by LeMay, Jim
Soon they were under way. Billy went first, followed by his boys, Buck, Willard, Todd, and Robert leading their mules. His big surly red dog whined to go with him, but a couple of the younger boys that were staying behind held him securely by his leash. Billy explained that Fred didn’t get along well enough with folks to accompany them. Mitch’s gang followed next with the mules Billy had lent them, four of which pulled Stony’s “trucks”.
Billy’s wagon, pulled by two of his stoutest mules, came last. It was divided into two compartments by a barrier at the center. One half was filled with corn and the other with wheat. Waterproof cowhides covered the wagon, to keep out moisture and to contain the heaping load. The heavily-loaded wagon left last because the rest of the group would soon outdistance it. The main party would reach their destination by mid-afternoon; the wagon wouldn’t make it until after dark. Ed Baines drove the wagon, accompanied by one of Billy’s other men. Both were armed. No one expected trouble along this road – it was sparsely populated, but at least more people lived here than in most places – but extra precautions never hurt with a cargo as valuable as a full wagonload of grain.
A couple of weeks later the other two adult men of Kane’s Cove and some of the older boys would deliver cattle to buyers at Columbia’s market with whom Billy had already made deals. One of the adults, Ruben Garcia, would be the front man because he was less likely to be known as a member of the Kane community by Chadwick or his men. Chadwick had not overtly threatened Billy when he had come to Kane’s Cove looking for the Johnson gang, but Billy didn’t want his presence in Columbia being a detriment to his trading. And since someone had to take the truck and grain to Coleridge Gardens, he might just as well go there as to Columbia.
Rather than a road built before the Last Days, they followed a track worn since then by the feet of numerous beasts and men and a few wheeled vehicles. It ran generally
along the western edge of the Grange River valley, though in a route straighter than the river’s looping coils. Occasionally it climbed the gently sloping hills along the valley to avoid a boggy area or some other obstacle. Twice they came to creeks tributary to the river that had to be forded. One could be crossed near the river; they had to follow the other a ways upstream before finding it shallow enough to cross.
More people lived along this road than John had seen elsewhere. There were two tiny settlements of two houses each beside the tributary creeks they crossed. The houses and outbuildings had been built since the Last Days and were little more than lean-tos. It was so early that the inhabitants of the first were still asleep, though a couple of dogs barked at them. At the next one, a woman gathering firewood from the yard waved and smiled. Billy and his folk traveled the road so often they knew everyone that lived along it. A little further along, a more substantial farmhouse dating from before the Last Days sat on a hill above them, also apparently inhabited. All the other houses and farm buildings they passed from that era were clearly abandoned and decaying into ruin.
As the sun rose, the day warmed but not to the enervating levels of just a few weeks before. The river’s floodplain lay dusty with drooping yellow grasses and copses of willows and cottonwoods along the banks of the river and its tributaries. Meadowlarks sang their territorial warnings, and rabbits warily sought seeds among the grasses, brush, and piles of driftwood. An occasional hawk drifted languidly far above. How happy John was to be moving with the gang again.
When they stopped for a brief rest at midmorning, John opened the bundle Ms. Kane had pressed into his hands. In it were two slices of fresh bread spread with butter and honey between them and a fat apple. He ate the bread and saved the apple for later. When they continued on, the crude road was forced to depart a distance from river because trees grew densely all the way down to the water. They had passed a couple more habitations, and there was evidence of others across the river. In answer to a question Billy said, “Folks gradually moved here after the Last Days because a the water. They know the Grange ain’t gonna dry up.”
They stopped for lunch in the shade of an ancient white oak tree beside a creek that was a little wider than the previous tributaries they had crossed but had a sluggish current. John sat just outside a ring that included Matt, Mitch, Lou, and Billy. As always, he stayed utterly quiet to avoid their notice so he could hear their plans without risking getting sent away. This had proven a valuable tactic; if he hadn’t been in the confab in Newcastle when they discussed looking for the Missouri River, he wouldn’t have gone with Matt to look for it. More importantly, he wouldn’t have been there right then.
“We’re nigh there,” said Billy. “Couple more hours. There’s a guy I gotta see lives up this here crick first, ol’ Fats Tanner. His place is on a salt lick, an’ he an’ his fam’ly make a purty good livin’ off’n the salt. He sells it mostly at Coleridge Gardens, but I make my deal with him on the way t’ market so I can git a better price. Then I pick it up on my way home. I’m one a his best customers ’cause we got so much meat t’ cure, but I don’t have t’ pay retail t’ ol’ Fats. I trade him somethin’ he loves that he can’t git nowheres else.”
“An’ that is ...?” said Mitch.
Billy indicated a mule that held two boxes slung over its sides, each full of very well swaddled pint jars of whisky.
The others chuckled. “How could I forgit?” said Mitch. “You got the only still aroun’!”
“An’ I make good money from it. Soon as we eat an’ ford this here crick, I’ll take a few a them bottles up the crick an’ me an’ Fats ’ll make our deal. Then we’ll move on.”
They crossed it on a ford of flat stones that raised the bottom somewhat though the water still came to their thighs, and all the way to John’s and Jack Kincaid’s waists. “You can’t cross this ford in the heavy spring rains,” said Billy. “Then y’ gotta go up t’ Fats’s an’ pay him whatever he asts t’ cross his bridge. A course years ago, when I was a kid, you couldn’t never wade acrosst it like this ’cause the water was so high, but this country’s a lot drier nowadays.”
While the last of the men and mules finished crossing, Billy led his whisky-laden mule up a path beside the creek and disappeared into a stand of willows. He was back in an hour or so. It wasn’t so far up to Fats’ place, Billy explained, but Fats had to sample his purchase to ensure its quality and it was only neighborly to have a sip with him. The road was more substantial from there on. It moved up onto a bluff and into a timberland. Further into the woods it was even graveled.
They came to a broad clearing occupied by a large house and numerous stables, sheds, and corrals. The house, a huge three story Victorian structure situated at the edge of a high bluff overlooking the river, easily dwarfed the outbuildings. It faced south with a covered porch across the front. Ancient giant oaks surrounded the buildings, pens, and a broad front lawn, lending an air of quiet aristocratic dignity. Through the trees, at some distance behind the house, John could see a high steel bridge crossing the Grange River. The gravel road they had followed turned west to avoid the buildings and seemed to lead toward the western approach to the bridge though John couldn’t tell for sure because it disappeared into the woods.
Activity across the river caught John’s eye. The elevation over there was considerably lower than on this side of the river, which allowed him a good view. At the top of a rather steep slope, separated from the river by several hundred yards of stubbled fields, John saw neatly laid out streets lined with houses of every description. A few had obviously been built before the Last Days, including one that was larger and finer than any of the others, and dozens of others had been built since of logs or scrap materials – even of railroad ties. There were people in the streets, even more than there had been at Kane’s Cove. Most of them wandered around between some lean-tos situated along the southernmost street. He felt a little thrill of dread at seeing such a big crowd. He knew he would soon be thrust into its midst.
“That’s Coleridge Gardens,” said Willard behind h
im. “Them stalls at the yonder end is the market.”
They followed Billy toward the house. There were horses in one of the corrals that nickered at their mules. A rather portly middle-aged man with reddish-brown hair combed straight back and a clean-shaven face except for a bushy droopy reddish mustache came out on to the broad front porch. Two of the man’s characteristics were unusual in these times: Food was so scarce that few people were overweight and the paucity of razors meant few male faces were devoid of hair. John would find out later that Bernie was the rare owner of an old-fashioned straight razor. (Before the Last Days, men who didn’t want facial hair removed it with electric implements or depilatory ointments.) He was wiping his hands on an apron. When he recognized Billy, he smiled and waved a greeting.
When the caravan stopped before the porch, Billy called all the gang up to the porch. “Boys,” he said, “this here’s Bernie Haas, the proprietor a this fine establishment. We’ll be stayin’ here durin’ the market. And Bernie, this is the Mitchell gang, a piece away from their normal haunts but as good a bunch a men as y’ve ever knowed.”
“If you say so, it’s true, Billy,” said Bernie with a broad smile. “Welcome to Haas House, gentlemen.”
Billy introduced each of the gang by name and then said, “Why don’t you boys unload the mules an’ help Joey here rub ’m down an’ feed ’m while Mitch an’ Bernie an’ me have us a confab. Joey’ll tell y’ where t’ make ’m t’ home.”
A young skinny teenager with a vacuous grin and a bobbing head, who had appeared beside the portly landlord sometime during the conversation, bounded down the steps of the porch and led them toward one of the corrals. The outbuildings were built in units of two, facing each other across a corral. One building of the unit they approached was a warehouse built of stout oak logs with a sturdy plank door fitted with a padlock, no windows, and a roof that sloped away from the corral. The other was a stable with its roof likewise pitched away from the corral.
Joey, still grinning and bobbing his head, led Billy’s boys to one warehouse and Mitch’s gang to another and helped Mitch’s men put away the truck. They backed the still-loaded carts into the warehouse and stacked the truck from the mules around and on top of the carts.
As they worked, Willard told John, “This is a great place t’ stay. They got great food an’ the hottest women you ever seen.”
After finishing with the mules, they went into the house. Most of the rooms on the ground floor had been turned into a bar and dining rooms and they were occupied by a number of people, but since there were no children, it wasn’t as noisy and disorderly as the Kanes’ house. He found a corner from which he could sit and observe the bar and a dining room set at right angles to one another, while the other gang members and Billy’s boys circulated around the crowd.
He was soon able to sort people out. A dozen or so of the men and women were dressed for the road much like Mitch’s and Billy’s men, and Billy’s boys seemed to know them; they introduced Mitch’s men around. That and the horses in the corral next to theirs identified them as scrounger groups like Mitch’s gang (the gang he belonged to, he reminded himself happily, at least for the time being), patrons of this place as were he and his companions. The others must have worked for Bernie Haas. These included two burly young men who didn’t seem to do much besides lounge by the front door and glare at the customers and (delightfully!) two or three women in low-cut chemises and short swirly skirts who served the customers.
He noticed the gang members and Billy’s men mixing with the other patrons and ordering beer. Only Matt sat apart from the others in a rather moody contemplative silence sipping a beer. Since he didn’t look as though he wanted to be disturbed, John turned his attention back to the room at large. He didn’t necessarily want to join in any of the conversations, and the older people probably would ignore him anyhow. That didn’t matter since he enjoyed watching their interactions as much as he would participating.
Then, to John’s surprise, Matt came over and sat by him.
“A little different from Kane’s Cove, huh?” he said with a slight grin, his mood apparently lighter than John had thought. “Think you can get used to this?”
John nodded. “I sure want to try.”
They sat in companionable silence for awhile. Then Matt asked, “Did Buck tell you directly that he first went trucking with Billy when he was thirteen?”
John shrugged, looked down at the floor, red blossoming in his cheeks. Then: “Well, you know, I figured it likely that he might’ve gone with Billy about then.”
Matt shook his head. “You’re gonna make a helluva poker player.”
* * * *
After dinner, as the other men started toward the bar, Matt drew Lou aside. “Let’s take a walk. There’s something I want to run by you.” Outside it was already nearly dark and more comfortable as the day’s heat subsided. They crossed the porch, descended the steps, and turned down the road, away from the stench of the stables and corrals.
“Something’s been eating at me,” said Matt. “A couple of things seem odd. At first they seemed unrelated, but now I’m not so sure. I wanted to see what you thought.”
“Fire away.”
“First of all, as you know, we seldom ever went to Kansas City before that time we met Chadwick there, only once before, in fact. And Chadwick, according to Bennett, had only been there a couple of times himself. Don’t you think it peculiar, then, that you guys ran into them there? And in January, an unusual time of year to go trucking so far from home?”
“I’ve thought that same thing, yes.”
“And then there’s the question of Downing. Why didn’t we find a single trace of him back at Summerfield Crossing?”
“Well, at the time I think we figured that wild dogs dragged him off. I mean they, or at least something, sure made a mess of Johnson and Dodd.”
“But Johnson and Dodd were at least there, if a little spread around. And there was blood everywhere around them. Downing didn’t leave a drop of blood, a scrap of clothing. Not a trace.”
“So what happened to him?”
“That’s what I’ve been asking myself. Here’s another puzzle for you. We’ve all wondered a couple things about the ambush. Number one, how did they figure out it was us that robbed the gold? And they must’ve found out. Otherwise, why the ambush? And two, if they knew it was us, why’d it take them so long to come after us? I mean, two whole years? They’d have wanted revenge, not to mention their treasure back, a helluva lot sooner than that.
“Here’s another thing to think about. Remember how Downing sulked when it finally got through to him that he’d been kicked out of Johnson’s inner circle and replaced with Mitch? We didn’t see anything of him all winter, not till we went truckin’ in the spring.”
“I’m trying to see where you’re headed here.”
They reached the bridge and walked out on it a ways.
“So try putting it all together like this: Downing is replaced by Mitch. He’s really pissed. He decides to leave the gang and goes to Columbia to join up with Chadwick. We didn’t know much about Chadwick, but we’d heard he had the biggest and most successful gang in that area. It doesn’t work out for some reason, so Downing comes back to rejoin the gang. His loss of status gnaws at him, though, for a couple more years. But who notices? Downing’s always been surly and unsociable.
“Then Johnson decides we should go truckin’ in January to make up for a rather lackluster season. Remember, he brought it up during the market before he left for his secret hole-up. Winters are usually pretty mild anymore, so why not go all the way to Kansas City? Downing sees his chance to get even. After the market he goes back to visit his buddy Chadwick and tells him our schedule. None of us would miss him between the close of market and January in Nellie’s Fair, right? We didn’t all stay at the same place and sometimes didn’t see each other for days at a time. Some of us, like you and me, had winter jobs part of the time.” (O’Conner usually hired Lou f
or engineering and public works advice and design during the winter. Matt worked for an accountant.)
“So,” said Lou, “it wasn’t such a coincidence that Chadwick decided to go to Kansas City the same year after all. Even though Johnson pretty deftly turned the tables on him.” He looked suddenly to Matt. “But the gold! You think Downing told Chadwick we stole his gold?”
Matt shrugged. “Somebody must’ve. How else could he have found out it was us? Is there a more likely candidate?”
“Why didn’t Downing warn Chadwick we were planning to steal the gold?” Then Lou answered himself. “Probably couldn’t get away long enough. We talked to Bennett toward the end of October, and we had to go to Columbia on Thanksgiving. Since we’re still hanging out together pretty much through November, it would’ve seemed odd for Downing not to be around then.”
They sat down on the bridge railing. They could see lights across the river in Coleridge Gardens.
Lou thought it over for awhile, then said, “But if Downing was in cahoots with Chadwick, he wouldn’t ’ve gone along with us to steal the treasure.”
“He had no choice. Everybody else was going, even cowards like you and me. He couldn’t even act like he was against the plan. He backed Johnson in every nutty scheme he thought up, the more dangerous the better.”
“But why’d they wait so long to come after us? I mean, they’d have been on us, in Mitch’s words, ‘like stink on shit’, the minute they found out it was us.”
“Not if they were waiting for Downing to give them the perfect time and place for an ambush. A crime like that would have to be utterly secret and foolproof. It wouldn’t be wise to let it become common knowledge that you had perpetrated such a chicken-shit crime. Other gangs would consider such a renegade band bad for business and think about eliminating it. And by single-handedly foiling their first ambush attempt in Kansas City, Johnson had gained their respect as a dangerous opponent. For those two reasons this next, more deadly, ambush had to be at a site that took him and his two chief warriors completely unawares.