Return to Massacre Mesa - Edge Series 5 (12 page)

Edge offered no response.

‘You can have a talk with that squaw when she comes in to do her regular chores for folks,’ Billy,’ Goodrich pointed out.

‘Yeah, and there ain’t no rush to get the guy’s death registered official,’ Russell said like he was thinking aloud. ‘Even if things like that have to be done properly these days: by the book. Paperwork is a real bitch.’

He looked toward Edge who had started to leave the stable as the fat liveryman, his small eyes glinting with guile, asked evenly:

‘Did you talk to Andrews before he gave up the ghost, mister?’

Edge halted in the doorway, still in the shade. ‘Some.’

‘He make any mention of buried treasure to you?’ His demeanour was almost coy.

Edge saw Russell was as keenly interested in his response as Goodrich was. ‘Like I said, I went to see him about a debt I’m owed. I didn’t get it paid back because he didn’t have any money. But he told me about a lot of government cash that was stolen from the army a long time ago. Which I got the impression is common knowledge hereabouts.’

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Russell snorted.

‘Common knowledge like everyone knows Christmas Day is December twenty-fifth every year, Mr Edge,’ Goodrich said sardonically. ‘A theft that big can’t he kept secret, not after so many fine men died because of it. Stands to reason, if you think about it. Even if it did all happen a lot of years ago.’

‘What nobody knows is what happened to the money,’ Russell said. ‘Whether it was hid in the hills around here by those that stole it or they spent it far away from this part of the country.’

‘Yeah, I figured that, feller.’

The two men at the rear of the stable started to eat again. And the scraping of spoons in bowls and the less obtrusive noises made by contented horses in the stalls along with the buzzing of foraging flies in the foetid air were the only sounds to follow Edge outside.

He ambled diagonally across the end of Cedar Street and pushed between the batwings of the Wild Dog Hotel. In the saloon a handful of customers were eating and more were drinking in pairs or alone, spaced out along the angled bar or seated at the scattered tables.

Among them were the two business-suited men he had heard call each other John and Chester this morning. And this pair was among the few who eyed him with a little more than passing interest while most ignored him as he headed for a point along the bar where Sam Tree waited with an expectant expression on his angular featured, dark eyed face.

‘What can I get for you in the food or drink line, mister?’

As he crossed the saloon Edge had seen again the menu Lucy Russell had chalked on the blackboard this morning and his sense of smell told him what many of the customers were eating.

‘A shot of rye and some lamb stew?’

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‘No problem.’ Tree half turned to get a glass off the shelf behind him as he reached under the counter for a full bottle of whiskey and set both down in front of Edge. ‘You have yourself a seat and Lucy’ll be right out with the chow. Be ten cents for that. Five cents a shot for liquor.’

Feeling no need for more than one drink, Edge filled the glass and re-corked the bottle, paid the money due and went to a nearby table. He sipped the whisky as soon as he sat down and found he liked it simply as rye: that the passing of time had already rid his mouth of the bad taste he carried away from the adobe out on Farm Trail. Tree had gone through the door in the corner behind the bar and emerged ahead of Lucy Russell who carried a bowl of steaming stew. Edge made to get up and go bring his own food, but the saloonkeeper signalled him to remain where he was. The lawman’s daughter, the expression on her pallid face as mournful as the style and sombre hue of her dress, came around the end of the counter to his table and set down the bowl.

‘I hear you went out to see Rose Bigheart and the sick man she’s taking care of?’

the dejected looking woman said.

‘She’s not anymore.’ Edge removed his hat and put it down beside the bowl of stew that looked as good as it smelled.

The woman was unsettled by the unexpected response.

Edge explained: ‘He died.’

‘Oh.’ Her tone was neutral for the announcement did not startle her and she continued to look and now sound ideally suited to the subject of recent death. ‘Of his wound, I expect?

‘Right.’ The stew tasted as good as everything about it had promised. ‘Did you know the gunshot man?

She looked around the big room apprehensively, but nobody was paying overt attention to her or Edge. Then heavy footfalls and the rap of a cane ferrule on the 81

threshold of the saloon caused her to catch her breath and fix her attention on the doorway. The sheriff said over the tops of the batwings:

‘Lucy, I need to see you, girl.’ He shifted his gaze toward the bar counter.

‘Guess you spare my daughter for a few minutes, Sam?’

Edge thought that Russell needed to work hard to make it appear he was at ease. His grin was patently forced and his tone of voice sounded brittle not only from the discomfort of the painful walk from the livery. Then Edge was sure the woman just managed to suppress a rasped curse when Tree answered:

‘Sure, you go ahead, Lucy.’ Then he laughed. ‘But don’t keep her away from here too long, Billy. If Abby gets stuck with washing the dishes there’ll be hell to pay for me.’

Lucy Russell’s reluctance to leave was even more apparent when she held back for stretched seconds: then she turned and strode grim faced toward the doorway as her father swung unsteadily around to move painfully away from the saloon. Edge began to reduce his bowl of stew to a heap of lamb bones and washed down the food with the rye that he finished in two swallows. When Tree came for the bowl he said ruefully: ‘Lucy Russell’s a full grown woman pushing forty but her pa still fusses over that daughter of his like she’s no more than a little kid.’

‘Does she give him any cause to do that?’ Edge started to roll a cigarette.

‘Not in the way I guess you’re thinking of, mister.’ His voice was conspiratorial as he leaned closer to Edge. ‘But Billy gets real concerned when he thinks Lucy is being encouraged to rake up the past again. She’s had her hopes raised and dashed too many times already.’

‘I raised her hopes?’ Edge was genuinely puzzled.

Tree shrugged. ‘Like the rest of your kind, mister.’

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‘What kind is that, feller?’

‘The kind that has his sights set on a whole pile of missing government money?’

There was just the hint of an accusing question in the voice and expression of the powerfully built man.

‘Not me, feller,’ Edge replied as he shook his head and put on his hat. Then he hung the unlit cigarette at the corner of his mouth, rose from the table and became the focus of all attention when he started toward the foot of the stairway and Tree called after him:

‘Are you saying you ain’t another of them treasure hunters looking for the stolen money? That you ain’t like all the rest - fixing to find that pile of silver dollars?’

Edge started up the stairs as he replied evenly: ‘I guess maybe I buck the trend –

to coin a phrase.’

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CHAPTER • 8

______________________________________________________________________________________

IN THE cramped and stuffy, ill-furnished second-floor rear corner room of the
Wild Dog
Hotel, Edge hung his hat on a hook behind the door and draped his gunbelt over the chair. Then he stretched out on the narrow bed and smoked the freshly rolled cigarette. Afterwards he invited his weariness, the quiet of the afternoon and a full belly to encourage sleep. And only briefly did he ponder the fact that the easy ability to take a nap during the day was yet another symptom of advancing years. Before he relished the luxury of a degree of contentment that negated the anger he would once have felt about his failure to recover the money owed him by the dead Andrew Devlin. It had been his intention to doze for a half-hour or so but he slept deeply for much longer than that and when he woke it was a whole lot cooler and much darker in the room. And he was not alone. He immediately registered that he had been awakened by his sixth sense for knowing when all was not as it should be: which he thought was one well-honed instinct that had not diminished as he grew older.

‘Mr Edge?’

It was the voice of a woman - not threatening in tone, but he remained tense as he raised his head off the pillow and was ready to lunge for his gunbelt hung on the back of the nearby chair. Then he was easier in his mind after he saw who she was when she rose to her full height against the wall beside the door. Where she had been sitting on something that was not there when he entered the room. He eased up so he was able to lean his back comfortably against the headboard and said: ‘I was told you didn’t give your pa this kind of cause for concern, Miss Russell?’

Enough pale silver moonlight glimmered in through the curtain at the window above the bureau to show she was still dressed all in black. But now she wore a coat and hat and highly shined boots. The soft moon glow amply illuminated the frown on her pale skinned face as she swallowed hard – like she was having difficulty voicing 84

what she had to say - and interlocked her hands nervously in front of her. He spoke first as he swung his legs off the bed and set his feet firmly on the floor.

‘I don’t think the sheriff would like to know his daughter was in a man’s hotel room, lady.’

‘What?’ It was an uneasy whisper.

‘I thought you just did the cooking here at the Wild Dog, Miss Russell? And other women took care of men’s other appetites?’

She rasped: ‘No! No, I’m not a . . . I’m here to ask if I can go with you . . . Oh, I mean . . . Please, I can help you find the government money. If you help me to bring Glenn back?’

He saw it was a bulky carpetbag she had been seated on while she silently waited for him to wake up. ‘How long have you been here, lady?

She shrugged. ‘Not long. I knocked and I could hear you breathing. Heavily, like you were soundly asleep. I came in and you were asleep and it got dark. About an hour, I expect. I didn’t intend to make you angry. And I certainly did not mean for you to think . . . ‘ She shuddered. ‘ . . . think what you did. I have to find what is left of Glenn: bring his remains back here for a decent Christian burial. By doing that I’ll prove he was not involved in stealing the money and getting the other officers killed. I think you’re the man who can help me to do that, Mr Edge.’

He said evenly: ‘Something you can help me to do right now is understand just what the hell it is you’re talking about, Miss Russell.’

She nodded emphatically, advanced resolutely across the room and sat purposefully down on the chair beside the bed. When the gunbelt dug into her back she removed it and set it down carefully on the bed beside him. ‘I’m so sorry. I don’t mean to be one of those females who chatter on and on and take forever to get to the point. How much do you know about the government money that went missing all those years ago, Mr Edge?’

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‘Not very much.’

‘Surely you did not travel all the way from Kansas to Lakewood without having positive information?’ Her tone became entreating. ‘And I’m sure that if we could share what each of us knows then . . ?’

Edge eased up slowly and interrupted: ‘Lady, the only money that concerned me when I left Kansas was a two thousand dollar pile stolen off me by a crooked lawyer who I heard was heading for this town.’

‘You mean you don’t . . ? You’re not here to look for the money that . . ? If that’s so then it means I’ve got this whole thing muddled up?’ She sounded on the verge of tears.

He shook his head and sighed. ‘Why do I have the impression that you getting things muddled is not exactly a rare occurrence, lady?’

She leaned forward. ‘But my father . . . When he came to the saloon earlier to .

. . ‘ She rose suddenly to her feet, strode fast across the room and stopped to snatch up her carpetbag. Then paused with her free hand on the doorknob and chewed on her lower lip as she looked back at him. ‘I owe you an apology for coming into your room uninvited, Mr Edge. And also for thinking to burden you with my troubles that are certainly no concern of yours whatsoever. I bid you good evening.’

‘Look, I’m – ‘ he started. She swung open the door, stepped outside and closed it softly behind her. Her tread was light along the hallway in the direction of the outside stairway. And Edge concluded to the closed door: ‘ – not against listening to somebody tell me how I can come by a lot more than two grand, lady.’

He shrugged, moved to the bureau, poured water from the pitcher into the basin and splashed some on his face. Glanced out of the window and saw a figure moving across the area out back of the hotel: the black garbed Lucy Russell, clutching her carpetbag with both hands as she strode to where a horse was tethered to a clump of brush.