The Outrage - Edge Series 3 (18 page)

Meeker sighed and directed a look of disdain at his deputy. ‘Okay, what’s done is done. Alvin, you sit your ass down on that chair in front of the desk. Max, you put that damn sixshooter back in the holster now. And Edge, I guess you ought to be brought up to date on what we found out in Austin?’

Ivers turned his head to direct a pleading look at Edge and protested: ‘We didn’t have nothing to do with killing Nancy and her ma and that’s the God’s honest truth, mister!’ He seemed even skinnier and shorter close up, with a ruddy complexioned, angular featured face and long, black, greasy hair. He was nineteen or so and was dressed in stained and much patched straw-coloured denim pants and shirt and wore a battered Stetson a size too large for him.

Meeker told him in weary resignation rather than anger: ‘Alvin, I want you to keep your damn mouth shut unless somebody asks you to say something, boy.’

Lacy, looking not at all perturbed now by the recent killing of an unarmed man and Meeker’s public reaction to it, went through a door in the rear wall of the room. Water was heard to splash into a metal bowl and as the deputy began to wash up, Edge leaned his back against the wall beside the door to the street and lit the cigarette. Meeker said: ‘So how it was, up in Austin they had Ivers and his buddy dead to rights for stealing from a ranch house. The pair of them were locked in the jail and the jailer heard them talking about how they had a good run in the thieving business down here in Springdale. And how they should have figured their luck was likely to run out on them.’

‘Yeah, I’ll go along with that. Because it’s the truth, but – ‘

Meeker slammed the flat of his free hand down hard on the desktop. It made a violent sound that caused Ivers to jerk upright on the chair and vent a choked cry of alarm. ‘What did I tell you, boy?’

From his position behind him Edge could not see Ivers’ expression but he could guess from the rigidity of his posture on the chair that he was not far removed from being terrified. But the youngster insisted on making his point.

‘Nothing was said about us doing them killings out at the Quinn place, though! And that’s because we never did them! I want everybody to know that!’

Meeker looked both insulted and incensed as he said grimly: ‘I ain’t anywhere near perfect, son, but I don’t tell lies. If you can prove I tell a lie, I’ll turn you loose and no questions asked, all right?’ His narrow eyed gaze was fixed on the face of the discomfited young man. ‘I asked you a question! All right?’

Ivers gulped loudly, nodded emphatically and answered: ‘Yeah, Mr Meeker. I mean, all right. Sir.’

Meeker nodded curtly as he returned his attention to Edge and pointedly ignored Lacy who re-entered the office, his square featured, heavily bristled face freshly washed and water stains on his shirt front. ‘So, I questioned the two of them and they admitted they broke into a bunch of houses and stole valuable goods from them around Springdale. But, like Ivers said, they claimed to know nothing about the killing of the Quinn women.’

Ivers was obviously about to speak but a warning glare from Meeker persuaded him to remain silent.

Lacy sneered: ‘Nobody would expect them to say nothing else is my opinion.’

Meeker continued to address Edge. ‘The upshot was the law authorities in Austin allowed that even if Ivers and Hooper didn’t murder the Quinn women they’d committed more crimes down here than just the one time up there. And turned them over to us. Now, though, we got just one suspect to try and get the truth out of.’

‘The way I see it we got a better chance of getting this no account little bastard of a mommy’s boy to confess than that hard nosed sonofabitch Hooper!’ Lacy muttered. Meeker warned evenly: ‘Any more of that kind of talk and I could start to think you backshot Hooper on purpose, Max. Just to make the job easier for us?’

‘Hell, I never – ‘

‘So best you keep your opinions to yourself, uh?’

Lacy took a few moments to respond with a scowling nod to the quizzical glower that the man behind the desk directed at him.

‘And that’s just about all we have, mister?’ Meeker’s questioning look, minus the angry glint, was turned toward Edge. ‘So, did you find out anything to earn the money Quinn put up?’

‘Not a thing. The kid’s mother – ‘

Ivers swung violently in the chair to glare his anger at Edge and demanded: ‘You been troubling my ma, mister?’

Meeker was as interested as the boy in the answer.

‘She stopped me on the street awhile ago. Said how Alvin has always been in trouble but that he never was mixed up in anything violent. I got the idea she didn’t have the same opinion of Hooper.’

‘Keep it buttoned, Alvin!’ Meeker warned without looking at the boy who had turned to face him again. He had finally lit his pipe and he moderated his tone. ‘That’s right. Of all the youngsters in Springdale I guess Alvin has caused more trouble than any of them. But it was all penny-ante stuff. Until he started to run with Hooper and they set about robbing so many houses.’

‘Like Floyd told you, that was his idea, sheriff,’ Ivers said miserably. Edge asked: ‘Did Ivers know the Quinns?’

‘Yeah, course I knew them! Me and Nancy were real good friends once.’ He shrugged.

‘For awhile. And I saw Mr and Mrs Quinn around town sometimes.

‘Tell him about knowing Nancy,’ Meeker instructed then sat back in the chair, drew contentedly on his pipe and looked relieved to have surrendered his place at the centre of attention.

Ivers was briefly disconcerted by the change in the lawman’s demeanour then shrugged his resignation. ‘Her and me used to see each other around town from time to time. Say hello or wave, the way folks do. But we weren’t what you’d call friends. Not until last year for awhile. After I got Blackie.’

There was contempt in Lacy’s tone when he said: ‘That’s what he called a big black stallion he had for a couple of weeks last year. Damn fine animal to give such a stupid name to.’

‘Best damn horse there ever was in this town and a lot of people were jealous of me because of him!’ Ivers boasted with a sneer toward the deputy.

Meeker complained: ‘We ain’t here tonight to engage in the horse trading business, boy!’

Ivers shrugged. ‘I ain’t got him no more as you well know, Mr Meeker.’

‘What’s the animal got to do with Nancy Quinn?’ Edge asked, relishing his cigarette more than Meeker appeared to be enjoying his pipe.

‘Yeah, that‘s right.’ Ivers nodded earnestly. ‘Well, soon after I got Blackie Nancy started to be a lot more interested in me than she ever was before. This was at the time when she was a bit wild and did some crazy things.’

‘She was a wild one all right!’ Lacy growled.

‘She wasn’t sparking with no boy in particular back then and just went around with whoever gave her the best time. Well, when I got Blackie she started to do more than just wave and say hello to me, mister. She kept giving me the eye and bouncing her body when she knew I was looking at her, if you know that I mean?’

‘I guess I remember,’ Edge allowed on a stream of tobacco smoke.

Ivers was suddenly morose as he recalled his bad treatment at the whims of a good looking woman. ‘At first I thought she liked me for myself. But it soon showed that she only wanted to get to ride Blackie. He really was some horse, anyone’ll tell you that. And Nancy, she reckoned she was some kind of horseback rider. And Blackie was the kind of animal that needed a rider who could – ‘

Meeker suddenly became impatient with the line of bragging talk he had obviously heard before from the young man who had never had much in life to boast about. And the sheriff broke in: ‘To cut a long story short, Mr Edge, Ivers claims that once Nancy Quinn had shown she could control that powerful stallion as good as any man was able to she lost interest in it: and in Alvin. Went back to just saying hello to him the few times they met up.’

‘Damn few,’ Ivers muttered. ‘Her and me just never were in the same crowd except for that time.’

‘But you still saw her around every now and then, ain’t that right, Alvin?’ Meeker said.

‘Yeah, I’ve told you that.’

‘And the night before Nancy and her mother were killed you were at the Founders Day dance in the meeting hall. And she was there, too.’

‘Yeah, I was there. So were most Springdale folk.’

‘You and Floyd are the only ones that concern us at the moment, boy,’ Meeker insisted.

‘Well, that didn’t ought to be so, sir.’

‘Tell Mr Edge where you went and what happened after a bunch of you kids got bored with the dance.’

Ivers was disconcerted again as he glanced over his shoulder at Edge. He licked his lips, dry washed his hands and squirmed his slight frame on the chair.

Meeker sighed and prompted: ‘Alvin, you told Deputy Lacy and me. You and Hooper both told us about it. Didn’t ought to be so hard to go over it again.’

‘If it’s what really happened and it ain’t all a pack of lies,’ Lacy augmented. Ivers came close to losing his temper with the needling deputy then shrugged and said miserably: ‘We had a party of our own. Out at the old mill.’

Meeker knocked dottle from his pipe on to the floor and explained: ‘He’s talking about a derelict corn mill on the Cassidy spread, out along River Road. A place that’s a long way from anywhere. Hasn’t been used to grind corn for twenty years at least I’d say.’

Edge said: ‘Jordan – the feller who rode over the cliff yesterday – that’s where he lived?’

‘Right,’ Meeker confirmed.

Ivers picked up where he had left off. ‘A few of us boys got tired of that high-flown dance in town. And we went out to the old mill to play some cards and stuff. Do a little drinking and raise a little of the kind of hell we weren’t allowed to raise at the town dance. Well, it started out with us just playing cards and shooting dice and drinking.’

‘How many were there?’ Meeker asked as Lacy took to raking dirt from under his fingernails with the folded out blade of a pocket-knife. ‘Tell Mr Edge everything that happened.’

‘A dozen or so: maybe fifteen or sixteen. Like I already told you and Mr Lacy, I ain’t too clear about the details. On account of being more than some the worse for drink.’

‘But you can remember some of the kids who were there?’ the sheriff insisted.

‘Sure. There was Floyd and me, of course. And Matt Colman. Bob Jordan, because he lived at the old mill. Eddie Sawyer and Scotty Scott. Frank Parish. Some hands who work for the Cassidys.’

‘So what happened?’ Edge asked.

Lacy said sourly before the boy could reply: ‘Nancy Quinn showed up and did some kind of shimmy dance that got the boys all excited.’

‘Yeah,’ Ivers confirmed. ‘She come to the old mill and she was just like she used to be that time last year. Said she was bored by the town social and wanted to have some fun like we were having.’ He swivelled his head to look at Edge again. ‘I guess she was just about as drunk as any of us. Colman – he was her beau – tried to get her to go back to town. But she told him to go to hell and wanted to know if anybody there had anything to make some kind of music with. Well, Bob Jordan, he always had his harmonica in his back pocket. He was almost as proud of his old mouth organ as he was of that Bowie knife he had.’

He was abruptly embarrassed, his complexion even more scarlet than usual as he turned from Edge and went on uneasily: ‘Like I said, Nancy got Jordan to blow a tune on his harmonica and she started to shimmy. And while she was snaking her body that way she . . . ‘

His voice trailed away and he gazed down at the floor between his feet. Lacy snarled impatiently: ‘The little whore started to take her clothes off is what happened. Like some dancehall harlot in one of them rowdy saloons in one of them Yankee railhead cattle towns!’

‘Alvin and Hooper told us how Nancy Quinn did that kind of dance for all those stirred up young drunks,’ Meeker confirmed with a heavy scowl on his fleshy features.

‘Well that’s sure enough what she started to do,’ Ivers corrected dolefully. ‘All of us yelling and stamping our feet and clapping fit to raise the roof. But Matt Colman forced her to quit it. And when we got mad at him for doing that he pulled his sixgun on us and forced us to back off. So she never got to take off any of her underwear. Then Colman left with Nancy and we all headed home. That’s what happened, mister. All of it and it’s the truth.’

‘But not the
naked
truth, sounds like!’ Lacy guffawed.

Edge swung around, opened the door and tossed his cigarette butt out on to the street.

‘You leaving?’ Meeker asked, deep weariness suddenly apparent in his tone and in his slumped attitude on the chair behind the desk.

‘The kid just said that’s all there is to it, sheriff.’

Lacy grinned broadly as he challenged: ‘Reckon you and Vic are the same, stranger. Like him you don’t like my sense of humour either?