by Bill Crider
“I’ll bet your daddy didn’t like that,” Ellie said, remembering her own father, who could be insensitive in many ways but who had been fiercely protective of his only child.
Sue extended her arms onto the table and clasped her fingers, as if trying to stop her hands from trembling.
“My father wasn’t there. He worked for the railroad and wasn’t home a lot; when he was home, we didn’t see much of him. He was in the saloon more often than in the house. My mother tried to stop Angel that day, but that just made him angrier. I think he hated me from that moment on.”
“Did he ever hurt you?”
Sue unclasped her fingers and brushed at her eyes with her right hand. Then she put her hands in her lap.
“No,” she said. “He never hurt me.” She paused. “He tried, though.”
Ellie was certain she didn’t want to hear more. The look in Sue’s eyes made it clear that the story was a painful one. But Sue was going to tell it.
“Angel killed other animals later on. He killed a neighbor’s dog once, strangled it with a rope. He said he didn’t do it, but we knew he did. The neighbor knew it too, but there wasn’t anything he could do about it. And Angel picked fights with all the boys at school, even the ones that were bigger than he was. If he got whipped, he always got even. He’d wait till the boy who whipped him was off guard, maybe catch him on the way home from school some afternoon, and then he’d use a stick or a rock on him. There was one boy, John Temple, that was hurt the worst. Angel jabbed him in the face with a sharp stick and put his eye out. I knew what happened, and I told our parents. They were afraid to punish Angel by that time, afraid of what he might do to them, but they didn’t make him go back to school. I’m sure everyone was happy about that, especially the other boys.”
“What about you?” Ellie asked, certain that she would be sorry she asked. “What did he try to do to you?”
“Oh, he tried to kill me,” Sue said, almost matter-of-factly. “He waited a long time, so long that I’d almost forgotten that I was the one who’d told about John Temple. I would’ve thought he’d forgotten too, but that was another thing about Angel. He never forgot anything that anyone did to him, not ever. He always said that sooner or later he’d get anyone who did him a bad turn. Usually it was sooner, but he never got a chance with me until later. My mother watched him too closely, I guess. But then she forgot, too, and Angel came after me one night with a stick of dry kindling about two feet long. It was round and solid and hard as a rock.”
She looked at Ellie, then looked away. “I was in bed asleep. It was dark in the room, or he would have killed me, most likely. As it was, he swung where he thought my head was on the pillow and just barely grazed me. I woke up and rolled over, so he missed me completely the second time. My mother came in with a lamp, and he swung at her. He hit her in the knee, and she fell. She dropped the lamp, and it shattered.”
Sue looked out the window. Her lower lip was trembling slightly, but her eyes were completely dry and her voice was steady.
“The next thing I knew the bed was on fire. I jumped up, and Angel swung at me again. He hit me that time, hard, right on the arm, and my whole arm just went numb. I stood there and watched him hit my mother in the head with that stick, and I couldn’t even try to take it away from him.”
“You don’t have to tell me any more,” Ellie said.
Sue shook her head. “I want to. I’ve never told anybody about this except Lane, but you’ve treated us so well and been so kind to Laurie that you deserve to know.”
Ellie wasn’t sure why she deserved anything, much less a story like the one that was unfolding.
“Are you telling me all this because of your dreams?” she asked.
Sue looked uncertain. “Maybe that’s a part of it. They were bad dreams, and I’ve had them before. They’re always the same. I dream that Angel will come here, come to find me. He’s not finished with me. I know that for sure.”
Ellie thought she’d figured out why Sue was so determined to tell about Angel.
“What you’re saying is that you’re afraid you’ve involved me with your brother by living here on my land. If he comes for you, I might be affected.”
“That’s right, and I’m sorry. I wanted to tell you when Lane took the job, but I was afraid you wouldn’t hire him. We needed to get away from where we were, and I didn’t want to do anything to hurt our chances.”
“It wouldn’t have made any difference,” Ellie said. “I hired Lane because he was the right man for the job and because I liked you and Laurie. No story about your brother would have changed my mind, no matter how bad he is.”
“You haven’t heard it all yet,” Sue said. “Angel ran away and left our mother and me there in that burning house. I tried to get her out, but I couldn’t. I pulled and pulled on her, but I couldn’t move her. She was unconscious, and I couldn’t use my right arm. I stayed as long as I could, until my hair was starting to singe. But finally I had to decide whether to leave my mother or die.”
Sue looked down at the table. “I left.”
Ellie reached out to touch her hand. “No one could blame you for that.”
Sue swallowed hard and said, “You’d be surprised. My father blamed me. After my mother’s funeral, he sent me to live with an aunt in San Antonio, and I never saw him again.”
“You saw Angel again, though.”
Sue looked up. “How did you know?”
“It was just a feeling.”
“Well, you’re right. I saw Angel again. Oh, yes, I saw him. Whenever he got in trouble, and he got in trouble all the time, he’d come back to his family. It was his idea that the family had to help him because that’s what families were for, and some of the time he did get help. I don’t think my father ever did anything for him, but he turned up in San Antonio more than once. And every time my aunt would give him money or food or a place to hide out for a while. Whatever he needed.”
“Had you told you aunt what happened that night at your house?”
“I’d told her, and I’m sorry I did. That’s why she helped Angel. She was afraid of him. But I didn’t blame her for that. So was I.”
“He didn’t try to hurt you again?”
“I stayed away from him, and I don’t think I slept a wink whenever he came to my aunt’s house. You should have seen the way he looked at me, smiling that angel smile of his. If you didn’t know him, you’d think he was just back from choir practice or maybe come home from church where he’d recited scripture for the congregation. But I knew him better than that. I knew what he was thinking.”
“You’re safe here, though,” Ellie said. “There’s no reason for him to come after you here.”
“Oh, yes, there is,” Sue said. “That’s why I have the dreams.”
EIGHT
Ben Jephson knew he was in deep trouble. He was in with a bunch of killers, and he’d more or less helped them kill three men. Four if you counted Yankee Tom, though maybe the law would let them off for that one. But Jephson wasn’t a killer, not really. In his whole life, he’d never wanted to hurt anyone. He just kept winding up in the wrong place at the wrong time.
The plain fact of the matter was that of all the men behind the walls in Huntsville, at least ninety-nine percent of them claimed they were innocent. And they were all lying.
Jephson, on the other hand, had never claimed anything, though he was actually innocent of any wrongdoing. Or at least any intentional wrongdoing. Or at least of killing anyone, which is what he’d been accused of.
He’d been out of a job and on the prod when he’d fallen in with two men who offered him some coffee and a meal late one evening. He’d still been with the two when the posse caught up with them.
How was Jephson to know that they’d robbed a bank, killed a teller, and then wounded three other men in their getaway?
One of the men, by the name of Shepard, was both quicker and meaner than Jephson would have guessed. When he realized what was going to happ
en, he whipped out his pistol, shot his partner, and then shot Jephson. The bullet slapped off Jephson’s hat and plowed a furrow along the right side of his head. He hardly had the time to blink before he was lying on the ground, unconscious.
When the posse arrived, Shepard said, “I fell in with these two drifters last night, and it just dawned on me who they was. When I mentioned that bank hold-up to ’em, they drew on me, but I got in the first licks.”
The posse members believed him, either because it was convenient for them to do so or because Shepard was a convincing liar, not that it made much difference to Jephson or the partner, either way.
Jephson lived, the partner didn’t. Shepard even collected a small reward and no doubt the thanks of the townspeople, who were grateful that their bank got most of its money back.
When Jephson came to, no one was interested in hearing his side of the story, and there was no one about to back him up, Shepard having lit a shuck for parts unknown with his reward and with the little part of the bank’s money that he’d managed to hold onto.
The jury that was convened had no sympathy for Jephson, who counted himself lucky that they hadn’t sentenced him to hang, which they would have done if any of the prosecution’s witnesses had been able to swear he was one of the two who’d robbed the bank, which they couldn’t, not because he hadn’t been there but because Shepard and his partner had covered the lower halves of their faces.
As it was, Jephson got life in prison, and his life probably wouldn’t have lasted very long if his reputation hadn’t preceded him. By the time he was locked up, everyone behind the walls knew he was a robber and a man-killer, and they didn’t try to mess with him.
His appearance helped, too. He knew that he looked mean as a snake, even if he wasn’t. The other prisoners wouldn’t bother him as long as they were afraid of him, so he kept his mouth shut, tried to look meaner than he was, and went about his business. And although he knew he was never going to get of out of prison, at least he was alive, and that was just about the best he could hope for.
Or so he’d thought. Now he was free again. The storm had passed, there was a big blue sky over his head, and he could see a couple of buzzards spinning lazily in the distance. For a second or two he could almost imagine that the last three years behind prison walls had just been a bad dream.
But he knew that wasn’t true. He was free, but he was mixed up with killers a lot worse than those two bank robbers, and he’d already been a party to something far worse than the robbers had ever thought about.
He knew he had two choices: stick with Angel or strike out on his own. He didn’t like either option. If he went out on his own, he was bound to get caught. He didn’t have any weapons, any money, or any clothes.
Angel had the sawed-off shotgun, and he’d stripped Rankin’s clothes off and taken them, though they didn’t fit him very well. There hadn’t been any need for them to bother with Bowman. His clothes wouldn’t have come close to fitting any of them. He’d had a couple of dollars in his pockets, but Angel had taken those. No one had complained.
Now they were making their way somewhere, but Jephson wasn’t at all sure just where. Maybe they were just drifting.
Angel had said something about wanting to visit his family, but Jephson thought he might be joking about that. Angel didn’t give a damn about anybody or anything. It was hard to believe he even had a family.
Hoot Riley wanted to find a farmhouse and kill whoever was in it and take whatever was there. Angel seemed to think it was a good idea. They needed more clothes and some guns.
Abilene Jack didn’t appear to care much what they did as long as they got something to eat before dark.
“They’ll know at the prison that something’s gone wrong by now, and they’ll be out after us,” he said. “We need to find us a place to hole up for the night and maybe get a little rest. And I’d surely like something to eat before it gets too much later. My belly think’s my throat’s been cut.”
Angel laughed. “It’s not like you’re used to eatin’ the best of food. You wouldn’t know what to do with a biscuit if it didn’t have wigglers in it.”
Jephson thought of the food he’d been eating for the last three years or so, if you could call it food. When you got meat, it was spoiled. And Angel was right about the biscuits. They were always full of weevils.
“Find us that farmhouse, we’ll find something good to eat,” Hoot said. “Real biscuits, and maybe some honey to go with ’em. Maybe find us a woman, too.” He smacked his lips.
Jephson knew what Hoot was thinking, all right, and it didn’t just have to do with food. Jephson could even understand it in a way. They’d been locked up for a long time, after all. But to Jephson’s way of thinking, Hoot was a little on the crazy side. If Hoot had his way, every lawman in the state would be on their trail.
“We’re all dead men anyhow,” Hoot said, as if reading Jephson’s thoughts. “They’ll hunt us from hell to breakfast for killing Bowman and Rankin. We might as well have us a little fun while we got the chance.”
Hoot was already having more fun than Jephson because Hoot was getting to ride. So was Angel. Jack and Jephson were walking, which wasn’t exactly easy in the mud that the storm had created. It was warming up and the walking was hard. But Jephson wasn’t complaining. He hadn’t been astraddle a horse or a mule in four years. He knew that Hoot was going to pay a price when he got off that mule.
“We’re not here to have fun,” Angel said. “I’ve got some business to finish with my family, and if you’re goin’ with me, you’ll have to wait to have your fun. We don’t need to be slowing down for any shenanigans.”
“We could use some grub, though,” Jack said. “I don’t know where your family is, but if they ain’t within another hour or so’s walkin’, I’d just as soon find us something to eat.”
Jephson agreed with the sentiment, though he knew they weren’t going to be able to walk into a town, find a cafe, and order up some steak and gravy.
Hoot agreed, too. “There’s bound to be a farm along in here somewhere. There’s little farms all over this part of the country. And like I said, find that farmhouse, and we’ll find us some food.”
Angel didn’t comment.
“What kind of business you got with your family, anyway?” Hoot asked. “I don’t see why you’re so het up to see them all of a sudden. I don’t remember you gettin’ any letters from them while we were locked up, and they damn sure didn’t pay you any calls. I bet they don’t want to see you anywhere near as much as you want to see them.”
Angel smiled in a way that made Jephson’s stomach feel queasy, the way it felt when he ate that prison meat. Suddenly he wasn’t very hungry after all.
“That’s one bet you’d surely win,” Angel said.
NINE
“We turned Angel in,” Sue Tolbert said, looking down at the steaming coffee in the mug that sat on the table in front of her. “Lane and I did. I didn’t even think he knew where we were living, and he didn’t think I knew what he’d done. But he found us somehow, and I’d already heard about the man he killed.”
Ellie took a sip of her own coffee. She liked to drink it while it was so hot that it nearly scalded her tongue, even though she could barely taste it. Then she said, “How did you hear?”
Sue turned the thick coffee mug in her hands. “Lane has a brother, too, but he’s not like Angel. Just the opposite, I guess you could say. His name’s Brady, and he’s a Texas Ranger. He figured that Angel might show up at our house sooner or later. He sent a telegram to tell us that Angel had killed a man in a fight in San Antonio. The man was unarmed. Angel had stabbed him ten times.”
“He couldn’t very well claim self-defense, then, could he,” Ellie said.
Sue smiled ruefully. “If you believe that, you don’t know Angel very well. I don’t think he ever took responsibility for a single thing he did. It was always someone else’s fault, never his.”
Ellie nodded. She’d known
people like that.
“I’m sure the man in San Antonio wasn’t the first that Angel had killed,” Sue said. “But this was the first time that there were witnesses.”
“You can’t be sure about any other times,” Ellie said. “Maybe he’s not as bad as you think.”
“No, I can’t be sure.” Sue sipped her coffee, then set the mug back on the table. “But he’s as bad as I think. He’s probably even worse. I’ve heard plenty of stories about things he’s supposed to have done, and I’m sure most of them are true, even though I don’t have any proof.”
Ellie understood what Sue meant. There were some things that you just knew, even if you didn’t have any evidence to back them up.
“Anyway,” Sue said, “Angel turned up, just like Brady thought he would. When I told Angel I knew what had happened, he said that he’d been pushed into the fight and that the man had pulled a pistol on him. He asked if he could stay with us for a few days, but I knew he meant a few weeks. He always stayed that long when he turned up. They wouldn’t give up the hunt for him in just a few days. So I didn’t give him any argument. I told him he could stay, and then that night I told Lane to go into town the next day and send a telegram to Brady to let him know where Angel was.”
“Didn’t Angel suspect anything?”
“No. We never let on that there was anything for him to worry about, and he was used to getting his way with us. He probably never dreamed that we’d turn him over to the law.”
“What about Laurie?” Ellie wanted to know.
“That’s a funny thing,” Sue said, but she wasn’t smiling. “For some reason, Laurie always seemed to like Angel. I could never figure out why.”
The thought of Laurie associating with someone like Angel gave Ellie a chill.
“Was there trouble when the Rangers came?” she asked.
“There was only one Ranger, and that was Brady. They wouldn’t bother to send two for a just one man, not even a man like Angel.”