Devon Monk - Dead Iron

The light in the shop grew darker as one of the railmen shadowed the door, stomping his boots of dust before removing his hat and stepping into the store.

“Afternoon, sir,” Rose said, moving out away from the counter. “Can I help you find something?”

“You the owner?”

“No, sir. Owner’s daughter, so I know my way around the shop. Maybe you’re looking for the doctor, though?”

Mae glanced over at the man. He was rawboned, tall, looked like he drank far more than he ate. His left hand was wrapped with a dirty cloth, stained with blood. Like all the railmen, he carried a gun at his hip.

“If I was looking for a doctor, I’d of found one,” he said. “You got any of the fireproof gloves for sell? Those damn matics boil the meat off a man.”

Rose gave him a smile that would sweeten honey, but still had a bit of sting to it.

“We sure do. Right back there on the shelf to the right, below the washboards. Cowhide suede with wool felt inside. Come in special from Chicago just last month.”

He headed down that way, and Mae was very aware that Rose did not turn her back on him, but instead put her hand in the pocket of her apron. Mae wasn’t certain what she carried in those pockets, but from the set of Rose’s jaw, she’d guess it wasn’t a Bible.

Mae opened the lid of the box and picked up the canvas bag. She pulled at the cords and glanced inside. This purse held more silver than copper, and no gold. She hesitated. It was enough to buy a horse, or a small matic to sort or thresh the crops, or plow the field. Maybe enough to set her right for the long winter ahead. She’d been saving it in hopes she and Jeb would one day need to put a room on the house for a child, or to send that child to a good school down in California, or back East.

No hope of that now. That tomorrow was gone. All the good this money would do now was buy her a man’s death. She tucked the purse into her other pocket and closed the lid on the empty box.

Rose came back around the counter, dusting again, her gaze never leaving the rail worker for long.

Mae glanced over at the man. He slid looks their way, nervous, as if waiting for something. He did not seem to harbor intentions of the neighborly sort.

That was the downfall of having the rail push through. Too many men and women who followed the great landway were desperate folk who had supped on hard luck too much of their life. Robberies, shootings, and more followed in the wake of the rail.

Hallelujah might be putting itself on the map, but that mark would be made in blood, as well as iron.

Mae locked the box and took back her key. “Thank you, Miss Small.”

Rose nodded and put the box at her feet behind the counter, out of the man’s sight.

“Is that all for you today?” Rose asked.

“I’ve a mind to wander the store a bit until your father arrives,” Mae said. “I have a pertinent question for him. He’ll be back any moment now, isn’t that right?”

Rose shot her a look of thanks for the lie. “Why, I suppose he will. Said it wouldn’t take him but a shake to finish his business with the sheriff. Said Sheriff Wilke might even come back to check the new rifles we got in yesterday.”

At that, the man in the back stopped dawdling and came up to the counter to pay. Mae stepped aside and found herself interested in a collection of fragile glass globes with thin copper wires threading them set in a straw-filled bucket not far away. The man paid, took his gloves without a word, and left just as the tiny bird on the windowsill chirped the hour.

Outside, the water clock tower whistled out the noon bell, a melodious, lonely chord.

“I’m obliged to you,” Rose said. “Never know what those sorts of men have in their mind. Mr. LeFel works them like demons. Come in wild-eyed and mean, near often as not.” She made it sound matter-of-fact, but Mae could see the slight tremble in her hand as she brushed her hair back from her face. Rose might be too old to marry conventionally, but she was very pretty. Too often a man took that kind of beauty to be his right to spoil.

“You keep a gun in your pocket?” Mae asked.

Rose gave her a level gaze. “A proper woman wouldn’t,” she said. “But don’t suppose I’m so proper as some.”

Mae nodded. “That’s well and wise of you.”

Rose’s smile was sunshine and summer breezes again. “Such talk! If my mother heard me, I’d be left scrubbing floors for the remainder of my God-given years. Is there anything else you’ll be needing today? I cooked up a rhubarb pie this morning. I’d be happy to bring it out to your place this evening, and maybe sit for a bit of tea?”

“No,” Mae said, “don’t bother yourself.”

Rose looked disappointed. Mae realized she wasn’t asking to give the pie out of pity, but out of a need for friendship.

“I’m just not in the conversing mood, Rose. I’ll come by again soon. To bring those blankets I’ve finished. And the lace, of course. When again is Mrs. Haverty’s daughter being wed?”

“Not for three weeks, if a minute,” Rose said. “Though they’re going on about it as if Becky and John are going to burst out into vows any minute now.” She’d picked up a small spindle from the shelf and she was rolling it between her hands, the wood clicking against the thimble on her finger.

Rose never held still, her fingers always flying from one thing to another as if all the world were something that needed touching, changing.

“I’ll bring the lace before then. Will you tell Mrs. Haverty that for me, if you see her?”

“I’d be more than happy to.”

Mae started for the door.

“I don’t suppose you’re looking for the Madder brothers?” Rose asked.

Mae turned in her tracks and gave Rose a long look. She still held the spindle, but was no longer rolling it between her palms.

“Why would you think such a thing?” Mae asked, deeply curious. Rose might be winsomely clever, but she didn’t seem to have a knack for reading thoughts. Mae was certain she hadn’t mentioned the brothers to her.

Rose shrugged but didn’t look away from the spindle and string.

“Just a guess is all. If my husband had gone to his death suddenly, I suppose I’d be looking for a gun, in the least. Maybe other contraptions in the most. The Madders have a way with contraptions that’s better than the best in the old states, I’ve heard whispered.”

She shrugged again and looked up at Mae. “It’s known they devise, though no one talks about it in the cold light of day. Only by candlelight when they think there aren’t ears around to hear.”

“Do you know where the brothers are?” Mae asked.

“They haven’t come into town today. I’d guess they’re up at the mine. You aren’t going out there alone, are you?”

“I won’t be unarmed,” Mae said. “I’m not near proper as some either.”

Rose nodded. “That’s well and wise of you.”

The door opened again. This time a handful of women just come back from church sashayed in. They chattered like scrub jays before spotting Mae. One look at the golden-haired weaver and their perky demeanor snuffed right out, taking on the high-chin stilted manners of a trial, instead of an afternoon’s chance meeting.

“Mrs. Lindson,” said Mrs. Dunken dismissively. The baker’s wife had a face that looked like it’d been pressed out of dough. Her eyes were deep set and nut brown, her nose a knot, and her cheeks round. She’d piled her hair up so high, it threatened to push her blue taffeta spoon bonnet right off her head, roses, lace, feathers, apples, and all. Mrs. Dunken had her nose in everyone’s business, though she didn’t lift a finger to keep her children—some of them, like her Henry, older even than Rose—out of making such trouble that the sheriff had a nightly seat reserved at their supper table. “Have you finally brought a scrap of lace today?”