The stogy was out, but still retained a faint trace of warmth. Edge remounted and thudded in his heels to drive the horse into a gallop. The trail continued to be as tortuous as before in reaching up to the western pass, and he followed it with a calculated recklessness. He spotted the stage as he halted the gelding in the break in the ridge. As was his way, not even a flicker of satisfaction showed in the ice-cold blueness of his slitted eyes when he saw the rig lurching slowly across the rocky bed of a wide but shallow stream some two hundred feet below him. The mountain air was so clear that he could hear every snarling curse uttered by the ill-tempered driver as the whip lashed across the quivering backs of the struggling team.
The angry words, the hiss of water over the rocks, and the splashing and snorting of the team covered the sounds of Edge’s approach. At the bank of the stream, he veered the gelding to one side and forded the ice-cold water fifty yards upstream from the trail. He stayed in the cover of a deeply shadowed rock wall until the stage was dragged clear of the water course. Apart from the driver, there was also a guard riding on the high box seat. A considerable amount of baggage was lashed to the roof behind them. The blinds had been drawn across the windows.
“You reckon you oughta rest the horses, Troy?” the elderly guard suggested.
The much younger driver had, in fact, halted the team clear of the water, but only so that he could take a tailor-made cigarette from his shirt pocket and light it. He laughed. “You ain’t got no bride of a week to get home to, Bill,” he answered.
The guard’s laughter had a cackling tone. “Absence makes the heart grow fonder, boy,” he said.
“Ain’t my heart that’s growing, Bill,” the driver responded picking up the whip. “If I don’t get home I’m gonna bust my breeches.”
“Troy, wait!” Edge said evenly, urging his horse out from behind the rock and leveling the Winchester.
“A stickup!” the guard rasped, reaching for the rifle resting on the roof behind him.
“You tired of living, old man?” Edge asked, moving the gelding in closer.
The guard halted his move, then swung around to face the half-breed again. “We ain’t got no bank shipment aboard, mister,” he said. “Ain’t got nothin’ aboard worth anyone gettin’ shot.”
Troy nodded in agreement. His face was very pale in the moonlight. The cigarette slanted from the comer of his mouth and smoke curled into his right eye. He was paralyzed with fear, unable to touch the cigarette or mb his eye. ~
“Toss your guns down here,” Edge instructed. “Hold them by the barrels.”
The rifle clattered to the ground first. Then Bill’s Colt. He had to hook the Remington revolver from Troy’s holster and toss it down.
“Now the both of you,” Edge urged. “And roust out the passengers.”
The old guard climbed down carefully, his ancient bones creaking. Fear made the driver’s actions even slower and stiffer.
“What you gonna do, mister?” Bill asked nervously. “Put a bullet in you,” the half-breed replied sofdy. The old man gasped and flattened himself against a wheel. Edge added, “If you don’t get the passengers outta that stage real quick.”
The guard licked his thin lips and reached out a trembling hand to turn the door handle. As the door folded back, five white faces stared out at the impassive man astride the gelding. Three of the passengers were men and two were women. Both the women were in their sixties and gray-haired.
“Please get out, folks,” the guard pleaded. “If you don’t, I’m the one’s gonna suffer.”
Edge shook his head. “You won’t suffer, feller. It’ll be quick.” His eyes raked over the ashen-faced passengers. “And you’ll have company on that long stage trail in the sky.”
The passengers were galvanized into action, fighting each other in their haste to get through the narrow doorway. They gathered in a tight-knit group, careful not to get between Edge and the driver and guard. The halfbreed ducked his head momentarily to peer inside the stage. It was empty.
“All I got is three dollars, mister,” one of the male passengers said with a quiver in his voice.
“Save it to buy the drinks you’re gonna need,” Edge told him, and fixed his glinting stare on the guard. “Where’d the girl get off?” he asked.
The old man had to swallow the lump in his throat before he could speak. “Trail Forks. Back over the other side of the pass. That all you stuck us up for, mister? I’d have told you.”
“That all?” one of the women asked, irritated. “You don’t want anything else from us?”
“Not me, ma’am,” Edge replied, sliding the Winchester into the boot and flicking a finger against his hat-brim. “You folks got nothing I want.”
His right hand was draped loosely over the butt of his holstered Colt, warning them against faying for the guns on the ground or any the passengers might be carrying.
“Well, really, frightening us all like that for such a small thing!” the irate lady complained.
Edge sighed. “If it’ll make you any happier, lady, I’ll shoot you,” he offered softly.
The woman gave a choked cry of alarm and hurriedly, ungracefully, climbed back aboard the stage. The other passengers followed her, but more carefully, pointedly avoiding the unblinking eyes of the half-breed. They sat very erect in their seats, like wax dummies.
“On your way, fellers,” Edge urged.
The driver was still rigid with fear. His movements had a mechanical quality as he climbed up onto the seat.
“What about our guns?” the guard asked, his tongue darting out to moisten his lips.
Edge spat. You’re welcome to try picking them up,” he invited.
The driver yelled as the cigarette burned down to its end and seared his lips. The guard dropped his gaze from Edge’s face to the hand draped over the gun butt.
“Guess the company’ll have to buy us some new irons,” the old man muttered, and hauled his arthritic body up onto the seat. “All right, Troy, head for home and that new wife of yours.”
The driver eased the team into a slow start. The fact that they were rolling again gave the shaken passengers courage enough to look out of the window at the tall halfbreed resting casually in the saddle.
Edge curled back his thin lips to show a smile. The humor did not extend to his eyes. “Sorry to have held you up,” he called.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The shavetail lieutenant with the battered and badly cut face tried not to tremble as he stood in the center of the stage, his hands tied behind his back and a noose looped around his neck. In front of him, the auditorium of the Pineville Playhouse was packed to capacity. Every seat was taken, the aisles were jammed with people sitting cross-legged, and the standing area at the rear was filled to discomfort.
The gallows had been so erected that the condemned man stood on a trapdoor close to the front of the stage with its row of hissing, gas-fueled footlights. A Confederate infantry corporal stood at each side of the stage, aiming a rifle at the helpless prisoner. One of the captains commanding the unit responsible for capturing the Union officer moved onto the stage from the right wing. He flushed and gave a stiff bow as the audience greeted him with a burst of enthusiastic applause.
He waited nervously for the noise to diminish, then cleared his throat. “Ladies and gentlemen of Pineville,” he nounced. “As you are all aware, this Yankee intelligence agent was captured yesterday on the soil of Confederate Virginia.”
There was a cheer which he silenced with a wave of his hand. “He is the lone survivor of an enemy force which cowardly slaughtered a score of our brave soldiers.
The fact that he alone escaped death is proof of how bravely our boys fought in the name of the cause.”
In the large communal dressing room below stage, Hedges and the six troopers listened with varying degrees of anxiety to what was happening above their heads.
“Ain’t that what’s called propaganda?” Hal Douglas muttered.
“Proper horses
hit is what I call it,” Forrest growled. “This officer,” the Rebel captain went on, stressing the commission in the manner of an insult, “has further compounded his cowardice by ratting on his comrades.” He laughed shortly. “As you can see, ladies and gentlemen, he was so frightened while we were questioning him that he kept going weak at the knees and falling on his face.” The audience exploded into laughter.
The Union men had guessed who was to be executed when, on their way to the dressing room, they passed a doorway guarded by the two corporals. The captain had emerged from the guarded room and was recognized, confirming the guess. Fortunately, the troopers in their decorative western garb were able to hurry through into the dressing room before the Confederate officer had time to spot them as fakes.
“Now he has served his purpose,” the man on stage continued after the laughter had died down. “He has told us every detail of the vile plot he and his fellow federal spies have hatched. I will not bore you with the details. But you may rest assured that the army of the Confederacy has taken steps to combat the plot.”
He paused for an expected cheer. It came. But it was late and lacking in vigor. The majority of the audience had heard enough words and were impatient for the gruesome climax of the added attraction.
Hedges had not even considered the chance of rescuing the lieutenant. The shavetail had failed twice—first in allowing himself to be captured, then in shooting off his mouth under torture. But there was no vindictiveness in Hedges’ decision. It was based on the simple fact that the death of Jefferson Davis was more important than the life of a no-account Union lieutenant.
“It has been decided to execute this man in public for two reasons,” the Rebel captain continued. “Firstly to show you people how we deal with enemies of the Confederacy. And secondly as a warning to any among you who may be, or may be considering, aiding the Yankee invaders.”
His voice was appropriately stem as he spoke the threat. Feet shuffled uncomfortably, and several throats were cleared.
By ignoring the plight of the condemned man, Hedges was able to apply his mind fully to the problem of maintaining the subterfuge of the stolen identities. And there was only one answer—to go through with the performance expected of them. To run out would surely start a hue and cry, and the civilian citizenry of Pineville would not be the only ones in pursuit of the escapers. For the agitated Griffiths had revealed that the detachment of battle-weary Rebel soldiers were resting up in the town, except for two men sent on horseback to Richmond with a dispatch concerning the plot against Jefferson Davis.
“This officer maintains that if he is to die, it should be by means of the firing squad,” the captain told his silent audience. “If he were an ordinary soldier as his uniform suggests, he would be accorded that honor. But beneath the uniform lurks a dirty spy. Therefore, a military tribunal consisting of myself and two fellow officers have sentenced him to hang.”
The silence seemed to solidify in the tense atmosphere of the playhouse. The captain’s boot soles rasped against the boards of the stage as he turned.
“Do you have anything to say before the sentence is^ carried out?” _
There was a large variety of costumes in the actors’ trunks, but no scripts. The only indication of the subject matter treated by the troupe was evidenced by a number of cardboard signs, garishly lettered: CALIFORNIA GOLD RUSH, THE BANK RAID, GUNFIGHT SHOWDOWN, CATTLE RUSTLERS and PRAIRIE CAMPFIRE.
With the Rebel captain close at hand and the possibility that there were other soldiers in the audience who might recognize the troopers as frauds, the choice was an obvious one. But it had a built-in complication, and the method Hedges used to get around this was not popular with Seward, Bell, and Rhett.
“Well?” the captain barked, leaning forward so that his face was only inches from the ravaged features of the helpless lieutenant. “No last words?”
The lieutenant dragged his shoulders erect and held his head high as he stared directly ahead.
“Maybe his necktie’s too tight!” a man shouted harshly from the audience, and drew guffaws. ,
“Corporal!” the captain snapped.
The guard on the right sprang into an about-face and ducked out of sight behind the proscenium arch. He rested his rifle and gripped the lever which operated the spring-loaded trapdoor upon which the condemned man stood. “Ready, sir!” he reported into the tense silence gripping the playhouse.
“May God have mercy on your soul!” the Rebel captain said to the lieutenant, and gave a curt nod in the direction of the corporal.
The noncom closed his eyes tightly and wrenched down the lever. The trap opened beneath the feet of the condemned man. He opened his mouth to say something but it was too late. His weight snapped the rope taut. His final breath shot his tongue forward, and his teeth crunched together as his neck broke. The tip of his tongue was bitten off and spattered onto the toe of his muddy right boot. Oozing blood adhered the pulpy flesh to its resting place as the body and limbs of the dead man swung. A massed gasp rose from the audience as a single sound. Only the expressions on the faces of the watchers revealed whether the individual utterances were of shock, horror, or exhilaration.
“So perish all enemies of the Confederacy!” the Rebel captain shouted dramatically. “Let the entertainment continue.”
“That’s us!” Hedges rasped, snatching up the sign lettered with the legend THE BANK RAID.
This was confirmed by a rap of knuckles on the door of the large under-stage room. “Five minutes, Mr. Ford,” Griffiths announced anxiously. “Will you be ready?”
“Yeah!” the Union captain replied, then lowered his voice. “As we’ll ever be.”
Applause broke out from the audience as Griffiths ran up the steps and elbowed the noncom executioner out of the way, reaching for the ropes to draw the curtains across the stage.
“Clear the stage, please!” he instructed the captain, doing his best not to look at the battered face atop the still swinging body of the dead lieutenant. “We must get on.”
He waited a few moments until the captain had beckoned to the two corporals and the three soldiers were moving toward the gallows. Then he stepped between the curtains and help up his hands to silence the final handclaps.
“And now, ladies and gentlemen,” he announced. “On to the main part of the program. Mr. John Ford, the distinguished actor, and his band of players will present a series of short plays depicting life in the Far West of this great country of ours. The Pineville Playhouse is indeed honored to welcome this famous acting troupe, and it is with the utmost certainty that I can promise you an evening of fine entertainment. The plays will commence just as soon as the items used in the first section of the program have been removed from the stage. Thank you.”
“They gotta be good to keep me interested after what I just seen!” a man shouted.
“Damn right!” another man agreed;
“They will be,” Griffiths responded a trifle nervously, and ducked back behind the curtains before his lack of conviction became too obvious.
The body had been removed, and,the two corporals were in the act of carrying off the gallows under the direction of the captain. Griffiths worked the lever which raised the trapdoor back into place. The officer gave a curt nod of farewell and went into the shadows to the left of the stage. The agitated playhouse manager looked across the empty boards, running a crooked finger around the inside of his dress shirt collar and mopping the beads of sweat from his forehead.
“Christ!” he muttered. “Scenery and props!”
A mumble of conversation sounded from the auditorium. It seemed to Griffiths to contain a heavy note of impatience.
“We don’t use ’em,” Bob Rhett said.
Griffiths was startled by the voice, then gave a gasp of amazement as he turned and saw the speaker—and Seward and Bell coming up the steps behind the New Englander.
“Just these crazy outfits!” Seward rasped gruffly, and thrust the cardboard sign into the han
ds of the blinking Griffiths. “Stick this out and let’s get on with it.”
A wooden stand was leaning against the wall, and as the stamping of feet augmented the discontent of the waiting audience, Griffiths hurriedly unfolded it, rested the sign on the brackets, and thrust the announcement through the side gap in the curtains. A cheer rose. And a few seconds later, as Griffiths reacted to a pointing finger from Rhett and hauled on the rope, the swishing open of the curtains signaled a sudden, expectant silence.
Rhett stood down-stage center, attired in a black gown buttoned high to the throat and sweeping down to brush against the boards at the hem. Heavy padding beneath the bodice provided a good imitation of a feminine figure. His own slim shape needed no artificial aids to complete the picture. Rouge, lipstick, and thick eye makeup caused the handsome face to match the body and the final touch was a shoulder-length, blonde wig.
A number of the more outgoing men in the audience were sufficiently fooled to greet the New Englander with admiring whistles. And it was Rhett alone who captured their fancy, even though Bell and Seward were also attired as women. For they were obvious fakes, despite the fine meshed veils which hung from beneath broad brimmed hats to drape their unpainted features. Their postures were wrong, lacking the natural grace of Rhett and, despite the padding beneath their white dresses, they in no way looked feminine.
“Ladies and gentlemen,”
“Ladies and gentlemen,” Rhett opened, pitching his voice to a higher falsetto than normal. “We crave your indulgence in the matter of scenery, and ask you to enter into the spirit of what may be termed a new method of acting—a method in which you, the audience, play parts as important as we the actors. For you must use your imaginations to paint die settings in which we act out the drama. I will tell you only that this stage is a bank in a town of the southwest. I am the teller and my colleagues are customers. The actions will speak for themselves.”
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