Longarm and the Colorado gundown

_{Calling the publishing site of the Snowshoe Independent an office was putting the best face on things, to be sure. It consisted of a tent, and a rather shabby one at that, with timber reinforcements at the comers and native stone laid down to fashion an uneven floor of sorts. The roof sagged, and in some places the canvas was so thin that the sun practically shined right through. Longarm suspected it would leak like so much fishnet when it rained.}

_{Wooden crates were piled at the front to create a counter of sorts, and more crates and sturdy boxes were used as desks and chairs. Racks of metal type stood on sawhorses at}

_{the back of the tent, and a portable press rested on a stoutly constructed table, the only article of genuine furniture in the whole damned place. Longarm’s impression was that the Snowshoe Independent was not a particularly prosperous enterprise.}

_{Longarm pulled a cheroot out and lighted it. He hadn’t taken time for an after-dinner smoke before now, and the flavor of the tobacco was especially welcome. There in public he didn’t offer one to Aggie, and he thought the dirty looks he was getting from her might have something to do with that. He grinned and winked and blew smoke rings into the air between them.}

_{‘There, that didn’t take long, did it,” Farmer said as he breezed back in from his errand. “Would you care to sit down? This way, please.” He took Aggie’s elbow and guided her to a seat on a crate marked FloEver Ink.}

_{“You can sit there, Deputy. But I would prefer it if you didn’t smoke. Stinking, nasty things, cigars. I detest them.”}

_{“Do tell.”}

_{“Yes indeed. I find them quite vile.”}

_{Longarm took a closer look at the editor named Farmer. The fellow was thin and pale. He was of average height and wore a closely trimmed beard. His hairline was receding badly even though he was probably still in his twenties. There was something about him, though, that wasn’t quite ... normal. Nothing overt. Nothing Longarm could point to and say, “Hey, that’s it.” Just something that wasn’t quite ... right.}

_{Fortunately that wasn’t something that Longarm had to give a shit about. Ellis Farmer’s problems, whatever they might be, were his own worry.}

_{“You wanta know what I detest?” Longarm asked. He kept the cheroot trapped between his teeth and gritted his question around it.}

_{“I take it you intend to tell me?”}

_{“You take it right, Mr. Farmer. What I detest, mister, is newspaper articles that aren’t true. An’ that incite to violence.”}