“I figure no more than twenty miles between the outcrop and town, preacherman,” Edge interrupted.
“If more, not many.”
“Somebody rode out that far to post the flyer on me. Trains come and go by the rock. Between Prospect and wherever. Some people on one of those trains seven years ago knew what happened there and—”
“I understand what you are saying, Edge,” Loring cut in. He had reached into the back of the buggy and brought up a canteen, now sucked some water from it while the half-breed waited patiently for him to go on. “You have been out West for a long time, I’d say?”
“Since right after the end of the' war.”
The preacher nodded, briefly sad-faced, as he replaced the stopper in the canteen and returned the canteen to the back. “I, too. Many thousands of others. Ah . . . but I am leaving the point. With so much experience, you will understand how it could have happened—the growth of the town and the indifference to what took place at the Rock of Jesus.”
The driving of the buggy required little attention, the two geldings in the traces sensing that unless a movement of the reins indicated otherwise they were required to follow the gentle curve of the railroad track. And the man in control of the reins held them very slackly in his hands which rested in his lap. Now he kept hold of them with just one hand while the other moved so that the bony fingers with the split and filthy nails could again tenderly explore the ancient dam in the frock coat. This as Austin Henry Loring went on in a neutral tone that matched his expression:
“Back then the town was nothing more than a few animal pens and a cluster of buildings erected by the ranchers and the men who built the railroad. Nobody even lived there for any length of time. Just at roundup when the trains came down from the north to load the cattle. Never was an economic proposition, but back in those days, cattlemen got to be very rich and railroadmen thought they could not fail to make money wherever they laid track. You must have seen similar crackpot schemes, Edge?”
“Yeah, guess so.”
“Yes, I suppose bringing the materials for the chapel to the Rock of Jesus was the only contract outside of shipping cattle the Prospect and North Texas Railroad ever had back then. But I’m getting off the point again. The people who discovered me in such dire straits were aboard what might very well have been the final train to make the round trip from the north to Prospect. For they were going to town to wind up their business at that end. There was just not enough money in cattle to keep the company in business.
“Oh, dear, I fear I am being very long-winded about this? Perhaps making too much effort to stress that I blame nobody for turning their backs on the slaughter?”
“No sweat,” Edge said in response to the implied questions and the inquiring look the old man directed at him.
“Nevertheless ... the railroad people had their own troubles; if Prospect had ever been a town of any sort it then ceased to be so; and I moved on to preach the word of God far and wide.” He sighed and followed this with a shrug. “Some Indians had been massacred and a beautiful young woman married to a cranky preacher more than thirty years older than her had killed herself. At a place which, after the railroad failed, was in the middle of nowhere. And where nobody came. Well ... no disrespect intended, but to a man such as you . . . ?” “Yeah, feller,” the half-breed acknowledged after he had taken a drink of water from one of his own canteens. “I hadn’t figured on Prospect being so new.”
“Best part of seven years,” Loring explained. “Since the first group of homesteaders moved onto the land down there.”
“You were through this part of the country between seven years ago and just the other day, preacherman?”
A vigorous shake of the head as the sun inched close enough to the southwestern horizon and lost enough heat so that the veil of shimmering haze was almost neutralized—and a just discernible pall of woodsmoke became visible in the far distant south: formed by that which wisped from many chimneys in Prospect.
“No, I never was. In truth, I did not even realize where I was until after the fury following the shooting had died down, and I had given my account of what happened in the alley to the sheriff. You see, I have traveled whatever path I have been guided along by Almighty God since I accepted my new role in His service. Never feeling the need nor the inclination to question where I was nor where the next path would take me.
“After the sheriff and his posse had set off in pursuit of you as dawn was breaking, I felt drawn to the town church. For once to seek guidance in the light of circumstances, after I had given thanks for my deliverance and offered up a prayer that you might escape cruel injustice. Day was fully broken and the sun was risen when I emerged from the church, Edge. And in daylight I could not fail to recognize the old buildings and animal pens, disused now, that I had first seen . . . well, there had been just too many signs to be ignored. I asked a few questions of the liveryman who had tended to my team and then straightaway left town to follow this railroad to the Rock of Jesus. Where, I must admit, my faith in you as an instrument to direct the wrath of God began to suffer setbacks: as time elapsed and you were not guided to me. But then ... all is now well.”
Edge looked at the old man for the first time in several minutes and saw he had abandoned his fingering of the old mend in his coat and had once more taken the battered Bible from his pocket, was clasping it tightly, and yet again seemed to extract some kind of force from the book that added light to his dulling eyes, color to his wan flesh and strength to his flagging frame.
“We’ll rest up beside that clump of brush over there, preacherman,” the half-breed said, and it was obvious from the way he started that Austin Henry Loring had been totally absorbed in deep contemplation as he received the spiritual refreshment that had such a marked physical effect upon him.
“Oh, I feel I could travel for eternity, my friend!” the old man exclaimed eagerly, and looked fervently at Edge after casting a dismissive glance at the patch of greasewood, mesquite, mulberry and poison ivy at the start of a gentle incline.
“I get too close to town before dark, feller,” Edge growled, “eternity will likely get started for me from the end of a rope.”
“Oh, yes. Of course. What do you have in mind to do?”
“Go on living free.”
Austin Henry Loring bobbed his head in enthusiastic agreement as he halted the team alongside the saddle horse reined in by the rider. He said: “Yes, of course. But I meant what do you intend to do in Prospect after it is dark, Edge?”
The half-breed dismounted and said wryly: “The way you tell it, preacherman, the will of God.”
The old man became grave-faced as he continued to sit on the seat of the stalled buggy and gazed fixedly at Edge. He intoned: “I would urge you most earnestly not to mock, my friend. Almighty God is a just and merciful Lord but he is able only to help those who help themselves. And the only way—’ ’
“I told you, preacherman,” the half-breed cut in coldly. “Don’t preach to me.”
For stretched seconds Loring gazed as intently at Edge as Edge at him; and for the duration of this challenging confrontation, seemed on the brink of defying the command. But he abruptly dropped his gaze, and appeared drained, older than his many years and even sick. He found his Bible was temporarily out of recuperative power and shoved it sullenly back into the pocket of his frock coat before he climbed unsteadily out of the buggy. Even his voice sounded feeble when he asked sadly: “Have you no faith at all, Edge?”
“In myself, feller.”
“I know there is a God on high,” the oldtimer countered, and moved to take his team out of the traces as Edge unfastened the saddle cinch. “And whether you are prepared to accept it or not, I know He made all of us in His image.”
“Some of us Friday nights.”
Chapter Seven
THE irreligious man called Edge and the devout oldtimer named Austin Henry Loring ate a cold meal of biscuits and beans washed down with stale canteen wate
r as the afternoon moved into evening. Then, as the sun sank with a change and softening of color from yellow to pink through red, the half-breed dozed with his hat tipped over his face and the older man gave silent study to his Bible. One of them sprawled on his back with his head resting on his saddle, the other seated so that his back leaned on a wheel of his buggy.
The hobbled horses moved a little and made muted noises. There was reverence in the delicate and almost silent manner in which Loring turned the pages of the book, and finally closed it when the light was too bad to read by anymore. Which was when, almost as if he had been awakened from a light sleep by the muffled sound, Edge came up from the ground and set his hat back on his head.
“Time for us to leave?” The old man sounded weary still, and totally lacking in the fervor that had sustained him during the afternoon drive from the outcrop.
“No, feller,” Edge answered as he peered to the south, where a dull aura of light in the night sky had supplanted the smoke pall of late afternoon to mark the position of Prospect. “Time for me to leave. You stay here.”
“Why?” he asked, neither looking nor sounding overly interested in getting a reply.
“Because you can use the rest?” Edge suggested as he picked up his saddle.
“I can’t deny it,” was the equally indolent response as he fisted the grit of strain from his sunken eyes. “How long do you want me to remain here?”
“Until I get back.”
“But how am I to know? Anything could happen to you. You could ...”
The skinny shoulders were shrugged and the haggard face expressed apprehension as he watched Edge prepare the chestnut gelding for riding. In the soft light of the moon, it looked as if there was a gentle mockery in the smile of the half-breed as he swung up astride his saddle and said into the pause left by the unfinished sentence:
“I thought you were a man of faith, preacherman?” There was nothing gentle in his tone.
“In God. May He go with you.”
“Obliged,” Edge said, and touched the brim of his hat with a forefinger as he tugged on the reins to move his mount in a slow wheel. “You just keep it in mind that He moves in some mysterious ways, uh?”
This encouraged the oldtimer to bring a weary smile to his toothless mouth and unshining eyes. He countered: “If I did not constantly keep reminding myself of that, Edge, I would on countless occasions have abandoned the path of righteousness to step onto the slippery slope that sends the sinful plummeting into the fires of Hades.”
“Don’t know how long I’ll be gone, feller. But try to keep cool, uh?”
He heeled the chestnut gelding forward at an easy walk between the telegraph poles alongside the railroad track, and was conscious of the preacher peering after him with solemnity or perhaps even dejection in his sunken blue eyes, while Edge was content that he had gone as far as he was willing to go in offering the oldtimer peace of mind. Then, when he had ridden to the crest of the long slope and no longer sensed the somber eyes staring fixedly toward him, he was able easily to put all thought of Austin Henry Loring out of his own mind, and to keep his memory confined to serene inactivity and his conscience from disturbing him without too much effort while he watched the night-veiled country on every side of him: and paid particular attention to the south, where, minute by minute as he made slow progress following the line of the railroad track and the accompanying wire-strung poles, the town of Prospect could be seen in more detail from a viewpoint he had never taken before.
At first, as he rode onto a discernible trail past the most outlying of the homesteads, there was just the pitched and flat-roofed skyline of the distant cluster of buildings under the fringe glow of the light from many windows. Most of the homesteads scattered among their carefully tended fields of newly sprouting crops to both the east and the west of the parallel railroad track and wagon-wide trail were already in darkness, the farmers and their families bedded down early to prepare for a dawn awakening. And as Edge closed with the town, the clop of the gelding’s hooves from time to time causing a dog to bark, a horse to snort or a cow to moan, the citizens of Prospect began to take to their beds. And the aura of light emanated by kerosene lamps began to fade as window after window was darkened to leave the buildings as black silhouettes against the star and moonlit country to the south.
He saw that it was not just an association of ideas that had caused the preacher to sermonize about being drawn toward Prospect by the narrow cone of the church spire. It truly did provide an ecclesiastically dominant marker on which even a secular stranger could home in. But then Edge spat, a little irritably, into the dust, recalling that he had paid no more attention to the church spire than to any other aspect of the town when he first approached Prospect from the south. And anyway, he was no longer a stranger and needed no kind of marker in order to get a bearing on where he knew he was going.
At the town-limits sign that was in a better state of preservation than the one on the west trail into Prospect, Edge reined in the gelding and for perhaps ten stretched seconds scanned his surroundings in every direction before he swung fluidly down from the saddle. Not a single sliver of artificial light competed with that of the moon and stars out in the homesteaded area of the country. Almost complete silence had a seemingly palpable presence in the cooling air of near midnight, kept from being absolute by a faint and ever constant rustling of stray wisps of breeze among the fields of young crops. In town, an occasional crack of light showed where a door or a drape did not fit properly in the frame, or at a window where somebody could not sleep, did not want to yet, or was afraid to with the light out. There was a body of sound from among the buildings—a low hum comprised of the countless indistinct and often unidentifiable noises made by any large group of people undergoing the involuntary processes of staying alive while they slept. Restive movement contributed to the sound, but the half-breed saw nothing that moved along the deserted length of the broad main street before he led his horse over the railroad track into the shadowed cover of the depot buildings.
He hitched the reins to a strut of the framework that supported the timber water tank and went the rest of the way on foot, watching and listening for the first sign of danger—but reasonably confident that his instinct for being watched was not letting him down. He moved stealthily but with selfassurance between the cover of the railroad depot to the rear of the telegraph office that was back on the other side of the track, and the trail: the first building on the west flank of the street’s northern end.
Had his resolve to finish what he had started been blunted for any reason during the measured approach to Prospect, it would surely have gotten honed sharp again by the wanted flyers posted on the railroad depot and the telegraph office facades— and doubtless on other public buildings throughout town. The flyers were identical to the one tacked to the telegraph pole out at the outcrop Loring had named the Rock of Jesus. But these had a more recently printed strip pasted beneath them, emblazoned in large lettering:
REWARD NOW $3,500 DEAD OR ALIVE.
All was darkness and quiet in back of the telegraph office, a line of stores and the office of The Prospect Tribune which Edge had to pass to get to the rear of the Best in the West saloon. Between the newspaper office and the saloon, behind the false front of what would otherwise have been a six-foot-wide alley, was a darkly moonshadowed outside stairway that gave access to the upper storys of both buildings.
He took care to set down his booted feet quietly on the open treads, but was unable to avoid the limbers creaking under his weight. And within the close confines of the flanking walls the stressed planks sounded like they were screaming loud enough to wake everyone in town and out in the country. But Edge was familiar enough with the tricks a man’s mind can play at times of tension to be able to recognize this as one of them: so he stayed poised to respond instantly to any aggressive move against him without looking for danger where it could not possibly be.
On the open landing behind the false fro
nt at the top of the flight of stairs, he first tried the door to his left that gave onto the second story of the newspaper office building. It was not locked. And neither was the door that faced it across the landing in the side of the saloon, which made his task that much easier and which he did not consider either fortunate or odd: people who lived in quiet country towns where strangers were a rarity were as likely to leave doors unlocked as locked.
The brief flare of a match had shown him what he wanted to see beyond the first door he opened. He went without a light across the threshold and onto the second-floor landing of the Best in the West, closed the door at his back and waited a few seconds for his eyes to get accustomed to the lower level of light inside. And light there was: that of the moon that filtered in through the net curtains hung at a window at the far end of the landing.
He moved toward this window that looked out onto the roof of the single-story stage line depot that abutted the saloon on this side. He did not go all the way to the window at the head of the stairs that curved down into the barroom which was redolent with stale tobacco smoke, body odor, perfume and strong liquor. Instead, he halted at the last but one door on his left. He knew this gave onto the room from which the blond-haired and scantily dressed Marsha had called down to the soon-to-die Frank Crowell three nights ago.
His stealthy footfalls had counterpointed the deep breathing and rasping snores from behind several of the doors as he moved along the landing from one end almost to the other. He could hear nothing from beyond the door he now opened—until it was wide enough to allow him to step through. She was sleeping peacefully and breathing easily, on her back with her hair spread out across the pillow at either side of her face which did not look so old in the flattering light of the moon that shafted between the drawn-aside drapes at the window. The fact that she was in repose and, from the sweetness of her breath, had not been drinking before she came to bed probably aided the moonlight in making her look younger.
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