Silver Threads

by John J. McLaglen

  ‘By God...’ The hammers on the shotgun clicked back. ‘Don’t you think you...’

  Herne started to turn away, ignoring Daley’s anger. ‘You don’t tell me where I can meet the ladies, then I’ll go find someone who can. And I’ll tell them the way you greeted me to their town, Sheriff.’

  ‘Just wait on there,’ he called after him. ‘Wait on and don’t be so damned hasty.’

  ‘You change your mind, Sheriff?’

  ‘Yeah. Look, I’ll go up the house and tell Miss Lily and Miss Eliza that you’ve come. They’ll want me to see... want to meet you. Maybe with the rest of the council. You go in The Rich Nugget and get yourself some of that dust out of your throat. Charge it to me. Fellow runs the saloon’s my brother, Marcus. I got to go.’

  Herne watched him as he hurried off up the hill towards the big house, and went on into the saloon, letting the bats-wing doors slam shut behind him.

  If he’d waited, he’d have seen that the Sheriff stopped before he reached the Sowren mansion, and dived off down a side street, with the look on his face of a man with a very urgent mission to carry out.

  Chapter Three

  ‘Ten dollars a day. Your keep at three meals a day. No liquor. Bed for the night. And your ammunition. For a period of at least three weeks. After such date both parties are free to reconsider their positions. How does that suit you, Mr. Herne?’

  He nodded. ‘Real fine, Miss Sowren. I start right now.’

  ‘As soon as you like. But perhaps you would prefer to wait until the morning. It will be fully dark within the hour.’

  He glanced to the opposite side of the long table to the other Miss Sowren. The fat one. Miss Lily.

  ‘Fine with me. I can start by asking around just in case anyone’s gotten any information or thoughts on the robberies.’

  This time it was Eliza who spoke. ‘I think you will find nobody knows a thing, Mr. Herne. If anyone had such information, you can be quite certain that they would have brought it either to me or to my sister.’

  ‘Quite right, sister,’ agreed Lily, nodding her head so hard that Herne feared some of her chins might come adrift from their moorings and splatter all over the oak table.

  The meeting had gone well enough. Though he wondered why it had taken so long to get everyone there. It had been nearly six before he’d finally been introduced to the sisters and the rest of the family and council.

  While they talked to him about the robberies, Herne had sat still and quiet, watching and listening. Forming his impressions. Listing a few questions to himself.

  He’d never met anyone quite like Lily and Eliza. They came on like a couple of sweet little old ladies, but everything pointed to a different reality. For one thing, neither of them could be called ‘little’. There was something else. Both of them spoke as if their mouths were filled with sugared plums, but there was steel behind it all. A hardness that Herne’s experienced eyes didn’t miss. You didn’t get to run a mining town for as long as they had and as tightly as they did, without being exceptional characters.

  The Misses Sowren looked like being the toughest bosses he’d ever had. He’d asked what happened to any robbers he might catch. The question seemed to worry them, then Lily had smiled deep in the rolls of fat.

  ‘Leave them to us, Mr. Herne. Eliza and I will do what is necessary, with the help of our family and our friends.’

  He bet they would, too.

  Both of the sons were typically close-lipped businessmen. Joab and Gawain. The banker and the storeowner. Both cast from the same mould. Though they were the sons of skinny Eliza, they had inherited the tendency to fatness of their aunt. Both shook hands with Jed in a way that showed what they thought about hiring a gunman. Both wiping their hands clean after with a white linen ’kerchief.

  Marcus and Julius Daley were also of similar build. Both tallish men in their thirties. Both leaning towards chubbiness like their older brother Matthew, the Sheriff. Herne was told about Marcus running the saloon, but he wasn’t clear at first about what Julius did. Apart from being the mayor of Wild Rose City.

  It was Doctor Hillman who told him. Hissing out of the corner of his mouth when they were alone for a few moments in a corner of the church hall, where the meeting was held.

  ‘Cat-house owner. Runs the sporting-house, Mr. Herne. Six lovely clean girls. Could take your grandmother there without fear of offence.’

  The other outsider on the council was the one that most interested Jed. One who had a large question mark against his name.

  What was Robert Zimmerman so damned frightened about? So frightened that he nearly dropped the cup of tea that one of the Misses Sowren’s servant girls handed him. When he met Herne he looked everywhere except at Jed, his handshake as warm as a dead moth.

  The ladies were as aware of it as he was, and they made sure he never had a chance to talk to the mine manager on his own, constantly floating around and distracting him away.

  The Sheriff wasn’t there at the beginning of the meeting, v making his appearance half an hour later, with profuse apologies to his aunts. Herne had sharp hearing and he caught the words ‘tomorrow noon’ and wondered what that meant. He also puzzled over where Sheriff Daley had been. His shoulders were powdered with dust. The gray-orange sand that came from the mining operations back at Mount Morgoth.

  After his arrival, Herne thought he detected an easing of tension. Though he didn’t know why, he got the impression that Sheriff Daley had brought a secret message. Maybe they’d been checking on his credentials.

  Maybe.

  ~*~

  His room at The Rich Nugget was clean and quiet. There was something uncanny about Wild Rose City. Herne was almost tempted to go and visit the whorehouse to see if that was as orderly as the rest of the town.

  He’d tried asking the men in the saloon the same questions he’d asked at the meeting. About the robberies. Whether anyone had any clues.

  Nobody did.

  One old-timer suggested that it might be the Indians. ‘Plenty of Sioux around here, mister,’ he said. ‘Not so long since they took care of Yellow-Hair Custer.’

  ‘Damned near ten years since the Little Big Horn,’ Herne replied. ‘Hasn’t been any real trouble with the Sioux since then.’

  ‘Anyway,’ another man interrupted. ‘Indians can’t hardly process all that good ore.’

  ‘True. So where is it being done? Can’t be an operation you can readily hide.’

  Jed had looked round the room in the sudden silence, waiting to see if anyone came up with any ideas. But nobody did. All at once everyone had got mighty interested in the contents of their glasses.

  Something was wrong, but he just couldn’t figure out what it was.

  ~*~

  Next morning he got invited up to the big Sowren mansion for breakfast.

  The dining room was enormous. Long enough to exercise a horse in, with a table that would have seated fifty with comfort. As it was he found himself placed at one end, with Miss Lily at his right and Miss Eliza on his left. The meal gave him an indication of why the sisters were so totally different in build.

  Eliza Sowren helped herself from only a couple of the soldierly row of polished silver chafing dishes that lined the side table. She had a single rasher of smoked Virginia ham and a tiny portion of omelet. Picking at it as though it was far too large a helping for her. Peering down her nose at it with bony distrust.

  Lily went about as far as possible in the opposite direction.

  Her plate was much larger than her sister’s to begin with. Fork poised like a cavalry officer’s saber, she began with six slices of ham. A half dozen fried eggs, over easy. A mountain of hash browns with an equal helping of grits. Some smoked beans steaming on the side of the plate.

  The smaller plate at her elbow was piled with corn bread, soaked in butter that threatened to run off the edge on the white cloth. Herne then noticed a third plate positioned directly in front of the fat old woman. With a mound of steaming buckwhe
at cakes on it, and a glass pitcher of warm molasses ready to pour.

  The coffee pot would have held enough for half a regiment, and Lily didn’t cut back any on the sugar. Putting in five heaped spoons, and pouring in a flood of thick cream.

  Herne was more frugal, though anything would have seemed frugal by the side of such a gross exhibition of gluttony.

  A single fresh trout with some hash browns was enough for him, though the fish was so large that its eyeless head drooped off one end of the platter and its tail off the other.

  He washed it down with a couple of large cups of the excellent coffee, listening while the two sisters talked about the robberies. Trying to make out something that puzzled him. The Misses Sowren were obviously powerful. Indeed, there seemed no doubt at all that Wild Rose City was theirs to have and to hold. Nobody spat in the street without them knowing about it.

  And their talk brimmed with their total confidence in their own prim tightness. Even their righteousness. They told him how awful these robberies had been, and how much harm it had done some of their local competitors. And how they had asked for the best bounty hunter to be sent to them. All of that was fine.

  So what was worrying them?

  During the meal both of them kept shuffling in their seats. Lily straining her melon of a head on the wrestler’s shoulders, as if she was listening for someone. Eliza darting her nose like a beak, seeking her prey.

  Jed wondered who or what they were waiting for so impatiently.

  Towards the end of the meal a maid came silently into the room and walked around to Eliza, leaning close and whispering something to her. Without replying, the younger of the sisters rose to her feet. Glaring at Herne who belatedly rose to his feet, his napkin falling to the floor as he did so, nearly spilling coffee all over the table.

  ‘I have to go and sort out a small problem with the sheriff, Mr. Herne. Perhaps you would be kind enough to wait here until I return. I’m sure that Lily will be happy to entertain you.’

  The sisters stared at each other for a few moments, and Herne had the uncanny feeling that they were talking to each other in a way he couldn’t understand. Then Lily nodded and rose to her feet, pressing down with her hands against the table to lever herself up.

  ‘We have a pianoforte, Mr. Herne. You may come and listen to my singing.’

  If it was a request, it gave a fine impression of being a command. But it didn’t make a lot of difference to Jed. There was something there and the longer he spent in the mansion, the more likely he was to ferret his way to the bottom of it.

  Eliza stalked off, heels clicking on the polished wooden floor of the dining room. Shortly after Herne heard the heavy front door slam shut. Lily was briefly busy again at her trough, face buried in a heap of treacly cakes, and he snatched a glance out of the long window. Just in time to see Sheriff Matthew Daley whipping up a pair of horses and driving a buckboard off down the steep hill, the braked rear wheels kicking a great cloud of dust behind him. Even through the sandy veil there was no mistaking the angular figure perched on the seat at his side.

  Whatever Miss Eliza’s small problem was, it seemed like it was rather more urgent than she’d made out.

  ~*~

  Lily had insisted that Herne stood close enough to her to turn the pages of the music for her. Her fingers were so sticky from breaking her fast that he doubted she could have managed the chore for herself anyway. The ivory keys of the German piano were already stained and greasy from the attention of her fat little hands.

  Her voice was low, insinuating itself into the ears of her unwilling listener. Herne had once visited the strange area dose by the Yellowstone River, down in Wyoming, where natural hot springs forced water through the earth turning it into boiling mud. It was just that sinister sound that he recalled as he listened to Lily Sowren singing.

  Lily paused there and turned her face up towards Jed. Who noticed that in her exertions at the piano, she was sweating a great deal. The perspiration ravaging the heavy layers of make-up she wore. Opening up the crevices and furrows of old age.

  ‘Will you accompany me on the chorus, Mr. Herne? Or might I call you Jedediah?’

  ‘I think Mr. Herne is better, Ma’am. Seein’ as how I’m working for you. I don’t care much for singing, if you’ll pardon me, Miss Sowren.’

  ‘Now that is a shame. Just care for killing, perhaps? You must tell me all about every single person you’ve killed, Mr. Herne. Every one.’

  It was an odd request, and Herne was disquieted to see a strange light in her eyes at the mention of killing.

  ‘Not a fit topic for a lady, Miss Sowren.’

  ‘Oh, fie on that! Just don’t tell Eliza, that’s all. She doesn’t approve. I just wondered if any of the men you had slaughtered were ... you must think me quite awful ... but I wondered if they had been in a state of nature.’

  ‘How’s that, Ma’am?’

  ‘Unclad, Mr. Herne.’

  ‘Well, I guess some of the Indians might have been kind of short on clothes when they got sent to their hunting-ground in the sky.’

  ‘You have butchered many Indians, Mr. Herne? I am most impressed.’

  ‘Paiutes in the snows of ’59. I was just fifteen. Riding the Pony Express with Billy Cody. I figure over the years I’ve shot me plenty of Indians, Ma’am. Apaches, Sioux, Cheyenne.’

  ‘That is wonderful.’ She was sweating even more as they talked, the music forgotten for a moment.

  ‘No, Ma’am.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Begging your pardon, Miss Sowren, but I don’t enjoy killing anyone. Well, I guess there’s been one or two done me a personal wrong that I was glad to see dead. But the Indians fight us whites like a war, like soldiers. If’n I hadn’t killed some of them, they’d sure as ... they’d surely have killed me. It’s not wonderful, Ma’am.’

  ‘Oh. But there is talk that these noble savages have marvelous bodies. Developed more in some ways than those of white men.’

  Her hand was resting on his arm, the fingers digging in convulsively and then relaxing, like a cat. Tightening and loosening and her voice had grown more hoarse.

  ‘Can’t say, Miss Sowren.’ He was getting rapidly out of his depth in what he recognized were very murky waters indeed. ‘Shouldn’t we be gettin’ on with this song? Your sister might be back real soon.’

  ‘Oh, but this is so interesting! I have some books in my room that have pictures in them that you might find interesting. I have them sent privately through a close friend in Paris, France. They arrive under a plain cover with other items she sends me. She knows my tastes, you see, Mr. Herne.’

  The room was becoming stiflingly hot, the pressure of her hand tighter. Slipping down his arm.

  Lower. ‘

  ‘I believe I hear Miss Eliza coming now,’ he said, desperate to be away from this sick old lady. Masking God knows what unspeakable lusts behind the front of damask gentility and power.

  ‘My goodness!’ exclaimed Miss Lily, turning away from Jed so quickly she nearly knocked the pile of music from its stand on the piano, and it was only by a desperate grab that he was able to save it.

  ‘I’m off to Charlestown, early in de mornin’

  I’m off to Charlestown, with a little time to stay;

  So give my respects to all of de friends,

  I’m off to Charlestown before de break of day.’

  She didn’t seem at all put out that her sister didn’t appear, carrying on singing with occasional accompaniment from Jed for more than an hour. The previous part of their conversation, bizarre though it had been, seemed to be quite forgotten by her. And Herne surely wasn’t going to mention it. Just filing it away in his mind for future reference as part of the bewildering puzzle of Wild Rose City and the silver ore robberies.

  Lily was still in full flow when Herne was relieved to see the reappearance of the buckboard rattling up Main Street, towards them. Miss Eliza was on her own and he wondered where the sheriff had gone. Even at a distan
ce he could see that the old lady was smiling. A gash of red opened up under the prow of her nose.

  ‘Dear mother, sister, brother, all,

  One parting kiss to all goodbye;

  Weep not, but clasp your hand in mine,

  Pray let me like a soldier die’

  As she sang out the sad ballad, Herne noticed tears streaking Miss Lily Sowren’s cheeks with the emotion of the song.

  We’ve met the foe upon the field,

  Where many fiercely did defy,

  I’ve fought for right – God bless our flag

  Dear mother, I’ve come home to die.’

  Just as she was about to plunge into the last chorus, the door of the room swung silently open and in walked her sister, bringing a quick finale to the performance. Herne saw that the smile had disappeared and had been replaced by the usual formal, polite face. A mask. He wondered in passing what lay behind the mask.

  ‘I trust I’m not interrupting anything, sister,’ she said. ‘It is such a scene of perfect bliss.’

  ‘Indeed, sister, but Mr. Herne and I have enjoyed a time of the most perfect bliss and happiness.’

  ‘It is such a shame, Mr. Herne,’ said Eliza Sowren, ‘that you must stay at the tavern.’

  ‘It took a moment for him to realize that she meant The Rich Nugget.

  ‘Why is that, Miss Sowren?’

  ‘Because you have given my sister so much pleasure with your company. It would have been quite wonderful if it had been possible for you to have moved in as our guest.’

  ‘But I thought you’ve just arranged with ...’ began Lily Sowren. Stopping dead in the middle of the sentence as she saw the look her younger sister turned on her. Herne was sideways on to it but the force of Eliza’s anger blasted him as well, her eyes opening wide so that white showed all around the dark center. Blazing with a rage that vanished as swiftly as it had appeared.

  ‘You were thinking about the propriety of such an arrangement, were you not, sister?’ she asked Lily, in a voice that dripped poisoned honey.