Page 25 of Hell and Gone
Braddock spun his beer bottle on the wooden table top slowly, letting the condensation drip. “He didn’t seem… odd at all to you?”
“Define odd.”
“Explosive temper. Outbursts. Hiding things.”
Everett arched an eyebrow. He’d certainly seen, and felt, all that, but that just seemed like that was Lawrence Jackson. The man lived out loud. He had a temper as quick as a Copperhead snake. He repelled the world, it seemed. If he felt something, something powerful, he said so. He’d never had a shy moment in his life, surely.
He’d carried two dead men off of his land and was also worrying about another two that were missing. That worry, and being a corpse deliverer, had put a strain on Lawrence Jackson’s shoulders. Everett had seen it, the pinched look in his face, the tightness in his eyes. The clench of his rugged jaw. The way he held himself, looking for trouble and expecting it from every side. He recognized that readiness, that fear of what was going to blindside you.
And he trusted that fear. It was a learned fear, born through experience.
“Lawrence Jackson is an intense man. He can be loud. He can be contrary. But I never saw him violent while we were riding.”
Visions of the man sweet-talking Lantana and Trigger, hand-feeding them slices of apple and brushing them gently, scratching their manes or their necks, played in his mind. Making coffee for Everett and tossing over his sleeping bag.
Massaging his sore back.
“That’s one way to put it,” Braddock said, chuckling once. “Look, son, I didn’t just send you up to the Lazy Twenty-Two to learn how to ride out into the back country and see where Carson was hung. I sent you up there to keep an eye on Lawrence. Take the measure of the man. Your boss in Helena says you got the huntin’ instincts of a wolf. You’ve proven you can track, even when a man doesn’t want to be found.” Braddock leaned forward, his elbows on the table. “Tell me, what do those instincts of yours say about ole Law?”
“I’m not certain what you’re getting at.”
“It’s like this, son. Everything that’s been happenin’ recently? It’s all circled around Law and the Lazy Twenty-Two. He’s connected toeverythin’, every bit of this mess. You could say that these troubles start with him.”
“I thought they started with Carson, Dell, and Aaron getting off for the murder of two truckers.”
“Ahh, you heard about that. Well, they didn’t get off free and clear. They were charged with negligent homicide and sentenced to time served.”
“And what did that amount to?”
“Three nights in my cell, for Dell and Aaron.”
“You can understand why there would be some anger after a sentence like that.”
“Son, I lived through it. You don’t need to tell me how it was. Yeah, those truckers were pissed. Those truckers were local boys, went to the same damn schools as the cowboys and my deputies. Everyone fightin’ everyone else knew each other, was like brothers to each other. But then those truckers got their buddies involved, and the whole fuckin’ highway seemed pissed at the Crazies. I had cowboys and truckers brawlin’ all hours of the day and night. They wanted blood, both sides did, and they wanted Dell, Aaron, and Carson’s blood in particular. So those boys needed to get gone. It was the only way.”
“Howell fired them so they’d leave?”
“He told them what was what. They understood.”
“Then why did they stay?”
Braddock leaned back, shrugging. “Some people just can’t do what they’re told, can they? Dell and Aaron…” He sighed. “They hit their peak when they was children. Turned rotten as they aged. Cowboyin’ was all they were good for, and even that— Well, they weren’t going to be leadin’ their own outfits no time soon.”
“Why did Carson end up at Lawrence’s ranch?”
A flinch, barely there and then gone, and Braddock locked up tight. “That’s between those two boys. They had an understandin’.”
That phrase again.An understanding. These people talked in spirals, circles inside wheels inside barely comprehensible sayings, drenched in slow-moving molasses and vowels that stretched from horizon to horizon. “I’m not familiar with their understanding.”
Braddock leaned forward, lacing his fingers together, hands resting on the table between them. “It’s a private matter between them, and I’m not one to go blabbering ‘bout it, ‘specially since Carson ain’t among us anymore. I got more respect for him than that. But… lemme put it to you this way. When Carson and those boys were in my cells, Law came down from the mountains like the Devil himself was ridin’ inside him. I never seen him that fightin’ mad, not in his whole life. He got Carson out of my cell that night and put the entire Delaney ranch up as collateral for Carson’s bail. Between you ‘n’me, I don’t think he had Delaney’s permission to rightly do that. I didn’t peer too close at the authorization signature, though. I knew Carson wasn’t gonna run.”
“Lawrence pulled Carson Riley out and left the other two behind? So there was bad blood between those two and Lawrence?” Seemed there was bad blood between Lawrence and everyone in the mountains.
“If he could have, he’d have shot Dell and Aaron dead that night. Accordin’ to him, they were murderers, good-for-nothin’ wastes of human beings, and they’d gotten Carson wrapped up in their shit. Took four deputies to haul Law out of my jail and throw him to the curb. But, Law did more for Carson then Dan Howell did that night. He did more for Carson that anyone ever did.” He tapped the table, lips pursed, holding Everett’s stare.
“Dan Howell’s attorney got the murder charges reduced. He made them free men. That’s not insignificant help.”
“Sure, after the fact. But the night a man is sittin’ in a jail cell, holdin’ his head in his hands and thinkin’ long and hard about his life? That’s a long, lonely night. Makes a man think, and think hard. And those boys were all alone ‘til Law came burstin’ in.”
