Jimmy McParlan cracked him across the back of the skull with his pistol and fired into the air. “Back up you sons-of-bitches! Anybody so much as takes another step and I’ll start putting holes in all of you.”
Several men rushed him and tackled him around the waist, driving him to the ground. They peeled the gun out of his hand and one of the miners leveled it at McParlan’s head and squeezed the trigger. The gun clicked uselessly and a computerized voice emitted from the barreclass="underline" Fingerprint identification failure. Initiating security precautions.
The gun vibrated in the miner’s hand and glowed red, turning hot enough to sizzle the flesh inside his palm. The miner dropped the gun and ran screaming through the crowd. Boot heels cracked McParlan across the ribs and a finger gouged his good eye. McParlan batted them away from his face and tried fighting back even as more of them jumped onto him and started swinging freely. He gave up fighting and instead used his remaining strength to cover his head and hope to hold on long enough for them to get tired. They didn’t get tired. It only got worse.
The Marshal woke up in the dark, groaning for the bastards to get off of him. Someone was grabbing him, holding him down and McParlan shouted, “You don’t understand! Elijah Harpe has escaped!”
“It’s all right now, Marshal,” Bart Masters said.
“Where the hell am I?”
“Dr. Willow’s office. I dragged you in here to get you away from those maniacs out there.”
“I’m much obliged, now where the hell are my guns? I’ve got a fugitive to look for.”
“I honestly hope you weren’t too attached to that prisoner, Marshal. Jem Clayton caught him at Claire and Frank’s house and dragged him all the way out to Coramide Canyon.”
McParlan closed his eye and was struck by the image of Harlan Wells aiming a pistol at Adam, begging him to shoot. He thought about the strange voice coming out of Wells.
“I am ashamed of what happened to you out there, sir,” Masters said. “People disrespecting the law like that, it makes me sick.”
“I ain’t been much impressed by the law I’ve seen in this town so far,” McParlan said. “I’m not sure I can blame `em.”
“It wasn’t always like that, Marshal. “My daddy was a deputy under Sheriff Clayton. Helped him fight off the Beothuk on the night of the invasion and escorted the wounded across the wasteland out to the hospital in Seneca 5. He never told anybody about his own injuries and they say he collapsed in his saddle the second the last person was picked up on a stretcher. With him and Sam both gone, it was easy pickings for Walt Junger and Billy Jack to swoop in and take over.”
“So what are we gonna do about it?” McParlan said.
“Right now, you aren’t in shape to do much of anything,” Masters said. “And I’m just a miner.”
Anna Willow knocked on the door, and let herself into the room. “Thanks for minding the Marshal for me,” she said.
Bart Masters tilted his hat at her and left as Anna moved into his chair. She handed a cold compress to McParlan and told him to press it against his face. “You looked better after they dragged you out of the wreckage of that spaceship,” she said.
McParlan waved his hand at her, “That wasn’t my first angry mob. They all hit like women.”
Anna sat on the edge of the bed and folded her hands in her lap. “Thank you for saving my life today, Marshal.”
He ignored her and said, “How’s Adam?”
“He’s fine,” Anna said. “I sent him to stay with an older couple I know. He was just sitting by the window, rocking back and forth, like he was waiting for Harlan to come home. I thought a change of scenery would be good.”
McParlan nodded and said, “Good thinking. Plus, you got your hands full.”
“That woman that Harlan shot was a widow. She had two little girls. I guess someone will have to look after them now. That other man was shot in the hip. He’ll live, but probably won’t walk right ever again. But at least he’ll live. Why in God’s name did he do that? Why? It was like he was possessed by the devil.”
“In a way, I believe he was.”
“What does that mean?”
“I’m still not completely sure. But trust me, that wasn’t Harlan who shot them folks.”
Anna went to the next room and knocked gently before poking her head in. Frank Miller was sitting in his wheelchair next to the bed where his wife was laying. Frank’s face was swollen and crusted with blood, and there was a massive burn mark collared around his throat that he refused to let Anna even look at until she finished tending to Claire.
Frank pressed his fingers to his lips and said, “She finally fell asleep.”
Claire’s head was bandaged like a turban. Her eyes were swollen shut and her lips looked like she was wearing a pair of wax ones from the candy store down the street.
“She isn’t dead,” Frank said. “She isn’t going to be dead.”
“I know, honey,” Anna said.
“You fixed her, right? You fixed her and she isn’t going to die.”
“I fixed her,” Anna said. “How about you let me look at your neck now that she’s situated? If you get an infection, you won’t be able to take care of her.”
Frank nodded silently. Anna had to peel the shirt collar away from the injured skin, making Frank wince as it came unstuck. She rubbed ointment gently into the wound and Frank settled. “Does that feel better?”
“It stings pretty bad, to be honest.”
“That means it’s working. Whatever you do, don’t itch it. I want you to get some sleep now too, Frank.”
He ignored her and leaned forward, re-tucking the blanket around Claire’s shoulders. Anna shut the door rather than argue with him and took a moment to appreciate the quiet. Bart Masters coughed lightly to let her know he was watching her from down the hall. “Why don’t you go home and get some rest, Dr. Willow. I’ll stay with the patients and send someone for you if there’s a need.”
Anna thanked him and grabbed her coat. She stepped outside and saw a dim light from the Sheriff’s Office. Walt Junger was sitting at his desk, hunched over, scribbling on a stack of documents. Anna had heard rumors that Junger was applying for warrants for McParlan’s arrest, sending off letters to every government agency in the sector. She shook her head and was about to turn away when someone sitting on a porch swing outside of her office caught her eye. Anna squinted to make him out and said, “Jem? What in the world are you doing lurking around out here?”
“I didn’t have anywhere else to go. I figured I’d stay nearby if you needed me, but not disturb you.”
Anna held out her hand and said, “Come on. You’re coming with me.”
There were no lights on in any of the businesses along Pioneer Way as they walked. Even the bars were closed. “So tell me the fate of Mr. Elijah Harpe,” Anna said.
Jem looked down and said, “A person like you wouldn’t understand, Anna. Someone like you helps people. Someone like me does the opposite.”
“I wouldn’t expect anything less from the baddest man in the world,” Anna said.
Jem grinned at her. “You’ve been waiting twenty years to fire that one back at me, haven’t you?”
“Maybe. Do you remember Zeke that used to work for my father?”
Jem nodded.
“Did you ever hear what happened to me?”
“I heard enough.”
Anna’s voice was quiet when she said, “When I was a little girl, I trusted everybody. People acted so nice to me after my mother died, I just assumed that’s how they really were. Zeke told me I was special. He paid attention to me. Sometimes I wonder if I did something to make him think it was okay to do what he did.”
“You were just a kid, Anna. Of course you didn’t,” Jem said.
“The worst thing about it was that the nice man who treated me so kindly told me he would kill me and my father if I told anyone. I believed him, Jem. I looked in his eyes and I saw evil. I never could tell your daddy what he did to me. Miss Katey had to do all the talking for me, and your daddy hauled Zeke off to the penitentiary.”