Part 9 (1/2)

Then he saw those distant riders reining in but not getting down in front of old Consuela's casa. n.o.body seemed to be shooting at anyone yet. But Longarm sighed and said, ”All right, just this once, but we really ought to watch this s.h.i.+t.”

It took a bit less time loping back than it had taken to trot off. But as he closed in on the tense scene he saw the argument had had time to build up some steam. Consuela and half a dozen of her ranch hands were on her front veranda afoot. None of the riders had dismounted, and one scrawny old cuss was waving a paper at the Indian gal as if he wanted her to take it.

Everyone stopped jawing to stare at Longarm as he reined in to join the discussion. As he neared the man who seemed to be the process server and held out his free hand, Consuela cried, ”Don't take that! You have to accept an eviction order before they can make it stick!”

Longarm smiled down at her rea.s.suringly. ”I fear you may know more about ranching than legal proceedings, Miss Consuela. That ain't the way things work, and even if it was, I don't own an acre of spit in these parts. So I'd best have a look-see.”

He turned back to the mean-eyed old goat who'd been trying to serve the Indian gal with his fluttering single sheet, and mildly asked who he had the honor of confronting.

The older man said he was Cyrus Grayson of the Bar Three Slash, and asked who Longarm might be, aside from a Mex-lover.

Longarm ignored the snickers from the other riders backing the old goat's play as he mildly suggested, ”By the time you found out exactly who I was, you might have decided you didn't want to know me all that well. What have you got there, Mister Grayson? Looks to me like a notarized letter.”

Grayson handed it over, snapping, ”d.a.m.ned right it's notarized. Had it witnessed and sealed by a licensed notary public yesterday afternoon!”

Longarm scanned the absolutely worthless doc.u.ment with a smile of disbelief. Then he turned back to the worried Consuela and said, ”This jasper knows no more about the law than you do, Miss Consuela. He's made a sworn statement to the effect that you are neither an American citizen nor a member of the white race, which is moot. Then he goes on to say you're squatting unlawfully on range he needs to get to the river road, and so on.”

Grayson nodded grimly and added, ”Signed, sealed, and delivered according to law. There's no arguing with papers witnessed and stamped by a notary public, right?”

Longarm laughed. ”Wrong. A notary public is a respected tobacconist, innkeeper, or whatever, licensed by the county to witness and seal doc.u.ments to prove he witnessed somebody swearing to him their words were true.”

Grayson nodded. ”That's what I just said.”

Longarm replied, ”No, it ain't. You tried to tell us this foolish scribble was a legal doc.u.ment. It's an expression of your personal opinion about a lady who was here first, on land you'd like to grab but ain't about to. I don't know what you paid to have this notarized, but you wasted your money. Didn't the notary tell you when he stamped it for you that all he was backing was your word that you and you alone were the blithering idiot who signed it?”

Then Longarm was suddenly holding a pistol in his hand as the sheet of paper fluttered down between his mount's legs. So the younger rider on the far side of old Grayson suddenly let go of his own pistol grips with a sick grin as Longarm quietly said, ”I only give one demonstration.

The next one who reaches for his side arm had better mean it.”

Old Grayson's face had gone frog-belly white, but his voice was fairly steady as he said, ”Don't never do that again without my say-so, Rafe.

Now get down and pick up that paper you made the man drop.”

Longarm kept his gun out as he said, ”I have a grander notion. I want Miss Consuela's lawyer to keep and cherish that free sample of doc.u.mented stupidity.”

He said a few words in Spanish. Consuela nodded, and one of her hands dashed forward as Longarm danced his mount off the paper.

Consuela asked something in Spanish. Longarm wanted both sides to get his message, so he replied in English. ”It was a childish bluff I'd be ashamed to try in a lunatic asylum, Miss Consuela. I'd say your friendly neighbor's own lawyer told him there was no way they'd ever get a court order in New Mexico evicting anyone from an old Mexican land grant. So he wasted more time and money on a notarized doc.u.ment, as I said.”

Grayson told the Mexican hand, ”I'll take that,” as the hand picked up the doc.u.ment in question. The Mexican hesitated. Longarm snapped at him in Spanish, and he ran clean past Consuela and into the house with it. Then Longarm told Grayson calmly, ”You were trying to serve that paper on the lady, in front of witnesses. So now she's got it, and when her lawyers finish laughing at you, they'll likely want to hang on to it in case you ever try to waste their time in court again. Didn't your own lawyer explain any of this to you, old son?”

Grayson snapped, ”I have my rights, d.a.m.n it! I'm a U.S. citizen who fought at Cold Harbor for the Union and came away with scars to prove it. Who are you to take the side of a full-blood Indian against a good white American?”

Longarm chuckled fondly and replied, ”I'll allow you seem to be a white American. I doubt you're all that good, and I know you're as smart as the average scarecrow. I don't know where you got the grand notion you could run a taxpaying grant-holder off her land as you might some Digger Indian poking through your trash heap, but it just ain't possible. So why don't you just git and save wear and tear on all concerned.”

Grayson sat taller in his saddle as he grimly replied, ”I don't run off as easy as your average Digger neither, Mexlover.”

Longarm said, ”I don't think you understand this situation, land-grabber. It ain't going to work. Even if you shot everyone here and burned the whole spread to the ground, you would never in this world gain t.i.tle to a Spanish grant recognized by the U.S. Government, unless you could get Miss Consuela here to marry up with you.”

Neither Grayson nor the widow Llamas seemed enthusiastic about that suggestion. Longarm laughed and said, ”You got to admit nothing else would work half so well. But seeing you haven't come courting, old son, why don't you just be on your way? If your pony has its feet stuck, I might be able to inspire it to run with a few pistol shots.”

Grayson glared down at the cornely widow on the veranda instead, snarling, ”You win this hand, you stubborn squaw, but I can find me just as many hired guns as you, hear?”