Killing Time In Eternity - Edge Series 4 (9 page)

‘No love lost?’

44

‘Flynt is a lazy good for nothing man. And he hasn’t got the disposition to have strong feelings about anybody, I’d say. He wouldn’t put himself out to do much about anything. And if he’s taken up with that hired killer Warner again, well, I don’t . . . ‘ She sighed. ‘Folks are entitled to pick their friends, I’ll allow. But when a man’s as mean and unscrupulous as Clay Warner, some of it’s bound to rub off on people who associate with him.’

‘I heard he was a deputy in Eternity at one time?’

She scowled her disdain. ‘Ward Flynt gave him a badge and that’s the title he had for awhile. He broke a few heads and once he shot a man, but he didn’t kill him, thankfully.’

‘In the line of duty?’ Edge asked.

‘It was one of those times when some Texas drovers were in town and raising their usual Cain. It almost caused a riot, the way Warner was so fast to pull a gun and crack men over the head with it. Then he shot the wrangler and local people organised a petition.’ She shook her head reflectively. ‘Which claimed that if word was spread that Eternity had a lawman who just up and shot noisy drunks the cattlemen would head for some other Kansas railhead town to ship their beef in future. So the marshal fired that trigger happy gunslinger and Warner left town before sundown.’

‘But now he’s back,’ Edge said as the two riders drew close enough for their expressions to be read. And
vice versa.

Warner was smiling at the glowering Sue Ellen. Flynt looked uncomfortably around at everyone. Edge was impassive.

‘Sue Ellen, Mr Edge,’ the lawman greeted without warmth. ‘Do you mind telling me what the two of you are doing out here?’

‘It’s a free country and this is open range, marshal,’ the woman replied frostily. ‘But if you truly feel it has anything to do with you, I came here to see if the doc’s wreath for Billy needed replacing.’

Flynt looked even more disconcerted and cleared his throat noisily. ‘It’s just that this is a dangerous stretch of railroad line, Sue Ellen. As you surely know after what happened to Billy.’

Edge peered pointedly in both directions, the gesture tacitly implying that on a morning with weather as clear as this, it was possible to see for long distances to both far horizons and so be warned in good time of the approach of a train. Sue Ellen’s deep set, pale blue eyes fixed Warner with a glare and her tone was acid as she accused through pursed lips: ‘As I recall, anywhere can be a dangerous place if this hot tempered gunslinger is close by.’

45

Warner’s insecure smile wavered a little as his mouth line tightened. Then he shook his head and excused defensively: ‘I did my job as I saw fit, Miss Spencer. And as soon as the marshal told me it wasn’t the way he wanted it done, I quit. Ain’t that right, Ward?’

‘Water under the bridge, Clay.’ Flynt eyed Edge quizzically as he took up his reins and prompted: ‘You didn’t say why you were out here, mister? I saw you leave town. And awhile later I noticed that Miss Spencer rode out in the same direction. Some kind of romantic assignation?’ He smiled briefly, but deepening unease undermined his pretence at good humour.

The woman snorted her irritation as Edge said: ‘Testing my new horse, marshal. And I happened to be headed back this way when the lady showed up.’

‘Happy coincidence,’ Warner muttered.

‘Coming from your twisted mind, I guess that’s intended to mean something dirty you didn’t say?’ Sue Ellen accused.

Warner’s now more secure smile stayed firmly in place as he shrugged. ‘I just meant that I reckoned it’d be nice for any man out for a morning ride to meet up with a fine looking woman. That’s all I meant, Miss Spencer.’

She countered vehemently: ‘I welcome a compliment from a man like you as much as I would the bite of a rattlesnake!’

She jerked her mount into a wheel and angled him away from the railroad toward the trail on the other side of the hollow.

‘As I guess you’ve figured out, Edge, Sue Ellen Spencer and me ain’t exactly the best of friends,’ Warner rasped with a grimace.

Edge said evenly: ‘I admire your taste in enemies, feller.’

Flynt switched his gaze rapidly between the two men, the marshal clearly disturbed by the undisguised mutual dislike. ‘Clay and me are old
friends
, mister. Maybe we don’t exactly see eye to eye in the way to uphold law and order, but Clay’s had valuable experience all over the country. Tracking down wanted men and seeing that justice gets done. I brought him out here this morning to show him what little evidence there is to do with the way Billy Childs died.’

‘Hell, Ward, you don’t have to explain yourself to this guy!’ Warner eyed Edge with contempt. ‘A storekeeper who’ll be back saddle tramping soon as he can sell up, the way I figure it?’

‘Happen to agree with you about not needing an explanation, feller,’ Edge said evenly and clucked his horse forward, following the line ridden by the woman. ‘But I’m not so sure of my future plans as you seem to be. It could be I’ll stick around, whatever happens with the Quinn store.’

46

Warner growled: ‘Well, you be real careful.’

Flynt demanded anxiously: ‘What’s that supposed to mean, Clay? I hope you ain’t meaning to threaten – ‘

Warner showed a broad grin as he nodded toward Sue Ellen Spencer riding across the hollow. ‘Hell, I just meant for Mr Edge here to take care if he has an eye for that fine looking female, Ward. Seemed to me that the last time I was in town she was husband hunting. And she still hasn’t got any jewellery on the third finger of her left hand.’

‘Appreciate your concern, feller,’ Edge said sardonically over a shoulder. ‘Especially since I have to allow the name Eternity has a certain ring to it.’

47

CHAPTER • 6

______________________________________________________________________

EDGE MADE less effort to catch up with Sue Ellen Spencer than she did to be
overhauled and they rode side by side at a slow pace in silence for a minute or so. Then they both looked back and saw in the distance that Flynt and Warner had dismounted and hitched their horses to the telegraph pole on which the faded wreath was hung.

‘I’ve never been certain that feminine intuition can be trusted as much as some women pretend, Mr Edge,’ she murmured grimly. ‘But at the moment I have a very strong feeling I’m being talked about by those two back there.’

Edge took out the makings and answered: ‘You and me as a pair, I reckon. Warner figures that you’re husband hunting and I told him – ‘

‘The darn nerve of the man!’ She directed an embittered grimace over her shoulder.

‘Why is it that every unmarried woman over thirty is accused of . . . of being some kind of predatory animal constantly on the look out for any half way presentable man to lure into matrimony?’

‘I guess you don’t expect me to give you an answer to that?’

She shook her head angrily and glanced back once more to stress that her ill feeling was directed elsewhere. Then she drew a deep breath and showed a fleeting smile that lit her pale blue eyes and shaped her wide mouth in a combination that made her look at her attractive best. ‘I’m sorry I sound so cynical. But what with one thing and another, this hasn’t started out to be the best of days for me. How about you? Have you had any luck finding a buyer for the old Sims haberdashery?’

‘Are you thinking of going into store-keeping now you’re out of a job?’

She remained good-humoured. ‘Even if I was and if I had the money, I hardly think men’s tailoring would be a suitable line of work for me. Although it could provide me with a happy hunting ground for a husband maybe?’

His smile was no more than polite. ‘Do you mind if we save small talk about my commercial problems for another time, Miss Spencer? I’d prefer it if you’d tell me everything you know about how Billy Childs died?’

She had the kind of face that could alter its style of attractiveness unintentionally with the slightest change of her mood. She was puzzled now and with her head tilted slightly to one side she looked like a little girl lost. ‘Why should you be interested in how Billy died?’

Edge finished rolling the cigarette, hung it at the side of his mouth and lit it. ‘There are quite a few reasons, lady. Such as how Charles Childs was planning to buy the store for 48

his son, for instance. And how the same feller who killed him and Shelby tried to gun me down. And I’ve got a stink of rottenness in my nostrils that’s been there ever since I heard Childs and Shelby talking in the saloon. And the way a bounty hunter like Warner is such a close buddy of the Eternity lawman and – ‘

She cut in: ‘All right, Mr Edge, I’ll – ‘

‘Just Edge will be fine.’

‘I’m sorry?’ With her head cocked to one side again and the quizzical expression slightly twisting her lips, Edge was finding Sue Ellen Spencer more appealing by the moment.

‘I’ve been a one name man for a lot of years.’

‘All right, Edge. Ask away.’

‘Tell me about Billy Childs?’

‘Where to begin?’ She shrugged then nodded. ‘First, I want to make it quite clear that there was nothing of a romantic nature between Billy and me. I’d known him since he was eight and the near twenty years between our ages didn’t lessen as he grew into a young man, of course.’ She eyed him levelly and drew an impassive nod. ‘And I got to know him even better after he became involved in the Washington Memorial Theatre. He wasn’t a bad actor for an amateur. Plus I worked for his father, you understand?’

‘Sure, Miss Spencer.’

She smiled. ‘If you don’t mind all the eager chatterboxes of Eternity reading into it that I’m setting my cap at you, you can call me Sue Ellen?’

‘Sure, Sue Ellen.’

‘Good.’ She sighed and gathered her thoughts. ‘Well, the theatre is run by a small group of dedicated supporters. A number of us act and others sell tickets and build scenery and do prompting – that kind of thing. I’m one of those who loves the theatre, but I don’t have the talent to step out on to a stage in front of an audience.’ She glanced at the undemonstrative Edge and hurried on: ‘We all have to work very hard during the time when we’re putting on a play which can be for six months or so from start to finish: planning and rehearsing it and then staging it for just a few days. We had an opening night last night and we’ll close on Saturday.’

‘So you’re a pretty close knit bunch while you’re doing a play?’

‘We certainly are. We see much more of each other than we usually do. So, it’s not only me who can tell you about how troubled Billy was during the last few weeks of his life.’

She made a rueful clucking sound with her tongue and shrugged. ‘But I was something like an older sister to him. In some ways even closer than that even in a strange sort of way. 49

Because I wasn’t a blood relation he seemed to feel able to tell me more than he could his father. And he confided in me sometimes.’

‘Did he do that lately?’

She met his quizzical gaze and expressed sadness as they rode to within sight of town. Then as Edge tossed away his cigarette butt, she looked over a shoulder, saw no sign of Flynt and Warner and answered: ‘No he didn’t - not recently. In the past when he was troubled about something that had to do with a play or his father or his work or maybe a girl, he’d tell me about it. More often than not without me needing to ask him what was bothering him. Even if I did ask and for a while he’d say it was nothing, he’d eventually come around. And talk to me.’

‘But not this time?’

They reached the meeting of the trails alongside the deserted depot and turned on to the start of Main Street where people were now patronising the business premises along both sides of the curving street. And Edge once again became aware of the dank smell of Eternity: like the community was built in an expanse of dense timber where the sun never penetrated. Although this morning the sun continued to shed bright if cold light on the town as an ominous bank of dark cloud began to form to the north.

‘And not in the usual way, either,’ Sue Ellen said dolefully. ‘On account of how I’d known Billy from when he was a child, and I knew pretty much the kind of person he had grown into. And since I’d worked with him as an actor I think I understood even more about the emotions he was capable of.’

Edge became aware of how some of the people on the sidewalks were showing surreptitious interest in the woman and himself riding side by side along the street. But Sue Ellen appeared oblivious to her surroundings as she went on: