Colter's Path (9781101604830)

by Judd, Cameron

  “Who did it?”

  “Seems to have been done by somebody who came through and stayed with the family a few days. Nobody in the area knew him, and nobody knows why he was there. He might have been kin of Carver’s wife. His name was John Collier. Ever heard Treemont mention that name?”

  Jedd thought it over and shook his head. “Not ringing any bells with me. Was Carver’s wife a Collier before she married?”

  “No. Beth was a Bradburn. But she could have been kin to some Colliers. Hell, they’re both kin to my people, you know that? The Blalocks have ties to the Daltons and Bradburns both.”

  “Why would this Collier have to be kin to the family at all? Maybe it was just somebody they knew.”

  “Could be. But folks who talked to the current sheriff, Jim Campbell, said they had it in their heads from somewhere that this Collier visitor was kinfolk with the family on Beth’s side. So somebody must have been told that along the way, by Beth or Carver or one of the children.”

  “Any notion at all why this Collier would have done this?”

  “Not a bit. They were found outside the house, laid out in a line, all seven of them. Shot in the back of the head, every one of them. No blood in the house, so somehow he—or whoever did it—had gotten them all outside. Or maybe they were killed here and there and dragged to the same place and laid out in a line. Apart from being shot like they were, the corpses were left in decent condition. Except for Carver.”

  “What was different with him?”

  “He was chopped up. No other way to describe it. Cut into pieces—arms and legs hacked off, feet cut off at the ankles, hands cut at the wrists, head severed—but then the pieces were all laid out in place, like he was whole. Strangest thing I ever saw. But the fact that Carver’s remains were treated so much worse makes me figure that motive for it all might have had something to do with him more than the others.”

  “You saw it yourself, then.”

  “I did. I ain’t been sheriff for a long time now, but I still held a deputy status up until a short while ago and happened to be in town when the boy who’d found them rode in and gave word. I went out with Sheriff Campbell to the house. It was hard on him, real hard. There was a time, you see, when he’d courted Beth Bradburn himself. Carver Dalton asked her for her hand first, though, and she said yes. Broke poor Jim Campbell’s heart clean in two that she married somebody else. And he sobbed like a child when he saw Beth lying there dead with that flyblown hole in the back of her head. ‘She should have married me,’ he said to me. ‘If she’d married me, she’d not have been here for this to happen to her.’ That’s what Jim Campell said. ‘Should have married me.’”

  “I know some of what he went through,” Jedd said. “I was set to marry a gal name of Emma McSwain, daughter of the president of a college in Knoxville. She cut me loose, though. Didn’t even have a marriage offer from anybody else when she did it, either. She decided I was too poor, too broke, to be a husband for her. She ended up marrying a man named Stanley Wickham, and from all I’ve heard, he’s naught but a sorry bastard. Treats her hard and mean. Unfaithful, too. But he had a bit of money, so if money was what she wanted, I reckon she should be happy.”

  “She still in Knoxville?”

  “No, sir. California. He took her there.”

  “Well…and now you’re going there. Reckon you’ll see her?”

  “I reckon so.”

  “Well, Jedd, I got to tell you that this fellow who killed the Dalton family, the story is that he’s gone to California, too. Or maybe just on his way. Whether by land or sea, I don’t know. That’s what led me to hunt you down. I wanted you to know what had happened before Treemont did—and I wanted to tell you that there’s a damned good reward up for the capture or killing of this John Collier.”

  “I’m no manhunter, Sheriff Blalock.”

  “I know that. But I got a feeling a good friend of yours might decide that he’s going to do some manhunting, once he knows what was done to his kin.”

  “You’re talking about Treemont.”

  “Of course.”

  Jedd thought it over and saw that Blalock was right. Treemont was devoted to his kin, and he’d been particularly close to his cousin Carver Dalton. When he wasn’t out hunting with Jedd, he was fishing or trapping with Carver. Tree had shared space at the table of Carver and Beth Dalton. He’d be devastated when he learned what had happened to them. And probably bent on vengeance. That would be Treemont’s way.

  Jedd looked seriously at Blalock. “I don’t think Tree should be told right off that Collier might be in California. I’m afraid he might spend all his time, once he gets there, trying to hunt the man down and call him to account.”

  Blalock merely nodded.

  Witherspoon had been sitting by listening quietly to all that was said. He made a strange “urp” noise in his throat and drew the attention of the other two. Witherspoon swallowed hard and said, “He was cut to pieces and then laid back together, like puzzle pieces?”

  Blalock nodded. “That’s a fact. But I failed to mention that his arms had been switched, and his legs laid back in place upside down, so that he was lying on his back but his feet were pointing downward. And his privates had been cut off and shoved into the hole in the back of his head. Horrible thing to see. Horrible.”

  Witherspoon tried to speak, but merely achieved making that strange noise in his throat again. He came to his feet much faster this time, not stumbling like before, and rushed off behind the nearest wagon, from whence the sound of his retching could be clearly heard.

  “Not a man of strong stomach,” Jedd said to Blalock.

  “No. Evidently not. I can’t much blame him, though. I nigh did the same thing when I first saw that family lined up dead.”

  The call of a familiar voice came across the camp, and Jedd looked up to see Treemont heading toward him and Blalock. Tree wore a big smile and bounced along cheerily. When he saw Blalock he froze and stared, then laughed aloud. “Sheriff? Is that you?”

  Blalock stood and grinned back falteringly. “It’s me, Treemont! How are you, boy?” Then, quietly side-speaking to Jedd, he whispered, “You’d best tell him, Jedd. He’ll take it better from you than from a plain-spoke old son of a gun like me.”

  Jedd wasn’t so sure, but there was no time to do anything but quickly nod. Treemont came up and wrapped his arms around Blalock and gave him a firm hug. Blalock looked at Jedd over Treemont’s shoulder, the expression on his face that of a man ready to flee.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  At the age of fifteen, Squire Hale Napier of Philadelphia already felt like a seasoned adult. His father had died three years earlier, and after that the boy had been frequently forced to serve as the functioning head of the family. His mother, though devoted to her brood and capable domestically, was intensely shy and easily overwhelmed by difficult situations. Squire, though, had his birth father’s natural strength, self-possession, and mental dexterity.

  It hadn’t been easy for Squire to adjust to his mother’s second marriage two years ago. Under the circumstances, he didn’t mind the idea of his mother being the wife of someone other than his father, but he did wish she had married someone less like herself. Squire’s stepfather, Joe Napier, was a good man, but he was even more timid than his wife. More timid than Ferkus Varney or Witherspoon Sadler, neither of whom Squire or any of the Napiers had ever had occasion to meet or hear of.

  The California-bound Napier family, though at the moment encamped immediately adjacent to the site occupied by the California Enterprise Company of East Tennessee, were part of an entirely different and smaller band of travelers, one that had come out of Pennsylvania. None of the Napiers had ever set foot on any terrain farther south than northern Kentucky, so the Sadler group was composed purely of strangers to them.

  Squire was moving among the Tennesseans just now, however, having drifted over from the Pennsylvanian encampment with a distinct and secret purpose in mind. He drifted silently betwe
en the campfires and wagons, scanning the Sadler camp closely, searching.

  Exactly what he was looking for he could not have said, but he would know when he saw it. Then, Lord willing, he’d be able to get his hands on it and take it to the one who needed it.

  It wouldn’t be so bad, would it, to steal something that would maybe bring comfort to an ailing little girl, a child so sick it appeared unlikely she would live to reach California? Did not Squire’s little sister at least have the right to die with some sort of cheering personal possession in her hands? Winnie loved dolls, tops, carved gadgets—any kind of plaything—had since she was very small, but all of hers had been lost or left behind when the move westward began. Squire was determined to find her a toy or two. Something to distract Winnie from her deteriorating physical condition. The little girl was in such a dejected mental state of late that she spent more time talking about her wish to be buried by a roadside, where there was life and movement and activity, than of any hope of recovering and enjoying life and movement and activity for herself.

  Her family had higher hopes. The Napiers believed that, if they could reach California, the climate could bring health to their declining little one. That prospect was, to them, far more attractive than any gold could be.

  If they could reach California…that was the key. But to do that, Squire believed, the girl would have to regain her determination to hang on and live. Anything she could have that would make life more pleasant for her would go far toward giving her that determination.

  Squire moved through the camp, so quiet and careful that hardly anyone noticed him. And he searched.

  * * *

  When rain came, those who usually slept beneath the sky found themselves scrambling for cover, inside the wagons or beneath them, beneath improvised tents, within any available natural shelter or random shed or abandoned structure that might chance to be handy.

  This rain had come with little warning, and Ben Scarlett had been sufficiently in his cups to not notice it at all until he was half drenched. He then made a zigzagging, stumbling line for the wagon nearest him, which happened to be the one in which Zebulon McSwain spent most of his time hidden away. McSwain was not in his wagon at the moment, though, having taken a stroll into the nearby camp of the Pennsylvanians, and where he had fallen into conversation with a trio of strangers.

  Caught by the storm away from his own camp, McSwain had accepted an invitation to wait out the weather in a roomy tent with his new friends. Because friends had been hard for him to claim in recent times, he was glad to be where he was. These people knew nothing of him, of Knoxville, or Bledsoe College and his ignoble ouster therefrom. In the company of these northern folk, he found a foretaste of what he hoped California would be for him…freshness, newness, a place and chance to start new without being surrounded by prejudgments and preconceptions regarding him. As he told the Pennsylvanians about himself, he lied freely, knowing they could not know the difference. He became a successful Knoxville merchant rather than a disgraced former collegiate leader. They nodded acceptingly, having no reason to disbelieve anything he told them.

  One camp over, as Ben Scarlett was clambering with some difficulty into the back of McSwain’s wagon, he was suddenly bumped backward as another person exited the same vehicle. Ben tilted back and fell to the ground, landing on his rump as the one who had collided with him took a jump across him and darted away, heels slinging mud. Pratfallen, Ben quirked his head and looked after the fleeing figure of Squire Hale Napier.

  A boy. Just a youth, one Ben did not believe he’d seen before. The boy had something clutched in his arms that Ben did not clearly see and couldn’t identify. He ran in the direction of the adjacent camp where Ben knew those northerners were.

  “You could have took a moment of your time to help a poor old drunk get out of the rain, son,” Ben muttered. Then he pulled himself to his feet and managed to climb back up and roll in beneath the sheltering wagon cover. He quietly called the name of McSwain but got no reply. Evidently McSwain was elsewhere.

  Ben found a comfortable place and sat looking out the loosely cinched, horse-collar-shaped rear opening of the wagon cover, listening to the drops pelting above him, and, after a few minutes, swigging from his new flask, which was at the moment still half-filled. A little while later, he was leaned back against the side of the wagon, sleeping to the lulling music of the rain.

  Treemont took it hard.

  Jedd struggled for ten minutes, trying to find a way to work his way into the bad news Blalock had brought. There was no way to do it. All Jedd could do in the end was grasp Treemont by his shoulders, look in his eyes, and say, “Tree, listen to me: your cousin Carver has been murdered, and all his family, by a man name of John Collier.” Tree had gaped at Jedd, then the tears came. They heightened as Jedd gave him more details, which he somewhat sanitized, because Jedd found the description of the mutilation so hard to inflict upon his friend.

  “I have to find Collier and make him pay,” Treemont said.

  “You can’t change the fact they’re dead,” Jedd said. “I want to see this Collier brought to justice, too. But nothing you can do with him or to him will do a thing for Carver and his family.”

  “It’ll avenge them. And it’ll sure as hell blazes make me feel better,” replied Treemont. Jedd knew better than to argue with him.

  Treemont then insisted that Blalock give him a more detailed description of the whole sordid matter than Jedd had presented, including the condition of the bodies and Blalock’s assessment of how much suffering was or was not involved. Jedd suffered through the repeated account and wished Treemont would try to turn his thoughts to other matters for now. It wouldn’t happen. Jedd knew Treemont too well to expect it would.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Zeb McSwain threw back his head and laughed heartily at a joke just told by one of his new Pennsylvanian friends. He’d not laughed so freely in the longest time, and it was like a cleansing in his soul. Hope for his future grew inside like a swelling light. It could be like this, the way it was now. He could start over and find a good life again.

  Feeling invigorated, he stood and walked to the opening of the rain-pounded tent. There was little to see outside but campfires steaming in the rain that had extinguished them and other people peeping out of tents and wagons of their own. McSwain wondered if the rain would let up soon. If not, he was perfectly prepared to spend the night here in this neighboring emigrant camp, and return to his own camp and wagon in the morning. As long as no one bothered his most important possession hidden in his wagon, it wouldn’t make any real difference where he slept tonight.

  He wished then that he’d brought that item with him when he came over here. He could keep guard on it then and not have to worry and wonder. On the other hand, he’d probably have risked making these new acquaintances look askance at him as a strange fellow. Seeing a grown man clinging to a dead, stuffed cat like a treasure would probably have been off-putting to them, as it had to Jedd.

  If only Jedd knew. Then he’d understand. But Jedd could not know. No one could.

  Continuing to stare out into the rain, McSwain thought back to his fine house in Knoxville, unoccupied now. He wondered if the man Ben Scarlett had caught nosing around the place with a gun in hand had returned there since. He smiled privately to think of the fellow’s disappointment, finding his prey completely absent.

  Would he pursue? McSwain allowed himself to doubt it. Surely there was not sufficient motivation for that!

  Or was there? Anytime significant money was involved, one never knew just how far things might go.

  Here in this tent on a rainy plains night, however, it was easy to feel safe. He would not be followed, not be found. Not be hurt. Or worse.

  McSwain turned his thoughts away from the past and its pursuing demons, and aimed them forward and westward. To California. What would he find there? What kind of life would he make for himself? Would he find himself someday back in the world of academia, o
r would he actually attain success in the gritty world of mining? Could such a denizen of classroom and library as he hope to find in himself the capability of pursuing such an earthy line of work?

  Others were doing it. The conventional wisdom had it that almost no one was, in California, what they had been in their original haunts and old lives. Everything changed. The world was washed so clean that even personal histories were scoured away. McSwain found himself mouthing a biblical passage but with a secularized twist: “Old things are passed away; all things are become new.”

  What of Emma? Would he find his daughter easily? How would she receive him? Would he be welcome in her present world? Might she see him as an agent of needed and welcome change for herself? A catalyst to break away from the man she had had the bad judgment to marry and now knew for what he really was?

  McSwain hoped she would. He had no regard whatsoever for Emma’s husband, his own son-in-law. Stanley Wickham would lead Emma to ruin if she stayed with him long enough; of that McSwain was quite sure. It was something known by intuition rather than reason, and normally McSwain prided himself on being a reason-centered man. Even so he had no doubt he was right in his negative judgment of his daughter’s husband.

  He hoped she would break away from the wretch. If, upon reaching California and finding her, he could help her achieve that, McSwain was ready to do so. He’d kill the son of a bitch if he had to.

  And with that thought, McSwain realized that he was already transforming into a very different man than he had been. He’d never before seriously thought of killing another man as something he could actually do. It was a little frightening, but also cathartic.

  Just then he saw someone moving through the rain and heading toward the very tent in which he stood. It appeared to be a youth, a boy, and as he grew nearer McSwain saw that the lad clutched something close to his chest, shielding it from the rain. And it looked as if it might be….