Longarm on the Fever Coast Read online

  Leaning back in his swivel chair, Billy Vail relit his soggy old cigar. "To tell the truth, I'd planned on letting Gilbert get better and bring his man in before you got your own fool self in this worse fix. But seeing you have, what say we send you down to Escondrijo to see about getting both old boys back up this way in as much comfort as they both deserve?"

  Longarm sighed. "I reckon it beats being hauled into a damned old divorce court any time of the year, and it might not be too hot in south Texas this early in the year. I'll just tell Henry out front, and tend me a few errands whilst he types up my travel orders and vouchers, right?"

  "Wrong," Billy Vail replied again. "I've already told Henry what I want typed up for you, Gilbert, and your prisoner. I'll get word to Prunella Farnam later and save you the trouble and considerable risk of running back up yonder to warn her they'll be riding hard on her with spiteful intent. It ain't our worry if she can't hold out till you can help her with her organ some more when her dad-blamed divorce is final!"

  Longarm smiled sheepishly and said, "Well, as long as somebody warns her ... It sure feels spooky working for a boss who reads my mind so good, Billy Vail."

  To which Marshal Vail could only reply with a modest smile, "I reckon somebody has to do some thinking for you when it comes to women. Lord knows the pretty little things surely seem to confuse the shit out of you when left to study about 'em on your own!"

  CHAPTER 2

  Longarm spoke enough Border Mex to translate Escondrijo freely as "Hideout." So he wasn't too surprised to discover Escondrijo, Texas, was one of those places You just couldn't get to from most anywhere else without a whole lot of trouble.

  The Lone Star and erstwhile Confederate State was commencing to attract more settlers and railroad tracks now that President Hayes had called a halt to Reconstruction and let those who best knew the Southwest run it their own way, as long as they remembered who'd won. So most of the Southern railroads had standardized their tracks to the same broad gauge, and Henry had managed to get Longarm by rail to the head of navigation on the Rio Grande. You had to go by steamboat from Brownsville to Escondrijo and beyond in any case. Railroads ran where there was profit to be made, across sensible terrain, and even if there had been enough settlers to matter, it would have been a bitch to lay track across the line of swamps and estuaries between Brownsville and Galveston with the construction methods of the day. So it made more sense to everyone if such freight and passengers as there were moved up and down the Fever Coast by boat, whether sail luggers out on the gulf, or steamers plying the inland waterway a good pilot could follow from lagoon to lagoon behind the sandy barrier islands that lay just offshore--as if to guard the low, swampy mainland from that mean Indian deity Hura Kan.

  Longarm had known better than to head for south Texas in a three-piece tweed suit with summer coming in. The paddle-wheel passage down the lower Rio Grande was hot and sticky enough to a gent wearing no more than a thin cotton work shirt and well-washed jeans between his tobacco-brown Stetson and low-heeled stovepipe boots. Nobody along the border got excited by the sight of a sober gent packing a gun on one hip. He only sported his badge when he was up to answering pesky questions about his immediate intent.

  He'd been fooled before about whether a lawman on such a routine mission might or might not need to do some riding. So this time, seeing he needed someplace to pack his possibles in any case, he'd brought along his personal McClellan saddle and army bridle with his roll, saddlebags, and Winchester '73 attached. Henry'd told him there was a Coast Guard station near Escondrijo, and so he'd doubtless be able to borrow a government mount there in the unlikely event he had to ride out after any escaped fever victims.

  The paddle-wheel trip down to Brownsville was uneventful. He boarded a larger coastal steamer there without incident, just in time to be on his way north on the next tide just before suppertime, his cabin steward told him. So he tipped the helpful colored gent a generous two bits in hopes his cabin would stay locked, locked his baggage up for the moment, and ambled back out on deck to enjoy some salt air as well as a smoke. He naturally stationed himself to seaward on the shady side of the long promenade deck. His tobacco smoke still felt far cooler than the steamy breeze stirred up by the steamer's steaming at around six knots. There wasn't any shoreward sea breeze at the moment, and six knots of apparent breeze didn't do a lot for a man who'd just come down from the higher and drier climes of Colorado.

  Traveling Denver folks often remarked on how thick and soggy the air felt, even on a dry day in, say, Frisco or Saint Lou. Most found San Antone a steam bath as early as April. Folks from that far north in Texas tried to avoid the gulf coast once the robin began to drift north to cooler summer climes.

  "Doesn't it ever cool off down here?" a plaintive female voice was bleating from behind him. So Longarm turned with a smile, noting with regret that the willowy ash-blonde in the middy blouse and straw boater hadn't been talking to him at all--Her complaint seemed to be aimed at a pink-faced jasper in a rumpled white merchant marine cap and uniform. Longarm recognized him as the purser he'd had to check in with coming aboard. The poor bastard was sweating like a hog in that choke-collared linen suit as he somehow managed to assure the blond passenger, "Things will cool off a heap once the sun goes down, ma'am. The nights are way cooler along this coast, and as soon as we hit the more open waters of Laguna Madre the skipper will be ordering more speed."

  Longarm doubted that. They'd swung north into the Laguna Madre if he was any judge of maps and if the distant shoreline to either side meant spit. But it would have been pointless as well as rude to call a ship's officer a bare-faced liar, or point out how hot and steamy most cabins figured to remain no matter how much steam they fed the twin screws back yonder. These coastal steamers got more cargo space by using the more modern screw drive, but the smaller boilers they could get by with had no more speed to offer. Steamers poking up and down the gulf coast made their money on stopping as often as possible, not by getting anywhere in such an all-fired hurry.

  The sun was low, he could tell--not by looking to the west on the sunny side, but by admiring the first evening star in a purple sky to the east. It would still be some time before any evening breeze picked up its lazy heels. But he still drifted forward towards the dining salon as he finished his smoke. For whether traveling by rail or water, a man with a tumbleweed job soon learned to never be first or last to be seated for dinner.

  The dining salon was already crowded as Longarm entered from a shady doorway and drifted to an empty table, on the sunny side but near an open window. His brow felt somewhat cooler as he hung up his hat and sat down by the window. The setting sun was still spiteful, but the faint breeze from the bow almost made up for it as a colored waiter, cheerful enough considering his white choke-collar jacket, came over to hand him a menu and fill a tumbler with ice water for him. How a gent used to this climate managed to keep his jacket no more rumpled than the linen tablecloths all around was a total mystery to a man feeling wilted as hell in a thin blue shirt with an open collar. Longarm was scanning the menu for something that looked safe as well as cooling when that same ash-blonde came over to ask if the seat across from him was taken. She seemed less distressed by his rough costume when he rose to his feet to assure her she was welcome to join him as long as she refrained from sipping the ice water.

  As they both sat down, she frowned thoughtfully at his glass and asked what was wrong with sipping ice water on such a hot afternoon. He glanced about to make certain he wasn't insulting any of the help as he softly explained, "There's this French chemist called Pasture, I think, who's been studying on bitty invisible bugs that may spread plagues, and they call these waters the Fever Coast with reason, ma'am. I've been down this way before, and I've found it way safer to stick to hard liquor, or hot softer drinks such as tea or coffee. If you order either, make sure you're served stuff too hot to drink right off. Don't order iced desserts or salads down this way either, hear?"

  She looke
d more amused than annoyed as she observed, "Oh, dear, and I was looking forward to the shrimp salad here. I take it you're some sort of physician, good sir?"

  Longarm laughed easily. "Not hardly. I'm a federal deputy marshal. Name's Custis Long. So you go right ahead and order the iced shrimp if you've a mind to, and I'll tell 'em you died brave if you guessed wrong. The odds are better'n eight out of ten in your favor, ma'am. I just don't value the taste of shrimp cocktail that highly, having witnessed a few cases of food poisoning whilst passing through these parts in the past."

  The willowy blonde made a wry face--it still remained fair to gaze upon--and decided, "Brrr, I don't think I like those odds myself. So what do you suggest, seeing you seem so familiar with the local cuisine?"

  He replied without hesitation, "Anything Mex served hot, ma'am. I know hot tamales or chili con carne washed down with cold rum or hot coffee sounds dumb. But the Mex folk, who've lived down this way longer, hardly ever come down with food poisoning. Hot spicy grub must kill them bitty bugs that French chemist has been studying."

  She studied the menu he'd handed her dubiously, telling him that she'd read about Louis Pasteur in a ladies' magazine devoted to female problems and getting the vote. Then she asked if he'd read anything about that other scientist blaming tropical fevers on the bites of bigger bugs, such as flies, ticks, and even mosquitoes.

  He nodded. "Him too. You're talking about that Anglo-Cuban doctor, Carlos Finlay, who keeps saying yellow jack and Texas fever might be spread by bug bites. I don't see why they can't both be right. Meanwhile, I see that waiter coming back. So do you trust me to order for the both of us, Miss ...?"

  "Colbert, Lenore Colbert," she said with a bemused smile. "I suppose I'll have to trust you when it comes to hot tamales and so forth. I've never eaten any Mexican food no matter which of those scientists may be right. I don't see how they could both be right, though."

  The waiter was there by this time. So Longarm allowed they'd both go for chili con carne, tamales, and chicken enchiladas, knowing most Anglo palates could manage such beginner's fare. To drink, he ordered black coffee laced with white rum. As the waiter left, Longarm explained, "I don't hold with one cause for all fevers. It only stands to reason that fevers as different as, say, scarlet, yellow, and the ague or chills-and-fever can't be caused by the same whatever. We know now that the milk fever that killed Abe Lincoln's mother was inspired by poisonous snake-roots their milk cow had been into. For some reason the poison passes through the cow harmlessly to kill human folks who drink her milk. But you don't have to drink milk to come down with yellow jack or even the Texas fever northern cows die from. So maybe both Pasture and Carlos Finlay could be on to the truth. Or half the truth leastways. I suspect there's way more to coming down sick than modern medicine has a handle on. I know my own job's more complicated than some figure. I've wound up mighty confounded by two separate crimes I was trying to solve as the work of one outlaw. So what if folks get sick for all sorts of different reasons whilst the docs seek some common cause?"

  She was staring past him in a desperately casual manner as she replied, "That's their problem. Don't look now but there's another man boring holes in your back with his cold steel eyes. You are on some sort of mission for the government, right?"

  Longarm resisted the impulse to turn his head as he smiled at her uncertainly and replied, "I am, but it ain't no secret mission, and it wouldn't do anyone a lick of good if they managed to stop me. My office sent me down this way to pick up an owlhoot rider by the name of Clay Baldwin. He's already been arrested and they've been holding him at Escondrijo for us. He'd still be locked up if someone bored real holes in my back and threw me over the side. My boss would likely send two or three deputies to fetch Baldwin as soon as things got that serious. Might you have a bitty mirror in that bag across your lap, Miss Lenore?"

  She said she did and, to her credit, never asked why a grown man might want to borrow such a thing. Meanwhile, the waiter got back with their orders. So it was easy enough for her to slip Longarm the small square mirror amid all the confusion atop their table.

  As the waiter poured and laced their coffee and the gal across the way stared thunderstruck at the unfamiliar grub in front of her, Longarm found it easy enough to prop the mirror up against a saltshaker. Sure enough, an ugly galoot was staring mean as hell at him from another nearby table. The lean and hungry face failed to remind Longarm of anyone he was currently after. The stranger sat across from another cuss dressed for south Texas riding. But that didn't mean either had to be mixed up in beef or other produce. For it had been six or eight years since Longarm had been a serious cowhand, and wasn't he wearing shirt and jeans in this infernal climate?

  The one staring mean at Longarm's back had his slate-gray Texas-creased hat on at the table. The one facing the other way had on a less dramatic Carlsbad with its crown crushed cavalry. Their matching white shirts, worn vestless, might have said they were a couple of Texas Rangers if Longarm had had recent trouble with the recently reorganized and often proddy Rangers. But he was on fair terms with the Ranger captain back in Brownsville, and didn't know if they even had a Ranger station up around Escondrijo. As in the case of federal deputies, the Texas Rangers worked out of widely spaced headquarters, mostly built near towns of some importance, and only chimed into local matters in other parts when a federal or state offense seemed too big for the local law to cope with. So Longarm doubted there'd be any cases the Rangers would be worried about this side of, say, Corpus Christi.

  Escondrijo was on this side of Corpus Christi, and a day's ride away in a straight line from that more important stop. But moving along the Fever Coast by horse took longer, thanks to all the inlets and swamps there were to go around. By an ironic trick of geology, as the post office riders had known before coastal steamers got so common along the inland waterway, a rider could move much faster along the back dunes of Padre Island, an otherwise mighty lonely string bean of white sand and sea gull shit the winds and waves had piled a few miles out extending from Corpus Christi Pass all the way south to Matamoros in Old Mexico. They said it was healthier as well as a bit cooler out along the barrier sands. It was too bad nobody had yet come up with any way to make a living off no more than white sandy beaches and sunshine.

  "What are these things that look like lengths of broomstick boiled in oil?" the blonde across the table was asking as Longarm tried in vain to make out what sort of hardware the sinister strangers had behind him. He adjusted the mirror as he assured her hot tamales were sort of big hollow noodles made of cornmeal and stuffed with spicy ground meat.

  When she asked what kind of meat, he decided she'd feel better if he said it was likely beef. Beef was possible, and some folks felt odd about eating goats, cats, dogs, and such. The idea of all that red pepper in a hot tamale was to assure that the meat was safe to eat as well as impossible to identify by taste.

  He knew he'd said the right thing when Lenore took an experimental taste, followed by a bigger bite and a sudden grab for her coffee to put out the fire, then a smaller but more relaxed nibble as she decided it was a tad spicy but good.

  He dug into his own chili con carne to look busy, with his back to those jaspers in her mirror as he casually replied, "That's doubtless because we've a Texican chef on board, ma'am. Mex grub is peppered more along the border than anywhere north or south of it. I suspect Mexicans and Texicans are trying to prove something to one another. Left to themselves--say as far off as Durango, Mexico, or Durango, Colorado--cooks pepper just enough to make a dish sort of interesting. Further south in Old Mexico they cook lots of other ways, with bananas, rice, and such. I had a chicken basted with hot bitter-sweet chocolate down Mexico way one time. Reckon that's what they call an acquired taste and... I see that one in the lighter-gray Carlsbad is packing a two-gun buscadero rig, with the one gun I can make out from here a nickel-plated Schofield."

  She said, "These beans are less spicy. What's a Schofield?"

  He explained
, "A revolver gun, ma'am. Mostly made by Smith & Wesson, but named after Brevet Colonel George Schofield of that Colored Tenth Cav. The colonel wasn't colored. He was the baby brother of General John M. Schofield, in charge of the U.S. Army Small Arms Board during the Grant Administration. Colonel George was stuck with a gross of Model 3 S&W horse pistols left over from an order for the Russian cavalry. It wouldn't be charitable at this late date to guess what the general got out of the deal. The younger Schofield, stuck with using the bargain six-guns in the field, made some improvements on the originals, rechambering 'em for army ammunition to begin with. So by the time they'd sold the first three thousand remodeled Russian cavalry guns to their own army, they were so delighted they renamed the gun the Schofield."

  She was too polite to indicate she was sorry she'd asked. But he knew women would rather talk about clothes and such. Hence he added, more tersely, "Let's just say the Texas Rangers are issued the Colt.45 Peacemaker one at a time. A man packing two Schofields in tie-down holsters is showing off or expecting some serious fighting. Either way, I doubt they could be Rangers, and I'd be likely to recognize any well-known outlaws in these parts."

  She suggested, "Maybe the one glaring at you just arrived from other parts. He certainly seems to recognize you!"

  He volunteered to just get up and see what the cuss was so sore about if such rude staring was getting on the lady's nerves. But she pleaded, "Please don't! I can't stand public scenes, and it's not as if he's done or said anything wrong to either of us!"

  So Longarm just went on eating, and a few minutes later, having started earlier, the two mysterious strangers finished, got up, and sauntered out of sight. But not before Longarm had made certain they were both loaded for bear. Neither looked dumb enough to carry six in the wheel on either hip. But assuming they, like him, preferred the hammer of a six-gun riding on one empty chamber, that still tallied out to twenty rounds for them and five for him in the first exchange. He'd left the derringer he usually carried in a vest pocket with his other possibles back in his stateroom. So maybe it was just as well he hadn't yelled at them over their dessert.