Through Darkest America

left Harlie and Ketch to play out the rest of the game and disappeared quickly into the noonday crowd. Instead of going directly back to the Keep, he circled through the middle of town, past the crowded clapboard shops and narrow stalls that stretched the length of Roundtree’s main avenue of commerce. It was a noisy, sprawling street; merchants large and small vied for every copper that lined a passing pocket. They were intense, quick-eyed men, hungry for trade at ever- climbing prices. No one knew how long the war might last. Why, God forbid, it could end tomorrow!

There were vegetable sellers, feed mash merchants, and whiskey dealers by the dozen. A man could buy steel blades, wheat flour, hemp rope, cotton cloth, bone tools, clay kettles, horse blankets, real and false gemstones, and pretty girls no more than fourteen summers old. (“And you’ll be the first to touch her, sir, I promise you that!”)

Howie passed the butcher shop where a small boy tried vainly to keep clouds of black flies from hanging cuts of meat. Next door, a whole carcass dripped grease over sizzling coals, while the butcher’s other offspring kept it turning. It was prime young mare, fat and full of juices. Howie hadn’t eaten since sunup and the rich smells assailed his empty stomach. He gave the boy coppers for a meaty rib half as long as his forearm and gnawed it happily through the crowd.

He’d gone no more than a block before he was certain someone else was in his tracks—and more than one, at that. He’d felt vaguely uneasy since morning, when they’d loaded the cart on Dryside past the Keep. The usual watchers were about; Howie knew the regulars well enough. But there was someone else, too. He could have easily dismissed the whole business, but if they were still with him after he’d left the cart behind, that was a different brand of trouble altogether.

Keeping to the busy street, he glanced in stalls and shops for another short block, then turned off the avenue and walked south toward the dry river, and Pardo’s Keep. They wouldn’t push him until they were ready, only Howie didn’t figure on waiting for that. Pardo was right about some things. If the problem was low down and dirty enough, he likely had an answer for it. In this case, it was clear as day. Get square behind whatever’s after you.

There were at least two of them. Howie figured three. He’d seen the first two briefly, in the crowd behind him. The third was hanging back, playing shadow out of sight.

Howie moved slow and easy, giving his followers no trouble. At the end of the block he crossed the street, stopped a moment to hitch up his belt, then turned casually into a narrow alleyway. The minute he was out of sight he broke into a fast run, circled the block, and cut back to the crowded avenue. He was right where he’d started, just past the butcher shop, a short walk from the corner. He saw them coming back up the hill, out of breath, the anger in their faces clear a good block away. From their dour looks, neither was anxious to report their failure.

He guessed their path ahead, a line of shops across the street with an alley at the end. He cut through the strollers and circled the short block, coming up on the alley from behind. Howie grinned to himself. The man was where he ought to be, in the shadow of a doorway a few steps from the street, his eyes on the crowd.

Howie moved, letting the street noise cover him. He wasn’t anxious to handle three of them; the man’s companions would be on him soon. With one motion he turned the man hard against the wall and brought his blade up sharp under the throat. The man stiffened, then let his body go loose. He watched Howie over his shoulder and grinned.

“Don’t want no trouble, boy. Just a little talk.”

“You’ll get it,” snapped Howie. “Move!”

He glanced quickly up the alley, then herded his prisoner out the back way, stopping only when he was several turns from the avenue, where Roundtree backed into the dry river. There was no one about. Only the slat walls and the hot glare of the flats. He searched the man quickly, found a long steel knife and tossed it aside.

“Now we’ll talk some,” he announced. “That’s what you was wanting, ain’t it?” He jammed his own blade back in his belt and replaced it with the pistol. The man looked at the weapon, then at Howie.

“No need for that,” he smiled. “Said I didn’t want no trouble.”

He was a tall man, spare, with no meat on his bones. He had an easy grin and a lazy, friendly manner that set Howie doubly on his guard.

“You been pushing me all day, mister,” he said darkly. “What for?”

“A question or two,” the man shrugged. “Nothing more.”

“Questions about what?”

The man studied him calmly. “Guess we could start off talkin’ about Cory.”

Howie blinked back his surprise. The words shook him visibly, and the man knew it.

“Ah, you recall him, then.”

“I remember him.”

“He was a friend, perhaps?”

“I remember him!” Howie flared. “You follow me ’round all day to ask that?”

“That, and a bit more if you can,” the man said gently. “Like what happened out there…  and how come Cory ain’t coming back.”

Howie licked his lips to get the dry out. “Cory got it ’cause the rebels come up on us-and took the herd. He wasn’t the only one, either. Weren’t too many that made it.”

“You did.”

Howie stepped back and raised the barrel of his pistol. “Mister, who the hell are you and what’s Cory to you? And, don’t give me one of them answers that don’t say nothin’!”

The man shrugged bony shoulders. “A friend of Cory’s is all. Maybe one of yours, too.”

“Yeah, I’ll just bet.”

“Might be I could help some.”

“Help who? Me?” Howie laughed uneasily. “I don’t even know you and you ain’t making much sense far as I can see!”

“’Bout as much as you, boy.” The man turned lazy eyes on Howie. “Lordee, isn’t anyone in Roundtree doesn’t know what happened out there. The rebels got the herd all right… but not by themselves they didn’t.”

Howie started to protest; the man held up a hand. “Now I ain’t sayin’ I care one way or the other. What I care about is Cory and what happened to him.”

“And I just told you,” Howie said irritably.

“Ah, you did and you didn’t,” said the man. He wagged a long finger at Howie. “You said he died and I know that. What I’m huntin’ for is how.”

“I already said he—”

“—Died when the rebels took the herd,” the man nodded. “And I’m certain that’s so. What I don’t know is whether one of them did the job, or someone else.” He gave Howie a sly wink. “Pardo himself, maybe? Or one of the others? You recall right off which it was?”

Howie stared at him. “You got to be crazy. Or figure I am.”

“No,” the man blinked at the sun and scratched his scrawny neck. “Don’t guess it’s either of us, boy. It’s the times, mostly. Good men are dying and them that did ’em in are walking the streets with pockets full of silver. Peculiar things are happening everywhere and more’n one man has got hisself tangled in other folk’s affairs deeper’n he’d like to be.” He grinned affably at Howie. “It is some hot out here, you know?

 Looks to me like friends could talk better in good shade over a drink or two, without pistols and such between ’em.”

The man took a slight step forward. Howie backed off warily and waved his weapon. “I told you what happened to Cory,” he said harshly. “You can take it or leave it, mister. I got nothing else to say.”

“No. Didn’t figure you did, right now.” The man gave him a tired, curious smile.

“Might come to it, though. Can’t never tell.” Without another word, he turned and started back toward the center of town.

“Hey, now just a damn minute!” Howie yelled after him.

The man didn’t answer. He just kept walking, as if Howie wasn’t there. Howie stood in the sun with the pistol hanging from his hand, feeling like a plain fool.