Jack awoke the next day to the sun's warmth tickling his face. He sighed and wrinkled his nose at the light before rolling onto his side, groaning in annoyance when the restrictive fabric of his shirt made the position uncomfortable. Being too caught up in his head the night before, he hadn't thought to change and ended up passing out fully dressed, dirty boots and all.
He rolled back onto his back and squinted his eyes open, staring blankly up at the ceiling as the sleepy fog clouding his head began to dissipate. His eyebrows furrowed, confusion striking him as he became more aware of his surroundings. The sun was out. What time was it? He couldn't have slept straight through the entire night….
Jack sat up with a start and looked around the room. His eyes landed on the clock on the wall, which confirmed that he had slept through the night— and the morning too. It was well into midday.
His confusion deepened. It had been so long since he was last able to get a full night's rest; typically, he'd be lucky to get two hours of sleep before being jolted awake by a nightmare. And given the circumstances, he had expected to be thrown into the worst horror show of his life when he fell asleep the night before, but he couldn't recall having a single nightmare. It was puzzling and almost eerie, as if the nightmares had seen no point in continuing to torment his sleep now that they'd finally escaped into reality.
Jack sighed and buried his face in his hands as his brain latched onto the reminder of his predicament. He had spent all of the previous evening thinking about it, playing out every possibility in his head and driving himself crazy with questions he had no answers to. He wished he knew how much the law knew about what happened to Ross; he felt powerless being so completely in the dark. The only information he had was what he'd read in that newspaper article, and it wasn't much help to him now.
Jack straightened up a bit as a thought occurred to him. It had been a while since that article was put out; maybe there had been some kind of update. It'd definitely be all over the papers if it was discovered that Ross was dead, and that was what Jack wanted to know above all….
Before he had the chance to talk himself out of it, he rolled out of bed, his mind set on getting ahold of a newspaper. Not even bothering to throw on his hat, he grabbed his satchel and started for the door. His stride was cut short when he tripped over something on the floor.
He looked down and spotted the book Lilly had lent him laying open and face down on the ground. Cursing under his breath, he crouched down and picked it up. He brushed the pages off, frowning at the scuff marks the floor had left on them and the harsh dent in the corner of the cover. Great, he thought bitterly as he ran his thumb over the damaged corner. Ruin the girl's book; give her another reason to hate you. As if she doesn't have enough already. With a contemptuous sigh, he stood up and shoved the book into his bag to deal with later.
He cracked the door open an inch and peeked out, scanning the hallway for anything or anyone suspicious. Finding nothing out of the ordinary, he let out a sigh of relief and left the room, kicking the door shut behind him.
A cool breeze tousled his unkempt hair as he stepped outside of the saloon. He ran a hand through it and sighed at the realization that he had forgotten to tie it back up before he left. Not that it mattered much anymore. He'd been found out; there was no longer any real point in trying to change his appearance.
Bowing his head, he stepped off the curb and started for the docks, careful not to draw any attention to himself. Still, he could feel the countless stares cast on him as he walked down the street. His mere existence was enough to draw unwanted attention from Blackwater's gossip-obsessed residents. Jack sped up his stride and bowed his head further, beginning to regret leaving the cover of his room.
—
Jack arrived shortly at the dock and climbed the small, creaky staircase that led up to the platform. A low beam of sunlight blinded him as he reached the top, and he put a hand up to his forehead to shield his eyes from it. His chest tightened as he began surveying his surroundings.
There was a crowd of people gathered around the dock that day, all dressed in fanciful clothing and acting as if they were in a competition to see who could stick their nose up the highest. He clenched his jaw when he caught a couple looking his way with those familiar haughty stares that never failed to make his blood boil.
He stepped off to the side, positioning himself behind the wall of the ticket office so that he would be out of view of the crowd. He sighed deeply and leaned against the wall, considering just abandoning his errand and leaving. He hadn't expected there to be so many people around; the dock wasn't usually so crowded at that time of the day. But apparently, the ship to the hoity-toity convention was running late that day.
His heart rate started to pick up, and he took a deep breath of the cool lake air in an attempt to calm it. He had already taken the risk and walked all the way over there; he didn't want to leave empty-handed. As far as he could see, there were no lawmen or bureau agents lurking anywhere nearby, and he wasn't planning to linger around long enough for that to change.
Peeking out from behind the corner, he scanned through the crowd in search of someone who could sell him the newspaper so he could get the hell away from there. Luckily, It didn't take long for him to spot a paper boy standing at the opposite side of the dock, waving newspapers in the faces of largely disinterested passersby. The scrappy kid stuck out like a sore thumb in the sea of lavishly-dressed people. Jack imagined he did as well….
As he looked closer, he realized that the kid was the same paper boy that had talked his ear off the last time he was there. The corner of his lip twitched; he wasn't particularly in the mood to listen to the boy's rambling again. But it wasn't like he had a better option.
With a final cursory glance around, Jack took off towards the boy, not taking his eyes off him as he pushed his way through the crowd, receiving a record-breaking number of appalled scoffs and glares in the process.
He skidded to a halt a short distance away when he noticed a woman rushing over to the boy's side. She knelt down beside him with a big smile on her face, but the boy didn't return it.
"I did bad today, momma," he whined to her, sounding as if he were about to burst into tears. "Everyone's just ignorin' me 'n someone almost shoved me in the water!"
The woman's face fell as he continued lamenting over his lack of success at selling his newspapers, and Jack felt a little pang of guilt in his chest for his earlier hesitancy to approach the kid.
She shook her head at him and placed her hands on his shoulders to silence him. "Okay, it's okay," she said softly, but her words didn't appear to have any effectiveness at soothing him.
He pouted and dropped his tote bag onto the ground, causing a bundle of newspapers to spill out.
His mother sighed, grabbed it off the ground, and reached inside, pulling out a small coin pouch. She opened it up and poured the meager amount of coins inside into the palm of her hand.
"You didn't do too bad," she assured him. "Look, you got…" She paused to count the change. "About fifty cents."
"That's nothin'! There's so many people here; I shoulda got—"
"It ain't nothing," the woman retorted, her voice suddenly stern. She held out her other palm, which was empty, and jutted it out to him. "This is nothing. Fifty cents is far from nothing."
The boy bowed his head and kicked at the wood beneath his feet. "It ain't enough to get me better shoes, though," he mumbled.
The statement prompted Jack to look down at the kid's shoes, and he frowned when he noted how old and mangled they were.
His attention was suddenly torn away from the pair when someone bumped into him from behind, sending him stumbling forward a bit. He whipped around and scowled at the culprit, who, without faltering, gave a look of disgust in return.
The person kept walking, shouting over his shoulder, "Get outta the damn walkway; some of us got places to be!"
Jack glared after him then looked back at the paper boy and his mother to find that they were staring at him.
Recognition quickly dawned on the kid's face, and he perked up a bit. "Hey!" he exclaimed. "I remember you!"
The boy's mother furrowed her eyebrows at Jack and rose from her kneeling position. She stared intently at him as he returned the boy's greeting with a small, awkward wave. He fidgeted under her gaze, the urge to retreat once again bubbling up inside of him.
Finally, she asked, "You're John Marston's son, ain't you?"
The question filled him with dread, and he hesitated to answer. It wasn't that he was ashamed to be a Marston— the opposite was true— he just knew that most other people didn't consider his last name to be a badge of honor.
Bracing himself for the negative reaction he knew to be coming, he stuck his chin up and guardedly answered, "Yes."
To his surprise, a gentle smile spread across the woman's face. "You look just like him."
The comment caught him off guard. It was something his mother used to say to him all the time, and hearing it again felt like a knife in his chest. Swallowing hard, he despondently replied, "So I've heard."
His tone made her smile waver, and she looked away as they fell into an uncomfortable silence.
The paper boy took the opportunity to cut in and eagerly ask, "Did you want another paper, mister?"
His mother's face flushed, and her hand flew to her forehead. "Danny, please, now is not the time to ask that," she scolded him in a hushed voice and gave Jack an apologetic glance.
The boy shrank back and mumbled an apology at the ground.
Jack shook off the apology; he hadn't been upset in the slightest by the tone-deaf interjection. In fact, he was deeply grateful for the change in subject. He said, "Yeah, actually, I did."
The boy straightened back up and beamed at him before jerking his bag out of his mother's hands. He rifled through it, pulled out a slightly crinkled-up newspaper, and extended it out to Jack.
Jack took it and held it underneath his arm while he opened up his satchel and reached in to grab the money to pay for it.
"Oh, you don't have to pay," the woman said, waving her hand.
Jack paused and raised an eyebrow at her. "No, that— that's alright," he insisted with a quick shake of his head before resuming digging for the cash in his bag. "I can pay for it."
"I don't want you to," she maintained, reaching for his arm to stop him from pulling the money out.
Jack recoiled from her touch and gave her a bemused frown.
She pulled away and clasped her hands together. "Your father… he did me a great kindness back when Danny here was small," she explained, her voice cracking slightly as she smiled down at her son.
Jack furrowed his brows at her and cocked his head, expecting her to elaborate.
She took the hint and said, "We were having a real bad year, had so much debt hanging over us…." She sighed, and her face took on a pained expression. "I went to the store to get some food, but I didn't have enough to buy a single thing. He was there shopping and overheard me making a fool of myself, begging the shopkeeper for more credit, and he came up and offered to pay for whatever we needed."
The story tugged at Jack's heart; it didn't surprise him at all that his father had done that. Shortly after moving to Beecher's Hope, they had come into a lot of money. He still didn't know where exactly it came from— his parents refused to ever tell him— but his father never hesitated to be generous with that money.
"It may not seem like much, but I won't ever forget it," she choked, dabbing at her eyes with the back of her hand. She then shook her head and let out a little laugh. "The least we could do is let you have a newspaper."
Jack looked down and mulled over her words. Unfortunately for her, his stubbornness was unrivaled, and her story about his father's generosity only fueled it. He wasn't really in a position to be giving out money, what with the fine he received looming over his head, but he didn't care. He wouldn't be able to come up with that money regardless.
Without saying a word, he pulled a small stack of the cash he'd won in that cursed poker game out of his bag. Knowing that the woman would likely reject it, he handed it to the boy.
As the boy took the money from Jack's hand, the woman frantically shook her head and protested, "I-It only costs five cents."
Jack shrugged. "Get the kid some shoes."
She gaped at him then started to speak, but only a sigh came out. Her lip quivered. "Are you sure?" she asked, barely above a whisper. "I don't—"
"Yes," he asserted before she could object any further.
She pressed her lips together and gave a quick nod before looking down at the boy.
Holding the money close to his chest, he grinned up at her and started bouncing on his toes. "Can we go to the store?" he asked, unable to contain his excitement.
"Just a minute," she said, placing a hand atop his head to stop his bouncing. She looked back at Jack, tears welling up in her eyes. "Thank you."
"Don't mention it."
She smiled at him and wiped her eyes before refocusing on her son, who appeared to be growing impatient. She placed a hand on his shoulder and lightly pushed him. "Come on, then."
They turned their backs on Jack and started to walk towards the street, but before they got too far, the woman paused and turned back to him.
"You know…" she started then looked down at the ground for a moment, as if debating whether she should continue. "I hated to see all those stories they spread around about your father after he..." she trailed off, her face turning somber.
Jack nodded, his chest becoming heavy. "So did I."
"I can only imagine," she said. "Just know, we don't all believe 'em."
Unsure of how to respond, he just nodded again.
She gave him a final sad smile before turning back around and grabbing the boy's hand to lead him away from the dock.
—
Jack wasted no time getting away from the dock once he had the newspaper. He found a grassy, out-of-the-way spot at the lake's shore on the other side of town, where he stopped to read and get a break from the prying eyes of Blackwater's inhabitants.
He leaned against a lone, thick tree that grew there, aligning himself with it so that he would be less visible from the busy street several yards behind him. He pulled out the paper and unfolded it, sighing when the breeze hit it and immediately folded it back over. After a moment of trying unsuccessfully to fight off the wind, he gave up and sat down in the grass, spreading the paper out on the ground in front of him.
He held it in place to keep it from blowing away and began scanning over the headlines. As to be expected, the pages were crammed with articles detailing the progression of the war in Europe among a spattering of other things Jack couldn't care less about.
He reached the final headline—about the growing civil unrest in Mexico— without seeing a single mention of Edgar Ross. He couldn't decide if that was a good thing or not. On one hand, he was happy to see no mention of finding his body. On the other, he was still just as in the dark as he was before.
Jack paused when the sudden sound of footsteps crunching in the grass behind him reached his ears and the smell of tobacco smoke wafted towards his nose. He kept his eyes glued to the newspaper in front of him as the steps grew closer and the scent of the smoke became more pungent.
The steps stopped a couple of feet away from him, and the toe of a man's glossy black shoe appeared in the corner of his vision. The hair on the back of his neck stood up as he felt the stranger's eyes boring into him. Fighting to keep from squirming under the man's gaze, Jack kept his head down in the small hope that he would just leave if not acknowledged.
He cursed internally when the man cleared his throat, making it clear that he had no intention of leaving. Jack's chest grew sore as fear swelled up inside of him. He could only assume that the man worked for the law. His mind raced. They had already come to lock him up. He was already out of time. He never should've left his room.
The man spoke, but the blood pounding in Jack's ears muddied the words.
Realizing that he wasn't going to get rid of him, Jack took a sharp breath through his nose and looked up at him. His anxiety dissipated a bit as he took in the man's appearance. He was dressed far too casually to be a lawman or government man. He stood with one hand buried into the pocket of his dingy jeans and the other holding a smoldering cigarette up to his scruffy face.
Jack was flooded with irritation. Why was this idiot bothering him? He glared at him and snapped, "What?"
The man smiled back, clearly not the slightest bit fazed by the daggers Jack was shooting his way. "Hi there," he said with a nod. "Lovely afternoon, huh?"
Jack didn't respond and deepened his scowl, hoping that the man would take the hint to get lost.
The man shifted his gaze out to the lake and took a slow, deep drag of his cigarette. "This's a nice spot," he said, blowing out a puff of smoke.
"It was," Jack grumbled.
The man chuckled with a hint of contempt and took another long puff of his cigarette before squinting down at the paper in front of Jack. After a few seconds of studying it, his brows raised, and the ghost of a smirk appeared on his face.
He hummed and nodded towards the page. "Seems like all that unrest in Mexico isn't ever going to end, huh?" He shook his head. "Things are crazy down there."
Jack said nothing and looked away, feeling a strange, subtle sinking in the pit of his stomach.
The man stayed silent for a moment before asking, "You ever been to Mexico?"
Something about the man's tone of voice as he asked that question made a shiver run up Jack's spine and raised a thousand red flags in his head. He spoke as if he already knew the answer— as his mother used to do when trying to get him to confess to something she knew he had done wrong.
Jack tensed up, suddenly becoming deeply suspicious of him. Who was this guy? Why exactly was he talking to Jack? Who would go up to a stranger sitting in the middle of nowhere just to make small talk? It didn't make sense.
Jack slowly looked back up at him and was presented with an artificial smile that made him feel ill. He clenched his jaw and narrowed his eyes. "What's it to you?"
The corners of the man's mouth twitched, and his sickening smile turned sour. He studied Jack's face for a few uncomfortable seconds before shaking his head. "Just curious."
Something wasn't right about him. He didn't look like he worked for the bureau— he wasn't wearing a badge or one of those stupid hats. But the way he spoke, his persistence, and the way his mere presence made Jack's stomach turn caused him to think— to know— otherwise.
"No," Jack declared, fighting to keep his voice from wavering. "I haven't."
Dissatisfaction overtook the man's face, and he humphed. He took his eyes off Jack and stared out at the lake's horizon. "Well"— he aggressively flicked the remainder of his cigarette into the water and sighed— "enjoy the view, Marston."
Jack's blood ran cold as the utterance of his name added further validity to his suspicions. The man briefly locked eyes with him again, flashing him another phony, condescending smile before turning away and heading towards the street.
Jack watched over his shoulder as the man slithered away, eventually rounding a corner and disappearing from sight. His eyes lingered on the corner to ensure that he was really gone and wouldn't come back.
They must've thought he was stupid, sending someone to covertly interrogate him and make him incriminate himself. Maybe he was. But not that stupid.
Had they been watching him from the minute he left the saloon? Hell, had they been watching him from the minute he left the sheriff's office the day before? Was he still being watched now?
He shivered and took a paranoid glance around, noting all of the innocent-looking people who could actually be bureau agents sent to spy on him. All of the windows and corners that they could be hiding behind. His heart raced as he looked around the city; he swore he could feel it looking back at him.
In that instant, he made up his mind: he couldn't stay in Blackwater any longer. There was no getting around it anymore, no more living in the delusion that he could skirt around them.
He was walking around with a massive target on his back, and his adversaries were methodically lining up their shots. There was no way he could dodge them any longer; his only option now was to flee.
—
Jack paced around his room, shoving his belongings into his satchel until it was too full to latch closed. On his frantic rush back to the saloon, he had stopped by the general store and purchased some necessities for his travels— cigarettes, various packaged foods, and of course, the all-too-essential couple bottles of whiskey.
He didn't have a clue where he was going to go. His plan was just to hop on his horse and ride away from town until he collapsed from exhaustion. After that, he wasn't sure. Thinking too far ahead only filled him with dismay, as he dreaded the thought of living on the run like he was forced to do throughout his childhood.
Once he had gathered up all of his things, he took a final solemn look around the room. He didn't know why, but the realization that he would never see it again tugged at his heart. Shaking the feeling off, he turned his back on the room and left.
He walked slowly down the stairs and made a beeline for the door, trying his best to look casual to avoid drawing attention. For all he knew, one of the people sitting around the bar could be undercover and spying on him. He couldn't let on that he was running away; he didn't want to be followed.
"Jack!"
His heart sank as Lilly's voice rang out from the corner of the bar, and his steps faltered. But he quickly recovered and kept walking to the door. He heard the sound of a chair scraping against the floor, then heels clicking towards him, and his heart sank further as he quickened his pace.
Just as he was halfway outside, he felt a hand on his shoulder and tensed up.
"Hey, where are you going?" Lilly asked from behind him, her voice full of confusion. "I thought we were gonna talk about the book tonight."
Jack paused, keeping his back to her as he searched for an excuse. When he finally turned to face her, he avoided her eyes and said, "I… It's stuffy in there. I needed some air."
"Oh," she said. "Well, we can sit and talk outside instead if you'd prefer. It's a nice—"
"No," he said, the word coming out more harshly than he intended.
Her shoulders slumped, and her face fell, hurt and confusion flashing in her eyes. "Is everything—"
Before she could question him, he stammered, "I'll be back later. I just… need some time alone."
Lilly furrowed her eyebrows at him and silently scanned his face, questioning him with her eyes. She didn't look like she was buying his excuses, though who could blame her. He had been acting off ever since he returned from the sheriff's office, and she wasn't clueless.
"Alright…" she murmured skeptically, pursing her lips. "You know where I'll be."
Jack's chest ached as he watched her turn around and disappear back into the saloon. He hated to lie to her, hated to think how she'd feel when he never returned, but he didn't have much of a choice.
Swallowing the lump in his throat, Jack hopped off the curb and walked with his head down to retrieve his horse and leave Blackwater behind.