Chelsea returns and asks them politely, “So what are you fellas going to eat?”
“I’ll have the western omelet and hash browns, side of sausage,” Marshall says.
“Biscuits and gravy, two eggs scrambled, hash browns, and toast,” Chester responds.
“White or wheat?” Chelsea asks.
“I’ll do wheat,” Chester responds.
“Give me two eggs sunny side up, double order of bacon, white toast for me, and the grits darlin’,” Princeton responds.
“Thank you,” Marshall tells her before she walks away. “So, since I’m feeding you, what else can you tell me about the man in brown?”
“There is something that’s important but I don’t’ know that it should be spoken here or that you would even believe me.”
“Just say it in a hushed tone. There’s hardly anyone here and if they were listening in, they would have tuned you out long ago.”
“I don’t even like talking about this but he has, in his possession, a box and it ain’t no ordinary box. A man shouldn’t even speak about it and how he came to have it is anybody’s guess. Last I had heard, that box was buried in Warrensburg in a cedar chest in the ground on account of the terrible things that would befall those unfortunate souls exposed to it. Anyone who comes in contact with it experiences strange happenings, pets up and die, people fall ill suddenly, a stifling stench comes from it, I heard it originated from an evil man and somehow his soul is still trapped in there, people have become possessed, demons have been let loose with its opening, it is what we would call a cursed artifact. Woe comes to any man or beast that opens it but it has come into his possession and if you weren’t afraid of him before, if you’ve got any wits about you, now would be the time to feel a fright.”
“I hate to break it to you son, but I don’t believe in any of that,” Marshall says, he sees Chester’s eyes widen as Princeton tells them about the box.
“If we get to him like you plan, you will, detective, you’ll start to believe.” They finish their meal and are back on the road; Chester slowly dozes off in the car.
“I have killed all manner of creatures in this great land, killed one of nearly everything at one time or ‘nother, at least animals indigenous to North America but hunting a man, especially that man, why I do believe you’ve piqued my interest,” Princeton says.
“Your tracking skills and your knowledge of the caves will be of use to us. Chester and I would be fine without you, but your skillset could lead us to a quicker capture,” Marshall says.
“I never promised a capture. I’m more of the shoot first, think later kinda man.”
“I need him alive.”
“I can’t understand your thinkin’.”
“All I can tell you is there is another.”
“In Missouri?”
“No, the other man we seek operates in big cities. They know each other and they are both killers, the man in brown though, I have to stop him and I have to see what he knows about Jackson.”
“What makes you think he will talk?”
“I have a knack for making people tell me what I need to know, it is integral to my job.”
“If I’m going to help you find this man and his merry band of followers, I will need you to employ your skills in helping me discover where Handsome Hank Wright hid all that gold.”
“I can decode that map but you will need to give me access to your family and the descendants of the members of his gang. I will need letters that they wrote, journals, diaries, photographs, whatever artifacts you have, then I can put the puzzle together.”
“We can do that inside Springfield proper.”
“And your trail for the man in brown resumes outside of Springfield.”
“It’s almost like we were destined to find each other.”
“I don’t believe in fate.”
“I don’t know if I do either but you found me and I can’t think that was mere coincidence. My only concern is, if we find that gold, which is mine by birthright, what guarantee do I have that you and the big guy won’t try to make off with it? I don’t trust most people.”
“Neither do I.”
“You and I are alike in many ways, detective. You may be on the side of right and you have this code you follow but there is a darkness in you that I recognize. And I know you’ve been shot up, same thing happened to Hank. My father, Robert Wright, he taught me how to read people and he always tried to steer me onto an honest path in life, but there is something in my blood that makes me prone to stealing, conning people, hurting people that get in my way. I’ve learned not to fight it and I can tell you have that darkness yet you make a conscious effort not to embrace it.”
“Before I became a detective for hire, I was a cop, I was promoted to detective, I worked vice, I worked arson, I worked homicide. But on my mother’s side, they were all criminals. My father’s side, the men were all cops.”
“So, you’re split right down the middle.”
‘Not necessarily, I chose my path; I have not deviated from it since. We all make our choices.”
“So, how come you ain’t a cop anymore?”
“I had a case against a very powerful man in Kansas City, I was told to drop it, I wouldn’t do it, so they let me go.”
“You stuck to your principles just like Hank did, that’s admirable. I’m sure one day; you’ll get your revenge.”
“Revenge will drive a man to ruin.”
“Or it can give a man a purpose to carry on.”
“As for the gold, I have no interest in any stake in your birthright. I made a lot of money in my practice, then when my office was burned to the ground, I got money from the insurance company. I have enough in savings where I can pursue the man in brown without taking on additional cases. I’m not rich but I have made a comfortable living, money is not a current concern of mine.”
“And what about the big guy?”
“If you’re willing to look past your differences, you will find that you have much in common with him too.”
“So, he has a past as well?”
“Everyone has a past, Preston. Some people never look back at it and some are bound to it, never to escape. I try to focus on the present; I try not to let my mind drift back to the past even though it does from time to time.”
“I was always raised never to trust cops. I find it ironic that now I is workin’ with one.”
“If it helps you feel better, remember, I’m an ex-cop.”
“That’s like sayin’ one’s an ex-criminal. They may try to fight it but the fact is they always fall back into it. There is no such thing as an ex-criminal just as there is no such thing as an ex-cop. You’re still going to think like one and you’re still going to act like one. But I like that darkness in you and I believe you can help me, so detective, I will help you.”
CHAPTER TEN: THE BOYHOOD OF THE OUTLAW DESCENDANT
Growing up, Princeton knew his father was unique, his first memory in life was of the quiet man in winter, when his father was behind the wheel, another car pulled right out in front of theirs, his father put his arm out to protect his mother, as he slammed on the brakes, with that same arm, he pulled his gun out of the glove box, switched the gun to his left hand effortlessly and fired two shots up into the air as he yelled as loudly as he could, “I’ll kill you, motherfucker. That’s my family.” Princeton’s mother, Bernice, calmly asked her husband to put the gun away.
“Not in front of the boy,” she said calmly.
His boyhood was spent running around with neighborhood kids and cousins, firing rocks out of slingshots, getting into fights, playing cowboys and Indians, fishing at the nearby pond, blowing up anything that crossed his path, he would shoot marbles and play dice, one of the older kids in the neighborhood taught them to play cards and they would play for cigarettes that they had stolen from home or bought at the bar that had a cigarette machine in the front hall which no one monitored. They spent long hours laying on the banks of creeks c
atching frogs and watching white clouds swirling, talking about what they would do when they were older. “I’s gonna be an astronaut like Neil Armstrong,” Princeton would claim. “If I can’t be that, I’ll start on life as a criminal.”
“Boy what the hell wrong with you?” his cousin D.T. asked. “Astronauts can die up there and they have to go to school forever, they is literally rocket scientists. Then you have to eat these dried up packs of food in no gravity, piss all over yourself on account of said lack of gravity and you ain’t gonna meet no purty girls up there, it’s just a big ol’ pecker party.”
“But you’re a hero,” Princeton said as he skipped a rock across the creek water and onto the opposite bank.
“If you live that is, in the meantime you’d be studying books all the time.”
“I likes books,” Princeton replied.
“We is better suited to be criminals,” D.T. told him. “Let’s go put pennies on the train tracks, if we leave now we can make it there before the train arrives.” They hopped on their bikes and rode down to the train tracks that were surrounded by lush green woods.
“I don’t know why you always wanna put our money of the tracks, it never does nothin’ and all we do is waste our money.”
“My friend tol’ me the train might derail.”
“Your friend was dumber than a retard hit with a bag of rocks. Coins ain’t gonna make a train derail.”
“My friend would tan your hide if he heard you.”
“Shit, I’d pound on his dumb skull ‘til he was crying for his mommy.”
“He’s a big sumbitch though.”
“That don’t matter one god damn lick, I’s kicked the shit out of boys three times my size, you hit ‘em in the balls or the knee, you knock ‘em down to yo’ size.”
“I seen you scrap, I ain’t doubtin’ ya, I’s just sayin’ he would give you enough to handle.”
“Shut yo’ fuckin’ trap, the train is comin’,” Princeton says, the boys stand in amazement as they watch the train roar past, its loud whistle blowing, they stay and watch until the caboose passes by. “I always keep hopin’ for a red one, but they’s always just gray, yella, or green.”
“We should hop one of dem one day,” D. T. suggests.
“We will but we need our knives and our guns, dere be hobos that ride on trains, they may try to kill boys like us.”
“If we’s armed, we can kill dem first.”
“That’s what I’s sayin’.”
Princeton and his father were out hunting as they had been for years. Princeton was ten at the time. His father has taught him how to shoot and how to clean his rifle, his father had a belt with holsters and pistols that he would wear yet he never drew the pistols, Princeton asked him about the belt and the holsters. “They was handed down to me, just like when it’s time, I will hand them down to you.”
“Cool,” Princeton responded.
“The pistols are mine but the belt and holsters have been passed down the Wright family line, ever since Hank died.”
“All those stories you tol’ me, they is all true isn’t they?”
“Yes, they is, the story about the treasure is true as well though no one has seen it or knows where it is. Let me show you something,” his father said, he took his canteen and set it in a tree, then he walked away from it. “Now, get behind me boy,” he said. His father drew his pistols out of his holsters and fired one shot from each pistol, knocking the can out of the tree.
“How in the hell did you do that?”
“Practice and reflexes, boy. That’s the same way you’ll learn how, today you’ll get your first lesson.”
“But, pap, you’s just a mechanic.”
“Boy, a man is not only his occupation. While that is true, I am a mechanic, that is not my sole identity. Sometimes a man must have two and every man has his secrets. So while I am a mechanic, I am also something else, or someone else if you will, do you understand?”
“What or who else are you then?”
“Don’t trouble yourself with that. I am your father and I am a mechanic, those two roles I am happy for you to know me as but the other, well, the other’s best left unspoken. Now when you is grown, it will make sense and you shall look back and understand for the same thing will befall you, in time, it’s in our blood and there’s no escapin’ it.”
“All right,” Princeton said softly.
“Now put these holsters on with this belt, we’ll need to wrap the belt around twice, it will work, you’s only gonna draw one pistol, now when you draw it, you can pull the hammer back with your thumb but seein’ as how you’s ten, you best use your other hand to do that, make sure that other hand is clear ‘fore you fire, you lose any fingers and your mother will cut my pecker off. Now you face your hips in the direction you want to shoot and tilt your hand to aim. At first, you’ll shoot nothin’ but dirt or maybe a tree but in time, you will learn to shoot from the hip, it is a lost art, the more you practice the better you’ll get at it, in time you’ll be as fast as me and the Wright men that came before. Now you go ahead and try and shoot that can down,” his father says, he holds his hand up as he retrieves it from the dirt and places it back in the tree. “OK, now you try.” Princeton pulls the gun out, he pulls the hammer back with the palm of his other hand, then he moves his hips awkwardly and fires a shot that lands some where in the dirt of the forest floor. “No, see you’ve gotta bend your knees, like so, you may want to practice that, it gives you more stability, don’t swing your hips out like you did, have them facing your target before you draw, shoulders and feet facing your target too, once you get stronger we can practice squeezing off every shot in that clip but you gotta hit the hammer down fast for that and be cautious. Now you are not to practice any of this without me around ‘cause I will not lose my son on account of it, nor will I lose my pecker at the hands of your dear Ma, do you understand?”
“Yes, sir, I can’t practice without you.”
“Now, you can practice drawing your toy guns to your heart’s content, I suggest you do so to improve your speed but the real thing, that stays between you and me. Now if yo’ momma ever catch you drawin’ yo’ little toy gun, you dare not tell her I tol’ you to do it, understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“She’d be angry and my life is easier when she be happy.”
“Does momma know about your other identity, the secret one?”
“She only knows what she needs to, anymore would cause her worry. This is our secret and this is our way.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN: THE BALLAD OF HANDSOME HANK WRIGHT
Handsome Hank and the gang meet in the basement of a saloon owned by kin, Hank has brown hair and a brown mustache, he wears a red shirt with a brown duster, and brown trousers with a brown cowboy hat, he takes a drag off of his cigarette and looks at the gang, Jack Dolon is a pale man with clammy skin prone to drinking and gambling, his hair is black and greasy, his eyes are narrow, he wears a black jacket and black trousers with black boots, Jeremiah Wilkins has red hair and a bushy beard of like color, he wears a blue suit with brown boots, Ernest Gobbins has sandy blonde hair and wears spectacles, he peers over the layout of the bank, Billy Callahan is the youngest of the group, he has dark hair and dark eyes, he wears a white cowboy hat with a brown shirt and blue trousers. “That bank that Ernest is looking over is holding onto Confederate gold, boys. This is the last of it, what they took. They need to be relieved of it, we rob the customers too, Yankee folk deserve no less.”
“How long have we been at this now?” Billy asks. “The war is over.”
“You ain’t been around this gang long enough for your opinion to warrant any attention here. The war may be over for you but not for the rest of us, hell, you wasn’t even born until it was nearly over anyway. We all had family that died; Union soldiers burned my mother’s house to the ground while I watched. We may have lost the war but we will have what is rightfully ours. If you don’t have the stomach for it anymore, you can get the hell ou
t. I’ll give you your cut and you can go on your merry fucking way.”
“I don’t want out, I’m just sayin’, eventually they’re going to catch on.”
“When they do, we have a plan, that plan will take care of our kin for generations to come, that is our legacy. History will not remember us because it’s not written by men like us, but we know what really happened. Atrocities were committed on both sides and I’m a just man. Winning the war may help them sleep better at night but in their dreams they will fear us and the hell that we bring upon them. Those homes that they looted, we’ve gotten it all back, this bank is the only job left.”
“They said it was an impossible task,” Ernest says. “This bank is not an impossible task but getting all of that money and gold back, they said there was no way a five-man gang can do it.”
“If it was impossible, then that was only in your head. We’ve claimed nearly all of it all ready. The only way they can stop us is if one of us fucks up, and I’ll be damn sure that if any of you do, soldiers or not save for the kid, you will feel my wrath.”
“Hank, you know we’re all golden, none of us would betray you,” Jack says. “We believe in what we’re doing.”
“If I didn’t have the rush before a job where my hair starts feeling like I’ve gotta bull’s blood coursing through me, I don’t know what I’d do,” Jeremiah says. “Go back to tending to the farm? Shit, I’ve got the boys to do that.”
“I’ve had a peculiar feeling that came over me after we left Kansas. I’ve gotta feeling that one of you will make a mistake and everything we’ve been working for will come undone,” Hank admits, he looks at each of them as he scans the room.
“I’ve had peculiar feelings too, but then I switched to a different brand of whiskey and those feelings went away,” Jeremiah says.
“Let’s get focused on the job. Jeremiah, you will handle the safe if they do not agree to open it, it will take too long to crack it, make sure we’re clear before you light that dynamite. Last time, you ruptured my right ear drum. Ernest will watch the door, none gets in, no one gets out. Billy and I will clean out the jewels and the cash, Jack will load up the gold, then he stays with the cart,” Hank explains.
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