Doom Weapon

by Ed Gorman

  She leaned back and studied my face.

  “You look funny.”

  “It’s just—”

  It was one of the subjects that still hurt to talk about. In my drinking days I’d talked about it a lot. I’d emptied saloons talking about it.

  “Just what, Noah?”

  I sighed. “Adultery.”

  “Adultery? God, don’t use that word. I hate the word. We’re just having some fun. Adultery—all I can think of is burning in hell.”

  “My wife—she used to cheat on me all the time. I was gone a lot. I came home one day and found her. And I realized then that when you’re married you shouldn’t cheat. Walk away from the marriage if you have to—but don’t cheat.”

  She laughed. “Just my luck. I’m in bed with a minister.” Then, putting her hand behind my head and pulling it toward her: “He spit in your face, Noah. And don’t think he did it just because he was drunk. He’d do the same thing sober.” Then, her free hand slipping down to my crotch: “Now that’s a nice big one, Noah. Let’s not waste it.”

  But I wasn’t listening anymore. All sensation was now in my crotch. I was one singular piece of need. She was more skilled than passionate but who was I to complain? The only company I’d kept for most of the last month was my horse. So I was grateful even though I knew I was just part of some stupid game she and her husband had apparently been playing for some years now.

  And then it did the deed, the juice she’d given me. None of that stuff that just throws you to the floor. More subtle, as was to be expected from a well-bred woman. I’d have to get the name of the drug she’d used on me. Might come in handy some day.

  I wasn’t sure of the time when I finally woke up. All I knew was that somebody seemed to be tossing trees against my door. That thunderous. There was just enough dawning light to see that Nan had ripped through all my clothing, bureau drawers, saddlebags. And even the clothes I’d been wearing, all the pockets turned out.

  I wondered who the hell she really was.

  But the pounding on my door continued and then I was up and struggling into my trousers and there was Knut. Gasping a bit. He must have been running.

  “You better get over to the jail fast, Noah.”

  “What is it?”

  “Somebody murdered Molly Kincaid.”

  “Wasn’t she in her cell?”

  “Yeah, that’s the strange thing. They killed her right in her cell.”

  PART TWO

  Chapter 15

  Even though the usual wake-up time for the town was still about an hour away, the frosty morning was already filled with people, at least in the business area where the hotels were.

  There was a crowd outside the sheriff’s office. A lot of people were drinking steaming coffee out of tin cups. A deputy I didn’t recognize was ordering them to stand farther back from the door because the funeral wagon would be arriving soon.

  I didn’t blame them. Regular death is pretty exciting. Death by murder is fifty times better. Especially if the death was visited upon the female of the species and especially if she was young and pretty. You live in any city with a tabloid and you know that that’s what keeps them in business. You half suspect they go out and commit the grisly murders themselves just to stay in business.

  I didn’t know who the deputy was but he seemed to recognize me. He waved me inside.

  The small office was crowded. Longsworth, the young attorney, was there with his treasure chest of a briefcase. A minister clutching a Bible to his chest would have looked reverent if he hadn’t been smoking a cigar. And a nurse in white was saying to nobody in particular, “There just wasn’t anything we could do to help her. They didn’t find her until it was too late.”

  But it was the two standing in the corner, next to the American flag, who interested me most. The widow Ella Coltrane and the wealthiest man in town, Nels Swarthout. He saw me first and glared in my direction. She followed his glare with her own. Grieves might have had a relationship with her but it was doubtful I would.

  I wondered how they’d gotten the news so quickly, given that their fine big homes were on the outskirts of town. Even more I wondered why they would be there at all. What interest did they have in Molly Kincaid? They didn’t look like the kind of tabloid readers who showed up at every murder.

  Terhurne burst from the people packing the inner doorway to the jail cell. When he saw me, his face took on a radiance that was almost religious. Few people had ever looked so happy to see me. Hell, my parents had never looked that happy to see me.

  “Let’s us go get some coffee and have a smoke, Noah.”

  I believe that was the first time he’d ever spoken my first name.

  I wondered what the hell he wanted from me.

  He gave me a little shove, which irritated the hell out of me. I turned around and gave him the same kind of glare that Ella and Swarthout had put on me.

  “Sorry, I’m just in kind of a hurry.”

  Hurry to get out of here, I thought. I remembered his discomfort around blood. How’d poor Molly been killed?

  “If I don’t figure this thing out damned fast, there goes my reelection.”

  Politicians are pretty much the same, whether they be sheriffs, governors, or presidents. They do best the things that are in their own self-interest. While he was worried about his career, I was thinking about the sad, oddly fragile girl named Molly.

  “There’s one man in town here who’s jumping up and down this morning, I’ll tell you that. His name’s Rafferty.” He spoke around a lumpy mouthful of pancake and over-easy egg. He jabbed his fork at me from time to time for emphasis. “A little gal is supposedly sleeping in one of my cells and somebody gets in and kills her. I can hear that bastard up there on the stump now. ‘Right in his own cell while he was home sleeping off a—well, I won’t say it but we all know how the sheriff likes to support the liquor industry, don’t we?’ That was a joke from the last election.”

  We sat in the Imperial, the same place where I first saw Swarthout and Ella, where the elite, as they say, meet to eat. It was now getting on to seven a.m. so the restaurant was starting to fill up quickly. From what I could hear of the talk around me, the only subject was Molly Kincaid being murdered in her cell.

  “I hate to interrupt you, Terhurne, but maybe you could fill me in on what happened.”

  He leaned forward and said, “I know you think I’m a callous bastard, Ford. But look at it this way. This town deserves the best lawman it can get.”

  “And that could only be you.”

  “You’re one sarcastic bastard, you know that?”

  “Look, just tell me what happened.”

  He knew they were looking at him. A lot of men whose attire and bearing told you that they were important in that little town were nodding in his direction. He was going to become, at best, a joke. And at worst a true villain.

  He said, in a gravelly low voice, “I don’t know what happened. That’s the thing. Hayden went over to the café where we get meals for the prisoners. And there’s this new waitress there with these milk jugs you just wouldn’t believe and—”

  I tried not to groan. “So it’s five o’clock in the morning and Hayden figures he’ll not only get breakfast, he’ll put in a little time sniffing around the new girl. And he leaves the office unlocked because it’s too much trouble to unlock it when he comes back with an armload of breakfast.”

  “You sound like you were there.”

  “So the killer sneaks in, grabs the key, and lets himself into her cell.”

  “And kills her.”

  I had to say it. “You might as well turn in that badge right now.”

  He got twenty years older right in front of me. “That bad?”

  “At least that bad. You can’t even protect a young woman in your own jail?”

  He punched a fist into an open palm. “I never should’ve hired Hayden. My damned sister bred six morons. It’s in descending order. By the time you get to the sixth, wh
ich is Hayden, they can’t take a piss without three people helpin’ ’em.”

  He was just finishing up this round of understandable self-pity when a lanky man in a blue suit and a grim New England face walked in and came straight to the table.

  “Oh, just what I need.”

  “Who is he?” I said as I watched the bald man advance on us.

  “The mayor.”

  “Good morning, gentlemen. Ford, we haven’t met.” He shoved a hand at me and we shook. “I’m Bryant Willis, mayor of this fine town.”

  I smiled. “You’ve got my vote.”

  “This is hardly a time for levity.”

  “No, it isn’t. But if you’ve come over to pound on our friend Terhurne here, he’s doing a damned good job of it himself and he doesn’t need any reinforcement.”

  “As a federal man, I’d think you’d be disgusted by this kind of shoddy work.”

  I shrugged. “The thing is, Mayor, there isn’t a lawman, a senator, or even a president who hasn’t done something stupid in his career. And I suspect the same thing could be said for mayors. So he made a mistake and something terrible happened. Like I said, he’s well aware of that.”

  “I’m shocked you would defend his stupidity. He hired Hayden over our objections. But Terhurne here has a bully side to him and he managed to browbeat the town council long enough to get his way.”

  “I’ll tell you what, Mayor, if it’ll make you feel any better, I’ll throw in with Terhurne here and help him out with the investigation. You can wire D.C. and ask about my record as an investigator.”

  “Why would you do that?”

  “Simple. Vested interest. I think Molly was killed by the same person or persons I’m after.”

  “I can tell the council this?”

  “Be my guest.”

  “They’ll want me to fire Terhurne here.”

  I could see Terhurne forcing himself to sit quietly as we discussed him. He had enough rage inside to kill four or five men with his fists and right on the spot. At that moment all the rage was surging in him but all he could do was sit still like a good citizen and hear himself run down by the mayor.

  Willis scowled at Terhurne. “I sure hope you won’t be stupid enough to run for election again, Terhurne. Because right now my arthritic old mother could beat you three to one.”

  “You’ve been waiting for this a long time, Willis. And you finally got your wish.” The self-pity in Terhurne’s voice just made it worse.

  “The point is, Mayor,” I said, “as soon as we leave here, Terhurne and I start on our investigation. And I hope to have a written report on your desk within twenty-four hours to let you and the council know how things are going.”

  “You hear that, Terhurne? That’s a real lawman talking. A professional lawman. Something you’ll never be.”

  He offered his hand again and we shook. “The folks in D.C. should be damned proud of you.” This was the voice he used when he was handing out the award for Not Farting in Church Oftener Than Once a Month given by the local Kiwanis club.

  Even with the mayor gone, Terhurne was still sullen. “You both made me sound like I’m an imbecile. I didn’t ask you to step in. I don’t need no favors.”

  “No, but I do. I need you to help me find out what happened to Grieves.”

  “I still don’t think that has anything to do with Molly.”

  “No? Then why did she mention his name when she was holding a razor to my throat?”

  “It doesn’t mean that it had anything to do with murdering her.”

  I leaned over and said, “You want me to start telling everybody that I think you should be fired before the election?”

  “You just told the mayor—”

  “I can always tell him you were holding a gun on me under the table.”

  He started to call me a name but apparently couldn’t come up with one vile enough. He sank in his chair.

  “I’m running this investigation, Terhurne. And if you don’t help me, I’ll give a statement to the paper about what an incompetent you are.”

  He started to call me another name but I spoke first. “How many brothels you have in town?”

  “Three. Why? What’s that got to do with anything?”

  “Which is the best one?”

  “Brandy Bowen’s. But—”

  “I need directions.”

  “What’s Brandy got to do—”

  “Because Grieves probably went there a few times. Only the finest for our boy Grieves. I want to see if she can help me with anything.”

  He smirked. “So this is how you ‘professional boys’ do it, huh? A whorehouse is the best you can come up with?”

  I stood up. “And I’m going to be needing a lot more information. So keep yourself easy to find.”

  I threw some money on the table and left.

  I wanted to see for myself where Molly had been murdered. A deputy nodded courteously when I came in. He said, “Afraid the sheriff isn’t here right now. My name’s Cliff Needham but I’m just a deputy.”

  Needham was a middle-aged man in a boiled white shirt, a string tie, a full head of dark-brown hair and a mild face. The eyes were blue and intelligent. If he had been on duty, Molly would still be alive.

  I showed him my badge and he came out from around the desk and shook my hand. “Hearing some good things about you, Mr. Ford.”

  “Noah’ll do fine.”

  “Any way I can help you, Noah, I’ll be glad to.”

  “I’d like to look around the cell where Miss Kincaid was.”

  He smiled. “You’re making it easy for me.”

  He walked back to the desk, opened a drawer, pulled out a ring of keys, and then reached out and handed them to me.

  “You like a cup of coffee?”

  “Appreciate it, Cliff. But I can get my own.”

  I walked over and got myself a cup and started filling it. “You hear anything new about her being killed?”

  “Some people think Hayden might have done it. But I’m pretty sure he didn’t.”

  “Why not?”

  He hesitated, uncomfortable. “Well, Hayden isn’t real mature about things. He’s a nice kid but he isn’t an adult yet, if you understand what I mean.”

  “Yeah, that’s the impression I had, too.”

  “If Hayden killed her, he would’ve confessed by now.”

  “You sure about that?”

  “Well, if he didn’t confess you’d at least be able to tell it on him. He’d be all jittery and edgy. And he’d confess real soon.”

  “You sound pretty sure.”

  “He grew up next door to me. I’ve known him since he was about two. He can’t keep a secret and if he does anything bad, he comes right to you and tells you. Besides, he’s got that young gal at the café as his alibi.”

  “Maybe she’s lying.”

  He laughed. “You got it wrong. He’s sweet on her but she ain’t sweet on him. She already got one of the Hayworth boys to go around with. Believe me, Hayden doesn’t have a chance against a Hayworth boy.”

  Five minutes later I was in the cell where Molly had been murdered. There was a splash of blood on the wall and some strands of her hair in the blood. The killer had pounded her head against the wall, which wouldn’t have been hard to do, given Molly’s size. According to the doc’s report, which Cliff had shown me a few minutes earlier; Molly had died of a brain injury. There had also been faint bruising on her neck, as if the killer had started to strangle her but stopped.

  Farther down you could see more blood. Molly must have slid down the wall after losing consciousness.

  I sorted through the bed clothes, I scanned the walls for any kind of abrasion or scratch, I got down on my hands and knees and searched under the cots. I probably wouldn’t have noticed it if it hadn’t made a scraping sound against the floor. Just a tiny scrape.

  I pulled my hand out from beneath the cot and looked at a button. That was my first impression of it, anyway, a miniscule dot of s
ilver. It looked ornamental, not practical. But I had no idea what it was.

  “Sorry, Noah, I sure don’t know what it is. There’re a lot of people in and out of those cells. Preachers and women from Salvation Army and then of course the prisoners themselves. You’re seein’ us at low tide. Usually every one of them cells is filled.” He pushed his face closer to where the silver lay in my palm. “Could be off a fancy boot of some kind. One of them real fussy ones they make up for ya in Denver. I seen ’em decorated like this a lot of times.”

  “How about an envelope to put this in?”

  “Sure thing.”

  When I had the unidentified silver dot in the envelope, and the envelope in my back pocket, I thanked Cliff and left.

  I ran into Knut walking toward the office. “Sorry I wasn’t around when they found Molly. Home sound asleep.”

  “Wouldn’t worry about it, Knut. You can’t be on duty twenty-four hours a day.”

  He frowned. “Between you and me, somebody should be.”

  Terhurne was damned lucky to have an assistant deputy who cared about his job the way Terhurne should have.

  The railroad depot was noisy, crowded, and smelly. One thing nobody’s figured out—unless you’re traveling in a private rail car—is how to keep very clean on long train rides. So on a substantial trip, body odors of various kinds begin to accumulate. The railroads advertise that things are a lot better than they used to be but then we know about advertising, don’t we?

  The cigars being smoked didn’t help the depot atmosphere much, either. It seemed everybody over the age of two was puffing away.

  Several elderly Comanches, an enormous family of Irishers, three middle-aged men in the loud suits and dusty derbies of drummers, and various weary-looking single travelers of just about every age filled the benches where passengers waited to depart. And then there were the kids. With their fresh faces, their noisy games, and their laughter, they looked as if they belonged to a species separate from the one the adults belonged to. A new species, these kids were, one that neither travel nor boredom could wear down. Their energy was almost threatening.