Read Killing Time In Eternity - Edge Series 4 for Free Online Page A

the most: encouraged to do so when the unlikely new owner promised he could keep every dollar of profit that was made. Since the man lived away from the premises, in one of the line of houses on the California Trail, Edge was able to temporarily settle himself in reasonable comfort in the cramped accommodation behind the store.
    He had almost finished the cup of coffee poured from the reheated pot and was lighting a freshly rolled cigarette when a fist thudded at the store doorway. He left the 25
    connecting door open to spill lamp light across the man who stood under the sidewalk roof, sheltered from the rain that fell with less intensity on a street that was quiet again and deserted except for his caller.
    ‘Marshal,’ he greeted as he opened the door.
    ‘Mr Edge, I’d like to talk with you for a minute. Is it all right if I come in?’ He blew into his cupped hands and hunched his shoulders within the sheepskin coat he now wore over his Sunday best suit.
    Edge turned and led the way, leaving the anxiously frowning lawman to close the door and follow him.
    ‘I guess I ought to apologise? The way I pulled my weapon on you? But I heard the shots from inside the theatre. And the first thing I saw when I came blundering out the way I did was a guy aiming a pistol up the street. We don’t get a lot of gunplay in Eternity as a rule.’
    ‘No sweat, feller. It doesn’t bother me so much as it used to. You want coffee?’
    ‘That sounds real good.’ Flynt blew again into his cupped hands. ‘Cuts clean through to my bones, this kind of cold and wet weather. It never used to.’
    ‘I know what you mean.’ Edge gestured toward the less comfortable armchair on the other side of the stove from his own and went into the kitchen to bring a second cup and filled it from the pot. Then, after he had performed his duty as host, he sat down, sipped at his own coffee and eyed the discontented Ward Flynt quizzically.
    ‘Buck Segal told me he thinks you maybe got a good look at the guy that shot Doc Childs and his buddy?’
    ‘Had a better view of the feller’s horse.’
    ‘Uh?’
    ‘The killer was wrapped head to toe in a black slicker. His horse was dark, too. A bay or a chestnut, I’d guess.’ He ran three fingers down his forehead and nose. ‘With a white blaze.’
    Flynt’s ruddy face expressed disappointment. ‘Is that really all you saw? There must be dozens of horses around here match that description. It ain’t much to go on.’
    ‘I could’ve stopped him if you hadn’t stuck a gun in the back of my neck. The lawman sighed, shrugged and acknowledged miserably. ‘Yeah, okay. It turned out my move wasn’t so smart.’
    Edge asked: ‘Nobody else got a better look than me, I guess?’
    Grimacing disappointment became resignation in Flynt’s brown eyes and hard set mouth line before he swallowed some coffee, the cup gripped tightly in both cold hands.
    ‘No one except you was outside until the shots brought folks running. But by then the killer 26
    was high-tailing it down the street. Looking like some kind of big bird is how one guy told it. I guess that fits in with him wearing dark oilskins. They would have billowed out each side of him. Like a pair of wings?’
    Edge said nothing and remained impassively at ease as he smoked the cigarette while Flynt spent the time sipping his coffee, clearly even tenser than before. Then the lawman became pensive. ‘Buck Segal, Walt Benson and John Dickens: they all said as how Doc Childs’ buddy was a police detective from New York City. Guess you heard the same thing? While the doc and him were talking over old times in the Second Chance?’
    ‘I can tell you as much as the bartender, marshal. And a little more than the two old timers on account of they left awhile before me. Same as the Colbert brother and sister did.’
    ‘Art and Olivia were in the saloon?’ The lawman was surprised and a little irritated. Edge blew out tobacco smoke between pursed lips. ‘Seems