Read Online Longarm and the Unwritten Law by Tabor Evans - Free Book Online
Authors: Tabor Evans
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said she didn't understand what on earth he was talking about. So the brakeman said, "They all seem to lose that edge it takes after they've been through enough gunfights. That's all greener gunfighters, who still feel immortal, have to hear. The most famous but far from the only example would be Wild Bill Hickok up in Deadwood. He'd taken to drinking more and practicing with his pistols less, and Cockeyed Jack McCall wasn't the only one who'd noticed. So if McCall hadn't gunned Wild Bill in the Number Ten Saloon, it would have been some other gun waddy in some other saloon." He paused. "I reckon I'll have ham and eggs," he said casually.
CHAPTER 6
Longarm had been studying his railroad timetables, and so he'd seen that if he rode on down the line to Cruces, he'd be better than forty miles further from Fort Sill and there wouldn't be a northbound for the next two days.
On the other hand, a body getting off at Spanish Flats in the chill before dawn might hire a livery mount and make it on up to Fort Sill by the time that weekly combination serving the Indian Territory ever left Cruces.
So as the moon still hung high, Longarm got off at Spanish Flats, due south of Fort Sill, thankful to be packing so little baggage for a change. Since he hadn't been planning on getting off there before he'd consulted his timetable after midnight, Longarm felt no call to worry about the few other passengers getting off at the same stop in the tricky light. He could still taste his midnight snack back in Amarillo, and he knew he'd sleep lighter if he quit while he was ahead. He knew they'd expect him to pay in advance at that hotel across the way whether he arrived with his usual McClellan and saddlebags or just this fool envelope. So he did, and in no time at all he was sound asleep in his small but tidy hired room.
It felt as if he'd slept less than an hour, but the sun was up outside as somebody commenced to pound on his locked door with a heap of authority and what sounded like a pistol barrel.
Longarm rolled out of bed in his underdrawers and grabbed for the.44-40 slung from a handy bedpost as he rose and called out, "I hear you, damn it. Who is it and what do you want?"
The pounding was replaced by: "Clovis Mason of the Texas Rangers, and we've had a complaint about you, stranger. Where did you get off signing the register downstairs as a federal deputy, by the way?"
Longarm held his own weapon politely pointed at the floor as he cracked the door, nodded at the badge on the other gent's freshly laundered white shirt, and opened wider, saying, "I signed in under my right name because that's who I am and I have nothing to hide. I am Deputy U.S. Marshal Custis Long, and I'm bound for the Indian Agency up at Fort Sill on government beeswax. I've barely talked to a soul here in Spanish Flats, and you say someone's made a complaint about that?"
The Ranger, somewhat shorter and stouter than Longarm, stepped in to regard the half-naked hotel guest dubiously and replied, "A lady says you've been following her all the way from Amarillo after you conspired with another gent to try and move in on her. I hope you have some identification before we go on with this bullshit?"
Longarm hung on to his own pistol as he moved over to fish his wallet from the duds he'd draped over a chair. The Ranger hadn't drawn his own .45-30--rangers were like that--but he'd been eyeing Longarm through narrowed lids until he spied the federal badge and identification. As his poker face got more human he said, "I'll be switched with snakes if I don't buy you're being the one and original Longarm! But why in thunder did that newspaper gal just come over to our company to charge you with mashing and menacing her all through the night?"
Longarm put his wallet and gun away and got out a couple of his cheroots and some waterproof Mexican matches as he calmly replied, "I didn't know I was. I recall her accusing me of some diabolical plot when I told a cowboy to leave her
CHAPTER 6
Longarm had been studying his railroad timetables, and so he'd seen that if he rode on down the line to Cruces, he'd be better than forty miles further from Fort Sill and there wouldn't be a northbound for the next two days.
On the other hand, a body getting off at Spanish Flats in the chill before dawn might hire a livery mount and make it on up to Fort Sill by the time that weekly combination serving the Indian Territory ever left Cruces.
So as the moon still hung high, Longarm got off at Spanish Flats, due south of Fort Sill, thankful to be packing so little baggage for a change. Since he hadn't been planning on getting off there before he'd consulted his timetable after midnight, Longarm felt no call to worry about the few other passengers getting off at the same stop in the tricky light. He could still taste his midnight snack back in Amarillo, and he knew he'd sleep lighter if he quit while he was ahead. He knew they'd expect him to pay in advance at that hotel across the way whether he arrived with his usual McClellan and saddlebags or just this fool envelope. So he did, and in no time at all he was sound asleep in his small but tidy hired room.
It felt as if he'd slept less than an hour, but the sun was up outside as somebody commenced to pound on his locked door with a heap of authority and what sounded like a pistol barrel.
Longarm rolled out of bed in his underdrawers and grabbed for the.44-40 slung from a handy bedpost as he rose and called out, "I hear you, damn it. Who is it and what do you want?"
The pounding was replaced by: "Clovis Mason of the Texas Rangers, and we've had a complaint about you, stranger. Where did you get off signing the register downstairs as a federal deputy, by the way?"
Longarm held his own weapon politely pointed at the floor as he cracked the door, nodded at the badge on the other gent's freshly laundered white shirt, and opened wider, saying, "I signed in under my right name because that's who I am and I have nothing to hide. I am Deputy U.S. Marshal Custis Long, and I'm bound for the Indian Agency up at Fort Sill on government beeswax. I've barely talked to a soul here in Spanish Flats, and you say someone's made a complaint about that?"
The Ranger, somewhat shorter and stouter than Longarm, stepped in to regard the half-naked hotel guest dubiously and replied, "A lady says you've been following her all the way from Amarillo after you conspired with another gent to try and move in on her. I hope you have some identification before we go on with this bullshit?"
Longarm hung on to his own pistol as he moved over to fish his wallet from the duds he'd draped over a chair. The Ranger hadn't drawn his own .45-30--rangers were like that--but he'd been eyeing Longarm through narrowed lids until he spied the federal badge and identification. As his poker face got more human he said, "I'll be switched with snakes if I don't buy you're being the one and original Longarm! But why in thunder did that newspaper gal just come over to our company to charge you with mashing and menacing her all through the night?"
Longarm put his wallet and gun away and got out a couple of his cheroots and some waterproof Mexican matches as he calmly replied, "I didn't know I was. I recall her accusing me of some diabolical plot when I told a cowboy to leave her
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