‘Aren’t you going to eat, Mr. Attinger?’ the woman asked.
He shook his head. ‘Suddenly I ain’t hungry, young lady. But you two folks, you eat hearty. Hear that wind? Buildin’ up, seems to me. This could be it.’
‘Be what?’ Crystal posed, and wrinkled her nose.
‘The new flood,’ Edge put in and was aware of the apprehension which had gripped the woman seated opposite him.
With the door of the windowless shack closed, the place smelled bad. The stench of the building’s neglected and decaying fabric and of the old man’s foul breath and unwashed flesh had been permeated through the atmosphere all the time, of course. But the cooling fresh air of evening and the aromas of brewing coffee and cooking beans had masked the stink until now. When the increasingly forceful north wind was barred access, the coffee had ceased to steam and the pot of beans was off the stove.
That’s right, that’s right,’ Attinger said in high excitement. ‘And I got a proposition for you folks. That’ll make you the luckiest young couple in this entire bad, bad world. She ain’t properly finished yet. Ain’t fitted out like they say. But she’ll float, you can take old Telly’s word on that. She’ll float and she’ll be stable in any kind of storm. And when the waters go down she’ll land us safely wherever it pleases the good Lord to have us.’
Crystal had raised a spoonful of beans to her lips. And now she wrinkled her nose again and held the attitude for a stretched second while her eyes expressed a tacit query to Edge.
The half-breed bent his head low, to bring his face within an inch or so of the heap of beans on his plate.
‘When the rains start, folks will come down here from Ventura,’ Aristotle Attinger went on in the same mood of triumph. ‘All them folks that had me marked as a crazy man for doin’ what the good Lord told me to. And if any of them make it before they’re engulfed by the flood, they won’t have to beg to let me have them come aboard. I told them that. If they make it, it’ll be a sign from the good Lord that they are the chosen ones. Just like you young people showin’ up here is a sign. Listen. Listen to that wind. You hear any rain yet?’
The old man’s eyes had been squeezed tightly closed while he delivered the monologue. Now he snapped them open and his mood suffered an abrupt change. To fear. Not of the man and the woman who were peering at him from either side of the table. Rather he was gripped by terror of having certain victory snatched away and replaced by irrevocable defeat.
‘I hear you talking up a storm is all, feller,’ Edge said evenly. ‘And I smell something bad. Before anyone’s eaten any beans.’
‘You think he tried to poison us, Edge?’ the woman asked tensely. And squeezed a hand to her throat.
The half-breed rose slowly to his feet.
‘No!’ the old timer blurted and unfolded his arms, to stretch out his hands in a gesture of innocence. ‘No, it’s not poison! Just a potion to make people sleep. A medicine I bought from an old Paiute squaw! It wouldn’t harm you none! I’m a true believer in the good Lord and I live by the Commandments he gave to Moses! I wouldn’t knowingly harm any livin’ creature! Thou shalt not kill! I just wanted to. . .’
Edge took a step toward the blabbering old man and spoke into the silence that followed the curtailment of his explanation. ‘Some rules are made to be broken, feller.’ He gripped the fingers of his right hand with those of his left and jerked. The knuckles cracked louder than the howling wind in the night outside. ‘Easy as an old timer’s bones.’
‘Edge!’ Crystal called shrilly.
Attinger groaned in dismay, whirled awkwardly, freed the catch, flung open the door and lunged outside. Dust billowed across the threshold as the half-breed stepped into the doorway and halted.
There was no rain and the light of the half moon was bright from a sky ragged with thin white clouds, scudding fast in the grip of the norther that gusted across the Colorado Plateau.
For long moments, while Attinger wailed in competition with the sound of the wind through the framework of timber, swirling dust drew a veil across the scene out front of the shack.
Then there was a lull in the storm. And Edge saw the old man come to a staggering halt and drop hard to his knees. In front of two long coated horsemen.
Both riders were leveling cocked revolvers at the towering form of the half-breed starkly silhouetted against the lamplit doorway.
Attinger vented another shrill wail of despairing, demented terror.
And the mounted man on the right drawled: ‘What’s the idea, mister? Scarin’ my Pa this way?’
Edge was poised to draw his Colt and blast at the men as he threw himself back into the shack. If it proved necessary. But his voice revealed no hint of tension when he replied: ‘On account of the beans, feller.’
‘Beans?’ the younger rider on the left growled. And the gun in his hand exploded.
The bullet sprayed wood splinters from the inside of the open door.
‘Vince, you fool!’ the older man yelled. Then: ‘Mister, we. . .’
Edge crouched, drew the Frontier Colt, cocked the hammer and squeezed the trigger.
The younger rider shrieked: ‘Pa, I never—’
And both men hurled themselves out of their saddles as the bullet from the half-breed’s gun cracked between them and imbedded itself in the stern of the boat.
Edge was inside the shack by then, his back pressed against the cover of the wall.
‘My God, not again!’ Crystal Dickens moaned.
‘Get over here!’ Edge snarled at her, and swung his revolver to aim at the kerosene lamp.
This as the woman ignored his order and threw herself full-length along the bed which reeked of the old timer’s neglected body.
‘No shootin’, Augie!’ Telly Attinger shouted desperately and Edge stayed his finger on the trigger. He inched his head to the side to risk a glance outside. ‘Put that gun away, Vince! No other folks must die on account of what I been told to do by the good Lord!’
The old man was still on his knees and he swung his head between the two men crouched to either side of him. Then directed a pleading gaze over his shoulder toward the lamplit doorway. Next sank his rump on to his heels, clasped his hands together and threw back his head to tilt his face to the cloud-streaked sky. The wind howled to mask the mumbled words of his prayer. And eddies of dust blurred the scene between the shack and the stern of the boat.
‘I didn’t mean it, Pa!’ Vince wailed. ‘My finger slipped and she just went off!’
Augie yelled, ‘You hear that, mister? The shot was an accident! Me and my boy don’t want no trouble with you!’
Edge tried to penetrate the stinging dust with one slitted, glinting eye around the doorpost. And glimpsed the two men with their revolvers still drawn, but no longer held in a threatening attitude. He rasped: ‘Holster those guns and never draw them against me again. Won’t need to trouble you then.’
The father and son looked anxiously at each other, then complied with the half-breed’s demand.
Edge holstered his own Colt and swung on to the threshold of the shack again.
Crystal Dickens remained face down on the bed, silent and unmoving.
The old timer continued to pray.
‘Yeah, beans,’ the half-breed said in a level tone, as if the exchange of gunshots had never happened. The old man didn’t eat any, but they’re the reason he got the wind up.’
‘What the frig you talkin’ about?’ Augie Attinger snarled.
The man’s short-tempered response nudged Edge close to the stage where he was likely to draw the Colt again. But the two men staring at him were unaware of this. Failed to notice that after he had shrugged his shoulders, his right hand was just a fraction of an inch away from the butt of the holstered revolver.
‘Because of the draught he put in them.’
Chapter Two
‘WHATS he sayin’, Pa?’ Vince growled. ‘I thought it was just Gramps was supposed to be off his rocker?’
The b
ed creaked and the woman’s footfalls sounded on the hard-packed dirt floor of the shack. And Telly Attinger’s son and grandson looked at her in surprise when her silhouetted form appeared beside that of Edge in the lighted doorway.
‘Who’s she?’ Vince asked huskily.
‘Far as you’re concerned, kid, just hips that pass in the night,’ the half-breed drawled.
‘The old man tried to poison us,’ Crystal said dully.
‘He did what?’ Augie countered, shocked. Then hugged his open coat around his body. ‘Look, can we all come inside and talk about this? It ain’t exactly comfortable out here.’
‘Be his guest,’ Edge answered, pointing to the praying man. ‘But don’t eat any of his food.’
He withdrew into the shack, picked up the pot of cooled coffee and placed it on the stove. Crystal returned to sit on the side of the bed, pale beneath her recent tan. And stared down at the congealing beans on the two plates.
Outside, Augie Attinger instructed: ‘Take care of the horses, son. Cut out that prayin’ crap and do some explainin’, Pa!’
There were muttered responses from his father and son, then he entered the shack with the dejected old timer immediately behind him.
Augie was close to fifty and, perhaps because of the old man’s beard and crinkled skin, it was difficult to see any family resemblance between the two. He was a head taller with a strong looking build. He had short clipped black hair with some grey in the long sideburns and blue eyes set too close together. He had the lined and stained skin of a man who worked in the outdoors and the gnarled hands of one whose work was hard. Beneath the white duster, which he took off after closing the door on the storm, he was dressed Western-style in faded blue denim. There was maybe a two day growth of bristles on his jaw and throat and his skin and eyes looked ravaged by long and uncomfortable travel.
But he was able to generate sour hardness into the gaze he divided between Edge and the woman as he opened, ‘Tell you my side first. That’s my son outside and this here is my Pa. Year ago he sold the family business in Omaha. River freight business. Seventeen steamboats operatin’ out of Omaha, Kansas City, St Louis and Memphis. Coverin’ every stretch of the Mississippi and Missouri which can take a sternwheeler. Got twenty-five thousand dollars for the whole kit and caboodle and took off for parts unknown. While me and my boy were down in New Orleans fixin’ to open up there. Took Vince and me the whole year to track him down.’
Augie paused as the door was opened to admit his son and the louder sounds of the storm. Then continued, ‘Ain’t none of that any of your business. Mister. Ma’am. But I told you so you’ll know we ain’t here to do nothin’ that’ll cause you trouble. And, I guess, in hopes that you’ll return the favor and level with me.’
‘What’s it all about, Pa?’ Vince asked, after shedding his dust-scattering hat and coat: all the while casting surreptitious glances at the still shaken Crystal Dickens.
He was in his early twenties and his features were an immature version of those of the man who had fathered him. Youth had allowed him to stand up better to the rigors of the long trail and what signs of weariness did show failed to detract from his good looks.
‘If you hush up, boy, maybe we’ll find out,’ Augie told him.
Edge poured himself a coffee and said: ‘You’ll need to bring in your own stuff if you’re counting on staying.’
‘We’ll do without for now,’ Augie said.
Edge nodded and held out the coffee pot toward the woman. Who shook her head and explained, ‘This gentleman and I are just passing through, Mr. Attinger. Your father invited us inside and offered us food.’ She grimaced and pushed her plate of cold beans away from in front of her. ‘We were just about to eat it when we noticed it smelled bad. Then he started to rant about having a vision and said he’d put some Indian potion in the food. To make us sleep. Mr. Edge here didn’t take kindly to hearing that. Then your father ran outside. Which was when you arrived.’
Edge sipped his coffee.
Augie and Vince Attinger stood with their backs to the door, holding their hats and coats. Augie nodded several times while the woman was speaking. And Vince stared incredulously at his grandfather, who had retreated to a corner of the shack and was pressing himself into the angle of the walls. Like a frightened child expecting imminent punishment.
‘It’s true,’ the old timer whined. ‘To put them to sleep is what I—’
‘Hush up, you old fool,’ Augie said, softly but with authority. And sighed, looking suddenly more weary as he shared a gaze between the woman and the half-breed. ‘We heard up in Ventura how he was spendin’ the money. Wastin’ it on this crazy scheme to build a boat in the middle of the desert. Like Noah and his ark. But how he…’ Augie glared at the cowering old timer now, ‘figured to load it with people instead of animals. Young people who’d be able to breed a new generation after the flood drowned everyone else in the world. My God, what a—’
‘Yes, boy!’ the old man in the corner exclaimed, and came erect. ‘Your God and my God and everyone’s God! It was He who told me what to do! He who told me to come to this place to build the ark! Here in the pure country, away from the corrupt masses! I was told that the chosen would come to me! But they’re late! The time is ever drawin’ near! My work is almost complete! I went lookin’! In Ventura! But the people there only laughed, the fools! So I have abandoned them to their fate! And the good Lord has begun to direct the true chosen to me! Listen! Listen to the start of the storm that will destroy the corrupt world! And praise Him who has led you here! You will be saved! Saved to create a new, better race of human beings!’
While the old timer shrieked the fanatical words at them, his audience remained silent. Vince appeared uncomprehending. Augie expressed disgust. Crystal showed something close to pity. Edge was impassive as he rolled and lit a thin cigarette.
Then Augie swung around and took a long, menacing stride toward his father. Which was enough to drive the old timer back into fearful silence. And Augie sighed with exhausted relief.
‘All right, Pa,’ he said softly. ‘I guess we all know as much as we need to know now.’
‘Except for one thing,’ the youngest Attinger put in sourly.
‘What’s that, boy?’ his father asked.
Vince stared hard at the now subdued old timer as he answered: ‘How much money has he got left. And where is it?’
Augie got angry again, and this time directed it at his son. ‘I said all we need to know for now, boy!’ he snarled. That’s family business and there’s no call to talk that in front of strangers.’
He snatched a glance at Edge and Crystal. Saw indifference on the lean features of the half-breed, but glimpsed a flicker of interest on the face of the woman before she averted her eyes.
‘I ain’t gonna tell you!’ the old timer challenged. ‘I sold what was mine and I’m entitled to the money I got for it.’
‘Pa?’ Vince rasped.
‘Hush up, boy,’ Augie snapped as he shared a glower between his father and his son. Then instructed: ‘Go bring in our stuff from where you left it, Vincent.’
The youngest Attinger went grudgingly out into the night through which the wind was blowing as strongly as ever. The moon was still bright above the swirling dust and there was no smell of dampness in the air.
‘Like to know something, feller?’ Edge asked after the door had banged closed behind Vince.
‘Long as it don’t amount to pokin’ your nose in Attinger business, mister,’ Augie allowed, and crossed the room to take the old timer’s mug down from a shelf above the stove. ‘All right to drink from this?’
Edge nodded. ‘Where’s Ventura and what’s there?’
Augie poured himself a coffee and sipped it while he answered. ‘Well, I’d say it’s about five miles north of here, Mr…?’
‘He’s called Edge,’ the woman supplied. ‘I’m Crystal Dickens. And you have no need to worry about us having designs on whatever money your father has left
.’
Augie was intrigued by the bitterness of the woman’s tone. But then shook his head and went on to Edge, ‘Guess it could be called a town. Mostly tents on silver claims. And a lot of claims that are abandoned. Only frame buildings are a store and saloon and a railroad depot.’
‘Railroad depot?’ Crystal asked eagerly.
Augie shrugged and nodded. ‘That’s right, ma’am. At the end of a spur off the Denver and Rio Grande track. Just the one train goes back and forth haulin’ the ore. But they carry passengers in the caboose. Vince and me rode down from Colorado Junction aboard the train.’
His son came in through the dust-filled doorway, heavily laden with two saddles and bedrolls.
The old timer pleaded: ‘You folks don’t want to leave for Ventura tonight. What with the storm and all. Even if the rain don’t come, it won’t be no picnic ridin’ into the teeth of a norther.’
‘This place ain’t exactly well equipped to handle this many house guests, old man,’ Augie growled.
‘But there’s plenty of room aboard the ark,’ Telly Attinger countered triumphantly. ‘I got berths for better than forty people. You and me and the boy can go aboard and these folks can bed down here in the shack.’ There was a desperate plea in his weak and watery eyes as he looked from the woman to Edge and back again. ‘And if the storm blows out and the rains don’t come, you can head for Ventura in the mornin’.’
‘That sounds like a good plan, Mr. Attinger,’ Crystal allowed. ‘And I’d certainly like to accept your invitation. Edge is free to do as he pleases.’
The half-breed dropped the butt of his cigarette in the pot of cold and congealed beans. And said sardonically: ‘Never accept a favor without returning it, feller. I’ll bed down under your roof. In exchange, I’ll cook breakfast.’
The unsubtle reference to the attempted poisoning was lost on the old timer, whose happy relief sounded in a childlike giggle. Which contrasted with the disgruntled snort vented by his son as he picked up his own saddle and bedroll from where Vince had dumped them on the floor. Then, with a kind of grudging attempt to be civil, he said: All right, Mr. Edge, ma’am. This is my father’s place and he’s entitled to have you stay if you want. And hearin’ that weather out there, I reckon I wouldn’t have you ride through it if it was up to me. Come on, Pa. Vince. Let’s go take a look aboard that crazy contraption outside.’
EDGE: Vengeance at Ventura Page 2