Killing Time In Eternity - Edge Series 4 (22 page)

Warner rasped: ‘I think it’s best that you concentrate on your courting and leave matters of the law to men paid to take care of such things, mister.’

Edge moved gingerly to the door, shot a doleful glance at the curled up corpse and took out the makings as he said evenly: ‘Be my guest, feller. I’m hurting and I’m hungry and I’m happy to let you two go to work on finding out why what happened here happened.’

Flynt sighed and said sourly: ‘All these killings are starting to play havoc with my brain. I just can’t see what they can have to do with each other.’

‘Tell you one thing they all got in common, Ward,’ Warner suggested and peered fixedly at Edge in the doorway.

‘What’s that?’ Flynt’s tone was indifferent and he clearly did not expect to be given a constructive response.

‘Edge was close by when that New York detective and the local doc got gunned down last night. Then he found Colbert with a knife stuck in him this afternoon. Now there’s Benson here with his head caved in.’

‘I can’t deny it,’ Edge allowed evenly as he turned to leave the house. ‘Though I can explain it as coincidence. Even if that ain’t something I usually set much store by.’

‘Damn it, I guess we better get Gannon up here to take care of another body,’ Flynt said and trailed Edge out of the house. Added quickly as Warner made to follow them: ‘You stay here until Joel shows up and does what he has to do, Clay. We don’t want anyone barging in and getting scared out of their wits from finding the colonel this way.’

Warner rasped something under his breath that was obviously a complaint about being given yet another chore he did not welcome.

Edge held back to light the newly rolled cigarette and Flynt pushed on ahead, not wanting to become involved in a time wasting exchange with his deputy. Then beyond the gate he slowed down for the cautiously walking Edge to catch up with him and said with a gesture in the opposite direction to the one they were headed:

‘Sue Ellen Spencer lives three houses up from Benson’s house, Edge. If supper with her really was the reason you were here tonight.’

116

‘It was the reason sure enough. But after what happened I need to get cleaned up again to visit with a lady. I didn’t know she’d invited you and the gunslinger along as well?’

Flynt shrugged. ‘Nothing special brought us here. Despite what certain folks may say I do my best to run a tight town. And I was just making my usual evening round before going home for supper. Clay came along to keep me company. We saw Walt Benson’s door was open, which wasn’t as it should be on a night as cold and damp as this. Then we saw the light when you lit the lamp.’

‘And you didn’t see a couple of fellers – ‘

‘We never saw a soul on the street and that’s the truth, mister. But is it the truth you didn’t go to see Benson for a different reason than the one you gave me? Maybe to pick his brains on something that happened in Eternity before you got here? For instance to try to get a line on Billy Childs’ death that seems to interest you so much?’

‘I already talked with Benson, marshal. If you want to check on what I told you, let’s go see Sue Ellen and you can ask her?’

Flynt sighed and shook his head. ‘I’ve got more pressing business at the moment. Hang on here for a minute, will you?’

They had arrived outside Gannon’s premises and Edge welcomed standing still for a time on the empty street in the quiet town with a few lighted windows while Flynt went into the undertakers. He smoked his cigarette and decided he could not tell if the pains in his belly and back were getting worse or lessening after the mild exercise of the short walk. When the lawman re-appeared after a minute or so he was still talking to Gannon through the open doorway. ‘ . . . and tell Clay Warner he’s finished for the day. I got some private business to attend to.’ He closed the door and lowered his voice to ask of Edge: ‘I figure you think I’m pretty dumb to be a town marshal, ain’t that so?’

Edge had not only been considering the extent of his discomfort while he waited outside the premises of the small town undertaker who had been so busy lately. He had also reflected briefly on how this was the first time since early morning that he had been with the marshal without Warner being within earshot. ‘I figure you to be the kind of man who gets fixed ideas that can be hard to shift a lot of the time, feller.’

Flynt scowled then gave a curt nod. ‘Nobody’s perfect. And anyway, sometimes that’s not a fault to my way of thinking, mister.’

Edge started to move out across the street with a careful gait and Flynt fell in alongside him, seemingly without thinking about how the other man had taken the initiative. ‘But I reckon you’re having second thoughts about the way Billy Childs died and how his father was gunned down?’

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Flynt nodded absently and allowed: ‘I can see how it probably was just plain coincidence that put you close to all the killings except for the kid. But this many dead men and all coming at once . . . I figure that’s not coincidence. But I can’t work out just what it is.’

‘Me neither, marshal.’

There were sounds from across the street behind them and they glanced back as the tall and overweight, dungaree-clad Gannon drove a wagon slowly out from the alley beside his premises. A single plain pine coffin rested on the flatbed rig. They faced front again and Flynt said grimly:

‘Are we heading down to my office for some reason, Edge? Because if Warner sees a light on he’ll be sure to come in and want to know what’s going on. And I don’t mind admitting that I can do without having him around for a while.’

‘I’m going to the Childs house.’

‘You are? Didn’t you take a look there after I said - ?’

‘I went and I found something in Billy’s room that ought to interest you now you’re a little more open minded about the kid’s death. Mary Whittier was there when I stopped by but if ever one’s needed you’ll be a more reliable witness that I don’t do anything I shouldn’t with what could be important evidence.’

They turned on to the short street and Flynt waited on the porch of the darkened house at the end while Edge went in through the unlocked door and climbed the stairway, trying not to wince with every painful upward step. He recalled enough of the geography of the house not to need a light and quickly found the box he was looking for in the wardrobe. He took out the letters and returned the box. Then went back down the stairway, stepped outside and fastened the door behind him.

‘You gonna give me some kinda hint of what this is all about?’ the irritably intrigued lawman asked as he eyed the bundle of paper that Edge had brought out of the house.

‘The way it looks, the Childs kid had one almighty yen for your sister, feller,’ he was told evenly.

‘Billy and Beth?’ Flynt was incredulous and even angrier than before. ‘What the hell are you talking about, mister? I know Beth and him were both wrapped up in the play acting at the theatre. But outside of that . . . Beth and Billy Childs? She would have said something to me. No, Edge, you’ve got it wrong. They just don’t go together as a couple, not in my mind.’

‘I don’t think they ever did, except in the boy’s mind.’ Edge held out the letters toward Flynt, who took them with a quizzical frown. ‘A little bedtime reading for you, marshal.’

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Flynt shook his head, expanding disbelief and simmering anger contributing to his scowl. He moved off down the walk and out through the gateway in the hedge on to the dead end of the street and beckoned for Edge to follow him. ‘I don’t have any idea what I’ve got here, mister, but if you don’t mind, I’d like to have your company while I find out. And it’s not that I don’t trust Clay in a lot of ways, but it’s gotta be someplace he won’t find me?’

‘Sure, feller.’

‘He’s got a real mean temper, has Clay. And about the only person in the world he gives more than two cents for is my sister. So I want to know exactly what’s in these envelopes before I have to show him. In case I need to prepare him: maybe keep him from blowing his top.’

‘The kid who wrote those letters is a long way beyond the reach of any more harm,’

Edge reminded.

‘I know that!’ Flynt snapped. ‘But when he’s in a bad temper Clay’s likely to lash out at anyone he even thinks is gonna rub him up the wrong way. And for some reason you stick in his craw every time he lays eyes on you. So, I’d appreciate it if we could go over to your place where he ain’t likely to show up?’

Edge shrugged and started across Main Street. ‘No sweat.’

‘And you said you wanted to clean up anyway? Before you go and have supper with Sue Ellen?’

Edge’s need to eat had recently become of more pressing concern than to wash up and clean his clothes of mud. But then, with Flynt moving on ahead at a fast pace, anxious to get off the street before Warner finished his chore and spotted them, Edge reached the front of the Quinn and Son store troubled only by the fresh pains triggered by the haste of keeping up with the eager marshal.

He led the way through the parlour, lit a lamp and pointed to the more comfortable of two easy chairs. Invited the lawman to go through the letters while he went into the kitchen and used cold water to wash the worst of the mud off his hands and face. When he returned he saw that the earlier surprise, intrigue and incredulity allied with irritability had given way entirely to tautly controlled rage within Ward Flynt’s solidly built frame.

‘Hell, that boy sure did have a twisted mind, Edge!’ Without looking up he set aside one letter and reached for another.

‘And somebody with a twisted mind is liable to do anything – to others or himself?’

Flynt detected the cynicism is the other man’s tone and now looked sharply at Edge who was crouched in front of the stove, stirring more heat out of the embers.

‘Like to get himself killed or to kill himself, right?’

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Edge straightened up cautiously, went back into the kitchen to bring the newly filled coffeepot and put it on the stove. ‘I’ve been smitten by a few women in my time, feller.’

‘Yeah, the same here, I suppose.’ The naturally mean shape of his mouth line softened for a moment and he nodded reflectively.

Edge went on: ‘But they all came a little later in life for me than for Billy Childs. When I was his age I was too busy working the family farm and then there was a war to fight. Not much time for women . . . For romancing them, anyway. When there was the time I had a more adult outlook on life.’

‘Yeah, all right. You don’t believe that Billy killed himself. On account of my sister or anything else?’

Edge shook his head as he hogged the heat of the stove. ‘Wrong, marshal. I’m not sure about that one way or the other yet. Because I’ve lived long enough not to take too many things at face value. Often feel the need to look at them long and up close if I need to look at them at all. And for myself, if I want something, I’ll do all I can to get it by any damn means I can think of. And only when I’ve tried everything and don’t get what I want, then maybe I’ll give up trying.’

‘That’s easy enough for you to say, mister,’ Flynt growled. Edge gently massaged his aching belly. ‘Yeah, but it’s taken me a lot of living through a lot of tough times to learn where to draw the lines.’

Flynt looked about to take the exchange further, but then he sighed deeply and returned to reading the letters. Which gave Edge the opportunity to bring two mugs from the kitchen, wait for the water to heat and pour some coffee, one mug of which he put down on the table where the lawman was getting to the end of his study of the letters. Edge was sitting by the stove drinking the coffee when Flynt was through reading, lifted his mug, took a sip and grimaced as he muttered:

‘One thing your long life of learning ain’t taught you is how to make decent coffee, Edge. This stuff is strong enough to stop timber from rotting.’

‘Something else it taught me, feller. This strong is the way I like it. And nobody else has to drink it if they don’t want to.’

The lawman’s scowl weakened as he muttered: ‘Which from my point of view means that beggars can’t be choosers, right?’

Edge shrugged, starting to get impatient with his visitor. He felt hungry again now he was warmer, cleaner and more comfortable.

Flynt shuffled the letters into a neat pile and said with a nod toward them: ‘These call to mind another well known saying: that faint heart never won a fair lady?’

‘Sure.’

120

‘So they probably ain’t important in what’s been happening around this town lately?

Unless they mean the Childs kid killed himself for love of my kid sister?’

‘Seems like,’ Edge allowed.

‘I’d like to know who it was he talked to of the way he felt toward Beth.’

‘Yeah.’

Flynt took one more swallow of the coffee, pulled a harsher face than before, set down the mug and picked up the letters as he stood up. ‘I reckon I should keep these. As evidence, if that’s what they turn out to be, like you said earlier?’

Edge inclined his head. ‘If it turns out the faint heart got brave on the night he was killed and – ‘

‘I never thought of that, damnit!’

‘The way men are getting killed so regularly in your town, marshal, I guess you can be forgiven for not taking time out to sit and think about anything for too long too often.’

Flynt pushed the letters deep into a pocket of his topcoat. ‘Whatever, it’s best I don’t let Clay see these?’

There was a question implied in the tone he used, but Edge ignored it. ‘I’ll see you around, marshal. And I hope next time it won’t be on account of finding another corpse in Eternity.’