Iron Dogs by Neil Chase

Author:Neil Chase [Chase, Neil]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781458221674
Publisher: Abbott Press
Published: 2018-04-16T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 26

“When you have lost hope, you have lost everything. And when you think all is lost, when all is dire and bleak, there is always hope.”

— Pittacus Lore, I Am Number Four

“This way,” said Cole, pointing to the left hand side of the general store. There sat digging tools and mining equipment stacked on shelves or leaning against the wall below them.

Red grabbed a step-ladder, about to join Cole, when he spotted something poking out from under some burlap sacks. “Here,” he said to Cole, handing over the ladder before he went off to investigate.

Ivan busied himself grabbing other useful items from behind the counter, while Cole pulled down a pickaxe and two shovels. Ivan brought out a wheelbarrow with a line of strong rope, an axe, some hammers and nails, and other implements already inside.

Red stepped up to the pile of burlap sacks, the corner of a red box barely visible underneath. His hand moved to take off the top sack, when it stopped in mid-air, his attention suddenly riveted by something on the shelf right above it.

It was a row of children’s toys. A wooden train. Some slingshots. A metal spinning top. A yellow wooden duck with bright red wheels and a pull string. A felt bear with brown fur and shining button eyes. A Pickaninny doll with coal black skin and wide, bright red lips shaped into a perpetual smile. And a little girl’s doll with porcelain white skin, rosy cheeks, bright eyes and shining, curly hair.

It was this last that caught his interest. The twin of the one he found this morning in the deserted wagon. It was like seeing the before to the after he held just hours ago. And despite himself, his eyes welled up for the second time this day as his thoughts once again drifted back to little Lucy, the stray girl he rescued from Atlanta’s gutters all those years ago.

At first, it seemed she would be safe. Thanks to Frank’s connections, he’d managed to place her in an orphanage run by Spanish nuns. They had a hell of a time tearing her away from him, and it took repeated assurances that he’d come back to visit as often as he could before she acquiesced. In reality, they both understood this to mean he would come for her as soon as the fighting was done. She was the baby sister he never had, and the bond that had quickly grown between them was as solid as any he’d known before or since.

As a token of his commitment to her, he’d given her a gift that day. Quite by accident, he’d stumbled on a selection of toys in a general goods store somewhere in the east-end of the city. Frank had sent him and Virgil on an errand to fetch some wire and nails, as they’d run short in their defense preparations, and the supply sergeant had no idea when fresh equipment would next come. They’d scoured the city, and finally came upon that particular store.

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