Read Online Longarm and the Diamondback Widow by Tabor Evans - Free Book Online Page B

come into town askin’ a bunch of questions that ain’t none of your business,” the bearded man said.
    â€œYeah, that’s what Melvin said,” said the mustached man, jutting his dimpled chin at Longarm. He appeared to have lice, tiny miniature rice, clinging to his hair ends. Longarm wasn’t sure which man smelled worse but altogether they were making him feel sick to his stomach.
    Both pairs of eyes staring at him were glassy from drink.
    â€œI’m sorry, friends,” Longarm said amiably, “but I didn’t do any such thing.”
    â€œWhat?” said the mustached man. “You callin’ Melvin a liar?”
    â€œNo, not all. I’m calling him a tinhorned, limp-dicked peckerwood, and I’m calling you two the same. Not only that, but you both stink like a sow giving birth, and you’re ugly as last year’s sin. Now, unless you can answer the question I posed to Melvin, kindly retreat from my air space so I can take another breath without vomiting my guts out on the floor.”
    Both men stared at Longarm dumbly, as though neither could quite believe his ears. They looked as though they’d both been backhanded.
    Finally, the bearded man, nearest Longarm, bunched his jaws and said, “Friend, I don’t care if you’re a federal badge toter or not. You just made the wrong pair of enemies, an’ you’re about to pay dearly for it!”
    He hadn’t finished that last before he swung his beer schooner back toward his shoulder and then launched it toward Longarm’s head. Longarm had seen that coming two weeks ago. He merely stepped into it, raised his left arm, deflecting it, and got a little beer splashed across his back as he smashed his right fist hard against his attacker’s bearded jaw.
    He smashed him twice more before the big man knew what was happening.
    The bearded man stumbled backward, eyes rolling back in his head, as his partner launched himself at Longarm, throwing his arms around the lawman as though he were just so happy to see him he couldn’t contain himself.
    â€œYou dirty dog—you’re gonna die, lawman!” he bellowed as he tried to toss Longarm to the floor.
    It didn’t work. Longarm was five inches taller than the mustached gent.
    Longarm head-butted the man, and when the man released his hold on him, Longarm smashed him once with a right cross and once with a left uppercut. He stepped on the man’s right boot to hold him in place and then let him have two more of the same before the mustached gent, nose exploding like a ripe tomato, stumbled backward and onto a table, sending the table’s three occupants quickly grabbing their drinks and scattering in all directions.
    The table tipped over and the mustached gent and the table hit the floor with a loud, thundering bang! The mustached gent bellowed like a poleaxed bull.
    â€œSon of a bitch!” raged the bearded gent, heaving himself to his feet and hurling himself at Longarm from six feet away.
    His intention apparently was to bull into Longarm and pin him against the bar. Longarm had seen that one taking shape a month ago.
    He merely stepped to one side, spreading his boots wide and grabbing the back of the big, bearded man’s shirt collar and heaving him in the same direction he’d been headed.
    Only harder.
    He slammed the man’s head against the edge of the bar with a resounding, cracking thump.
    When he released the man’s collar, the bearded gent dropped straight to the floor like a fifty-pound sack of seed corn hurled from a second-story loading door.
    The mustached man was cursing and snarling like a wounded wolf on the floor, trying to pull his shotgun around in front of him. When he finally did so, aiming the double-bored popper at Longarm, the federal lawman stepped toward the man, swinging his right foot up savagely. The square toe of his cavalry boot connected soundly with the underside of the barrel as