Dead Man's Hand (Caden Chronicles, The) Read Free Page B

I’ll wander into town. See if I can get a cell connection. I think we’re in a dead zone,” I remarked, waving at the cluster of trees flanking the creek. “Tell Mom and Dad I’ll be in the saloon.”
    “You’re not going to try to sneak back into that barn, are you?”
    “You think I should?” I caught her glaring at me. “Relax, sis. I won’t do anything stupid.” She hates it when I call her sis. And I hate being tattled on by my younger sister. “If I stumble into a brown bear I’ll take a picture with my phone and save it for you.”

    The heavy aroma of fried food greeted me as I stepped through the swinging doors of Sassy Sally’s. Men and women leaned against the bar, elbow to elbow, boots hooked on bar-rungs. Cowboy hats and overcoats hung on dowels. Guests sat around square tables and feasted on fried chicken, corn on the cob, and steaming bowls of beans. A piano player banged away at a riveting rendition of “Yellow Rose of Texas.” On the far side of the saloon, card players sat hunched forward and tossed wooden chips onto the green felt.
    I slid onto a bar stool. “Is there any place around here I can get a decent cell signal?” The bartender, a whiskered man with hound-dog eyes and oily bangs, dried a shot glass.
    I held up my phone. “You know? Talkie, talkie?”
    The bartender slapped his towel over his shoulder and waddled off to take another drink order.
    “General store has a pay phone,” said Marshal Buckleberry, sidling up next to me. “And if you need to get online, you’re welcome to borrow my computer. I have dial-up.”
    Dial-up? You kidding me? Smoke signals would be faster
.
    “But the best advice I can give you is to just relax and forget texting and talking and checking your email while you’re here. One of the best parts of Deadwood is that we’re a long ways from no place.”
    “So no cell coverage,” I answered. “Not even a little?”
    “Closest tower is two miles west of Rattlesnake Gulch. If you catch the wind right you might get one bar.”
    “Rattlesnake, that’s …?”
    “A place you’ll want to avoid, for obvious reasons. By the way, I checked the barn like I promised. Found the Charger, but no body or blood.”
    “Marshal, I’m telling you, a man died in that hayloft. As a law enforcement officer, I’d think you’d be concerned.”
    He popped a handful of peanuts into his mouth and chased it with a shot of what I guessed to be tea made to look like whiskey.
    Aiming those tired gray eyes in my direction, Marshal Buckleberry said, “What makes you think you’re qualified to judge what I should and shouldn’t be concerned about?”
    “Solving murders is sort of a hobby of mine.”
    “That so.” He scooped another fist of nuts. “Well? Tell me about this hobby.”
    “Actually, it’s more than a hobby. A bunch of us formedthis association called Cybersleuths. We use online investigative tools to examine real murders and solve cases.”
    Marshal Buckleberry raised his eyebrows. “Really? What sort of tools?”
    Looking away, I studied the poker players across the room. “Television detective shows, mostly.”
    “Say again?”
    “I watch crime shows and compare those crimes against actual murders.”
    Choking on the nuts, the marshal drained his drink. “Well, that’s a new one.”
    “It’s not as crazy as it sounds, Marshal. The way it works is, after we’ve gathered all the data from a real crime, I run a versatile statistical analysis algorithm for the detection of aberrations.”
    “You do what to who?”
    “Check for trends that might hint as to who committed the murder and why. A lot of what you see on television is pure fiction. Just stuff the show’s producer tosses in for dramatic effect. But sometimes you find an episode where they’ve used a real crime scene expert as a consultant. That can be useful. Once I have the final report of all the suspects, their motives, means, and opportunities, I load that into a database.