Relentless

by Ed Gorman

  He shook his head. “That’s all I’m going to say.”

  ***

  The door opened. A trail-dusty man in a good suit came in with a carpetbag and a pint of whiskey he would no doubt consume in his room tonight.

  I slipped Gunderson his money and walked to the front door. Five men stood there waiting for me. A somewhat embarrassed-looking Tom Ryan; Toomey and Grice; and two deputies I’d hired once upon a time.

  Pretty easy to figure out what was going on. Toomey and Grice wanted to use this opportune moment to demonstrate what law and order meant in Skylar.

  They’d arrest me in a public way. And drag me off to jail-aiding and abetting; not cooperating with an official investigation; resisting arrest, they’d come up with something-and then post a couple of armed guards out front as if I was Billy the Kid and the Dalton gang combined. Toomey and Grice knew how to do things like this.

  I moved swiftly down the interior hallway to the back door. I knew even before I got there what I’d find. Another armed deputy. Waiting for me.

  I took the back stairs two at a time. When I found a silent room on the second floor, I pushed open the door and went inside with the help of my skeleton keys. An older gent lay on his back, snoring beneath a book that had dropped on his face in sleep. There was a damp, wild, but satisfied sound to his snoring. He didn’t wake up the whole time I was in there.

  I had remembered correctly. The building adjacent to the hotel was a one-story structure. I pushed up the window, crawled up on the sill. Toomey and Grice and the lawmen couldn’t see me from this angle. Neither could the deputy in back.

  As the man continued to snore, as the town moved toward dusk’s festivities-there were to be fireworks and a band concert and another picnic spread, and of course the guest of honor was going to favor us with another of his self-serving sermons-I made my move.

  Jumping wasn’t going to be all that easy for me. I’d inherited the family curse of arthritis. And there was enough of a divide between the two buildings to make landing somewhat uncertain. Halfway there, I could plunge to the ground. I’d certainly break something, a leg most likely. They wouldn’t have much trouble finding and arresting me then.

  I glanced over at the dozing man. Sure looked enviable, lying there that way, enjoying himself in the comfort and safety of his little world.

  I looked back at the roof below me.

  I jumped.

  TWENTY

  MY FIRST SENSE was that I’d sprained my right ankle. I hadn’t exactly landed with any skill or grace.

  But when I stood up on the pain, it started to go away. I’d stunned my ankle, not sprained it.

  The dusk sky gave me just enough darkness. People would have a difficult time seeing me. I moved to the rear edge of the roof. In the first faint moonlight of the evening, I saw the eyes of a couple of prowling tomcats as they searched the alley for food. Scraps of human food would be fine-there was a caf6 on this block and cafes were the preferred hangouts for such cats-or mice or rats. Cats, despite their reputations for being finicky, just weren’t all that choosy.

  There was a delivery buckboard in back. The bed was high enough that I could drop into it without hurting myself. I didn’t want to drop all the way to the ground.

  By now I had my gun drawn. I wasn’t taking any more chances. I had no desire to be put on display by Toomey and Grice.

  I took it easy this time, turning around, grabbing the edge of the roof, and easing myself down backward into the delivery buckboard. No chance of spraining anything this way.

  Then I was on the ground and moving as quickly as I could through a series of dark alley passages to the livery. I hid behind a tree to the right of the place till I could find out where the night man was. After a few minutes, he came out of the livery and joined a small group of folks standing in the street. They were all laughing and smiling. Ready for the band concert and the free food.

  I went around back, found my horse, saddled him quickly, led him quietly down the alley. I didn’t jump up into the saddle until we were a good block away.

  ***

  Forty minutes later, I was home.

  All the way out there I kept thinking she was going to be there when I got there. And not only would she be there. Tom and Grice and Toomey would come along soon after and tell us that Laura Webley had confessed. And then life would be the same again. I’d get my old job back.

  She wasn’t there. Neither was Tom or Grice or Toomey.

  I fed the cat, took my Winchester down, put on dark clothes, and poured myself a judicious belt of whiskey.

  I sat in the front door rolling one cigarette after another until full starlight turned the landscape into a place of silver-tinted shadows. The sharp, solemn cry of a night owl signaled night’s dominion. All I could think of at first was Callie. Where she was. How she was. She hadn’t run away. I was sure of it.

  Laura Webley was the killer. Of that I was now certain. But how did I get to her? Or did I get to her? Maybe it made more sense to challenge Tom himself. Somehow, I had to get into the Webley compound and make one or both of them confess.

  I knew I couldn’t stay here long. Despite a certain weariness, I had to push on. There would be a posse here soon. All for the amazement and amusement of our esteemed lieutenant governor. Any other time, I doubt Toomey and Grice would’ve moved quite so quickly. But now, if they couldn’t get Callie, they’d get me.

  I grabbed my Winchester and fled.

  TWENTY-ONE

  BEN LINCOLN ONCE said that if a man wants to kill you badly enough, he will. Unfortunately for Lincoln, he was right. I’d always looked as his remark from his point of view-from the eye of the pursued rather than the pursuer.

  But now I was the pursuer.

  The ride to the Webley spread took nearly an hour. The temperature kept dropping. I wished I’d wom a jacket.

  Webley, at the insistence of Laura, had built a Victorian house that would pass for a castle until the real thing came along. In the stark moonlight, its turrets, spires, and soaring center section resembled a storybook structure. The only thing missing was a moat. Men in chain mail riding fire-snorting golden steeds would likely come pouring across the moat bridge any moment now.

  I’d been out here a few times on business, that business usually involving some trouble with young Trent. I knew the general layout of the first floor of the house’s interior. And I knew where the guards would be now in the shadows.

  I decided the best way to come in was from the southwest. If things were as they’d once been, there’d be a perimeter man there with a shotgun. Webley’s men wore khaki uniforms not unlike those of law enforcement’s. He liked things official-looking.

  The trick would be distract the guard, then take him out in some fashion. The difficulty was getting close to him without getting shot. I wasn’t town marshal anymore. He wouldn’t have any hesitation about shooting me.

  Dusty grass, silvered by moonlight; the rim of a forest cast in deep shadow; oil lamps burning in half-a-dozen mullioned windows. This was what lay before me as I approached from the north.

  I considered but rejected the ancient Indian trick of coming in fast on your horse, rider concealed on the far side so it looked as if there were no rider. Webley’s men knew all the old tricks. And a lot of newer ones I hadn’t heard about yet, I was sure. He hired them cold-blooded, not stupid.

  The fire was the best idea, I decided by the time I’d swung wide and come out near the forest. There was a small white gazebo far from the main house. It sat in the middle of a sea of buffalo grass about ten feet from a wide, clean creek.

  But it was close enough that the guard would investigate it himself before he’d call out for help.

  I spent twenty minutes in the woods putting together just the right amounts of dried foliage, twigs, and paper as a means of starting the fire. The paper I got from my saddlebags, a small catalog offering various kinds of fancy law-enforcement gear that I hadn’t had a chance to look at yet.


  If I took a direct run at the gazebo, the guard would likely spot me. That meant taking the creek. I could get right to where the gazebo was. This would cut way down on the chances of my being spotted.

  I had four lucifers. I should have brought more, but I hadn’t thought to check. The only thing that could stop me now was if I couldn’t get the fire going in four attempts.

  I ground-tied my horse and got to it.

  The creek was a good three feet deep in places. It smelled fresh and cool. But the red clay banks were at best two feet high. I had to crawl on my hands and knees, and even then I didn’t feel sure that the guard couldn’t spot me.

  I started crawling up near the woods. If I slipped into the creek any later, I was afraid he’d see me right off. It seemed like hours passed before I came within sight of the mansion. I cut my hands on sharp rocks. A couple of times, trying to keep hunched down, my feet slipped into the water, which was a hell of a lot colder and wetter than it had any right to be.

  I kept the Victorian spires-exotic-looking played against the moonlit sky-in constant view so I had some sense of progress. My left hand was filled with all the material for setting the fire.

  And then the snake was there.

  Now, I’m not particularly afraid of snakes. Don’t especially like them, but certainly don’t get all sweaty and nervous when somebody brings up the subject of reptiles. Or I see one for myself.

  But given the conditions-the night, trying to keep my body from peeking up over the edge of the creek bed, worried about how I was going to get into the mansion-I was really startled by the damned thing.

  It was a milk snake. That kind of gray, coiled, slimy thing you mostly see around dairy bams. But you see a pretty good number of them around creeks in summers, too. They like to sun themselves.

  It had been sleeping under a rock, presumably in or near its hole, when my hand nudged the jagged stone and the snake struck my hand.

  Milk snakes aren’t poisonous. Even their bite is pretty minor. But given the night, the moment, the thing scared the hell out of me.

  I didn’t scream. I wasn’t that surprised by it. But what I did do was jerk upward and then roll down into the creek, so that everything from my hips on down was in the water.

  I realized instantly what I’d done. The lucifers were in my left-hand pocket. I’d managed to keep the foliage and paper dry. But what good was foliage and paper if you didn’t have a match?

  I jerked my body from the water and immediately shoved my hand into my pocket. Brought up the lucifers.

  I held them one at a time up to the moonlight, held them up no higher than the creek bank, of course.

  Two of the matches were soaked. I tossed them away. Of the remaining two, one match head was damp on only one side. The other lucifer looked and felt dry.

  My chances of starting a fire were down to two-at best.

  At least I’d managed to keep the paper and kindling dry.

  Now for the first big risk, getting from the creek to the gazebo without being seen. I slowly raised my head until my eyes were level with the grass. From this angle I could see the gazebo and a good piece of the south side of the mansion. I didn’t see the guard anywhere. Was he walking around? Had he seen or heard me and decided to ambush me? Was he lying in wait on the far side of the gazebo?

  I had no choice except to find out. I crawled up over the bank, my soaked pants feeling like worms against my skin. I realized then that I’d forgotten to check my Colt. A bit of it had been in the water. Would it fire properly? Sometime tonight, I was sure going to need it.

  ***

  When I reached the halfway point to the gazebo, I saw him. The guard. He’d been far back in the shadows of the house. He now stepped into the moonlight and began his sentry duty of walking up and down his quadrant of the property. As soon as he turned and began walking, I dug in my elbows and started crawling even faster for the shelter of gazebo.

  The octagonal-shaped structure had steps on both sides. The problem was that the steps would expose me to the guard again. If he was standing in just the right place, he’d have no trouble seeing me crawl up and inside. The other problem was that I wouldn’t be able to see him while I was crawling up those steps. I’d just have to hope that he wasn’t within sight.

  I took a huge gulp of air and worked my way up the three steps. I couldn’t see the guard from where I was. That didn’t rule out the possibility that he’d seen me. He might be sneaking around in back of me right now.

  I got myself up into a crouching position. The gazebo interior consisted of a pewlike seat that stretched all the way around the interior wall. Dark red cushions covered the wood. Here and there you could see books and newspapers. Apparently, people came out here to read sometimes.

  I angled myself away from the two entrance points so that I could set up the fire. It had been years since I’d started even so much as a campfire. Trains and stagecoaches had spared most people from traveling long distances on horseback. And camping out every night on gassy beans and tooth-jarring hardtack.

  The first match, the one damp on one side, sparked for a moment, but then the match head itself disintegrated, first the wet side and then the dry, but cracked, other side. The flare had lasted no more than a moment.

  I crawled over to the edge of the entrance and dared a peek for the guard. He was back in place-though not lost in the shadows this time-and at the moment stoking up a cigarette.

  Given the fact that I had only one match, and given the fact that it might misfire and leave me with no fire, I decided to see if there was some way I could sneak up on the guard. I thought that maybe from a different angle-

  But no. No matter how sly I was, he’d see me. And shoot me.

  I haunched backward and decided to try my luck again with the fire.

  I fixed up alternating layers of foliage, paper, and broken pieces of dry wood. Then I took a sheet of paper and rolled it tight. If I got it to light, I wanted it to last awhile, as near to a candle as I could make it.

  A coyote; a dog; a piano played suddenly inside the house.

  A breeze, too chill on my wet legs; a smell of whiskey and cigars from some happy moment here in the gazebo; a couple of cigarette butts on the floor.

  I held the match close to my eyes. From what I could see, it looked perfectly fine. A good old reliable match. But what if it wasn’t? But there was no point in thinking that way. You get to a moment when thought doesn’t matter. Only action does. And there’s a kind of wary thrill to that moment. Your fate is in the hands of the gods and you can never outguess them, not ever.

  I closed my eyes, the way I did when I threw dice. I didn’t want to look. I wanted to open my eyes and be surprised. A good surprise.

  I struck the match on the dry wood floor of the gazebo. I could hear the sizzle when the flame came up, feel the heat scar my fingers.

  When I opened my eyes, the flame was burning true. I set it against the sheet of paper I’d rolled up tight. It ignited instantly.

  I leaned down and touched the paper to the fire material I’d prepared.

  That’s when it went all to hell.

  The stuff I’d gathered wouldn’t ignite. I wondered if it had been sprayed with creek water and I just hadn’t noticed it.

  The lucifer flame continued to bum down. Only seconds left now.

  I quickly shifted the paper and foliage and in shifting them, saw the trouble. The leaves wouldn’t burn. Even though they looked dead, there must be traces of life shot through them, stubbornly resisting death.

  I had only moments left.

  I yanked the leaves from the fire material and set the last of the flame to the remaining stuff.

  It worked. The flame took. The fire burned.

  But this created another problem. The guard might not notice the fire right away. I’d hoped the leaves would slow the path of the burning. The material that was left would bum all too quickly. What if the guard didn’t see it before it burned out?

&nbs
p; I pushed the fire very near the entrance so that a blind man could probably spot it from where the guard stood. He might see me doing it, come up here, and we’d have a shootout, me with my six-gun and him with his shotgun. But I didn’t have any choice. I’d run out of tricks.

  The fire burned. I crouched in the shadows on the right side of the entrance.

  The way I knew he was coming was the jingling of his spurs. Somebody should have told this man that spurs weren’t a good idea if you might conceivably need to move about invisibly. Spurs could get you killed.

  I tried to be in his mind. He was responding to a fire. How did a fire ever get started in an empty gazebo?

  He’d be hitching that shotgun up a little higher now. And his finger would be nervous on the trigger. And he’d be wondering if he maybe should have called out for help. But he’d seen the little fire and his instincts had taken over. And he was the self-reliant sort, so why should he call out for help when it was just this teeny-tiny fire and wouldn’t he look like seven kinds of dipshit for calling out for help? They’d probably make fun of him-you know how the bunkhouse crowd was-they’d be on him for days.

  But now that he was drawing closer-

  Now that he was seeing this little fire-

  This little fire that looked for all the world like it had been purposely set-

  Well, he clutched his shotgun tighter, ready to shoot whenever he felt it was necessary-

  That’s what I would’ve been thinking anyway.

  Then the jingling of his spurs got louder, closer by.

  And that was when I got my first glimpse of his hat. It looked like a modified sombrero of some sort. And told you a lot about its owner. He’d be a jaunty cuss, this one, very dramatic in how he presented himself. Given to a lot of saloon self-mythologizing. Hell, I remember this one time down in Juarez, it was just me ’n Bobby Lee Grunewald against these fourteen vaqueros, see? We didn’t think we had a chance. But me ’n Bobby Lee Grunewald, we jes’ started a-shootin’, and before you know it they was all dead, fourteen vaqueros layin’ at our feet.