Love and Glory: The Coltrane Saga, Book 3 (26 page)

A bowl of delicious-smelling beef stew from the saloon kitchen was placed before Travis.

While Travis ate, Sam said, “Maybe we can leave for home in a day or two.”

“What’s your hurry?” Travis eyed Sam curiously over another helping of the stew, ignoring the smiling waitress who brought it.

“I figured you’d want to get back to little John.”

“I do, but I need time. What can I offer my son? A broken man for a father? A little boy needs a mother. I can’t give him one. I can’t give him anything right now. He’s better off with Mattie Glass. Kitty’s land will one day be his, I’ll see to that. She’d want it that way and so would John Wright. What I need to do is get my life in order. But there’s no need in your hanging around waiting for me to do that, Sam. You’ve been a good friend. You’ve stood by me. I can’t ask for more than that. You’ve got your own life to live.”

“Sure,” Sam laughed shortly. “I’m just an old trail rat who ain’t happy unless I’m on the go. I’ll ride back with you when you go, but I don’t imagine I’ll hang around North Carolina for long.”

He leaned back in his chair, folding his arms across his stomach. “You know something, Travis?” he said in a thoughtful tone, going on without waiting for a reply. “In these past weeks, I’ve had a lot of time to look around here and I like what I’ve seen. I like the West. It’s new, fresh territory. It’s exciting just to think about being a part of all this.” He waved a hand in a wide gesture.

He leaned forward suddenly in his enthusiasm, the front chair legs hitting the floor with a thud as he propped his elbows on the table and rested his chin in his hands. His brown eyes were glowing. “Did you know that there are nearly two hundred silver mines within four square miles? This country is alive, Travis.
Alive!”
His fist pounded the table. “And to think the whole thing happened almost by accident. When the gold rush of ’49 in California petered out, the miners moved into Nevada and Colorado to look for more gold, but they found silver instead. Like the strike I told you about at the Ophir mine here. It’s booming. This is the place to be.”

Travis pushed the empty bowl aside and this time poured his own coffee. He was starting to feel human. “You’re saying you want to try prospecting, Sam?” he asked, suppressing his amusement. “You’ve got the silver fever like the rest of these lunatics.”

“Hell, no, not the fever,” Sam guffawed. “It’s the territory, boy. The West is where the excitement is. It’s like discovering a new world. Hell, it
is
a new world. I know now why the pioneers have such spirit. It’s a feeling that gets in the blood, and you can’t get it out. Why, to think of living back in North Carolina or even the Louisiana bayou just makes me feel smothered.”

“I can’t blame you,” Travis said sincerely. “If I didn’t have a son to care for, I’d probably stay.” He fell silent. “Trouble is, I’m just not ready to go back and face him yet.

“And there’s another reason,” he took a deep breath. “Kitty’s death is too fresh, Sam. I need time. If I go back there now, I’ll kill Nancy for causing it, and then I’ll kill Danton for waiting so long to tell me what he knew.” He shook his head slowly. “No, I can’t go back now.”

He licked his lips, thinking that a stiff drink would taste very good. But suddenly, all in a rush, he had sense enough to know that the time had come to stop hiding in the depths of a bottle.

Sam kept quiet, letting his friend do battle with his demons. After several minutes Travis said, “I’ll send a letter to Mattie and explain things, thank her again for watching John. I gave her most of my pay from the Haiti job before we came out here, so my son isn’t costing her anything and she’s got some extra money for herself. Still, I will always owe Mattie Glass a debt of gratitude. Quite a debt. What would I have done without her?”

A little later he sighed, “Maybe I’ll get myself a pick and head for the hills.” He tried to smile but didn’t quite make it.

Sam looked him square in the eye and said, “You can go with me to Kentucky.”

“Kentucky?” Travis echoed, raising an eyebrow. “What are you talking about? You just got through talking about staying in Nevada.”

Sam leaned forward, glancing right and left to make sure no one could overhear. The saloon was nearly empty anyway. He told of having been in touch with Washington about a job as a federal marshal. The job had been promised Sam as part of the Dominican Republic deal. “I was told that plenty of marshals are needed in Kentucky because of the situation with the Negroes there. They’re being hurt something terrible. There’s a lot of violence—homes, schools, churches set on fire, whole families run out of their homes by white mobs. There’s even reports of lynch mobs hanging Negroes.

“It’s happening, I’m told,” he continued after a deep sigh of pity, “because white Southern extremists in them parts don’t see any other alternative to the Reconstruction program that’s been imposed on the South by the radical Republicans in the North. Now I don’t care nothing about politicians or politics, either, you know that. But I don’t like the idea of Negroes being killed and burned out of their homes and mobs taking over.” Sam shook his head emphatically.

Travis smiled. “So you sent a wire back to Washington saying you would be most happy to accept the assignment in Kentucky as a federal marshal.”

Sam nodded firmly. “Damn right. I’m going to do my part, and also save what money I can. Then I’m coming back out here and make me a home in the new world.” He paused, a worried expression wrinkling his face. “I’m an old man, Travis. It’s time I thought about settling down. I could find peace out here when I need it and excitement when I want it. But first, there’s a job to be done in Kentucky.”

Travis signaled to the waitress. “Bring us a bottle of wine,” he ordered, “and two glasses.”

“Are you going to start drinking again, Travis?” Sam asked incredulously.

“Relax,” Travis said and waved his hand. “I ordered wine for celebration. I want to propose a toast to your new adventure…yours and mine.”

“You’re going
with
me? Hot damn!” Sam leaped to his feet and danced a jig around the table before slamming his large body down once more. “We’ll clean out the state of Kentucky, and then we’ll go to North Carolina and get little John and head West. We’ll work hard, and we’ll save our money, and—”

“Sam, don’t.”

He fell silent and stared at Travis, puzzled.

“I’m taking things slowly, Sam,” Travis explained quietly sadly. “I’m not thinking beyond that. What money I make, I’ll send home to Mattie for John. That’s the only plan I have at the moment, so don’t start making any for me, all right?”

“All right,” Sam nodded, suddenly subdued. “I guess you do have to move slow. I’m just glad you’re moving at all.”

The wine was brought and Sam tensed, looking away from Travis, wondering what the bottle would do to him. Sam gripped his hands together in his lap, deliberately keeping his face a blank, and watched as Travis uncorked the bottle and poured out two glasses of the red wine. Travis put the cork back in the bottle, giving it a final tap, and then picked up his glass.

“To Kentucky!” he said, and took a sip. Sam picked up his own glass reluctantly and sipped at it, trying not to watch Travis too closely. When his friend set his glass aside with a determined shove, Sam almost collapsed with relief. His friend was not going to drink any more. The one ceremonial sip had been all he would take.

Sam was proud, but knew better than to say so. Travis had been to hell and back, and the agonizing grief had not left him. Maybe it never would. But he wasn’t going to drown himself in booze. Travis Coltrane was no coward.

Chapter Fourteen

Travis sat at his large wooden desk, gazing at the scuff marks on it and speculating about the men who’d sat there before him. What kind of men had they been? He knew they hadn’t been brave enough to stand up to the Klan. And that, he reflected wryly, was really all he needed to know.

It was ironic that Travis was there at all. He no longer needed the job, any job. A series of things had happened to Travis that he’d learned about only a few days before. Wiley Odom had died. A combination of things had killed him—his injuries, weakness, not enough decent food, and maybe even despair. Knowing he was dying, Odom had willed his silver mine to Travis Coltrane and Sam Bucher (to whom he referred only as Travis’ friend), in gratitude for saving his life—and saving the mine from the thieves. Odom’s wife and son had gotten another, smaller mine. Odom, perhaps, had worried about all the hard things that went with wealth, the envy and the danger, and hadn’t wanted his family to inherit something they might not be able to handle. But he knew Travis and Sam could handle danger, and knew they’d make something of the strike that had taken so much out of him. Odom’s family would be well off with the smaller mine.

Sam had given his share to Travis, brooking no argument.
 
“I don’t have a son, and you do. Besides, if I own half a mine now it’ll kill my appetite for going back out there and making a strike of my own. No, Travis, it’s better for me if you take the whole damn thing. If you don’t want it, save it for your son.” And Travis had had to accept full ownership. Sam, when he chose, could be as stubborn as…well, as stubborn as Travis.

So, Travis considered as he sat staring at his desk, he was a wealthy man. And what good was it to him? If he’d had money before, then maybe he and Kitty wouldn’t have fought so hard over the farm and maybe… He shook his head. He couldn’t allow himself to think that way. With a silent prayer of thanks to Wiley Odom for the wealth Travis could now give his son, he turned to the reports in front of him. Since arriving, he and Sam had done little except investigate crimes. As Travis swept through the reports, he seethed. So many cruelties inflicted upon the Negroes. Beatings. Lynchings. Homes and churches burned. But not one single incident had resulted in anyone being charged with anything.

“Can you believe this?” he cried, waving a sheaf of papers in Sam’s direction. “You’d think someone would talk. You’d think the people in this county would raise hell about all this.”

“I know. I know.” Sam nodded from behind his own desk. “But everyone just looks the other way. Even the nigras themselves refuse to tell when they know who’s responsible. We’ve been here nearly a week, though, and so far nothing’s happened. Maybe it’s going to quiet down.”

Travis snorted. “You don’t believe that any more than I do. The goddamn Klan is just sitting back and watching to see what we plan to do. They’re not scared of us. They’re just trying to decide if we are a threat. They’re asking themselves if we’re sympathetic to the Negroes and plan to uphold the law, or if we’ll turn our heads. Well, I’ve got news for the sonsofbitches. We will never leave Kentucky till we find out who’s responsible for this.” He slapped the sheaf of papers down on top of the other reports.

“It ain’t going to be easy,” Sam growled. “Hell, nobody will talk to us. It’s like we got the pox or something. Even the nigras cross to the other side of the street when they see us coming. They’re scared to death to be seen talking to us.”

“I know. That’s why I had our office moved back in this alley. I hoped that by working here and sleeping in the back room, that if anyone did want to talk to us, they’d figure on not being seen as easily slipping in and out here as they would if we were in the old marshal’s office out on Main Street. So far, nobody’s been around.”

“Well,” Sam sighed and leaned back from his desk, “we have to give it time. Right now, the Klan aren’t the only ones watching us. I imagine the nigras are checking us out, too. They don’t know if we can be trusted.”

“Time.” Travis stared through the glass pane in the door leading to the alley, seeing only the brick wall of the building opposite. “That’s one thing I seem to have plenty of these days.”

Sam scratched his beard thoughtfully, wondering whether to speak his mind. Finally, he could hold back no longer. “Damn it, Travis, you need to take some time off and go home and see little John. You’re not being fair to him or yourself, and he’s going to forget he’s even got a daddy.”

Travis continued to stare at the brick wall through the door glass. “That’s the chance I have to take,” he responded quietly. “As long as I know I’ll kill Nancy and Jerome Danton on sight, I don’t want to go back to Goldsboro.”

He looked back to the paperwork on his desk, anxious to pull away from the pain. “I suppose we need to put these in some sort of order,” he said, signaling that the subject was changed. “Let’s put each crime in a separate pile—beatings, hangings, burnings, shootings. Then we’ll go over each and question survivors or witnesses. Maybe we can establish a pattern or find some small clue.”

Sam agreed, knowing it was futile to continue to press him about seeing John. Travis would cope in his own way.

“It’s surprising,” Travis reflected out loud, “that Kentucky turned so pro-South once the war was over, because when the war started, the state was divided. About ninety thousand fought for the Union, and about forty thousand for the South. Yet, when the fighting was over, you’d have thought the whole state had been a united part of the Confederacy. It’s a mystery to me.”

“Yeah,” Sam agreed, shuffling papers into separate piles. “But I can understand a little of it. When they passed that law in ’33 that said slaves couldn’t be brought in for sale, Kentucky was already a quarter black, so the proslavery folks kept an iron fist on things and wouldn’t let the law change nothing. But the war took care of all that, and there’s some diehards who won’t accept it.”