EDGE: Vengeance at Ventura by George G. Gilman

Author:George G. Gilman [Gilman, George G.]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, mobi
Tags: General Fiction
Publisher: Lobo Publications
Published: 2015-05-30T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seven

THERE was a livery stable out back of the combination saloon and store run by the grey moustached, almost bald Pat Regan. And Edge put his horse in a stall and saw to it the animal had feed and water before he went around to the front and entered through the batwings.

The place was empty and remained so for more than a minute after the half-breed had sat at a table closest to the bar counter, his impassive face revealing no sign of the conflicting trains of thought which ran through his mind. The voices of the men loading the freight cars drifted across the street and into the saloon. From closer came the talk between Regan and a customer in the store section of the building. The customer left with his supplies and Regan appeared through the arch in back of the bar counter. The man looked surprised to see somebody at a table - unpleasantly so when he recognized the half-breed.

‘Something you want, stranger?’ he asked sourly.

‘Tell you I’ve put my horse in your livery, feller. And a beer.’

‘Half a buck a day for the stablin’,’ Regan said as he drew the beer and placed it on the counter within reach of where Edge sat.

A dollar bill was given and change was received before Edge picked up the beer and drank half of it at a swallow.

‘Owe you anything else?’

‘For what?’

‘You brought McArthur in here last night. I don’t see him now. Or smell him.’

Regan grimaced and wiped sweat off his forehead with a bare arm. ‘The kid who rode in with you buried his Pa and Gerry McArthur, too. Him and Millicent.’

Footfalls had rapped on a stairway and now the young whore came out of the arch behind the bar. Attired in a store bought black dress that was old but clean. And she had washed up, brushed her hair and applied fresh paint and powder to her face after her exertions in the makeshift cemetery of Ventura.

‘No charge, mister,’ she said grimly. ‘I done what I did to help Vincent.’

Edge acknowledged this with a nod as the girl came out from behind the bar counter and went to sit at the table where, the night before, Edge had poured the pail of dirty water over McArthur. For awhile, Regan wiped glasses and shared tacit rancor between the whore and the half-breed. In equal measure. Then a bell on the store doorway jangled and he went through the archway.

Millicent stood up, approached the table where Edge sat and asked: ‘Can I join you, mister?’

‘Long as you ain’t selling. On account of I ain’t buying.’

She pulled out the chair opposite him and sat down. ‘I’m through with all that. It was never supposed to be that way and I want to leave this place and forget everything I ever did here, mister.’

‘Telling a moving story never got anyone any place,’ Edge answered.

She pouted. ‘I ain’t askin’ you for anythin’.’

‘Then no sweat.’

‘Except about your friend.’

‘Friend?’

‘Vincent.’

‘He say he was that?’

She pouted again, then sighed.

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