The sheriff was quick to make amends.
“The Elders stand accused of killing your Dad, Shooter, and most think that old Ferdy’s letter told exactly how it happened. The Elders are the ones wearing guilt.
“You didn’t do it, and that’s all you have to remember. The Elders blame you because they haven’t anyone else to lay it on. Forget about them, and move on.”
Brunner changed the subject, “I’m ready to eat. Let’s go.”
They turned to step inside and Shooter said, “I don’t think I should forget about the Elders, sheriff. If they think I killed two of them, they won’t forget about me.”
Galloway got the door and held it for the older man. “I’m applying for a permit to carry concealed right after lunch, sheriff. I felt really naked sitting there with that monster ready to charge.”
Brunner sighed, “I’ll issue you a permit, Shooter. Lord knows you are trained enough, and you are right. The Elders were always a worry, and nobody should have to go unarmed unless he wants to.”
The sheriff chuckled a bit grimly.
“Not in most of Pennsylvania, that is, but don’t go down to Philadelphia. They will ignore your permit, slam you in jail, fine you, and confiscate your firearm.”
Brunner again chuckled humorlessly. “In Philly, only the criminals get to carry guns.”
It was the next day before Sonny Brunner realized that Gabriel Galloway never had said straight out that he did not shoot the dead Elders.
Had he, the experienced interrogator, been snookered? Was Gabriel that clever?
Brunner could not see how he could again raise the question without Gabriel believing that he was suspect, and that would certainly destroy Sonny’s friendship with the younger man.
Brunner did not want that. He liked and admired Gabriel Galloway. Hinting around without a scrap of evidence would be unfriendly and decidedly unprofessional. Sonny did not really believe it anyway. It was just that . . .
The sheriff guessed that, for now, he could only silently wonder.
Chapter 17
So, the Elders were still around, and if one of the brothers wanted him dead or beaten to a pulp, or perhaps arrested and convicted it was likely they were of like minds.
A girl who had sat beside Shooter in middle school worked at the Polyclinic Hospital where Andrew Elder was a patient. The friend kept Shooter informed.
She described Elder’s knee as torn almost apart. The talk was that the knee was beyond repair, and Andrew would need an artificial knee or go stiff-legged the rest of his life.
Shooter Galloway shed no tears over Andrew Elder’s injuries. If he could have, Shooter would have pulled the leg free from his body. He was pleased that Elder was down for a long count. He hoped that a new knee took every nickel he could find.
Later, the girl reported that Elder’s surgery was delayed indefinitely because of his seriously bad health. Elder was diabetic, and his weight was life threatening. Some sort of dramatic stomach reduction surgery was being proposed, but Elder was resisting.
The most interesting report was that Elder did not have visitors. A lawyer had appeared a number of times, but his brothers had not come. Shooter found that curious and wondered if the family had experienced some sort of falling out.
If the brothers were not gathering to plot his demise, Galloway guessed he had more urgent tasks than shooting Elders. The fact was that he would have to be extremely careful to avoid his name being in any way connected to the surviving brothers. The Elders had apparently put together the dots, and Sonny Brunner husbanded suspicions. Now was not the time to hunt Elders.
The biggest timber was gone from The Notch, and Shooter found his memory of how the virgin forest had looked was already dimming. He possessed hundreds of photos taken by dozens of scholarly researchers from as far back as his great-grandfather’s time to remind him, but the woods did look good with fewer trees.
Woodman was still hauling out limbs and filling and leveling the road that would become Shooter’s rifle range. The loggers had used that right of way to transport big logs from where they were taken down, and the temporary logging road was rutted and torn. Shooter had opened a shale pit on the land behind Ferdy’s old house, and Woodman’s trucks hauled countless loads laying a roadbed that would last. Woodman expected to be called in over decades to remove other great trees. There were plenty, and a good road would be helpful.
Shooter was pleased by Dan Grouse’s choice of Woodman for the job. The lumberman had integrity. He took pleasure in doing a job right and that, Galloway thought, was truly rare these days.
During the felling and transporting of the logs and careful removing of the tree roots, Woodman had almost danced about, intensely interested, and obviously pleased by what he had purchased. At times, he stroked logs and even talked to them as if they were pets. The man loved his work, and to increase Woodman’s excitement and satisfaction, Shooter gave him special information.
Shooter said, “I want to tell you something in strictest confidence.”
He pointed to the heavily nailed walnut tree that everyone admired and cursed over. Then Galloway told him about the short nail heads and the fact that there were no spikes buried in the magnificent old tree. He explained about the Elders and why, even though they seemed to be gone, Elders were never to be trusted.
Woodman was thrilled and showed it. He was entertained and beat his thigh in delight. He congratulated Galloway on a brilliant ploy, and he earnestly sought assurances, that when the time came to take down the finest walnut he had ever seen, he would get the job and the sale.
Shooter appreciated Woodman’s reaction to the walnut story, and certainly the man would get the job of taking down the great tree, if it became the thing to do in Shooter’s lifetime.
Galloway understood other ramifications of sharing the secret. He recognized that the superb walnut was a powerful persuader, and the possibility of the mighty walnut becoming available made certain that Woodman would complete his cleanup and whatever else young Mister Galloway wanted to the very best of his ability. There were, after all, other Notch trees not yet taken that might be considered some years down the road, and the “His” tree in front of the old house was a walnut large enough to make the lumber man stop and look at each passing.
+++
As the oldest, Roy Elder assumed leadership of the decimated Elder clan. When the brothers met, they now numbered only three. Roy, Cal, and John.
Andrew had gotten strange. He had blown up to balloon size, raised a stupid looking beard, and he no longer came around. Now he had let the Galloway kid tear him apart in a brawl that had brought attention to both the Elders and young Galloway.
Roy Elder wanted none of that. Ferdy’s letter accusing the family of killing Bob Galloway had landed among the brothers like a cannon ball.
They had denied mightily, and there was no corroborating evidence, but it was generally accepted that dying men rarely lied, and even if it could not be proven, most in the county believed the Elder family had killed Bob Galloway.
The Elders had stayed away, and the rumors and suspicions slowly settled. Not that anyone forgot. Country people never forget, but before they took care of the Galloway kid, Roy Elder wanted eyes and thoughts turned elsewhere.
The brothers had no doubts that they would settle with Gabriel Galloway. By the process of elimination, the Elders’ had decided that the deaths of Box and old Sam Elder had to be blamed on Shooter Galloway. There was no one else, but until an unexpected quirk of fate, enough questions remained to hold the sons from seeking revenge.
Waiting at the asphalt plant for his turn to load black top, Cal Elder struck up a conversation with one of the Thebes boys from Bloomfield. County talk turned to people, and Gabriel Galloway, who was now a Marine, came up.
Cal said, “We never knew young Galloway much. He was just a kid when we lived up there.”
Thebes was proud of his closeness to Shooter Galloway who, being wounded and all, had be
come something of a hero.
Thebes said, “I’ve known Shooter for years. He was just a boy when I taught him to drive a bulldozer up at my Dad’s landfill.”
Cal Elder was loaded and ready to leave before awareness struck. He pulled over his truck loaded with hot black top and hurried back to where Thebes was still waiting.
Cal tried to appear only generally interested, but he feared his eagerness crept through.
“When we were talking, you meant the landfill you had up on that hill behind the military school didn’t you?”
“Yep, but it’s been closed for years, now.”
Cal said, “Now you have to haul trash and garbage over the mountain and all the way down here, don’t you?”
“Yep, or else we haul all the way to York. Expensive and hard on the trucks. We should have a transfer point in the county, but we can’t get a permit.”
Cal tried for his point. “Why did young Galloway want to drive a bulldozer? How old was he—maybe eleven or twelve?”
Thebes shrugged dismissively. “He was researching for some school paper he was writing, I think. That was about the first time I met him. He was new at Carson Long, so he must have been in middle school, or whatever they’ve got up there. Yeah, twelve might be about right.”
Cal Elder was wise enough to drop Galloway. He continued his talk about earlier times, but his heart was pounding and his mind kept shifting about. His blacktop was cooling, and that gave him a reason to move on.
He had it, a connection they had all searched for. When Galloway came home from wherever he was they would shoot him dead. Cal Elder had no doubt about it.
Roy Elder was especially pleased. As sure as they had talked about it, Gabriel Galloway had bulldozed their house, and he had dug the ditch that had damned near killed John Elder. If Galloway had done part of it, he had done it all.
The Elders were not sophisticated thinkers, and they easily made imaginative evidence-free leaps of logic. That one person could have bulldozed while someone else did the shootings was ignored, and already convinced by even less evidence, any reservations were dissolved. When the time came the Elders would strike, and Gabriel Galloway would be their target.
John Elder said, “Maybe we should let the State Police in on Galloway learning how to bulldoze.”
His brothers examined him as if he was a dangerous insect, and John attempted to explain his reasoning.
“They’re looking to find out who has been after us Elders. Knowing that Galloway was the one would put blame on him, and take it off us.”
Roy was patient. “No it wouldn’t, John. First off, knowing how to bulldoze isn’t proof of anything. It’s good enough for us, but the law would just write it down and forget it.
“Second, knowing that Galloway was after us wouldn’t clear us of anything. All it would do would be to stir up interest all over again. We want things to get quiet. Then, we’ll get Galloway.”
Cal was vehement. “Wait hell, when he gets back I’m going to kill him.”
Roy said, “No you aren’t. We’re a family on this. We wait until the time is right. We’ll wait just like he did, so that we won’t get caught.
“Galloway’s been smart and careful. We’ll be the same. We stay out of the county and out of people’s minds. When Galloway goes down, no one will even think of us. That’s the way we want to do it.”
Andrew Elder had been strange even before Galloway had nearly pulled him apart, and now he was in a hospital all busted up by the same Galloway brat. The remaining brothers met to talk about that.
Cal wondered, “What do we do about Andrew, now, Roy? He is our brother even though he has gotten crazy.”
Roy was ready. “We do nothing. Andrew’s cut himself off from us, and he has made his own bed. Now, he can lie in it.
“Hell, what can we do for him, anyway? He doesn’t want to be around us, and we don’t want to get saddled with the hospital bills he’s piling up.
“In fact, we don’t want people to think we even remember Andrew. He shot off his mouth about us believing Galloway killed pap and Boxer. We ought to tear off his other leg for that.
“Andrew has set us back years. If anything happens to Galloway now, the law will come roaring down on us Elders, and if we get to thinking that we’re so smart that we can outwit everybody else, well, we’ll likely all end up in Rockview prison.
“We don’t visit Andrew, and we don’t talk about him with anybody. If his name comes up, we say we haven’t seen him for years.
“Otherwise, we just go about our business. Trees are growing on what property we’ve got left, and they will be big enough for cutting when we’re old. If it takes that long before we get to Galloway, so what? This is a dangerous game we’re in, and mistakes would cost us.
“Patience is what we need, and Elders have plenty of that. We’ll wait, and we’ll remember. Maybe a long time from now, something bad will happen to Gabriel Galloway, and only the three of us will know how it happened.”
The brothers agreed and knocked beer bottles on it.
Chapter 18
Gabriel Galloway missed The Marine Corps. He had been slow to recognize the reason for an obscure disconnect from happenings around him.
Despite his college and career intentions, Shooter experienced pointlessness to his daily activities. He slept late and wandered through the even more handsome thinned-out Notch. He found himself putting off small tasks that he should already have completed. Since Andrew Elder’s restaurant attack, Shooter carried a pistol in a vest much like Mop’s, but he rarely practiced. Why not, no one cared and he had all the time in the world—didn’t he?
He attended movies he did not care about and ate a lot of meals in restaurants more for something to do than for the food. His spirit was restless, and nothing he tried gave lasting pleasure.
Following another bad movie, Shooter ambled past a storefront recruiting station. He studied the posters portraying the offerings of Army, Marine, and Navy careers and on impulse went in—just to shoot the breeze a little.
The Marine Corps recruiter was absent. In retrospect, Shooter thought that was just as well, but the United States Army and Navy representatives were on him like a coat of paint. A Marine Corps veteran of the Gulf War, a sergeant with two Purple hearts, was specially welcome.
Gabriel explained that he had just come in to say “Hello,” but the recruiters had heard that before. Former servicemen were prime prospects. Many ex-soldiers, sailors and Marines had difficulty readjusting to civilian life, and if the service representatives handled it right, more than a few who just stopped by found themselves reenlisted and back where they ought to be—at least as the military saw it.
Galloway’s announced plan to attend college and earn an Army commission bled most of the steam from the hungry recruiters, but Shooter felt the comfort in being with men of similar interests, and he fell easily into the camaraderie of barracks talk that flowed among enlisted men.
It was like coming home, he supposed, and the realization struck Shooter that he had been in uniform and under military discipline since he was eleven years old. Almost eleven years of it! Half his life! No wonder he felt rootless and sort of useless.
That recognition helped greatly. For the first time in his life, the planning was his alone. No superiors looked over his shoulder, cared how he dressed, or were particularly interested in what he had to say. There were no close buddies to turn to, and no higher authority granted promotion or stamped approval or displeasure.
Gabriel was not sure that he preferred it. He liked being part of a team. He enjoyed the serving his country concept, and he was becoming acutely aware that a paycheck was not dropping into his bank account on the third of every month—no matter what he did or did not do.
Gabriel Galloway had money, a dazzling sum by Gabriel’s measure. Bob Galloway’s insurance legacy endured and Dan Grouse handled his finances.
Of course, there was the one million, three hundred thousand dollars receiv
ed from sale of The Notch timber, and Grouse had invested it all with dire threats of violent mayhem if Shooter began eyeing it. That money, the attorney claimed, would guarantee a comfortable future for his favorite client.
Shooter did not feel deprived; he had lived out of a footlocker or a duffle bag for most of his life. He drove an old car and bought little that he did not need. But he was aware of dollars bleeding away each month, and that added to a sense of insecurity.
By choosing Penn State, Galloway saved a lot of money. As a Pennsylvania resident, he received lower tuition, and he had a distant relative who lived in State College and offered a basement apartment for less than most sleeping places could be rented.
Still, the transition was not easy. At twenty-two Galloway’s worldly experience far exceeded that of the eighteen year olds who would sit beside him in classes, and Shooter was not certain how well he would endure their chatter and often mindless, juvenile posturing.
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