Red Water

by J. R. Roberts

THIRTY-FOUR

  Clint was counting on the fact that Marshal Flynt could at least get a few things right. For one, clearing the town of anyone who might take a stand against anyone like Laramie or his partners was supposedly the lawman’s top priority. Therefore, Clint hoped he could ride down the streets of Red Water without anyone of note taking an interest in him.

  Second, Clint had to assume the lawmen might post a few eyes here and there, so he couldn’t take the chance of riding directly to the front door of Franklin Fixtures. He climbed down from his saddle a few avenues away from the one he was after and then led Eclipse a bit farther down Sales Street. Once he got close enough, Clint tied Eclipse to a hitching post and kept his head angled so the brim of his hat covered a good portion of his face.

  While Flynt’s sense of organizing a posse seemed lackluster at best, the marshal seemed to have a time line for following through with his real plan. Unfortunately for the lawman, Clint’s arrival and scuffle at Joan’s Emporium had very likely bumped Flynt’s schedule up a bit. These things and several others tore through Clint’s mind in the same way statistics came and went during a poker game. Certain things factored into a win, others pointed toward a loss.

  For the moment, at least, Clint liked his chances.

  He hurried down Franklin Avenue as quickly as he could without drawing attention to himself. It was a busy time of the afternoon and there were plenty of shops in the area, so Clint had more than enough of a crowd to use as cover. But there could just as easily be men hiding in the crowd to look for someone like him.

  By the time he got to Franklin Fixtures, Clint had yet to spot anyone who seemed too suspicious. Even so, he kept his hand near his Colt as he stepped into the shop.

  “Clint? Is that you?”

  Wincing at just how quickly he’d been spotted, Clint shut the door and walked over to the counter. Of course, he couldn’t be too surprised that Allie had picked him out right away. She had seen an awful lot of him since he’d been in Red Water.

  “Yeah,” he told her, “it’s me.”

  She rushed around the counter and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. “That’s going to have to do for now,” she whispered. “I can’t exactly close up and give you the same service you had last time.”

  “It’s all right. I’m here on business.” He placed a hand at the small of her back and guided her away from the front door. Although Allie squirmed a bit, she went along with him.

  “Hold on a moment. Is the posse back already?”

  “Not just yet. Are there any customers in here?”

  “Not right now.” Allie planted her feet halfway down the aisle that led to the back of the shop and refused to budge. “What’s going on, Clint? Don’t tell me it’s nothing, because I already know better than that. You’re acting strange.”

  “Has anyone been in this shop today?” he asked.

  “I won’t say another word until you tell me what’s wrong.”

  The shop was small enough that Clint could see the entire section where any customers might be. The front was taken up mostly by the sales counter and cash register, while the rest had various samples scattered about on the walls or on small tables. There were a few cases along one wall and the back was the open area that he, Allie, and Gwen had gotten to know not too long ago.

  “It’s about those men we were after,” he explained. “They might be in town.”

  “Well, I haven’t left the store since opening.”

  “That’s the thing,” Clint continued. “I think they might intend on coming here if they haven’t been here already.”

  Just as Clint had feared, Allie didn’t take that news too well. Her face paled and she reached up to place her hand flat over her heart. “Oh, Lord.” She sighed.

  “I already got one of them,” he told her as a way to calm her down a bit. “But the other two are still about. One is a black fellow that’s a little bigger than me. The other is around my size with a narrower face. Both of them are in their early thirties or so. Have you seen anyone like that?”

  “A man like the first one you described came by to check on a few prices, but that was over a week ago.”

  “What did he look like?”

  Allie closed her eyes and clenched her lips shut as if she were trying to dig up the memory from a dusty corner of her mind. She shook her head and said, “I just remember he was black. He might have been bigger than you, but that’s it. Oh, and I think he was wearing a dress coat.”

  “A dress coat?”

  “That’s right,” she said definitely. “I remember it because it was a formal coat and he wore buckskins under it. That was peculiar.”

  Clint smiled as if he’d been dealt the missing card to fill an inside straight. “Perfect. Do you recall what he wanted?”

  “He asked about building a safe. I gave him some prices, but he didn’t seem to know exactly what he wanted. I passed him along to Sven.”

  The smile on Clint’s face dimmed when he heard that. “And that was a week ago?”

  “Maybe a little more.”

  “And,” Clint asked reluctantly, “have you heard from Sven since then?”

  Allie started nodding right away. “Oh, yes. I don’t even think he spoke to that man for more than a few minutes, but it went off without a hitch.”

  “What’s Sven working on now?”

  “I know he’s working on a few orders, but he may be doing that in his own workshop because I haven’t seen him all day.”

  “Is that unusual?”

  “Not really,” she told him. “I don’t even see him unless there’s his sort of work to be done. Hold on a second, though.” Allie walked back to the front of the store before Clint could make a move. He followed along behind her and kept walking to the front window when she stopped at the front counter.

  Clint stood so he was able to look out the front window while being mostly veiled by the simple brown curtain that covered it. Pushing the curtain aside a bit with his finger, Clint peeked out onto Franklin Avenue to find nothing more than a steady flow of people wandering up and down the narrow road.

  “That’s odd,” Allie said.

  Looking at her, Clint saw Allie peering into an open ledger and tracing something with the tip of her finger. “What’s odd?” he asked.

  “Sven was supposed to be in the shop today. He was working on a commission and he needed to use the equipment here.”

  “What equipment?”

  Allie was already walking around the counter again and striding toward the back of the shop. Motioning for him to follow, she said, “It’s all back here. He’s probably just busy and forgot to say hello.”

  Clint was quick to catch up to her and even got in front of Allie before she reached the back door. He reached ahead of her and said, “Allow me.”

  She stepped back and let him open the door. Outside, there was a small shed, which was kept shut by a large metal lock. The shed was too small for anyone to work inside with the door closed unless that person was a little child hoping to win a game of hide-and-seek.

  “That’s odd,” Allie said again.

  “Lock up the store,” Clint told her. “Then take me to Sven’s house.”

  THIRTY-FIVE

  Sven lived at the other end of Sales Street off Homestead Avenue. It was easy enough to see where the road had gotten its name since the only buildings on both sides of the narrow path were houses with enough stable space to accommodate the horses of the folks who lived in them. Apart from a few larger places at the far end of the street where the town thinned out, the homes were short and narrow. Some structures were two floors high, connected by rickety stairs that seemed ready to fall off the sides of the homes to which they were nailed.

  “There,” Allie said as she pointed to the second floor atop one of the rickety sets of stairs. “That’s where Sven lives.”

  Clint surveyed the road and didn’t like what he saw. There were so many houses stacked on both sides that any number of people could be
watching from any vantage point. There were rooftops riflemen could use to pick someone off from a distance. There were doorways bushwhackers could lurk waiting for the right moment to strike. The more Clint looked around, the more he wanted to forget about climbing those shaky stairs. Unfortunately, Allie wasn’t quite so reluctant.

  “Come on,” she said as she walked toward the bottom of the stairs and waved for him to follow. “I’ll show you to his room.”

  Clint walked behind her, but wanted to get in front in case someone was waiting at the top of the stairs for them. Before he could get around her, he reconsidered, thinking he should stay behind in case someone tried to rush up after them. Since he could see the street, but not the room at the top of the stairs, he went with his first instinct.

  “Allow me,” he said as he reached past her to grab the door handle.

  Allie smiled and bowed her head to allow him to walk past her and into the room.

  The door came open easily, and indeed seemed about ready to fall off its hinges. Clint stepped inside and took in his surroundings as quickly as his darting eyes would allow. There wasn’t much to see, so he was able to size it up in a matter of seconds.

  The front door opened to a small room that had a little table and a pair of chairs. There was a single cabinet, a crate of utensils, and a broom propped in the corner. A narrow door opened to another room, which probably was a bedroom. Clint couldn’t see much through that door because of the spindly man walking through it.

  Hunching down to fit through the door, the man reminded Clint of the scarecrow that he’d left to guard Tom. Matted bunches of dark blond hair sprouted at odd angles from his scalp to partially cover a shriveled face. Clint would have guessed the man’s age at anywhere from thirty to fifty.

  “What is this?” the man rasped in a thick Swedish accent. “Who you are?”

  Clint felt Allie behind him, so he stepped aside to let her in. When he saw the man reach for a gun he’d kept inside the bedroom, Clint extended his arm to keep Allie from getting in the way. Before he could draw his Colt, he felt Allie press against his arm.

  “Sven, it’s me!” she said.

  Lifting his chin and squinting, the blond man seemed to be gazing through a thick fog. “Allison? Who this man is?”

  Allie impatiently pushed Clint’s arm up enough for her to duck under it. “This is Clint,” she replied. “He’s a friend of mine.”

  “Your friend doesn’t know how to knock.”

  “No,” Allie said as she shot an accusing glare at Clint. “He sure doesn’t. Sorry about that.”

  Clint took a look outside and didn’t see anyone in the immediate area who hadn’t been there before. Of course, that wasn’t accounting for all the hiding spaces that he couldn’t make out no matter how hard he tried. “There are some suspicious men about,” Clint said. “Did anyone pay you a visit recently?”

  Sven scowled at Clint and then looked at Allie.

  “You know what I mean by suspicious?” Clint asked.

  Scowling even harder at Clint, Sven replied, “Yes, I know what this means. I have been in this country for little while.”

  “You recall that man who came by a week or so ago to ask about building those safes?” Allie asked.

  Sven nodded right away. “Yes. The fellow with the dark skin. He did not want any safes built. I know this because he did not even know what to ask when I gave him my valuable time.”

  “What do you mean by that?” Clint asked.

  Slowing his speech down as if he were talking to a weak-minded child, Sven replied, “I ask him about tumblers, multiple backings, and how many bolts he wants to hold the door closed. You know what I mean by these things?”

  “Sort of,” Clint admitted.

  Despite the vagueness in Clint’s voice, Sven grinned and opened his arms as if he’d been shown an epiphany. “Yes! Just like this. When I talk to this dark man from before, he look at me just like this. He was more interested in what I do before and what I am going to deliver yesterday.”

  Clint shook his head as if something had suddenly come loose between his ears. Although English words were coming out of Sven’s mouth, they were just disconnected enough to make Clint work extra hard to put them together. Suddenly, a few tumblers fell into place within Clint’s head. “Oh, you mean that safe that was picked up from your shop yesterday?”

  “Ah, maybe perhaps you are not so slow as I thought,” Sven replied.

  “What did he want to know about that?”

  “Yeah,” Allie said. “What did he want to know about our deliveries?”

  “Just who else was buying and what they wanted and things like this and such.”

  Allie shook her head. “I wish you would have said that before, Sven. That’s important.”

  “I know this is important. He wants to know what work I do and if I can be trusted for more work somewhere else.”

  “Please tell me you didn’t talk about the other bank orders,” Allie begged.

  Sven tapped his temple and gave her a quick wink. “I know better than this. I tell him other banks, so he doesn’t know which I have the work for.”

  Clint rolled his eyes and let out an exasperated breath. He may not understand everything the other man was saying, but he’d heard more than enough. “That’s what they’re after, all right. If any bank robber worth his salt got ahold of the plans for those safes or the man who put them together, it’d make getting into them a whole lot easier, wouldn’t it?”

  “Sure,” Sven replied. “But I keep my plans hidden well. They would need to shoot me dead to get a look at . . .” His voice tapered off when he saw Clint’s raised eyebrow and slow nod. “Oh. I see what you are saying.”

  “And after they turned this place upside down to get those plans,” Clint explained, “all they’d need to do is wait to see who picks up the safes and follow them to wherever they’re bound.”

  “Then they’d wait for them to fill up with money and steal them back again.” Allie sighed.

  Launching into a burst of nervous motion, Sven moved to the nearby cupboards and pulled out pots, pans, and whatever else was in there. “We should call sheriff or marshal or federals or . . .”

  “There’s nobody here,” Clint said. “That’s the point.”

  “Then we need to leave! I have gun, but—”

  Allie stopped him with a gentle hand on his shoulder. “That’s why we’re here, Sven. Forget the pans and just collect a few things you’ll need for a few days.”

  “And the plans for those safes,” Clint added.

  Sven tapped his forehead again, but aimed his wink at Clint. “I already think of this. My things are kept in here beneath the oatmeal.” Grabbing a dented canister, he held it out for the other two to see and then promptly tossed it away. “Oatmeal. Here are the plans,” Sven announced as he picked up a stack of papers that was wide enough after being folded in half to cover the entire shelf like a liner.

  “Is that all?” Clint asked.

  “Yes, but the safes are in my workshop.”

  “You think they’ll try to steal those?” Allie asked.

  Clint shrugged. “I wouldn’t think that would do them any good, but they might be desperate enough to try hitting the shop to see what else they can find.”

  “If no law in town and posse is off somewhere,” Sven pointed out, “why would they try to rob fixture shop?”

  Clint froze as a cold feeling ripped through him. “Aww, hell.” He snarled.

  THIRTY-SIX

  Clint led the way down the rickety stairs, but didn’t expect to see either of the two outlaws out there waiting to strike. While there was still the possibility of running into them, there were just too many other possibilities in Red Water. The town was open. The longer Clint thought about what he would do in the boots of the two outlaws, the more he scolded himself for not thinking about such things before.

  But there was still a plan at work and Clint reminded himself that the outlaws in question we
ren’t the sharpest knives in the drawer. For that reason alone, he went back to Franklin Fixtures before going anywhere else. Once Franklin Avenue was in sight, Clint stopped and looked at the two people following him.

  “Is there anywhere you can go that’s safe?” Clint asked Allie. “Somewhere that others might not know about?”

  “I can go to Gwen’s,” she replied.

  “What about someplace that might not drag anyone else into this mess?”

  “Gwen’s not going to be there for a while,” Allie explained. “She headed out to Dodge City this morning. That’s why she was so . . .” Glancing quickly over to Sven, Allie blushed and said, “That’s why she wanted to pack in so much celebrating over Founder’s Day.”

  “All right,” Clint said hastily. Shifting his eyes to Sven, he asked, “You brought those guns of yours, right?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “Then you take Allie to Gwen’s, lock the door, and wait for me to come get you. First, hand over those plans.”

  Sven’s eyes narrowed and he reflexively pressed a hand against the outside of the coat pocket where the folded papers were being kept.

  “It’s best if I keep them, so there’s no reason for them to come looking for you,” Clint explained. It wasn’t the most convincing thing he could come up with, but the blond man nodded and handed them over.

  “Because you are a friend of Allison and you are a duly appointed—”

  “Great,” Clint said as he took the plans Sven offered and stuffed them into his own pocket. “We don’t have a lot of time, so make yourselves scarce and don’t show your faces until it’s safe. Now where’s Gwen’s place?”

  “Right down the street,” Allie said.

  Clint was hoping for as much, since Sales Street led to nearly every other spot in Red Water. “Go on now. I’ll keep an eye on you.”

  Allie nodded and practically shoved Sven along in front of her as she crossed the street and picked up speed. Sven stumbled awkwardly without looking where he was going and almost broke his neck a few times, since he seemed more concerned with patting down his pockets than putting one foot in front of the other.