"Get rid of it," Little Willy said. "We're leaving."
"What about our deal?"
"Get rid of it."
"Aw, goddamn, Little Willy. You swore." Hank threw the rat as hard as he could against the wall and continued to whine, but Little Willy ignored him.
Little Willy kept his head turned to inside the Chief's office and he nodded with approval and said, "There you go. That's how you do it." Something was making a sickening crunching and slurping noise inside the office. "Keep going, Bill. Finish your meal."
Bill Sutherland's mouth was full of something wet and he garbled his words, saying, "So good. So unbelievably good."
Hank tapped Little Willy on the shoulder. "Is the Chief coming with us?"
"Bill's slightly occupied. Go find me a ship," Little Willy said. He looked back into the office and said, "Okay, Bill. Time's about up. Wake up and tell me what you see."
Hank tried to look past Little Willy's enormous form, but a shriek burst out from inside the office so full of horror that Hank immediately ran off into the docking bays to find a ship.
Four days after Jem Clayton had come to her house, Janet Walters summed up the nerve to go and see him. She knocked on the Sheriff's Office screen door, and when no one answered, she put her face against the screen and frowned when she saw a grizzled old man sitting at the desk . "Go away," he said.
Janet folded her arms and did not budge. "Who are you? Where's Sheriff Junger?"
"I'm Mr. Never You Mind, and this other feller is Nobody Cares, now beat it."
"Where's Jem Clayton?"
"Not here."
"Are you gonna let me in?"
"No."
Janet banged her hand against the door and said, "You open up right away, whoever you are. I've lived here my whole life and I'm not leaving until I get to speak to someone in authority."
McParlan grunted and came to the door. "We're closed. Your so-called Sheriff ain't here. I'm a PNDA Marshal and I'm housing a prisoner in this facility, which means I don't have time to investigate who stole your ears of corn or why Miss Mary Lou played fiddle at the ho-down instead of Old Billy Bob."
Janet folded her arms across her bountiful chest and said, "Lister here, Mister Fancy Off-World Newcomer, I didn't come to make no complaints. I came to bring something to Jem Clayton." She held up a framed photograph and said, "It's a picture of Jem's daddy, Sam, back when he was the Sheriff."
McParlan opened the door to take the picture from her, and Janet wedged past him to look at the man inside the cell. Elijah Harpe was lying on his back with his bandaged leg propped in the air, snoring. Her eyes widened, "Is that your prisoner? I heard he's famous."
"Don't go anywhere near him," McParlan said. "He's only famous for all the disgusting things he does to innocent women right before he slits their throats. Ain't that right Elijah?"
The man in the cell did not respond, but his snores paused long enough for McParlan to see a slight smile at the corners of his mouth. McParlan looked back at the picture. "Is that Jem back when he was a boy?"
Janet peered over his shoulder and nodded, "Sure was. And that's his little sister, Claire. She's married to a man that got gimped in the mines, poor thing. She's been taking care of him for most of their marriage. Everybody says it's a shame how she got stuck taking care of a cripple, being so pretty and all, but I think it's sweet." Janet pointed at the man standing in the middle of the photo wearing a gold star on his vest, "That's their daddy, Sheriff Sam Clayton. Wasn't he handsome? Everybody says how much Jem looks like him."
"Is that your daddy?" McParlan said.
"That was Deputy Tom Masters. I live in his old house down Pioneer Way. That's how I came upon this. My sister married his son Bart. I was going to take it to Claire myself, but she lives all the way at the opposite end of the settlement at the last house on Pioneer Way. I hoped to see Jem before he left. Everybody says he won't stick around for long."
"He'll be back," McParlan said. "I'll make sure he gets this."
"I'm much obliged," Janet said. "I work just down the street, across from the Proud Lady." Janet looked around the office and said, "Are you stuck in here all this time?"
McParlan shrugged and said, "Somebody's got to stay here and guard the prisoner."
"When's the last time you had a home cooked meal?"
The old Marshal scratched his chin and took a second look at the young woman standing in the doorway. She was heavy, sure, big as a truck, but she had real pretty eyes and her bosoms were bunched together to create a deep crevice that looked like the kind of place he might be able to rest his head and stay awhile. McParlan said, "It's been a long, long time, Miss Janet."
"You come see me tonight and I'll fix you up something special," she said. "You gonna hold onto that picture for Jem?"
McParlan stood the photograph on the edge of the table so it would be the first thing anyone saw when they walked in the door. "Maybe if they see this, they'll remember what a real lawman looked like."
Janet said good day and let herself out the door. McParlan watched her go down the street and smiled despite himself when she turned around and looked back, checking to see if he was still standing there. Elijah Harpe's voice ruined the moment. "Hey, Marshal?"
"What?"
"Can I see that picture?"
"Why?"
"I just want to."
"No."
"How old's the little girl?" Harpe said. "Is she young? Is she pretty?"
McParlan ignored Harpe's thick snorts of laughter as he kicked his feet up on the Sheriff's desk and laid his head back. "I get a contented feeling when I think about you spending the rest of your miserable life on a penal colony, boy. I really do."
The heater in the basement made an unstoppable clanking noise that sounded like a freight train running through Anna's office basement. Anna had taken the contraption apart a dozen times. She changed the filters and tightened every bolt, but it still rattled enough to shake the operating room floorboards overhead.
She picked up a heavy wrench and smacked the units thick metal side. She proceeded to curse it out when she was interrupted by a polite cough coming from the stairwell. Harlan Wells said, "Miss Anna, you all right down here?"
She wiped a grease-smeared hand across her forehead and nodded. Harlan's boy, Adam, was hunched over behind him, watching her. Anna dropped the wrench on the workbench and said, "I'm fine, it's just that this dang heater hasn't worked right since Doctor Halladay was here. I'm ready to rip it out and just buy a new one."
"Listen, you've been real kind to us since we got here. Let my boy Adam take a look. He's got some kind of special gift for fixing things. Do you mind?"
Anna looked at the young man, who seemed too obsessed with the movements of his fingers to comprehend keeping his mouth closed to stop drooling all over the place, let alone fix her heater. "I'm just going to get rid of it anyway, Mr. Wells. Let him have as much fun as he wants with it."
Harlan patted Adam on the arm and said, "Go ahead, son. Fix that thing for Miss Anna."
Adam looked back at his father with no obvious signs of recognition.
"Adam," Harlan repeated, pointing at the heater and coaxing Adam to look at it. "Go over there and fix Miss Anna's heater. It's making an awful racket." Harlan mimicked the heater's BONG-BONG-BONG sound, and Adam said, "BONG-BONG-BONG."
Harlan stuck his fingers in his ears and made an ugly face. "Make that sound stop. There you go. Good boy."
Adam approached the heater and looked it over. He ran his fingers over the coiled wires and touched the pressure gauges attached to them; he laid his ear against its wide metal belly and listened.
The boy sifted through the tools on the work bench and started to disassemble the bolts connecting the water lines. The clanging stopped. Adam continued working and Harlan said, "He might look simple, but he ain't."
Marshal McParlan's muffled voice hollered Anna's name from outside and down the street. "Damn," Anna said. "I was supposed to go
watch the prisoner for a spell. I'll be back, Mr. Wells."
"I can go," Harlan said. "Adam will be fine here. I promise he won't blow up your office. You go get freshened up. Jem should be back by nightfall, and you'll want to wash that grease off your face and make yourself all pretty."
Anna put her hands on her hips. "Just what does that mean?"
"It means I'm an old fart who's been around long enough to know what it means when a woman can't take two steps without bumping into something and spends a long time looking through the security gate. She's waiting for her man to come home." Harlan tipped his hat and smiled at her before turning to go up the steps.
There was dust on the road outside of the office, kicked up by passing carriages, and Harlan covered his face with his neckerchief before he crossed. Jimmy McParlan was leaning on the handrail, watching the older man limp out of the way of an oncoming carriage. "How's that forehead, Mr. Wells?"
Harlan lifted his cap to show the Marshal the line of stitches that ran under his hairline like railroad tracks and said, "At first, I was afraid it was gonna ruin my modeling career, but Miss Anna told me scars are sexy."
McParlan laughed and opened the door for Harlan. "This sum-bitch hasn't moved in two days except to eat and use the toilet. I need to go scout this town's layout and see if we can't set up some sniper nests, or choke points, or something we can use to our advantage. We got us a fight coming, and if Jem don't come back, we're dead men."
"Well, you go do what you need to and I'll make sure Mr. Harpe stays put," Harlan said.
"If he talks to you, ignore him. If he begs and pleads with you, ignore him. If he wants you to come close to listen to him, ignore him. I've seen prisoners throw a handful of their own filth at guards just for laughs. You follow me?"
"I do. I won't go anywhere near him."
"And most especially, if he does anything that remotely looks like he is trying to escape, pick up that pistol on the desk and shoot him. Can you do that?"
Harlan looked at the old pistol laying on the desk. "I will do my best."
"Okay. Good." McParlan took a deep breath and made sure he had Harlan's full attention, "I hesitate to say this because it probably won't happen, but maybe it's one of those things that can still happen unless you say it might happen. At which point it won't. Kind of like a reverse-jinx."
"If you say so, Marshal."
"If any hostiles show up to try and take this fool before I get back, you need to understand one thing. They might try to convince you that if you give them Elijah they will go away peacefully. That is a damn lie. They will do unspeakable things to every man, woman and child in this town just to send a message. If they show up, you take that pistol and kill as many as you can, but kill that son of a bitch first."
Harlan watched the Marshal ease down the steps toward the road and looked back at the gun. He'd never fired one before. Harlan picked it up and stuck it in his belt, and when he turned around, he saw Elijah Harpe sitting up in his bunk, staring at him. Elijah smirked and laid back down on the bench, folding his hands under his head before closing his eyes to go back to sleep.
McParlan stuck his fingers in his ears and waited for the high-pitched whining to cease. He walked past the mining site's entrance toward the column of massive machines all gathered around a massive crater. They were larger than buildings and shot white hot laser beams into the quarry in bursts that shook the ground and blew gusts of rock dust into the air. The Marshal tapped one of the workers on the shoulder and asked to speak to someone in charge and was directed toward a young man holding a clipboard.
McParlan walked over to him and touched the badge on his dusty coat, "Marshal James McParlan of the PNDA. Who're you?"
"Bartholomew Masters, but you can call me Bart." When he stuck out his hand to shake McParlan's, his fingers were tattooed black and tipped with cracked fingernails that would never heal. His skin was colored grey from so many years spent down in the mines.
"I need explosives," McParlan said.
"Sorry, but we don't use any. The entire settlement drills strictly by laser so we don't risk damaging any of the product."
McParlan looked at the laser drilling machine and said, "Actually, these might work even better. Can I see one in action?"
"You sure can. Come back tomorrow at seven AM. We're all done for the day."
McParlan put his hands on his side and said, "Actually, I'd like to see it a little sooner than that, son. Like, now."
"No can do, Marshal. The machines take forty minutes to work up enough charge to fire. We can only use a single machine twice in the same day. I don't have any left to give you a demonstration with, Marshal."
"Damn," McParlan said. "Don't you have anything else?"
"Just a few handheld's."
"Show me."
Masters took the Marshal to the equipment lot and showed him a bulky backpack contraption with a hose connected to a barrel. "These things are heavy as hell, but nothing works better for delicate detail work."
"What's their range?"
"About a foot and a half."
"Can it be expanded?"
"To what?"
"Fifty feet."
Masters laughed and said, "No. They'd blow up."
"Let's just say I'm looking to increase security around here," McParlan said. "The Sheriff around these parts couldn't handle an invasion of old ladies with knitting needles, and I'm afraid something much worse than that is coming. You got any interest in helping me?"
Masters looked over his shoulder at the men leaving the worksite to head home. The men waved to Masters and he waved back and said, "Goodnight." He turned to look at the Marshal and said, "This sounds like an over-a-beer conversation to me. You thirsty?"
An hour later, the sound of rattling keys woke Elijah Harpe. He rolled over on his side to face the cell door, and saw Harlan Wells selecting the right key to fit into the lock. The old man put a heavy iron one into the door and started to turn it. Elijah rubbed his eyes and waited for the dream to end.
Harlan yanked the door open and said, "Come on out, you idiot."
Elijah laid back down on the bunk and folded his hands behind his head. "You are stupider than that potato-headed son of yours if you think I'm dumb enough to fall for that. You think I'd let you shoot me in the back as I walk down the steps just so's you can claim a reward?"
Harlan's voice was deeper when he said, "Little Willy says you might even be stupider than you are ugly. And that's quite an achievement."
Elijah's eyes flew open and he bolted upright. "Well, I'll be damned. How in the hell did he manage to get to one of you all the way out here?"
Harlan's eyes fluttered and his face twisted. He gasped and reached out to clutch the door to try and pull it shut and keep it open at the same time, with one arm struggling against the other. "No! Get out, you son of a bitch. Get out!"
Elijah watched the old man with amusement and said, "I'm getting." He pushed Harlan away from the door as he limped out on his bad leg. "Back up, you damn fool."
Fat droplets of sweat spilled off of Harlan's face. He had to hold onto the cell doors just to stay on his feet. Through clenched teeth he said, "Meet by the crash site. We've got a weapon now that will change everything, forever."
Elijah walked over to the Sheriff's desk to look at the framed photograph. He popped the frame open and took out the picture. He tore off the end that showed the little girl with pigtails, smiling up at her daddy. Elijah ran his finger over her face and whispered, "I bet you're real pretty now, Claire." He looked at Harlan, "Tell Willy I'll meet him right here in the morning. I have some reckoning to attend to."
"Stop…stop…" Harlan muttered as he struggled to pull the pistol from his waistband. Elijah Harpe limped down the steps of the Sheriff's office and just as he reached the street, Harlan got the gun free and raised it to his back. "DO NOT TRY TO DEFY ME."
"Get out of my head," Harlan gasped. He tried squeezing the trigger, but watched in horror as his arm bega
n moving toward a woman walking down Pioneer Way. The woman was completely unaware as she strolled along the shop windows, admiring the items within, when Harlan's gun erupted, blowing a hole through the back of her hat and splattering its light blue fabric with dark blood.
People looked up from all around the town square to see the woman crumple to the ground. They waited, like it was a street performance and did not want to be thought a fool for acting surprised. Men in front of the Proud Lady lowered their mugs of beer and stopped talking. Children in front of the candy shop stood still as the old man holding the pistol groaned in misery, and blood spread out on the dirt under the woman's hat.
Women screamed and snatched their children up, dragging them back into the stores or into the alleyways. Three miners waiting to cash their checks at the Savings and Loan ran at Harlan, yelling for him to stop, but he turned on them and fired. Harlan moved like a machine across the street, turning his gun on anyone who looked at him.
Anna Willow threw her office door open and stood open mouthed at the sight of Harlan Wells coming toward her, gun at the ready. "Mr. Wells!" Anna shouted. She saw the bodies lying on the street behind him, but the cold, expressionless mask of his face terrified her more than anything. Harlan raised his gun to her face.
"No!" she cried and everything slowed down and magnified. The mouth of the barrel widened to reveal the spiraled rifling within. The flat steel surface of the bullet inside the chamber seemed larger than her fist. The only sound in the world was the mechanical click of the revolver's cylinder turning as Harlan squeezed the trigger. The gun fired and chunks of the doorframe exploded above Anna's head, showering her with wooden splinters as she dropped to her knees and covered her head. "Why are you doing this?" she screamed.
"I can't stop!" Harlan's gun hand shook and his pale cheeks exploded with burst blood vessels. "He's making me do this! Somebody help me!"
The office door opened behind her and Adam Wells came out of the office, looking in wonder at the way Anna cowered in front of his father. He turned to look at Harlan and smiled.
Guns of Seneca 6 Box Set Collected Saga (Chambers 1-4) Page 12
