Shadow Soldier (The Gunsmith Book 2)

by C. K. Crigger

  Jase, dressed for the warm weather in baggy shorts and a tank top, jerked his head in a northerly direction. “He’s down by the river right now, where we saw him before. Do you think he’s looking for the gun?”

  “No. Why should he? What’s it been—three weeks? Four weeks? He could hardly expect to retrieve anything from the river after all this time. Besides, have you noticed the water is up another couple of feet?” I shed my deerskin gloves, tossing them in with the rest of the tools and empty pots to put back in the storage shed.

  “Well, he’s sure looking under every rock, trying to find something. What else would it be?”

  Digging in my pocket, I came up with a crumbled ten-dollar bill. “Maybe I’ll ask him,” I said. “I owe you ten bucks, right?”

  The boy had the grace to blush. “Naw. You don’t owe us anything. We weren’t doing anything else anyway.”

  “Where is Austin?”

  “Down by the river keeping his eye on the dude. I told him I’d just be a minute. Can you come now?”

  A dog on a leash is as good an excuse for walking and prowling as any I know, so utilizing Gabe as a prop, we set off toward the river, a journey of not more than three minutes. Less, if I hadn’t brought the dog.

  We met up with Austin about halfway across the Argonne Bridge. He was pretending to be hanging over the concrete railing, watching the river. In reality he hadn’t taken his eyes off the old man.

  “There he is,” Austin said, in his surprising bass voice. “He’s been poking around under rocks and in the tulles. He slipped once and got his fancy cowboy boots wet. I couldn’t hear him, but I sure could see his mouth moving. He was madder than hell.”

  Of the “he” Austin indicated, about all I could see was a back. The man was on the riverbank below us and, as Austin had said, had all the earmarks of a man desperately searching for something he’s lost. I didn’t know for sure the object of his hunt was the Colt, but it did stand to reason. He was after something of value, for his search was systematic, a quartering back and forth across a section of riverbank.

  Disappointment wormed through me. The boys had said “old.” I’d been expecting someone really old, someone with a history. Instead, from what I could see this man was no older than my father, perhaps seventy or seventy-five. On second thought, he was probably younger, for I couldn’t imagine Dad walking, let alone striding over a rock- strewn embankment. As I watched, I saw the man toss aside a boulder weighty enough to have taxed Scott or Caleb. I had an impression he could have whished it through a basketball hoop if he’d wanted.

  Funny. I know kids have strange ideas about age, but I wouldn’t have expected them to be this far off.

  “You sure that’s the right guy? He doesn’t look old enough.” Cars were ripping over the bridge at a terrific rate and I had to yell to make myself heard. Gabe sat on my foot and pressed against my leg. He hates the traffic.

  Both boys nodded. “We had to look twice,” Austin said. “I thought he was older than that when we saw him the other day. Didn’t you, Jase?”

  “Yeah. That’s him, though, for sure. Remember I told you he had awful big hands? Well, take a look.” Jase based his identification on something more tangible. “See?”

  Though not grotesque, the man’s hands did seem out of proportion to the rest of his body. And the cowboy boots—how many idiots would go prowling through river-washed boulders wearing slick-soled cowboy boots?

  As we watched, the man lobbed another good-sized rock twenty-five yards into the river, then clapped his palms together to shake off the dust. His body language bespoke anger and disgust. The boys had been right on the mark there, but he was giving up his quest, and I fancied I saw despair also. He climbed the steep bank from the river to the sidewalk in nothing flat, and proceeded to stride quite briskly up the hill toward the Bethany Home where the kids said he lived.

  Yikes. He was getting away. I took a breath and blew hair out of my eyes. “Guess I’d better go introduce myself before he’s out of sight. Thanks, guys.”

  I felt the boys’ eyes on my back as I tugged on Gabe’s leash and we took off after the man. If I didn’t hurry he’d leave me in the dust.

  Gabe, I felt, was sure to be an asset in this meeting. People of all ages become emotional over their pets, and are drawn together by their interest in animals—mostly.

  Wouldn’t it be just my luck if this old fella hated dogs? Well, if he did, I’d know enough to stay away from him. Never trust a person who doesn’t like animals—that’s my motto.

  Fortunately, Gabe and I had been out in the warm sun long enough to ease the dog’s arthritis. He trotted beside me while I jogged at a good clip, his tail whipping, his nose scenting close to the ground. Maybe it was my imagination, but I thought he was deliberately trailing the old man, as if intrigued by something only he could perceive.

  Although the man moved with a sprightliness unusual in a man his presumed age, he could not out-distance Gabe and me. When the hill steepened, we caught up with him. I allowed our momentum to carry us past, then turned to face him.

  He didn’t stop, forcing me to walk backwards.

  “Hello,” I said, trying not to trip over my own feet. I raised my voice over the sound of traffic, hoping he still had his hearing. “I saw you down by the river. Have you lost something?”

  The thud of his boot heels never ceased, only slowed a little. “What if I did?”

  I tried a disarming smile. “Maybe I . . . we . . . could help. Gabe—” I gestured at the dog with a jerk of my head. “—is pretty good at finding things.”

  I hadn’t really looked directly at the old gentleman as yet. Well, you try looking someone in the eye when you’re walking backwards. I know the first impression I had of him was one of vigor. Vigor to the point of making me feel foolish for suggesting he needed my help.

  Abruptly, the man halted. “I suppose you think there would be a reward coming to you, in case I accepted your offer?”

  It was a question.

  His face pointed into the shade. I faced into the sun. I made a visor out of my free hand and peered up at him from under my fingers. Tall, like Jase had said, his boot heels added another inch or so. Lean, though not as skinny as the boys had implied. His hair was of a pale sandy color easily mistaken for white, depending on the light. His short-sleeved shirt revealed musculature beginning to go ropey under the skin, though not separated and stringy. His eyes . . . his eyes arrested me, stopping me cold.

  I swallowed, not helped when Gabe sniffed at the man’s boots and growled almost inaudibly. Hair along his spine rose on end. The man’s boots shifted slightly, as though the person in them wouldn’t have been adverse to drop-kicking the mutt if he’d thought he could get away with it.

  And, because I’d been taken off guard, amazed by Gabe’s reaction and startled by the old gent’s animosity, I said a little wildly, “I thought the reward might be yours, if you said yes.”

  Too late, I knew I should’ve excused myself and the dog, and gone on my merry way.

  He had eyes like chunks of fallen sky. “What do you mean?”

  He frightened me—I don’t know why—yet I was filled with an unfathomable urge to confide in him. A warning went off in my mind. Don’ t start, I told myself. Escape while you can.

  I shook my head and said, “I just thought we could help. Forget I asked.”

  The Lord only knows why or how, but while attempting to slip by him in inglorious retreat, I became tangled in the leash. Gabe jerked up his head, a move that almost swept me off my feet. Certainly I reeled, a little out of control, and my bare arm brushed against the old man’s equally bare arm.

  What can I say? Thunder didn’t roll; lightning didn’t flash; the earth didn’t open up and swallow me. Still, I swear something happened. Something I tried to blame on an over-active imagination—or sunstroke—or carbon monoxide.

  Inexplicably, fear reached out and grabbed me, as though something inside him had ignited and burned thr
ough to me. Though he made no overt move against us, I found terror in the mere touch of his gaze.

  I felt faint, with a queer emptiness, as if part of my essence had been taken from me. Stolen from me.

  What I’d felt was power’s touch.

  “Excuse me,” I muttered, when safely past him. I trembled from the unforeseen reaction.

  “Wait.”

  The command stilled my feet and I turned around.

  “Who are you?” He sounded angry, and puzzled, too.

  Truly, I swear my mouth wasn’t open, though words dropped between us using my voice. “Boothenay Irons.”

  Why shouldn’t I tell him my name? But why did I feel called upon to add, “I’m a gunsmith. I have some questions to ask you.”

  He blanched, a wild blue light in his eyes flaring out of a stark white face.

  Gabe and I took to our heels.

  CHAPTER 3

  Limping on one foot, with his tongue lolling like one of the mud flaps on Caleb’s 4-by-4, Gabe flopped onto the cool, wooden shop floor as soon as we reached home. He was panting as if he couldn’t draw in enough air to pump up his lungs.

  Physically, I was almost as bad off as he. Closing the door on my fear, I leaned back against the cold steel, and finally remembered to breathe.

  Dad, as my luck—rotten, as usual—would have it, had taken janitorial duties upon himself and set up a ladder in the middle of the shop. He was perched on the top step, changing a couple of troublesome fluorescents flickering above my workbench. I hadn’t wanted to talk with anyone just yet...not until I’d had time to think through my impressions of the Colt’s previous owner while the meeting was still fresh. But with visions of broken hips and hospital stays floating through my mind, that leisure was not to be.

  I swore under my breath. Consternation made me short. “What do you think you’re doing? You shouldn’t be up there when no one else is home. What if you fell off? What if the ladder collapsed?”

  Less than six months ago, he’d had heart surgery, and in my opinion, he had no business climbing to the ceiling and practically swinging from the rafters.

  “What if, what if. No one elected you my mother, child. I know what I’m doing.” Dad didn’t bother to look down as he tilted his head. “More to the point, what have you been doing? That old dog sounds like he’s been chasing bear. You know he’s too old and too stove up to be out running like a puppy, especially on the first hot day of the year. You sound almost as bad. What’s the matter? Somebody chasing the pair of you?”

  “Of course not. Nothing’s the matter,” I said, too fast of a denial to be convincing.

  “No?”

  “No.” He wouldn’t want to be involved anyway, I told myself. Many times in the past I’d been troubled by things the guns had shown me, and while he’d listen as I recounted their stories, he always said he didn’t want anything to do with magic. He refused to offer advice when asked, although sometimes he couldn’t help himself. If anything, he hated my strange powers more than Scott did, which was going some. Being unable to escape his own curiosity, he’d say he needed to be kept informed so he’d know what to avoid, just in case.

  The just in case he was talking about boiled down to being my safety net of last resort. More than once he’d provided the beacon that guided me home from my out-of-time adventures. Still, I knew he was right about Gabe, which made me feel about as smart as a carpenter ant in a gas fireplace. By way of apology, I filled the hound’s water bowl and brought it to him. At least he wasn’t mad. His tail thumped in gratitude and forgiveness.

  After a little persuasion, Dad deigned to accept my help with the lights and passed worn-out fluorescent tubes to me while I raised new ones to him. Saved him one trip up and down the ladder at least. With the bustle of activity, I believed him safely sidetracked.

  “The flower pots look nice.” He made mention of my afternoon’s activities later as we made our way upstairs to the apartment where we lived over the shop. With the kitchen windows open, a light breeze carried the fragrance from the freshly planted boxes inside, reaching all the way to the stairwell. “Which of those flowers smells so good?”

  I should’ve guessed he was lulling me, but as Gabe was so tired I almost had to carry him up the stairs, I was too preoccupied to think. Dad watched and let me bust my gut.

  “They are pretty, aren’t they?” I blew a fallen curl out of an eye, grateful when he seemed to let the probing die. “I hoped you’d like the scents as well as the colors. The stocks and carnations both smell wonderful and go well together.”

  He grunted, then asked quietly, “Are you going to tell me what—or who—you and Gabe were running from?”

  I might have known. I hunched my shoulders, knowing the gesture looked helpless and weak. Exactly how I felt.

  “Maybe nothing,” I said, on a sigh.

  “But?”

  “But maybe something. I don’t know. Or yes, I do. I just don’t know what or who. I never know why.”

  “You’re not making any sense.” Dad’s eyebrows drew together. “Which I should be used to, seeing that zero is just about a perfect score in your game. I suppose it’s more of your hocus-pocus.”

  A weird shudder crinkled my skin, as though the pleasant breeze had stepped up a notch or two. “Game, Dad? Since when has any of this magic business been a game? Even if you count the one or two episodes that have been mildly entertaining, you can never overlook the fundamental nucleus of the power, which is that it’s fueled by blood. I never forget it. I don’t dare.”

  Dad slowly shook his head before pointing at the chair he wanted me to sit on. He sat down opposite.

  “Well,” he said. “I guess you just answered one question for me. Whatever spooked you and Gabe a while ago isn’t any laughing matter.”

  As if to prove him wrong, I forced a mirthless giggle. “Here we go again. Shall I laugh or shall I cry? Charge onward or run and hide?” I’d never experienced a flashback that didn’t have elements calling for one or the other—or both. “Here we have the intrepid adventurer through time, Boothenay Irons and her bear hound, Gabriel, brought low by the cross words of one old man. No dark alley necessary. Broad daylight and a busy street are private enough for him to strike terror in our bosoms. Pretty funny, huh?”

  “Hush.” Dad stopped me before I got too wound up. After a moment, he said, “I never knew Gabe had bosoms.”

  This time I really did produce a small laugh.

  “What has this to do with the 1911.45 Colt you have hidden away in the vault?” he asked, breaking his own rule of not asking. “The same Colt you bought from those kids—one of whom I saw you go off with a while ago.”

  Finding myself unable to stay seated, I got up and wandered over to the fridge to check the supper fixings. Copper River salmon was the plan for the main course, already marinating in a lemon concoction, ready for the grill as soon as Caleb arrived.

  I wanted a shower first; needed to wash the residue of power down the drain and forget the old gent’s effect on me. I wished I knew his name. If I knew what to call him perhaps some part of the fear he raised in me would ebb.

  Out of his presence, I could barely comprehend that he’d scared me enough to send me away without asking any of the questions I needed answered regarding the Colt’s history. What was it about him?

  I flipped the fish over and put it back in the fridge before I turned to Dad. He watched my ineffectual doings over the thin blade of his nose—I inherited the Irons’ family nose from him—and I sensed a growing impatience. He’s a great one for facing unpleasantries, then getting on with life.

  “Well?”

  “Its magic isn’t done,” I said.

  “What do you mean, isn’t done?”

  Slowly, distinctly, I repeated, “The magic isn’t done. The story isn’t complete, isn’t finished, isn’t marked finis. And the power is hungry for blood.” I hadn’t known that until I said the words aloud.

  Dad’s face seemed to harden, li
ke wax taking shape in a mold, with every crease duplicated and accentuated. “Oh, hell. I don’t think we want to know what that means.”

  “You’re right. We don’t. But maybe we—I—should. And you’re the one who asked.”

  “I can’t understand how you get yourself in these messes, child. Now what are you going to do?”

  He didn’t understand how I got in these messes? Well, neither did I, although I suspected in some strange way the messes came looking for me. I mean specifically me, so I could interpret their story. So someone, somewhere, somewhen, would know what happened. But it was no good trying to convince Dad of that, as I knew from bitter experience. He seemed to think I should be able to ignore the power if I chose to do so. Unfortunately, as I’d told him over and over, magic has its own agenda.

  My hands balled into fists. Fingers aching with the strain, I forced them open. “I don’t know what to do, Dad. I’d hoped to talk with the man who tried to get rid of it, but . . . but . . .” I floundered, at a loss over my own perceptions of the man I’d confronted. Or perhaps I should say, tried to confront.

  “But?”

  I know Dad didn’t expect the words that popped out of my mouth. I didn’t expect them. I didn’t even know I thought them. “He’s evil. Or the Colt is evil. Both maybe. I know he tried to throw the gun away, yet against impossible odds, Jase and Austin saved it. And then he tried to find it again and instead he found me.”

  Dad stared at me as if he thought I’d lost my mind, though his comment was mild enough. “Are you over-reacting, Boothenay? It sounds like you’re saying the gun itself has a mind and is directing events. And evil? Sounds a little wild, don’t you think?”

  “Gabe was scared, too,” I said, like a child making excuses for her own bad behavior. “He growled and raised his hackles.”

  That got Dad’s attention. “Gabe did?”