”

“So you paid?”

Buck threw up his big, work-roughened hands. “What else could I do? I have a wife and two fine sons. I didn't want to die and nobody would buy this business.”

“Well,” Longarm said, “you won't have to worry about that anymore.”

“Maybe Marshal Beeson will hire a couple just like the pair that you beat almost to death.”

“No, he won't,” Longarm told the man. “And do you want to know why?”

“Sure!”

“Because before I leave Yuma your marshal is going to be either dead, run out of this town, or living up on Prison Hill.”

Buck smiled widely. “That would be real fine! Now if you could also find a way to get sever the tentacles of that octopus Mitch Lang and send him packing, we might even have a future here in Yuma.”

“I'm working on it,” Longarm told the man. “What I need is a horse and buckboard.”

“What for?”

“I'm going to collect some valuable cargo,” Longarm said, purposely vague.

“I got a small buckboard and a good pulling horse that you'll like. But if you're heading up the river you have to be damned careful not to get my wagon mired down in any patches of quicksand.”

“I'll be careful.”

Buck looked into his barn. “How long will you be needing the horse and wagon in this afternoon heat?”

“If all goes as planned, I'll be back in three or four hours. Right about sundown.”

“Good enough,” Buck said. “You just set easy in the shade and I'll get you hitched up and ready to roll in no time at all.”

“How much is this going to cost?”

Buck smiled. “It's free.”

Longarm offered a mild protest. “Buck, you can't make a living renting out your horses and wagons for free.”

“This time is free because I won't be paying any more extortion money to those deputies nor will my wife be worrying herself sick about them killing or beating me to death. Marshal, you're doing this town a huge favor and damned if I don't want to show my gratitude!” Buck pointed. “I see you're packin' a six-gun but no rifle.”

“That's right.”

“Why don't you borrow my old Winchester?”

“You think I might need it?”

Buck winked. “You've made some people here mighty unhappy and you're going off by yourself. Besides that, you might come across a couple of rattlesnakes.”

“I wouldn't kill them with a rifle.”

Buck thought about that for a moment and then he smiled and said, “You're absolutely right, Marshal. What you need is to borrow my big old double-barreled shotgun. Sometimes those rattlers run in packs . . . if you catch my drift.”

“Buck, I think you've got something there. Thanks.”

 • • • 

Twenty minutes later, Longarm was driving a small, flat-bedded wagon through the town and then turning north on the road that followed the river. When he'd ridden the blue roan he'd made far better time but the horse Buck had hitched to the wagon was a short but chunky sorrel mare that was steady and moved along at a slow but even pace. She had the smallest, cutest ears Longarm had ever seen on a horse and she flicked them back and forth with every stride.

When he came in sight of the
NO TRESSPASSING!
sign, Longarm stopped and examined the shotgun. Satisfied and with a half-dozen extra shotgun shells in his pockets, he drove on toward the gold mine.

“Hold up there!” a stranger shouted, grabbing a Winchester and coming forward. “This here property is off limits to everyone but those that own it or work it.”

Longarm looked past the man toward the mine, eyes searching for Albert or Carl but not seeing either man. “I came looking for a couple of your workers, mister. No need to point that rifle at me.”

“Who the hell are you?” The rifleman was almost dancing with excitement. “You be a lawman from Denver!”

It came to Longarm in a flash. This man was newly hired and he'd been warned to shoot on sight . . . especially if the intruder was a federal marshal from Denver.”

“No, sir.”

“Then state your name and your business!”

Longarm mustered up a disarming smile. “Well, I came to sell you some whiskey.”

“You got whiskey?”

“I do.” He glanced over his shoulder.

The man lowered the rifle a bit and started to move around so that he could see into the back of the wagon. In the brief instant when he was looking where he shouldn't, Longarm's hand flashed across his waist and out came his Colt in one smooth motion. The rifleman tried to turn and fire but he was too late. Longarm whipped his gun across his body and fired, striking the man in the forehead and blowing a hole out the back of his skull.

A moment later, two others burst out of the mine. When they saw Longarm jumping off the wagon and grabbing the Winchester, they both made a dive for the rifles resting just inside the mine. Longarm opened fire, levering the rifle as fast as he could, and the pair went down kicking. Longarm ran over to their sides and saw that one was dead, the other was shot in the gut.

“Where are Albert Dodd and Carl Wittman!” he yelled, kneeling beside the dying man. “Where are they, damn you!”

The miner looked up at Longarm and a bloody froth came out of his mouth when he hissed, “We killed them turncoat sons o' bitches! Shot and dragged their bodies out into the river and let 'em sink for the catfish to eat.”

Longarm sagged with defeat. The eyes of the man began to glaze over with death and Longarm knew he'd heard the truth.

Their witnesses were dead. And now, not even Judge Peter Hamilton was going to declare that Tom Ray had acted in self-defense.

Longarm was furious not only with the three killers he'd just shot but with himself for not coming sooner to collect the two critical witnesses. Now what in the hell were they going to do?

In his fury, Longarm was not inclined to load the three bodies onto the rented wagon and take them back to town. There would be many questions to answer and it would only complicate an already impossible situation.

He paced back and forth in front of the mine for several minutes as flies buzzed overhead and the short, sorrel mare flicked her eyes rapidly to keep them off her face. He looked at the last wheelbarrow load of rocks that had been taken from the mine and studied them for flecks of gold and found none. He then went to a small tailings pile and studied the most recent rock that had come out of the mine and found that it was almost devoid of quartz.

“They've run out of gold and the mine isn't producing much if anything anymore,” he said to himself.

But what to do now?

Stopping, he saw a couple of sticks of dynamite and reached a quick decision. With sweat pouring down his face, he dragged all three bodies all the way back into the mine then hurried outside and grabbed two sticks of dynamite. He wrapped their long fuses together and lit them then ran about ten feet into the mine and hurled them back into the darkness.

Toward the three bodies. He whirled and raced outside and he didn't stop or slow down until he had a good hold on the mare.

The explosion was muffled but a storm-like cloud of rock dust belched from the mouth of the cave, and the sorrel mare backed up in terror.

“It's all right,” he told the frightened animal. “It'll just be the two of us heading back to Yuma. Soon, you'll be back in your barn and I'll be trying to figure out what I'm going to do next.”

Longarm climbed back onto the wagon and studied the scene. The camp was littered with empty cans and bottles. He could smell man shit and the flies were thick and menacing. But just a short ways away the Colorado River rolled on, brown with silt, but placid and with a touch of sunlight dancing on its ripples. And somewhere under that deceptively slow surface two bodies were bouncing along on the riverbed headed toward the Gulf of Mexico. Maybe they were just now passing Prison Hill.

It all made a man wonder.

“Let's go,” Longarm told the mare as he turned the wagon back toward Yuma, trying to imagine how he was going to break this terrible news to Jessica, Kent, and Peter Hamilton.

They were crowded into Kent and Jessica's hotel room, heads bent in thought, saying nothing in response to the news that their two key witnesses were now fish bait. Finally, Longarm said, “Albert and Carl were good, simple miners. I really feel bad for what happened to them and know they didn't deserve their sad fates.”

Judge Peter Hamilton came to his feet. “You didn't say what happened to the three men that were at the mine when you arrived.”

“They're gone.”

The brothers looked at him for an explanation, but Longarm wasn't about to tell them that story. These men were judges and they operated strictly by the letter of the law. Telling them that he'd had to kill three more men was just going to make things even more difficult for everyone. Besides, those three had intended to kill him but he'd just gotten the job done a little quicker.

“So where are we now with a new trial?” Jessica asked. “We can't give up and allow my father to rot on Prison Hill! He's thin and he's aging fast. And all the while they're taking a fortune in gold out of our mine!”

“No, they're not,” Longarm said, surprising everyone. “I walked clear into the mine and the quartz and gold has run out . . . or very nearly so. The vein that they were working has gone dry. My hunch is that they were just taking out enough to pay expenses.”

Jessica let out a wail. “Then everything is gone!”

“It always happens,” Kent said quietly. “You know that gold veins peter out sooner or later.”

“But . . . but that means that everything that has happened to my father has been for nothing!”

“Not so,” Longarm told her. “I'm sure that Mitch Lang, the marshal, and the judge profited greatly from the gold they extracted before the vein ran out. They have stolen from you and your father and they're going to have to pay.”

“How?” Jessica looked to all of them. “How can we know how much gold they took out of our mine before it went bust?”

No one had an answer to her question, but Longarm said, “Let's set a figure.”

“You can't do that,” Peter told him.

“Oh,” Longarm said, “I think we could safely say that they took out at least twenty-five thousand dollars . . . or should we make it fifty?”

The brothers stared at him as if he might have gone daft. Longarm didn't care. It had been a bad day and he was ready to have a little fun. “I think it ought to be fifty thousand and that being the case I'm going to retrieve that much value in money, property, or whatever from those three thieves and murderers.”

“Now wait just a minute,” Peter cautioned. “You can't just confiscate their bank accounts and property.”

“Sure, I can. But I'll wait until after you've sent them up to Prison Hill or I've sent them to hell.”

No one said a word but just kept staring. Finally, Longarm barked a laugh. “Stop looking like we're finished and they've won. Jessica, the night that your father had to draw his gun and kill those two men cheating him at cards there had to be at least a few people who saw what was going on and could offer testimony if they weren't afraid of being killed.”

“That's true,” Kent said. “But I asked everyone and nobody would admit to seeing exactly what happened before the gunfight.”

“Well,” Longarm told them, “I'm going to start asking the same question all over again and I'm going to find a witness or witnesses who will testify in Tom Ray's behalf. In fact, I'm going over to the Cactus Saloon and start asking questions right now.”

“I should go with you,” Kent said.

“No,” Longarm told him. “You and your brother lock your doors and don't let anyone in before I return. You have guns and you all know how to use them so I think you'll be fine. Oh, and don't show your lamp-lit faces in the window in case there is already a newly hired marksman sitting on some rooftop across the street.”

“Okay,” the brothers said. “But be careful out there. You're as much of a target as we are.”

“Probably even more, if I may flatter myself,” Longarm said with a grin.

 • • • 

The Cactus Saloon was busy, and Longarm ordered a beer and stayed at the bar just watching. The crowd was having a good time, and there were three reasonably attractive whores working on the floor and taking men out the back door on a regular basis, probably to some shack or room off the alley.

“Marshal, you are very good for my business,” the bartender said. “Your beer is on the house.”

“Thanks. Why am I good for business?”

“Because a lot of people here no longer have to worry about making a monthly payment in order to stay in business, myself included.”

Longarm nodded with understanding. “Those deputies must have been collecting a lot of money every month.”

“More than you can even imagine,” the bartender said. “I owned this place for six years before Marshal Beeson and his hired guns arrived and made a deal with the devil to run Yuma.”

“The devil being Mitch Lang.”

The bartender and owner threw up both hands palms forward. “I didn't say that. I didn't say that at all.”

“You didn't need to,” Longarm told the man as he quaffed down his beer. “But I'll still take you up on a the free beer.”

“As many as you want, Marshal.”

Longarm leaned his elbows on the bar and watched the people, wondering which of them might have witnessed the gunfight that sent Tom Ray to Prison Hill. His eyes came to rest on one of the “working girls” who had reddish hair and the vestiges of a black eye.

“Who is that?” he asked when the bartender laid him a fresh beer down.

“That would be Loretta. She's been a steady here for almost a year.”

“Someone really popped her in the eye.”

“Marshal Beeson did that,” the bartender said quietly. “That big bastard is rough on the girls. It's gotten so that they aren't willing to service him anymore but he can be very persuasive so sometimes they have no choice. I pity them for having to lay down for the pig.”

Longarm watched Loretta circulate the room and he noticed that she was trying to hide the fact that she was limping. “She hurt her leg?”

“After the marshal beat hell out of her, two men raped her in an alley and left her for dead.”

“Were they ever arrested and brought to justice?”

The bartender shook his head. “Loretta admits she was very drunk when it happened and says that she can't remember her attacker's faces.”

“Do you believe her?”

The bartender shrugged. “What does it matter? If she does know who did it, she would be in danger of being killed. She's a whore, Marshal, so what good would it do her to press charges? Judge Thompson would toss her charges in the trash can and she would be run out of town.”

“Might be a good thing for her,” Longarm mused. “Do you think that Loretta was here the night that Tom Ray shot those two crooked gamblers to death?”

“Where else would she be working at night?”

Longarm took a deep swallow of beer and then began to make his way toward Loretta before some man grabbed and led her out the back door.

“Hello there,” he said, smiling.

Loretta was in the middle of a laugh but when she turned and saw Longarm the laughter died in her throat. Longarm saw that the bruises around her eyes were dark and swollen but the woman was still young and attractive. She had eyes that reflected considerable intelligence and sorrow.

Loretta swallowed hard and managed a professional smile. “Are you talking to
me
?”

“I am.”

Loretta shook her head and looked away. “I know who you are and I'd rather not associate with you, Marshal Long.”

“Sorry to hear that. I really would like to buy you a drink.”

“Why?”

Longarm took her arm and led her off to one side. “I want to talk to you, Loretta.”

“How do you know my name?”

“I know lots about you,” Longarm said bluntly. “I know who gave you those shiners and what happened to you in an alley. And I'm wondering if you'd like me to deliver a little overdue justice in your behalf.”

She pulled away from him. “What happened . . . happened. I don't want any more trouble from them or you.”

“Just point your two attackers out to me if they're here,” Longarm said. “That's all you have to do.”

“Why should I risk getting my neck wrung?”

“Because those kinds of men will do what they did to you or another girl again and again. And maybe the next victim will die.”

Loretta swallowed hard. “It was dark in the alley and I was naked and drunk.”

“So I've heard.” Longarm leaned close. “Tell me if they're here and don't look their way but describe them. I'll see that you get some revenge and that they don't do that to another woman . . . ever.”

“You going to kill them?”

“I don't know yet, but I'm going to hurt them as bad as they hurt you.”

Loretta's face suddenly twisted with anger. Tears bled from her eyes and ran freely down her cheeks. “They're standing at the bar together. One is big in a red shirt and gray Stetson, the other is smaller wearing a derby with a duck's feather sticking out of the hatband.”

“That's all I need.”

“Thank you, but . . .”

“Don't worry, they'll never know,” Longarm promised. “But I have to have something in return.”

She sniffled and wiped her cheeks dry. “I should have known. Okay, if you hurt them I'll pleasure you in whatever way you choose. If you want me right now, then let's go out the back. I'll give you the best you ever got from a whore.”

“I'm sure I'd like that but I can't take you up on the offer,” Longarm told her. “What I need from you is honesty.”

“Honesty?”

“Yes. Can you be honest with me, Loretta?”

“If you promise to kill or at least beat up those bastards like I heard you did with the deputies, then yes, I'll be honest.”

“Did you see the two men that Tom Ray shot to death in this saloon pull their guns first?”

All the color—and there wasn't much—drained out of Loretta's face and she tried to pull away but Longarm grabbed her with an iron fist. “It was self-defense, Loretta. If you saw it, then I really need you to testify in the new trial.”

She looked at him as if he were insane. “Before Judge Thompson?”

“No, before a new judge who will give Tom Ray a fair trial.”

“Oh my gawd, I'm going to be killed for sure!”

“I promise you I'll take care of you and protect you like you were my own sister. And after your testimony, I'll get you out of this shithole town and take you to Denver and help find you a decent, respectable job and a place to live.”

“Don't promise me things you can't deliver, Marshal. Men have been promising me things they couldn't deliver my entire life.”

“I give you my word of honor. If you saw the shooting and will testify that Tom Ray fired in self-defense and that the men were cheating him at cards, then I'll help you get a new life.”

“Maybe I don't deserve a new life.”

“Everyone deserves a second chance. The trouble is that real second chances often come just once in a lifetime. Are you ready for yours?”

Loretta was shaking now. “Marshal, I saw the whole thing. It
was
self-defense and I knew those men were cheating Tom at cards. And . . . and I'll testify if you swear you'll help me start over.”

“Deal,” Longarm whispered. “Now move away from me and stay away until I've gotten you some restitution.”

“Yes, sir!”

And then she was gone. Back among the crowd laughing and touching and it wasn't five minutes later that he saw her being led out the back door.