Killer's Draw: The Circuit Rider (11 page)

The three of them sat in the parlor at Mrs. Wolfe’s Boardinghouse. Mrs. Egans had insisted on heading directly there, whereupon she deposited her luggage in Bertram’s former room, freshened up, and met Tower and Morrison for afternoon tea.

Tower had received a chilly reception from Mrs. Wolfe, but he ignored her obvious distaste at his presence. The woman seemed to relax her negative attitude toward Mrs. Egans, although clearly she was a bit put off.

Now, they sank into their respective chairs around the fireplace. There was wood in the hearth, but it hadn’t been lit, as the day was still warm. Mrs. Egans set her teacup on the black lacquered table that was between the chairs, then folded her hands in her lap.

“I suppose the shock has worn off,” she said, answering Morrison’s question as to her general condition. “Now all that’s left is sadness. Bertram did not have an easy life. I thought he had finally found his way with his religion, and it certainly seemed that he had. Now this.”

Tower wondered about what kind of reception the woman would receive from the townspeople of Big River. He hoped they would temper their obvious disdain for the woman’s dead son.

Mrs. Egans’ refinement came as a bit of a surprise to Tower. Judging by her letters, he had not expected the woman now in front of him to speak with such a deep and richly cultured voice.

“I made arrangements to come as soon as the news reached me,” she said. “But even a woman like me with a simple life can encounter complications with getting away for an extended period of time. It took more planning that I would have thought.”

“How were you notified?” Tower asked. “About Bertram?”

“Father Silas sent word.”

She sighed, picked up her teacup, and sipped as Tower wondered if the woman knew he was in possession of her letters. He considered telling her and offering to return them but something held him back.

“May I ask why you ultimately decided to come to Big River?” Tower asked.

“I felt I owed him that, Mr. Tower,” the woman said. “I may not have been there for him at certain points in his life, but I felt that we had made a tentative connection again and that our bond was healing. I wanted to be here for him now, even though he is gone.”

She set down her teacup a bit too firmly on the table. The sound seemed to startle her.

“Have they found the person responsible?” she asked.

Tower glanced at Morrison, who caught the nonverbal suggestion that he answer the question.

“The short answer is that they have not caught your son’s killer,” Morrison said. “Yet.”

“Somehow, I knew that would be the answer,” she said. “I assume that would have been the first thing you would have told me.”

“I wish we were able to give you that good news,” Tower said.

“You should know, Mrs. Egans, that the investigation is continuing,” Morrison said. “In fact, Father Silas has asked Mr. Tower here to look into it as well.”

“Are the local authorities not up to the job?”

Morrison shifted uncomfortably in his chair.

“The local authorities are doing the best they can,” Tower said. “However, before I answered my calling, I worked for some time as an investigator. I believe Silas thought I might be able to help. And if not, he may have simply sent me out here for a second opinion.”

“It doesn’t sound like there is a first opinion yet, though; am I correct?”

Smart woman
, Tower thought.

“That’s correct,” he said.

Bird was surprised by the patience displayed by Henry Jones and Mr. Seven. When she hunkered down in her room in Harlan’s Crossing, she figured they would come for her around midnight or so. In their minds, that would have given her plenty of time to get even more drunk and then pass out, dead to the world. At which time, they could make her dead to the real world.

But they hadn’t made their move by one o’clock in the morning.

They actually waited until three.

And when they arrived, they did it in style. There was the faintest creaking of floorboards just outside her door, followed by a scrape then a thunderous crash as the door was knocked completely off its hinges. The door fell forward amid shouts and grunts and dark shadows accompanied by a cacophony of gunfire. Bullets exploded all around Bird, but she held steady until she could make out the clear definition of a man, then unloaded both barrels from the rented shotgun, figuring the man assigned the door-breaking task would be Mr. Seven.

She was wrong.

The double-aught shot obliterated the first man in, painting the wall behind him with an explosion of dark blood. But Bird had caught a glimpse of the man’s face and recognized him to be one of the two men she’d seen in the restaurant while defending herself from the man calling himself Ronald Hale.

Dammit
, she thought.

Bird tossed aside the shotgun, drew both pistols and shot the next man through the door, who turned out to be the first man’s dining companion from the restaurant.

And then two things happened.

Henry Jones darted into the room, and flattened himself against the wall, with his hands up.

Bird drew a bead on him.

“I’m not here to hurt you,” he shouted.

This statement was followed by an explosion of glass that showered Bird with lacerating fragments. She hesitated for just a moment before shooting Henry Jones with her left pistol, putting a bullet dead center in his forehead. And then Mr. Seven was through the window and across the room, grabbing her right arm and throwing her through the window. Bird had the sensation of being caught in a ferocious wind, the walls around her blurring with speed, a pain in her shoulder, and then she was being heaved over the narrow walkway and cast-iron railing, down two stories before she landed flat on her back in the street. The impact was brutal, driving all of the air from her lungs. Bird gasped, struggling to breathe.

She saw blackness and stars. Whether it was the sky or the blanket of pain and shock that she felt throughout her body she could not decide. She clenched her left hand. It was empty. She clenched her right. The gun butt was still there.

Bird blinked and rolled onto her left side, happy to see that she really had been staring at the sky, and now the images of a dirt street from ground level and distorted buildings on either side took shape in her vision.

Along with the foot of Mr. Seven crashing into her stomach.

The pain was all-consuming and fierce, and her mouth was suddenly full of blood. She felt no fear or panic, just pain and the sensation of something kicking against the palm of her right hand. She then realized that although she was firing her pistol over and over, the hammer was clacking on empty chambers. Her view of the street was replaced by the face of Mr. Seven.

With the top of his head gone.

Bird couldn’t breathe, the air was still refusing to enter her lungs, and her mouth was full of blood.

She smiled, and blood poured from her mouth.

She had cut down Mr. Seven.

Turned him into Mr. Three and a Half.

Tower thought about Mrs. Egans. Morrison said he would help the woman get settled, then give her a quick tour of Big River so she could make her way around on her own. Mrs. Egans hadn’t mentioned how long she planned on staying in Big River, and neither he nor Morrison felt the need to ask. Tower figured the answer would be that she was going to stay as long as she needed to, which was the way Tower was approaching this case, as well.

Tower walked back into the main street of Big River. He thought the woman was holding up pretty well. A child dying had to be every parent’s worst nightmare.

If nothing else, maybe the woman could get closure, as long as Tower found out who was responsible for her son’s murder. But he didn’t feel an overwhelming sense of confidence with regard to the investigation. It seemed like every day brought new questions instead of answers. And the old questions hadn’t been answered yet either.

Tower thought back to his first time reading through the papers Silas had given him. He had come to a decision regarding the documents he had studied on the train and continued to read. He would go back to his hotel room, pore over everything one more time, box them up, and give them to Mrs. Egans tomorrow. Once he had learned everything he could, he no longer had a need for them—and she was the rightful owner. It wouldn’t be right to keep them any longer.

He couldn’t help but think, however, that an answer was still somewhere to be found in those notes and letters. Something that he had overlooked. The thought nagged at him, irritating him and leaving behind a sense of frustration.

As he continued his walk, Tower shook off his negative thoughts and took a deep breath. The night was alive in Big River. A herd had come in earlier in the day, the cowboys had been paid, and laughter, shouting, and music poured out of the saloons. Occasionally, a gunshot could be heard.

He thought of years back when he would have been in there, a drink in his hand and a gun on his hip. Spoiling for a fight, a chance to work out the anger he felt inside by delivering pain to a complete stranger.

He was glad to no longer be a part of it. He had come to terms with his own pain, his own past, and no longer felt the need to demand answers from people who had no hope of providing them.

Tower’s thoughts were interrupted by the sudden appearance of a rider at the end of the street. The white on the horse’s chest caught Tower’s eye. He knew the horse and he knew the rider.

He raced ahead, caught the Appaloosa by the reins and pulled Bird from the saddle. Even in the dark, he could see the blood on her face, the way she slumped forward, the dark stains on the front of her chest. He quickly looked for signs of an obvious gunshot wound but found none.

Tower lifted her, remembered where the doctor’s office was, and carried her easily in his arms, running down the street until he turned a corner and spotted the medical sign in the window. He kicked at the door with his foot and was nearly ready to kick it in when someone partially opened it from within.

The face of a young woman, her brown hair pinned back behind her ears, took in the sight of Bird and immediately stepped back, opening the door wider.

“Tower,” Bird said. Her voice was soft and he looked at her face. Her eyes were glazed and unfocused.

“Shh,” Tower said.

The woman gestured for Tower to come inside, and pointed to a table in the center of the room.

He crossed over to it, set Bird down as gently as possible, and leaned down toward her face.

“Tower,” she said again.

The woman who’d opened the door moved behind the table and lit two brass oil lamps. The room brightened considerably as an older man appeared in the doorway.

“Just breathe,” Tower said to Bird.

“Jeffire,” she whispered.

She started coughing. More blood trickled from the corner of her mouth.

The doctor appeared next to Tower. “Well, that coughing doesn’t sound very promising,” he said. “You’re going to have to step aside, young man. Frannie and I will take over from here.”

“Tower,” Bird said. “Martha Jeffire. She lied to us. I think he’s there.”

“That’s enough!” the doctor said, as he pulled Bird’s gun belt from her hips and his assistant began cutting away Bird’s shirt.

“Frannie, get me some whiskey,” the doctor said.

Tower looked at Bird.

“My kind of doc,” she said, smiling, and then her eyes closed.

Martha Jeffire opened the door upon Tower’s knock.

“Oh,” she said. “I wasn’t expecting you.”

“I just need to talk to you about something,” Tower said. “It won’t take very long.”

She stepped aside, and shuffled uncertainly. Tower noted that she didn’t have the same quiet composure she’d shown on his last visit.

“If you have any of that coffee, I would greatly appreciate it,” Tower said, trying to put her at ease. “I remember it from the last time I was here. Thankfully, you forced a cup on me and I still recall how good it was.”

“I’ve just started a pot,” she said.

“We’ll definitely need some,” Tower said. “I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news.”

Tower sat at the table. When the coffee was ready, Martha Jeffire poured him a cup, set it on the table in front of him, then sat down in the opposite chair.

“Let me be as direct as I can possibly be,” Tower said. “I believe I have found your husband’s body.”

The lie came out of his mouth as easy as he could deliver it. He knew that Martha Jeffire wouldn’t believe him. But he just needed a small amount of time.

“What do you mean, his body?” she asked.

Tower ignored the question and said, “I need to draw a map of where I found him,” he said. “Do you have a pencil and paper?”

Martha Jeffire looked at him for a brief moment, then fetched a yellow ledger with a black fountain pen.

Tower wrote,
Where are they?
As he said, “This is roughly where I rode today.”

He handed her the pen.

She wrote,
In the pantry behind the kitchen
, and he said, “And it was right about here, between this valley and this river.”

He wrote on the paper,
How many
?

She held up one finger.

“That coffee was so good I could use another cup,” he said. “And then I can show you exactly where I found him.”

As she got up and went to the kitchen Tower followed her, grabbing the pot of hot coffee. He slipped past Martha Jeffire, opened the door to the pantry and threw the coffee directly into the face of a cowboy who was sitting on top of a bound Roger Jeffire. The cowboy had a pistol in his holster and a dime-store novel in his hands.

The scalding coffee burned his face and he screamed, dropped the book, and covered his face. He shot to his feet, planning to run into the kitchen, Tower assumed. So Tower kneed him in the groin, then whipped a vicious uppercut that smashed into the man’s mouth, splitting his lips and knocking several teeth onto the floor.

Tower grabbed him by the collar and dragged him from the pantry, took away his gun and pistol-whipped him. The blow knocked the man unconscious and he landed on his face on the kitchen floor.

Martha Jeffire used a paring knife to cut her husband free and remove the gag from his mouth.

“Thank you,” he said to Tower. He hugged Martha, who had begun to cry. “We don’t have much time,” Jeffire said. “We have to get to the
Bugle
office. Now.”