“He told me to come meet him in Seneca 6 after he robbed me and stole my wagon. He left me and my boy in the desert with no food and water. You either produce him or I will be forced to seek other reparations!”
“I seem to have room on my dance card.” Halladay grinned stupidly as he drummed his holster with the tips of his fingers.
“I don’t have no quarrels with you, old man,” Boles said. He moved his hand to his weapon. “I just want Clayton.”
Halladay went down the steps, “Alas, now I have one with you.”
A woman stopped her three children from walking into the sea of people, afraid of losing them in the crowd. She kept them behind her as Halladay and Boles squared off and pulled the littlest one into her wide skirt. She put her hands over the two older children’s eyes and said, “Don’t look.”
Charlie Boles Junior walked over to her and pulled on her sleeve. “Don’t be afraid, ma’am.”
“You shouldn’t watch this either, sweetheart,” she said. “Stand behind me and keep your eyes closed. I will say a prayer for your daddy.”
Junior pressed the device’s button with his thumb and said, “I’m not afraid. When I let go of this, we’re all going to glory.”
“What did you say, dear?”
The crowd roared as Jem Clayton came out of the saloon doors and drowned out whatever response the boy gave her. Jem Clayton called out to Dr. Halladay, “I’ll handle this.”
Halladay kept his hand near his gun as Jem came down the steps and stood in front of Boles. Boles nodded eagerly and said, “Yeah, time we settled up.”
Jem lifted both of his hands to show Boles they were empty. “I will not fight you, Charlie. We had our disagreement, and it’s over with. I’ve got too much else on my mind to worry about you right now. Accept my apology and take your boy home. You can have your wagon back, it’s parked near the Sheriff’s Office. I’ll even take you to it.”
“Won’t be no apologies,” Boles said. “Draw.” Boles snatched his gun from its holster and aimed it at Jem’s face.
Charlie Boles Junior tugged on the shoulder of the woman. He leaned up to her ear and whispered, “Your children are going to love it in Heaven.”
Charlie Boles started to squeeze his trigger when he looked across the street at his son approvingly, seeing that the boy was about to detonate his device. Detonate his device? Charlie thought. What the hell am I saying? He threw up his hands and screamed, “Junior! No! Don’t do it!”
Jem turned to look where Boles was yelling, but Royce Halladay shoved him out of the way and fired one bullet into Charlie Boles’ stomach and a second into the center of his forehead. Boles dropped his gun and weaved from side to side, taking steps in his son’s direction. He held up his hand and said, “Junior, don’t do it, son. Fight it.”
The electrical charges wrapped around Boles’ waist popped like blown fuses and smoke billowed out of his shirt. He let go of the toggle switch and it dangled by the wires hanging from out of his sleeve.
“Pa?” Junior said. “Pa!”
Charlie Boles shirt caught fire and the flames raced across his clothing and through his hair. He fell to the ground in a smoldering heap. Jem turned to look at Junior and the people around him who were too busy watching the burning body to notice Junior let go of his dead man’s switch. The boy’s bomb detonated and there was a flash of light that sent Jem hurtling backwards.
18. Golgotha
Harpe stood at a peak on Coramide Canyon and watched the scene unfold miles away in Seneca 6. It was smoky, and hard to get a clear view of any particular person, but the chaos was evident. Harpe measured the blast radius to be at least ten feet in every direction of the boy. Luckily, he’d been standing close enough to a building to take out one of its load bearing walls.
“How’s it look down there, Elijah?” Hank Raddiger said.
“The boy’s device worked fine, but something went wrong with his father’s explosives. I’m hoping he goes up any second now. My word, Hank, this is the best damn entertainment I’ve ever had. When I give the go ahead, send them Customs boys in to acquire our package.”
A fire-brigade wagon rolled toward the site with men clinging to its side. Another truck came up behind that one, a large, industrial vehicle with heavy front end scoop to clear away the rubble of the building.
“There you are,” Harpe said.
He saw Marshal McParlan standing knee deep in the rubble, scooping out handfuls of ash and dirt with his bare hands. The old man tossed away whole sections of wall and he dug like a beaver until a hand reached out from the rubble and McParlan grasped it, pulling with all of his strength.
“I hope you enjoy playing Savior, Marshal,” Harpe said. He put down the binoculars and looked around the crash site. A pair of large metal beams bolted into an X leaned against the hull of the ship. “Is it sturdy enough to do what I need it to do, Hank?”
Hank patted the crossed beams and said, “Yes, sir.”
“You’d better hope so,” Harpe said.
Anna Willow waded through the rubble of the destroyed Savings and Loan building. People were still buried beneath it. Burn victims’ clothing had melted into their blackened skin. The lucky ones were dead. Anna shouted for someone to bring her more medical supplies as she dug through smoldering building materials. She stuck syringes of morphine into the necks of any patient that was still moving and was running out fast.
There were at least a dozen dead bodies. People ran frantically in every direction, choking on smoke as they screamed for their loved ones. She tried to help them all. She did what she could.
Marshal Jimmy McParlan dragged someone out of the rubble and stuck his fingers in their mouth to clear out the mud. McParlan couldn’t tell if it was a man or a woman. He pushed the person aside and dove back into the wreckage for more.
Bart Masters ran through the smoke and started grabbing pieces of the wall at McParlan’s side. “Pull, pull!” McParlan shouted.
Water jetted at the flames from the fire brigade wagon, filling the air with moist black smoke. McParlan looked over to see Royce Halladay staggering to his feet near the steps of the Proud Lady.
Halladay clutched his head and coughed, spraying mouthfuls of blood across the ground in front of him. McParlan grabbed him around the waist and pulled him from the fumes and dust. He dragged Halladay over someone laid out at the bottom of the Proud Lady’s steps and realized it was Jem Clayton.
McParlan set the doctor down in an alleyway away from the blast site and said, “Catch your breath.” He hurried back to Jem and lifted his head to check for injuries. He looked into Jem’s eyelids and saw that his eyes were rolled back in his head but he was breathing steadily. “You got your bell rung real good, I reckon, but you’ll be all right,” he said.
Jem moaned and reached for McParlan. His words were garbled when he tried to say, “Another bomb.”
“What?”
Jem pushed up from the ground and got to his knees before collapsing again. He stretched his hand out to point at Charlie Boles smoking remains and the Marshal saw packets of grey plastic strapped around Boles’ waist.
“Everybody get back!” McParlan shouted. He ran over to Boles’ body and cleared away the charred fragments of shirt covering his waist. The fire had consumed most of the clothing but left the explosives untouched. McParlan grabbed the sizzling wires and started ripping them out of the packets. The metal threads and melted plastic from the wires stung the Marshal’s fingers and made them blister but he kept at it until each one was cleared. “Masters! Bring me a bottle of clear liquor.”
McParlan backed everyone away from Boles’ body and waited until Bart Masters returned with a bottle from the Proud Lady. McParlan grabbed the cork with his teeth and splashed liquor onto the plastic explosives around Boles’ waist. “Does alcohol neutralize them?” Masters asked.