New Mexico Madman (9781101612644) Read Online Free PDF Page B

places. “You see that wooden barracks just past the feed store? Texas Ranger headquarters. You got any idea how them old boys feel about Skye Fargo?”
    â€œAnd the New Mexico Territory,” Alcott added, flipping over an ace of spades, “allows hot pursuit for crimes committed in Texas. No matter which way we run, they’ll be pouring hot lead up our bung holes.”
    By now Cleo was thoroughly chastised. “Yeah. I didn’t think about none a that shit.”
    â€œYou don’t need to think, Cleo,” Alcott assured him, quickly building a smoke and expertly curling the ends. “You got enough guts to fill a smokehouse, and you can shoot the eyes out of a crow at two hundred yards. You’re a damn good man to take along, and that’s why you’re here. As for Skye Fargo and Lomax’s silky-satin bitch”—Alcott’s cruelly handsome face set itself hard—“I got a real nice plan worked out for them. Fargo ain’t never seen me, so I’ll be waiting for them at the Vado station. I want to get a good size-up of this galoot and see if I can puzzle out which passenger is on Lomax’s payroll.”
    â€œI don’t like that shit,” Cleo declared. “I mean, Lomax not telling us who he hired.”
    â€œIt don’t set good with me, neither. But this deal has got to be done right—from what I hear about Fargo, one mistake can be our epitaph.”
    â€œMy pap was a coffin maker,” Spider put in. “Every time I cut a board for him, he told me to measure it twice and cut it once.”
    Alcott tossed his head back and blew three perfect smoke rings toward the ceiling. Then he trained his pale-ice eyes on Spider and nodded.
    â€œYour pap was a smart man, and that’s how we’re gonna work this deal. Just remember this: If we want the top money,
we
got to kill Fargo and not let it fall to whoever Lomax has hired to ride the stage. His main job is to keep the actress on the coach until Lomax douses her glims farther north. But we have to do for Fargo first or that ain’t never gonna happen.”

4
    Fargo, Booger and the
mozo
made short work of securing Kathleen Barton’s trunks to the flat top of the Concord. Fargo was just tying the last hitch knot when Addison Steele led the boarding party out into the yard.
    â€œHa-ho, ha-ho,” Booger said, eyeing the actress. “
There’s
one petticoat you won’t get under, Tumbledown Dick. You seen that look she give you when Steele innerduced you to her? Christmas crackers! Like you ain’t good ’nuff to lick her silk boots.”
    â€œI’m generally better at unlacing than lacing,” Fargo assured the shaggy giant.
    â€œPah!
That
one pisses icicles. You can’t jump a four-rail fence, Trailsman.”
    â€œThe cat sits patiently by the gopher hole,” Fargo said as he began clambering down.
    Fargo had heard and read about Kathleen Barton’s famed beauty but had never seen a likeness of her. Watching her approach now, proudly holding separate from the rest of the chattering passengers, he understood the widespread claim that she was the most beautiful woman in America. Her wing-shaped, amber-brown eyes and regal, arching eyebrows set off a beautifully symmetrical face. The thick, coffee-colored hair was swept back tight under a jewel-encrusted tiara. Her complexion was like creamy lotion, and the delicate, disdainful lips matched her icy hauteur.
    But Fargo realized the “wide-eyed vivacity” theater critics claimed she projected on stage was nowhere evident now—just a cool disdain for all the lesser mortals around her. But great jumping Judas, he told himself, that woman makes Venus look like a dishrag.
    Her melodic but stern voice slapped him out of his reverie. “You do realize, Mr. Fargo, that men can also grope with their eyes?”
    Booger sniggered and whispered, “Looks like gopher hole