Portraits Page 2

“I swear, Shepp,” Nate said, calling him the last name of Harlen’s most used alias—Harvey Shepp. “I saw Thayne Strawn around that store over there. And you know he never travels alone.”

  Harlen nodded, exhaling. He stood back a ways to stay in the shade of the awning. No sense in tempting fate and standing out in the glaring sun if in face Nate had seen Strawn. “I reckon it could have been him.”

  “It was you, T. J., and Colvin who held up the bank here in eighty-three.”

  Back then, Telluride had been called Columbia and Harlen hadn’t yet met Nate and Manny. Just he, Thomas Jefferson, and Colvin had been into horse racing until no one would race Colvin’s mare anymore because she never lost.

  A childhood recollection hit Harlen, and he smiled to himself. Betting on mustangs was a far cry from betting on the grasshoppers leaping across his mother’s garden. He and Daniel and Robert would tie strings to the legs of the hoppers then let them go, betting an unpleasant chore as their ante.

  Harlen sighed heavily, the picture of his innocent youth clouding as a wagon rambled in front of the photography gallery. After abandoning the horse racing, T. J. and Colvin suggested they rob the Columbia Security Bank. Harlen had gotten too used to easy money to earn it honestly, and frankly, he liked the idea of stealing from a bank, since they were all operated by a bunch of crooks anyway.

  He, Thomas Jefferson, and Colvin had made off with thirty-one thousand dollars—just over ten thousand apiece.

  Harlen glanced at the corner where the Columbia Security Bank used to be. A hardware store now occupied the spot. He wondered if their robbery had busted the depository, and wasn’t sorry if it had.

  “If Strawn is in town, we’d better get the hell out of here soon as that photograph is ready,” Harlen suggested.

  Nate crushed his smoke beneath his boot. “I’m for that. ’Bout time we paid a visit to the Silverton Miners Bank and make a withdrawal.”

  Harlen pulled smoke into his lungs and thought on that a moment. They’d already sized the bank up and had decided to relieve the vault of its assets. If Strawn and his boys were in the neighborhood, better that they go south for a while. And after the job, even farther south. Maybe down to Mexico.

  After a time, Colvin stuck his head out the door. “Photograph’s ready.”

  Harlen and Nate put out their smokes and went inside. Having not seen Strawn or any detectives, Harlen allowed himself a little breathing room in the studio.

  Pride beamed on Edwin’s face as he showed them their formal portrait. Harlen stood over Thomas Jefferson to get a better look. Not a one of them had a hint of a smile in his expression. They looked like a bunch of somber preachers. But despite that, the image was a good one. And with Edwin’s coaching, the five of them did resemble a group of men who’d known both good and bad times together. There was a certain comradery in the soul of that photograph that came shining through.

  Reaching for his wallet, Harlen paid Edwin his fee. “We’re obliged, Darling.”

  “You’re welcome, gentlemen,” he replied.

  They all filed onto the boardwalk, Colvin inspecting his reproduction with a critical eye. “I shouldn’t have put my hand down there. Looks like I’ve got it on my crotch.” Colvin bumped Manny with his elbow. “Does that look like I’ve got my hand on my crotch?”

  “No. Looks like you’ve got your hand on your fly,” Manny replied. “You must have been thinking about that lady who came into the room.”

  “Damn . . .” Colvin let out his breath in a soft whistle. “She was something.”

  Nate’s hand came down on Harlen’s shoulder and he cautioned Harlen quietly, “Over there by that hitching post. The man with the derby . . . three others with him.”

  Harlen’s stomach knotted. Thayne Strawn of the Merchants and General Agency conversed with some other detectives, by the look of their suits.

  “Boys,” Harlen said in a low voice. “I don’t want any sudden moves or raised voices. We’ve got us a problem here.”

  Manny moved in, his hand on his gun.

  Thomas Jefferson reached for his revolver, and Colvin tucked the portrait into the inside pocket of his coat.

  Nate kept his head down, his hat tipped at an angle so his face couldn’t easily be seen. “Across the street. Four of them. M and G’s. Thayne Strawn in the middle.”

  Colvin swore.

  “We’ll walk on over to the livery, get the horses, and take the east road out,” Harlen said, his fingers instinctively curling around the wooden butt of his Remington-Rider .44. “I think we should split up. Colvin and T. J., you go first. Me, Manny, and Nate will follow a short distance behind.”

  Colvin and Thomas Jefferson started walking. Harlen kept his gaze trained on the men across the street who were talking with folded arms, as if they were discussing something as unimportant as the weather. None of the detectives had even glanced his way. Harlen took up the slack and began trailing T. J. and Colvin. He kept to the inside of the boardwalk, making pedestrians go around him.

  They reached the livery, saddled their horses, and mounted. Harlen took the lead, heading down one of the alleys, but having no choice other than to cross over at Main Street to connect with the southeastern route out of Telluride toward Silverton. He kept his gray roan, Blue, loping at an even gait through the obstacles of rigs and other riders filling up the road.

  He and the boys were about in the clear when Thayne came out of nowhere from behind the dry goods building. He ran to the corner, pistol raised, cheeks red, and meaning business. Harlen had to rein Blue in, the horse digging his heels into the dirt.

  “Harlen Shepard Riley, throw down your weapon in the name of the Merchants and General Agency.”

  From various points in a small circle at the intersection, Thayne’s men had them surrounded. The same call to drop weapons was issued to each member in the gang.

  None of them complied.

  Harlen was the first to damn the consequences and spur his horse forward. A hot bullet whizzed by his ear, so close he could hear the sizzle of his hair being singed. The rest of the boys followed him, revolvers drawn and returning fire. Harlen didn’t want to kill any of the detectives. He aimed only to disarm and put a man out of commission. Blue’s speed gave him the advantage to do so, as a moving target was harder to hit than a stationary one.

  Chaos erupted on the streets, hindering a fast getaway for the boys, because they had to dodge frantic citizens. Harlen sharply veered Blue to the left as a group of men sprinted out in front of him to duck behind a watering trough. Women scattered up boardwalks, leaving their parcels in the street to be crushed by Blue’s pounding hooves.

  Though Blue had been trained not to spook at the sound of gunfire, the roan acted skittish as Harlen directed him away from the armed men giving him pursuit on foot.

  Edwin Darling ran alongside of Harlen, then swerved. Harlen gave Blue a hard right spur to avoid knocking the photographer down. With only a moment to view what was going on, Harlen watched Edwin fall to his knees in the street beside a pool of peach fabric. His mournful scream cut through the pandemonium as he lifted his face heavenward.

  “Evaaaaaaaaa!” The sound that came from Edwin’s throat went through Harlen like a dull blade.

  Forboding prickled his skin. Without being told, he knew what had happened. Evaline Darling had been caught in the cross fire and killed.

  Harlen kept on riding because he had to. Thoughts of whose bullet had taken the life of that beautiful woman ate at his gut. That the fatal shot could have been caused by him brought rose bile to his throat.

  As he whisked past the photography studio, Little Darlin’s small face seemed to fill the window. Their eyes met for a second that felt like forever. In that flash of time, Harlen saw devastation and hate registered on the girl’s face.

  That look would haunt him for as long as he lived.

  1

  A lost inch of gold may be found, a lost inch of time, never.

  —Chinese proverb
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br />   August 20, 1904

  Eternity, Colorado

  Some inebriated fool was shooting the bottles off Marshal Scudder’s liquor tree. Rooted in the corner lot of Eighth Avenue and Main Street, the tree nearly took up the entire yard of the marshal’s office. Leah Kirkland could see the stunted scrub oak—long dead after a lightning strike—from the upstairs window of her house two blocks away. Midmorning sunlight glittered off the variegated colors of glass stuck on gnarled branches through the bottle mouths. Amber, green, caramel, blue, and crystalline were being picked off with wanton bullets.

  As soon as the first gunshot had been fired and she heard glass breaking, Leah knew there’d be an arrest. U.S. Marshal Benard “Bean” Scudder had been sticking his empty beer bottles on that tree for as long as anyone in Eternity could remember, and those bottles being blown to pieces would set the lawman off faster than the shutter on her No. 2 Bulls-Eye Kodak.

  Ka-Boom!

  Leah winced at the sound that spelled doom. This time the weaving culprit hit the top rung of the straight ladder Marshal Scudder kept propped against the tree. Taking aim, the gunman tried again and hit his mark. Blue shards fell. As far as Leah could tell, he’d hit one of the Pabst Blue Ribbon bottles. On wobbly legs, the drunk stopped to reload his revolver. She didn’t recognize him and took him for a passing drover who’d gotten drunk at one of the saloons. Most likely the Temple of Music or the Gold Belt, where neither bartender was known to cut a man off after he’d consumed his limit.

  Casswell Tinhorn, with his blacksmith pliers in his rear pocket, ran down Seventh Avenue toward the Aspenglow River where Marshal Scudder spent his Saturday afternoons fishing. There would be aces to pay as soon as Casswell came back with the marshal.

  Leah let the Nottingham lace curtain fall into place. Without question, she’d be taking the lawbreaker’s photograph for a charge of drunk and disorderly. She’d been snapping mug shots for the arrest records almost two years now. Ever since she’d established a gallery in her home after her husband’s death. Her photography studio was the only one in Eternity. Her specialty was shooting feminine scenes: mothers, children, pets, domestic activities, gardens, homes, and portraits. She also snapped criminal suspects’ faces when the need arose, and photographs for the Eternity Tribune when something newsworthy needed a picture with the article.

  Turning away from the window, Leah strode across the converted bedroom. The colors of her studio were old blue and ivory. Turkish rugs, silk draperies, upholstery chairs, and pottery made up her work area. The pungent smell of chemicals was apparent even though the four windows were thrown open. Easels on casters and painted canvasses took up an entire corner of the room. The space was light and airy with its skylight, low-raftered ceilings, and innovative decorative touches. She used the water closet as her darkroom, printing her negatives in the window.

  Leah went to a narrow mahogany table that butted against the far wall. Its finish had long since been ruined by thoughtless placements of silver nitrate and potassium iodide bottles. A stack of photographs she’d taken for use in the stereoscope tipped over and she shoved them upright, searching through the clutter for a single negative film plate. The Bulls-Eye Kodak, the Buckeye 1899 model, and the Kombi, covered in black-grain morocco, were all good for a sufficient mug shot. But she selected the Buckeye, because she didn’t have to use a tripod and it could be loaded in daylight. It was practical, compact, portable, and with developing costs at a minimum to produce the three and a half by three and a half-inch pictures. She packed the necessary equipment in a case with a shoulder strap.

  Florencio Constantino sang Verdi’s “La donna è mobile” on the Edison, but Leah didn’t take a minute to shut the phonograph off. The shooting hadn’t subsided, because Bean Scudder didn’t run too swiftly. He worked hard at his short, choppy steps to get anywhere quickly. Unless he picked up the pace at mealtime to get to Mrs. Scudder’s table. But Leah didn’t know that for sure. She was going by pure speculation and the girth of Bean’s paunch.

  Heading out the door with her straw hat indifferently pinned over her topknot, Leah briefly glanced at her reflection in the hall mirror. Her hair was never quite smooth and in place, because she spent so much time beneath a black focusing cloth. The chronic state of her coiffure was disheveled.

  The sun was high and warm as Leah walked the pebbled path to the road. She had a large front yard with a walkway lined by rosebushes and leading to a whitewashed, split-rail fence that went right up to the street. Leah hoped her mother-in-law made Rosalure and Tug stay inside her house and continue making candy, instead of letting the children out to investigate the noise. She didn’t want them getting underfoot with a lunatic in the road.

  Opening the gate, she saw Casswell Tinhorn return to the Anvil and Forge blacksmith shop, and Bean Scudder lumber up Seventh Avenue wearing an india rubber pneumatic boat. The tube resembled a big black doughnut with foot holes in it so the great outdoorsman could float like a cork on the water to catch all those unsuspecting trout. With a canvas creel slung over his shoulder, a fishing rod in his left hand, and a gun raised in his right fist, Marshal Scudder bore down on the offender with the fury of a black bear who’d been disturbed in his den. If the town hadn’t appropriated funds from the city treasury to buy Bean a Smith & Wesson hammerless safety revolver that couldn’t be fired unintentionally, Leah might have been more fearful. Scudder had a problem with going off half-cocked when he was mad . . . or tipsy. But the marshal’s current revolver required direct pressure simultaneously exerted on the stock and trigger to discharge it. Accidents were impossible. According to the ad, the hammerless safety revolver was the only absolutely safe arm for pocket or home protection. This greatly relieved the citizens of Eternity, who used to run in hiding when Bean Scudder was holding a gun.

  Leah kept to the sidewalk, but in the event of an emergency, she planned on hiding behind a tree. Her Queen Anne-styled home was a singular dwelling on the block. The rest of the lots were overgrown with box elder, sage, and the lingering July colors of columbine and verbena. Depending on which way a person was traveling through Eternity, her residence was the first or last they encountered. She liked being set apart from the central commotion of Main Street. From her porch swing, she had an unobstructed view of the Eternal Mountains and the enormous cross the First Presbyterian Church had mounted back in the mid-1880’s.

  “What in the hell?” Scudder hollered as he neared the gunman. “I say, what in the Sam hell is going on here?”

  The drover gunman, wearing downtrodden spurs and shaggy chaps, swiveled on his boot heels with the firearm still in his grasp. “Huh?”

  “Drop it!” the marshal ordered, fumbling with the stock and trigger of his hammerless.

  Leah immediately ran across the street to the opposite corner. She took cover behind one of two wooden Buddhas stationed in the entryway of the Happy City Chinese Restaurant. From there, she peeked around the Buddha’s broad, weathered shoulder to see if it was safe to come out.

  Marshal Scudder, rather than resorting to using his Smith & Wesson, was able to apprehend the suspect without altercation. The reason was because the suspect had dropped his gun—and himself—in the dirt. He’d passed out cold on the ground in front of the liquor tree.

  The marshal attempted to reholster his gun, but the rubber tube got in his way, so he held it along with his fishing rod. He wore hip boots that squeaked and sloshed from the water inside them when he took mincing steps. Huffing, he bent his knees enough to reach down and pick up the man’s gun. With an awkward grunt and a totter, Bean straightened, then turned toward his office.

  Leah dashed from her hiding spot and approached the prone suspect. Standing over him, she studied his pale face with its week’s growth of whiskers, thinking a likeness exposed in his passed-out, drunken state might be more interesting than one taken of him awake with bloodshot eyes. She always tried to come up with new ways to improve her picture taking, whether she altered the lighting or used dif
ferent lenses or poses.

  “Mrs. Kirkland.” The marshal’s voice lifted her chin. “Guess you heard the shots.”

  “I did.”

  “Don’t know why Moon couldn’t hear them and handle this matter himself. Instead, I was dragged from a brown trout a nibble away from being on my supper plate.” He glanced at the Buckeye in her grasp. “You brought your camera, I see. I’ll have to have Moon help me get the prisoner in the cell and revive him so you can take his picture proper.”

  Scudder opened the office door and stood back so Leah could enter first. The marshal, wedged in the door’s opening by the wide circumference of his pneumatic boat, had to shove himself inside. The line of his pole got hung up around the nose of his revolver as he struggled on stubby legs to get somewhere. With a scrambling of his squishy feet, he stumbled into the room, his boots leaving muddy tracks on the floor. Scudder flung his bamboo fishing pole, hammerless safety revolver, and the drunk’s gun on his desk in a tangle of fine silk line.

  Deputy Ferris Moon, with a half-smile on his thin mouth, was fast asleep on a cot next to a sunny window with one of those shady magazines draped over his skinny middle. Scudder kicked in the legs of the cot at Moon’s feet, collapsing his bed and sending Moon hard on his backside. He came up sputtering, a shock of straw-blond hair falling into his surprise-widened eyes.

  “Hang it all, Moon!” Scudder railed. “Didn’t you hear that gunfire?”

  Seeing Leah, Deputy Ferris quickly bunched the offensive magazine in his fingers and shoved the wad of paper beneath his right thigh. “I, uh, thought some kids were setting off leftover fireworks.”

  “Some kids,” Scudder mimicked sourly. “You blame fool. A drunken cowboy was shooting up my beer bottles! And he got six of them.” The marshal shimmied out of the rubber around his middle until the doughnut lay at his wet feet. He stepped out of it and rolled the tube next to his desk, where water ran off the plump sides and spread into a puddle. “On account of you sleeping on the job, Deputy Moon, you’ll be filling out all the necessary paperwork.”