Six Guns at Solace

by John Davage

  ‘There was a bank robbery in Solace two days ago,’ Tom said, keeping his voice matter-of-fact in an attempt to conceal his nervousness. ‘A man was killed. The other witness . . .’ he laid emphasis on the word ‘. . . the other witness has named the Pike gang as the perpetrators of the crime.’

  ‘ “Perpetrators”,’ Eli mimicked. ‘That’s a fine two-dollar word, mister. Well, your witness must be mistaken. Me an’ my friends here – if you insist on callin’ us a gang – were at my ranch all day that day, ain’t that right, Becky?’

  The girl swallowed and nodded.

  ‘In fact, Sheriff Lewis here was with us most of the day too, ain’t that right, Cord?’ Pike stared directly at the sheriff.

  ‘Y-yeah, that’s a fact, Eli.’ Cord Lewis avoided the other man’s eye.

  ‘So you see, Mr Walsh, your witness is kind’a confused.’ Eli Pike’s expression changed to one of displeasure and his voice rose several decibels. ‘Now, I’ll thank you to leave me to mourn my brother’s passin’ in peace. An’ I suggest you take yourself back to Solace, you hear?’

  Tom held his gaze. ‘Your brother not with you two days ago then?’ he said after a moment.

  ‘Eh? What?’ Eli looked momentarily confused.

  ‘Heard he was killed by a bunch of renegade Indians at about that time,’ Tom said, calmly. ‘Did I get that wrong?’

  Eli moved closer, his eyes ablaze with fury. When he spoke his voice was laced with cold venom. ‘I’ll tell you what you got wrong, mister lawman. Comin’ here, that’s what you got wrong. Take my advice an’ get back to Solace, lessen you want more trouble than you can handle.’

  With that, he pushed past Tom and marched on down the path. Tom watched them.

  At one point Becky Garrod glanced back, her face a picture of dread.

  Chapter Twenty

  ‘Get rid of the lawman,’ Eli told Nate. ‘If he ain’t left for Solace by nightfall, make sure he can’t go anywhere.’

  They were standing outside the undertaker’s office. Several yards away, Becky was sitting in the buggy Eli had used to drive them both into town. Cord Lewis was walking back to his office. Clay had headed towards the Holed Ace saloon.

  Nate nodded. He watched Eli join Becky in the buggy and drive away, then followed Clay. He caught up with the youngster at the bar.

  ‘You believe that lawman?’ Clay asked him. He was nursing a whiskey and looked nervous.

  ‘About what?’ Nate said.

  ‘You reckon he was tellin’ the truth about a witness at the bank?’

  Nate shrugged. ‘You were there, kid.’

  ‘I shot the teller,’ Clay admitted. ‘I saw Eli shoot the manager. You reckon one of them survived the shootin’?’

  ‘Maybe. Or maybe the lawman’s bluffin’,’ Nate said, waving to the barkeep for a whiskey. ‘Ain’t important. Eli’s told me to get rid of him if’n he ain’t headin’ for Solace by nightfall.’

  ‘That don’t solve the problem of the witness, if there is one,’ Clay said.

  ‘Nope.’ Nate removed his knife from its sheath inside his boot and began paring his fingernails.

  ‘So?’

  ‘So I guess we’ll just have to wait an’ see,’ Nate said. He looked across to the stairs where two saloon girls were sitting. One of them caught Nate’s eye and looked questioningly at him. He gave a half-smile and re-sheathed his knife. ‘See you later, kid,’ he said. ‘Got some company to keep.’ He downed his drink and walked towards the girl.

  Clay watched them ascend the stairs, then signalled to the barkeep to bring him the bottle. He was worried. Too worried to enjoy the delights of one of the saloon girls. Could the lawman’s ‘witness’ be Meg, and not one of the two bank staff? Had Meg worked out that it was the Pike gang he was mixed up with? Even if she had, he found it hard to believe she would tell the law and put him in danger. He was her brother, dammit! He’d stopped Silas mauling her and he’d let her go! And had she figured out that Becky Garrod was with the gang? Silas had mentioned the name. Clay poured himself another drink with a shaking hand.

  ‘You were at the funeral,’ a voice said from behind him.

  Clay swivelled round and almost fell off the bar stool when he saw the Solace deputy at his shoulder. ‘Go away, mister,’ he said. ‘I ain’t got nothin’ to say to you.’

  ‘Really? That’s too bad. The name’s Walsh, by the way. You got a name?’

  Clay swallowed a mouthful of his drink before answering. ‘Ain’t none of your business.’

  Tom Walsh shrugged. ‘Makes no difference. I can always ask around.’

  ‘It’s Thornton! That satisfy you?’ The words were out of Clay’s mouth before the appalling significance of what he’d let slip by revealing his real name dawned on him. Did the man know Meg?

  Tom was frowning. ‘Thornton?’

  It seemed he did.

  ‘Y . . . yeah, what about it?’ Clay tried to sound indifferent.

  ‘Nothin’,’ Tom answered. Then asked, ‘You got any kin?’

  Clay shook his head. ‘Nope. Now, why don’t you get lost!’

  ‘Just a coincidence, I guess.’

  ‘Coincidence?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Tom said. ‘My fiancée’s name’s Thornton. Meg Thornton.’

  Clay swallowed. ‘Your . . . fiancée?’ He took another drink. ‘Well, she ain’t no kin of mine.’

  The barkeep came across and Tom asked for a beer. He waited until it had been poured before speaking again. ‘You’re hooked up with Eli Pike.’ It wasn’t a question.

  ‘I work for Mr Pike, yeah,’ Clay said. ‘Help out at the Lazy O.’

  ‘So you know Becky Garrod.’

  ‘Sure. She an’ Mr Pike are . . . together,’ Clay said.

  ‘How did that come about?’

  Clay shrugged. ‘Can’t remember.’

  ‘I’m bettin’ he treats her badly,’ Tom said. ‘Knocks her around. Am I right?’

  Clay didn’t reply. The whiskey was making his head fuzzy.

  Tom swallowed some of his beer. ‘What’s your first name?’

  Clay looked at him. ‘Why?’

  ‘Just wonderin’. Mine’s Tom.’

  ‘It’s Clay,’ Clay said after a moment. There seemed little point maintaining the ‘Chet Adams’ fiction.

  ‘Listen, Clay,’ Tom said. ‘I came here to nail Eli Pike an’ his gang for the killings at the Solace bank, an’ I still aim to do that. But now there’s somethin’ else I need to do, an’ that’s to get Becky Garrod back to her pa. I’m pretty sure he don’t know she’s hooked up with Eli Pike or he’d have tried to do somethin’ about it.’

  Clay said nothing, picturing Harvey Garrod’s body buried somewhere out near Checker Pass by Cord Lewis and his men earlier that day. Becky was never going to see her pa again, and she knew that. But maybe this lawman could get her away from Pike. Get her away from the Lazy O. For that, Clay would be grateful. He was slowly beginning to realize he’d never be able to do it on his own. And then he could concentrate on getting himself away from Eli and the remnants of the Pike gang.

  But he was still trying to come to terms with the fact that the deputy was engaged to Meg, and that he didn’t seem to know Meg had a brother who was part of the Pike gang. That she had a brother at all. Clearly Meg hadn’t told him.

  But what was she doing now, back in Solace? Fretting that her fiancé was going to discover the truth – that it was her brother who had shot Silas and the bank teller?

  He was conscious of Walsh watching him, and tried to act unconcerned.

  ‘How’re you gonna manage that? Becky sticks pretty close to Eli, he makes sure of that.’

  Tom Walsh smiled. ‘So you wouldn’t warn Eli if I tried to make a move? That’s interestin’. Maybe you could get a message to her.’

  Clay glanced at the ceiling. In one of the rooms up there, Nate Morgan was enjoying the delights of one of the saloon whores, but his next job was to kill Walsh if the lawman hadn’t left Weslake by nightfall. Cl
ay tried to think a way round the dilemma.

  ‘A message to Becky?’ Tom prompted.

  ‘I dunno,’ Clay said. Nate would be coming down again soon and he didn’t want to be seen talking with Walsh. ‘I – I can’t talk about it here.’

  Tom had seen him look up at the ceiling. ‘Worried about your friend? Oh, I saw him with you at the bar afore he went upstairs with the bar girl. OK, meet me back of the hotel in an hour. We can talk again.’

  ‘No!’ Clay said. ‘Leave it until after dark. Say, nine o’clock.’

  The deputy swallowed the remainder of his beer. ‘OK, I’ll be waitin’.’ He nodded to the whiskey bottle. ‘And I’d lay off any more of that stuff. Best to keep a clear head.’ With that he slid himself off the bar stool and walked out through the batwings without looking back.

  Clay saw that the hand holding his shot glass was shaking. What was he doing, palling up with a lawman who could get him hanged? Answer: because he saw a chance of helping Becky get away.

  And because Walsh was Meg’s husband-to-be?

  That was another thing. How would she feel if he allowed Walsh to be gunned down without doing anything to stop it? Suddenly, Clay knew he couldn’t let that happen.

  ‘Jeeze, what a mess!’ he muttered to himself.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  An hour later, Nate Morgan, his thirst for fornication quenched, came down the stairs and looked round the saloon. The kid had left, he noted, or was availing himself of one of the other whores. There was no sign of the Solace deputy either.

  Question was, had the Solace lawman left town? Had he, Nate, been saved the task of killing him? Cord Lewis would know. Best pay him a visit.

  The sheriff was sitting at his desk playing solitaire when Nate opened the door of his office. He looked up as Nate came in – and immediately dropped the cards. Nate made him nervous. There was something menacing about the way his eyes seemed to bore right into your soul as he looked at you. He would be a difficult man to lie to.

  ‘That lawman left town yet?’ Nate asked.

  ‘He hadn’t when I checked fifteen minutes ago.’ Cord avoided the other man’s stare. ‘I went to the livery an’ his horse was still there. An’ he hasn’t checked out of the hotel. The clerk seemed to think he was stayin’ overnight. Maybe he’ll leave in the mornin’.’

  ‘Nope,’ Nate muttered to himself. ‘Reckon he’ll be stayin’ here permanently.’

  ‘What you say, Nate?’ the sheriff asked.

  ‘Nothin’,’ Nate said. And he turned and left, leaving the door open.

  The sheriff watched him walk away down the street, leading the piebald. ‘Gonna be trouble,’ he muttered to himself.

  Tom found Smokey Harrison in the café, tucking into a plate of beef stew.

  ‘Mind if I join you?’ Tom asked the old-timer. Smokey pointed to a chair with his fork. ‘Help yourself.’

  Tom looked across at the Chinese waiter and indicated that he’d have the same as Smokey. The Chinaman nodded briefly and disappeared into the kitchen.

  ‘Know anythin’ about the girl who’s livin’ with the Pike gang?’ Tom asked Smokey. ‘Her name’s Becky Garrod.’

  ‘What about her?’

  ‘I’m wantin’ to know how she came to get hooked up with Eli Pike.’

  ‘You know her?’ Smokey asked.

  ‘Yeah,’ Tom said. ‘Her pa owns the Palace Hotel in Solace.’

  ‘The story goes she joined up with Eli after a stage hold-up,’ Smokey said. ‘Seems she was a passenger an’ she elected to go with Eli rather than go on to wherever it was she an’ the stage was headin’. I say “elected to go”, but I’m guessin’ Eli kinda insisted. When Eli wants somethin’ he just goes ahead an’ takes it, ’specially if it happens to be a pretty girl.’

  Tom nodded. ‘Kind’a adds up,’ he said. ‘She always was a reckless kid, lookin’ for excitement an’ often findin’ she’d bit off more’n she could chew. Pike prob’ly didn’t have to do much persuadin’, although I’m bettin’ she’s lived to regret it.’

  ‘Reckon she has,’ Smokey said. ‘She always looks like a scared rabbit whenever she’s in town with Pike. Carries a few bruises, too.’

  ‘That’s what I figured,’ Tom said. ‘Can’t believe her pa hasn’t tried to find her afore now.’

  Smokey put down his fork and pushed his empty plate aside. ‘What’s her pa look like?’ he asked, suddenly interested.

  ‘About fifty,’ Tom said. ‘Fat, with greyin’ hair. Always wears a suit with a frock coat.’

  ‘Drives a smart-lookin’ buggy?’ Smokey asked.

  ‘Yeah,’ Tom said.

  ‘Reckon I might’ve seen him,’ Smokey said.

  ‘Here, in Weslake?’

  ‘Reckon so. Early yesterday mornin’. He was askin’ around about the Pikes’ hangout.

  ‘Yesterday mornin’!’

  ‘You sound surprised.’

  ‘Damn right I am,’ Tom said, thinking, Floyd and me should’ve kept an eye on Harvey Garrod. A few things about the hotel robbery are beginning to add up.

  The Chinaman arrived at the table and placed a plate of beef stew and a mug of coffee in front of Tom before moving away. Tom ignored it, staring into space.

  ‘The thing is, Garrod’s hotel safe was robbed just hours afore the bank raid,’ Tom told the old-timer. ‘Upshot of that was that me, the sheriff, an’ most of the town’s men were out of town when the bank raid happened, chasin’ after the man who robbed the hotel.’

  ‘You catch him?’ Smokey asked.

  Tom shook his head. ‘Way we see it now, he made sure we followed him until we were two hours out of Solace, then wiped his trail.’

  ‘So the hotel robbery was to lure you out of town,’ Smokey said. ‘The guy was a decoy.’

  ‘Sure seems like it,’ Tom said.

  ‘Sounds like Nate Morgan,’ Smokey said. ‘Ain’t the first time the Pikes have played that ruse usin’ Nate. ’Course it means they have to have help from somebody willin’ to be “robbed”.’

  Tom nodded. ‘An’ now you’re tellin’ me Harvey Garrod has been askin’ about the home of Eli Pike. Eli Pike, who’s got Harvey’s daughter, an’ whose gang robbed the bank at Solace.’

  ‘An’ you’re thinkin’ that this man Garrod did a deal with Eli Pike, that right?’

  ‘Reckon he agreed to provide a reason to send our posse on a wild goose chase in exchange for Pike allowin’ his daughter to go free,’ Tom agreed. He frowned. ‘Only that ain’t happened so far. She was at Silas Pike’s funeral, lookin’ as scared as hell.’

  ‘Wouldn’t put it past Eli to double-cross this fellah Garrod,’ Smokey said. ‘ ’Specially if’n he’s taken a real fancy to the girl. An’ if that’s so, it’s gonna be a real tough job to get her away.’

  ‘Yeah, I guess you’re right.’ Tom forked up a mouthful of beef stew. ‘Still, I may have got myself some help. Kid called Clay Thornton, one of Eli’s gang.’

  ‘The kid?’ Smokey said. ‘He’s new. Only hooked up with Eli an’ the others a few months ago. ‘Ceptin’ I thought his name was Adams. Chet Adams.’

  ‘Even so, my guess is he’s not happy about the way Eli treats Becky,’ Tom said. ‘Prob’ly soft on her himself. Anyway, I think he might be prepared to get a message to Becky if’n I can come up with some sort’a plan, an’ she’s not too scared to co-operate.’ He remembered her frightened face as she walked away from the funeral.

  ‘You be careful, son,’ Smokey said. ‘They’re a treacherous bunch. None of ’em can be trusted, includin’ the kid, an’ you could find yourself walkin’ into a trap.’

  ‘Might have to take that chance,’ Tom said.

  He finished his meal and walked across the street to the hotel. The desk clerk looked up as he came in. He peered across the top of his eyeglasses at Tom.

  ‘You need your key?’ he asked.

  ‘Not just yet,’ Tom said. ‘I need some information. You’ve got a man called Garrod stayin’ here, that righ
t?’

  The clerk frowned. ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘About fifty,’ Tom said. ‘Fat, with greyin’ hair. Always wears a suit with a frock coat.’

  ‘Oh, you mean Mr Granger,’ the clerk said. ‘Yes, he’s staying here. At least, he was. He booked in yesterday morning, but as far as I know, nobody’s seen him since. Asked for a room with two beds, like he was expectin’ to meet up with somebody who’d be staying with him.’

  ‘That right?’ Tom said. He thought for a moment. ‘Any chance I could look into his room? He’s a friend of mine,’ he added, seeing the other man hesitate. ‘I’m kind’a worried about him.’

  ‘A friend, but you didn’t know his name?’ the clerk said, suspiciously.

  Tom smiled. ‘Seems he uses a different name sometimes.’ He flicked the silver star on his waistcoat, as if to make a point. ‘Now, about that room.’

  The clerk sighed. ‘I guess it’ll be all right, you being a lawman.’ He turned and took a key from one of the hooks behind him. ‘Room five,’ he said.

  Tom took the key and walked along the passage, checking the doors. Room five was at the end. He used the key to go inside.

  The room boasted two single beds, a washstand, and a rail along one wall. A black slicker hung from the rail, and there was a leather bag beside the bed. Tom opened it and looked inside. A change of underwear, nothing else. No indication of why he had come to Weslake, although Tom was pretty sure he knew why – to somehow negotiate for the release of his daughter. Or maybe to collect her as due payment for aiding the raid on the Solace bank? So why hadn’t he returned to the hotel? Suddenly, Tom had a bad feeling.

  It would soon be time to meet up with Clay Thornton or Chet Adams or whatever his name was, and see if they could work out a plan to get Becky Garrod out of Eli Pike’s clutches. Something, Tom was beginning to think, Harvey Garrod had failed to do. Meantime, he’d go back to the café and ponder over a pot of coffee until it got dark. He had to come up with a plan.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Just before nine o’clock, from his vantage point amongst the dark shadows of the boardwalk outside the Weslake apothecary, Nate Morgan watched the Solace deputy leave the café and cross the street towards the hotel. Nate debated whether or not to gun the youngster down immediately, or go into the hotel and finish him off there.