He remained out on deck for the whole trip, aware of somebody standing in the shadows of a stack of life rafts. Knowing who it was and sensing the animosity that was being directed toward him. Impotent animosity. But, as the ferry altered course and reduced speed to nose into the slip, the twenty dollar whore approached the half-breed with a brittle smile across her face.
‘Hi there, again. I got the same problem I had on the other side.’
Edge glanced at her and saw that she had managed to get some pins from somewhere and that she was now more or less decently covered.
‘Me, too,’ he said absently, her words breaking in on his train of troubled thought.
‘But I need more than ten cents now. For cab fare up to the Silver Lady.’
The ferry bumped to a stop and the vehicle ramp was dropped as gangways were slid aboard-
‘Suggest you take out the pins, ma’am,’ Edge muttered as he moved away. ‘They say it pays to advertise.’
She rasped an obscenity in his wake but he had already closed his mind to the whore. And to everybody else and everything that was not a potential danger to him as he disembarked from the uncrowded ferry and gave a cab driver the address of Mason Dickens’ apartment.
‘Thank God for that,’ the bearded, weary-eyed man said, his voice thick with a Scots accent.
‘Yeah, I know,’ Edge answered, dropping a cigarette stub into a pool of horsewet in the gutter. ‘You were worried I might want you to take me back to Texas.’
‘Guess there are other places out west,’ the driver allowed as the half-breed climbed aboard and peered out of the open window, scanning the ferry slips exit for the familiar short, tubby form of Lincoln.
Then the reins were slapped above the back of the horse in the shafts and the cab was steered into a tight turn to head north. It was going home time for the people who had been out on the town and as the places of entertainment spilled their occupants, the sidewalks and streets filled up. And the noises and smells of too many people living too close together wafted in through the window.
Hearing the sounds, smelling the odors and watching the press of people and crush of traffic, Edge murmured, ‘Texas doesn’t seem like so bad a place anymore.’
And abruptly found himself wondering why he made a habit of running down the state and the people who lived there. He had had some bad times in Texas and some run-ins with a few mean Texans. But no more so than in other states and territories, and he had had to fight for his life against people from all over. No, his anti-Texas jibes were just a contribution to the American joke, a lighthearted defense against the boastful claims of those who were natives of the biggest state in the Union.
New York? Edge could see how it might be fashionable for out-of-towners to hate the city. But in his case, his attitude was based upon a much deeper foundation than what happened to be the vogue. Nor, like his cynicism toward Texas, did it have anything to do with being shot at and having to fight off attackers with knives. He hated New York because here in the city he felt stifled, both mentally and physically. He sensed he was a foreigner in his own country and for some strange reason this inhibited him - to the extent that he felt he could not be himself. Was afraid to be himself?
That was the key word. Afraid. And in the private darkness of the cab the half-breed scowled his disgust as his mind finally released this self-admission which he had tried to bury beneath a brittle weight of rationalization. Luigi Orlando was still alive because the man called Edge had been too scared to kill him. Afraid of the power of Emilio Marlon. A man who might also be dead now, if the confrontation had been out in some frontier town, in the rugged mountains or on a limitless prairie or desert. Where Edge would not have stopped to consider how many loyal gun hands Marlon had working for him, would have given no thought to the kind of terrain he had to cover to escape the consequences of reaping his revenge.
‘Here you are, cowboy,’ the cabbie called as he reined in the horse. ‘Delancy and Lewis. Dollar.’
Edge climbed down from the cab and reached up to drop two coins into the driver’s outstretched hand.
‘You tried, but I ain’t a stranger in this town any more, feller,’ the half-breed growled as the bearded driver scowled at the dime and nickel in the palm of his gloved hand.
Then the man shrugged and pocketed the money. ‘Flat fare. Nothin’ extra?’
‘You aimed to cheat me. What’s that worth?’ His tone and expression were neutral.
The driver set his horse into motion with an angry gesture and Edge allowed himself a brief smile of satisfaction as he made to enter the apartment building where Mason Dickens lived. Then abruptly altered course and instead strolled along the empty sidewalk. Walked the deserted streets for perhaps two hours, until he was sure that the nagging doubt which had been needling him since he left the Marlon mansion - causing the sullen mood which was vented through his churlish displays of ill-temper with the defenseless whore and the innocent government man - was eradicated. He had admitted, could understand and therefore accepted the reason for the course of action he took out on Staten Island. And because of the state of mind with which this left him, an avaricious but otherwise harmless cab driver had been allowed to leave without witnessing the killer glint in the slitted eyes of Edge.
Mason Dickens lived on the third floor of the brownstone building, reached by flights of dimly gaslit wooden stairs which creaked at every tread. The plastered walls were cracked and stained with damp patches. The air, which felt colder here than out on the street, smelled of food cooked hours ago, cat-wet and disillusion. No sounds came from behind any of the doors on each bare landing. And only at the base of the door to the newspaperman’s apartment was there a strip of brighter light than that which was emitted by the gas mantles.
Edge rapped his knuckles on the door panel.
‘Who is it?’ Dickens sounded nervous.
‘Nobody from Texas.’
Dickens’ footfalls approached fast and the door was jerked open. The man’s pale face beneath the unruly mop of light colored hair blatantly showed the depth of the anxiety which had sounded in his voice. He had changed out of his evening suit into a pair of baggy, stained pants and a collarless shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His black encircled eyes were too bright and there was a strong smell of rye on his breath.
‘How come you’re still running around loose?’ he demanded, and thrust his head outside to peer down the stairway before stepping back and beckoning for Edge to enter the apartment.
‘Who wants me?’ the half-breed asked, glancing around the room as Dickens closed and locked the door.
It was a living room with one corner serving as the kitchen and just a single door leading off it, obviously to a bedroom. Spartanly furnished with ancient pieces of furniture. Badly decorated, untidy and uncleaned in a long time. The temporary home of a man who lived without a woman and spent most of his time away from the place.
‘Captain Gilpatrick, that’s who!’ Dickens rasped as Edge dropped into a deep armchair with several splits and flat areas in its leather covering. ‘For killing the two barkeeps at the Silver Lady and leaving Fancy Fay bobbing around in that boat on the lake in Central Park. You’re crazy, Edge! I warned you, damnit! I told you that place has police protection ! Hell, Gilpatrick spends more time in that whorehouse than in his office at headquarters!’
Edge took off his hat and rubbed the back of a hand over the stubble on his jaw as he yawned. ‘The killings were self-defence. Needed some information from the madam.’
Dickens was pacing up and down the room. Then he stopped and sat wearily on a swivel chair in front of a paper-littered roll-top desk against a wall. He turned the chair so that he could look across to where the half-breed sat. The tension of pent-up anxiety drained out of him, as if he were suddenly too exhausted to play host to powerful emotions.
‘Where did the information get you?’ he asked flatly.
Edge shook his head. ‘None of your business, feller.
It never has been anybody’s but mine and Marlon’s ever since the kid took a shot at me at the hotel.’
The reporter made to interrupt, but the half-breed shook his head again. ‘Just listen. New York’s a big town and big towns have lots of people in them. A lot of people make a lot of noise. With their mouths mostly. Tends to confuse a country bumpkin like me.’
‘Bumpkin!’ Dickens snorted.
‘Mase?’
‘Yeah?’
‘I just got out of a bad mood. I’m feeling good. Don’t change it, feller.’
‘What d’you expect from me, mister?’ Dickens growled. ‘I’m hoping for the story of a journalistic lifetime from you. Not a cowboy’s reflections on the big city!’
‘Don’t want a thing from you,’ Edge replied, even toned in contrast to the other man’s irritation. ‘Just figured I owe you an explanation. You don’t want it, I’ll leave.’
Dickens sighed, then picked up an unsharpened pencil which he began to roll between the fingers of both hands.
‘First Gilpatrick butted in on my business. Then you. Next Black. A feller from Washington.’
The newspaperman was suddenly interested. But Edge continued without amplifying his oblique reference to Lincoln. ‘All of them trying to get something for themselves by interfering in my business. So by the time I got to the man I had to do business with, I was one confused country boy in the big city.’
‘You got to Emilio Marlon?’ Incredulity spread across Dickens’ face with the speed of a lightning flash.
‘Sure.’
‘What happened?’
‘I finally got to realize that New York people are the same as people any place else, feller. They want to stay alive and they want to live easy. I scared the hell out of Marlon and he got to me in the same way. And after that we finished our business by making the only kind of deal worth making. Because we both had something the other one wanted. Marlon to keep his godson alive and me to go on living. Rest of you people just wanted to use me for your own ends. Because none of you had the guts to go and get the shit scared out of you by facing up to Marlon.’
He put his hat back on and pushed himself up from the chair.
‘Just like that, uh?’ Dickens said.
‘What like what, feller?’
‘You kill a few men, give Boss Black the idea you’ve got a deal with him and then walk out on him, rough up a whorehouse madam with a police captain in her pocket... all that and you reckon you can just go up to Grand Central and wait for a train west.’
Edge nodded and went to the door.
‘Maybe in Tombstone or Dodge City or some other hick town out west, mister!’ Dickens snarled, worry displaced by anger as he realized he was about to lose the chance of the big story he had planned to get. ‘But never in a million years here in New York City. It doesn’t work like that...’
The half-breed had turned the key in the lock and started to pull open the door. Then saw through the crack of its first opening the dim light from a gas mantle glinting on something metallic. And he chose counter attack rather than defense - jerking the door wide instead of slamming it closed.
‘Down!’ he roared at the newspaperman, who had powered up from the swivel chair as he started to vent his anger. And went down himself, into a balanced crouch as he drew the Remington smoothly from its holster.
The blond haired kid with crooked teeth expressed terror as the initiative was snatched from him. Instead of being faced with an unready target framed in the doorway he saw the blur of the half-breed’s moving form and the fear frozen newspaperman standing like a carved statue in front of the swivel-chair across the room. Panic caused the twitch of his finger which squeezed the trigger as he tried to lower the aim of the Frontier Colt toward Edge.
The exploded bullet cracked across the top of the half-breed’s shoulder and ricocheted off the metal castor of the dilapidated leather-covered chair, its trajectory altered from a downward to an upward flight by striking the curved surface. And was finally stopped by the tissue at the nape of Dickens’ neck after tunneling into his throat and severing his windpipe.
The newspaperman coughed, the sound like a polite gesture of interruption, died on his feet and dropped back into the swivel chair.
By then a second gunshot had cracked out, from the upward angled barrel of the Remington. This bullet did not require a deflection and drove deep into its intended target - entering low down in the youngster’s belly and destroying countless lengths of intestines before it came to rest lodged against a rib.
‘Oh, shit,’ the young killer murmured as he dropped his gun and staggered backwards, clutching at the dark stain which was blossoming on the front of his pants between the flaps of his open topcoat.
‘As a hired gun you’re one heap of that, kid,’ Edge rasped through clenched teeth as he came erect and snatched a glance over his shoulder.
The chair had made a half turn as the dead weight fell into it, so that the newspaperman’s body was toward the desk now. But his head was hung over the low back of the chair, his upside-down face visible from the doorway. Blood trickled at each side of his neck and dripped steadily to the floor. The eyes were wide and staring, seemed to direct toward the half-breed the accusing glare of a man betrayed.
‘Yeah, feller,’ Edge murmured in a forceful whisper. ‘I’m wrong. You’re dead right.’
Rod Kirkby had come to a halt with his back to the door of the apartment across the landing. He had started to slide down it, but managed to prevent the move. Now stood with his knees bent and thighs splayed, hands still clawed at the base of his belly. He held his head up, his terror-filled eyes fixed upon the face of Edge, which looked satanic in the dim glow from the gas mantle and against the brighter light in the apartment behind.
‘You’re going to die, kid,’ the half-breed announced harshly.
Kirkby swallowed hard. But not all the saliva in his mouth. Some spilled out over his trembling lower lip and ran down his chin. ‘I know it,’ he croaked. ‘Confession is good for the soul.’ He stepped up close to the injured youngster and gripped the lapels of the open topcoat with his left hand while his right pressed the muzzle of the Remington tight against the pulsing temple.
‘What else can you do to me, mister?’ Kirkby said, and managed to get a note of defiance into his voice.
‘Make it quick. Like you were a horse with no hope. Feller can take a long time to die with a bullet in his belly.’
Up close - over a range of no more than six inches - the lean face did not look so evil to the dying man. It was devoid of all emotion, good or bad. So Kirkby experienced shock for a moment before agony as the half-breed kneed him viciously in the crotch. He screamed once, then again. First in reaction to the searing pain in his genitals. Then to the greater agony as his body jerked involuntarily and the movement tore the merciful veneer of numbness off the bullet wound.
The high-pitched sounds caused one of the mumbling voices beyond the apartment door to roar: ‘What the frig’s goin’ on out there?’
‘Stay out of my business!’ Edge snarled, and lowered his voice. ‘Long and painful. A bullet in the brain and it’ll all be over.’
Sweat and saliva was streaming down Kirkby’s chin now. When he tried to say something only a gurgling sound issued from his mouth.
Who sent you, kid?’
‘The boss.’ The two words were like tiny scratches on the silence.
‘Orlando?’
Kirkby shook his head. ‘Him the first time. At ... at the ... ho ... hotel This time ... Boss ... Marlon. Jesus it’s ... like my ... insides are burnin’ up.’
‘He still at his house?’
A deep swallow and then a shake of the head. ‘No. No, he’s at the ... the Silver Lady.’
‘Obliged, kid.’
Edge clicked back the hammer of the revolver.
Kirkby sucked in a deep breath to power out words without pauses between them. ‘Please, mister! I don’t wanna die! I told you what you wanted! Hop
in’ you wouldn’t kill me! I’ll take the pain for a chance to live.’
The half-breed eased the muzzle of the Remington away from the temple of the youngster and the pain contorted features of the doomed Kirkby were briefly altered by a wan smile of relief. Then the gun cracked out its killing shot, the bullet smashing into the head on the left and exploding out from the right amid a welter of blood, pulped tissue and bone shards.
As Edge released his hold on the coat lapels and the corpse crumpled to the floor the man behind the door ignored the pleas of a distraught woman and yelled: ‘You murderin’ sonofabitch!’
The half-breed cast a final glance in through the open doorway of Mason Dickens’ apartment. Then scowled down at the corpse of Rod Kirkby. ‘He ain’t in no condition to start an argument about that, feller,’ he called to the frightened and angry man who had snarled the accusation ‘On account of I just give him the kind that went in one ear and out the other.’
CHAPTER TEN
DOORS on the lower landings which had been opened by the nervously curious after the first two gunshots were hurriedly slammed closed at Edge’s footfalls were heard on the stairways. Then were re-opened more cautiously after he had passed. Out on Delancy Street the only living thing in sight was a grey stallion hitched to the iron railings which guarded the basement entry to the apartment building. More lighted windows showed in the facade of this building, those flanking it and those directly across the street than when the half-breed had arrived. But as he raked his now expressionless eyes over his surroundings, the watchers ducked into the cover of solid walls. Only dared to show themselves at the windows again when they heard the clop of shod hooves on the paved street surface diminish as the tall, lean, western-attired stranger rode a dead man’s horse to the corner and headed north, deliberately extracting empty shells from his revolver and sliding fresh bullets into the chambers of the cylinder.
He rode the city streets as he would ride the trails of mountains or plains, apparently at ease but actually poised on the very verge of whiplash reaction, every muscle in his powerful body tensed to respond should his constantly moving eyes spot a sign of potential danger. And thus as he rode across now deserted late night streets and along empty avenues, his attitude gave no hint of the burning anger and massive hatred which lurked deep inside him.
EDGE: WAITING FOR A TRAIN (Edge series Book 30) Page 11