Free Longarm 245: Longarm and the Vanishing Virgin by Tabor Evans Page A

days.”
    Longarm nodded. Even riding hard all day, he hadn’t managed to shave much off the lead that Nora had on him. Well, that decided things, he told himself. He would push on and ride several hours tonight.
    He rattled a coin on the bar and said, “Much obliged. Sorry about getting blood on the floor.”
    The bartender shrugged. “You didn’t have much choice in the matter. Billy was just too damned foolish to live, I reckon.”
    Longarm couldn’t argue with that, although it had been his experience that most folks, at one time or another, were too foolish to live, including himself. Some were just luckier than others.
    He pushed through the bat-wings and stepped out onto Ashcroft’s rickety boardwalk. The town had just one street, and the businesses were all lined up along one side of it. There were a few shacks on the other side of the street, all of them just dark hulks at this time of night. Folks turned in early around here. The saloon, a small cafe, and the hotel down the street were the only places still showing lights. Longarm turned toward the cafe. He had to eat anyway before he pushed on. Might as well take a break from his own cooking and make his supplies last longer.
    He had only gone a couple of steps when flame lanced from a gun muzzle across the street and something sang wickedly past his ear.

Chapter 8
    The glass in the saloon’s front window shattered in a million pieces as Longarm flung himself forward. He landed hard on the boardwalk, the Colt already in his hand as he sprawled out. He knew all too well what had hummed past his ear. Too many bullets had come his way for him not to recognize their song.
    He had seen the muzzle flash from the comer of his eye. It had come from one of the shacks across the street. He triggered a pair of shots in that direction, then scrambled to his feet and ran a couple of steps to a water trough, which was the nearest good cover. As he bellied down behind the trough, the rifle across the street blasted again and a slug thudded into the thick wood. From the sound of the shots, the man gunning for him was using a Spencer carbine, Longarm decided. That meant he probably had five shots left before he would need to reload. That was three more than Longarm had.
    Longarm had an ally, though. The bartender came bursting out through the bat-wings carrying an old Sharps. “Where’s the son of a bitch who shot out my window?” he bellowed.
    â€œGet down!” Longarm called to him. “He’s over there across the street!”
    The fella with the Spencer had already cut loose at the bartender, though. The bullet missed narrowly and smacked into the wall next to the door of the saloon. The bartender whipped the Sharps to his shoulder and pulled the trigger of the buffalo gun. It boomed like a cannon and threw a slug damned near as big, and the recoil knocked the bartender back a step. At the same time, Longarm fired again toward the spot where he thought the rifleman was.
    That was enough for the bushwhacker. Longarm caught a glimpse of him in the moonlight as he ducked back around the comer of the shack. The man was tall and lean and wore a broad-brimmed hat and a long duster. A second later, Longarm heard rapid hoofbeats.
    The bartender came down the boardwalk toward Longarm. “You all right, Marshal?” he asked.
    â€œYeah,” Longarm replied as he pushed himself to his feet. The hoofbeats had just about faded away already. “That fella’s in a hurry.”
    â€œDamn good thing for him too,” growled the bartender. “I had the glass for that window freighted all the way out here from St. Louis. It was the only window that big between Amarillo and Santa Fe. Do you know how much it’s going to cost to replace it?”
    â€œWouldn’t have any idea.”
    â€œWas that bastard shooting at you?”
    â€œI reckon so,” said Longarm. “It was my head his first shot nearly