Winter's Refuge

Chapter Two Hundred Nine

HEYES

While Vince and Ribs chased after the mouse under Auntie's watchful eyes, Angie tried to keep Chrissy downstairs with the little ones. But she was restless. Finally, they decided to go for a buggy ride. Well, actually Chrissy wanted to go riding on Spring's Moirai, but I talked her into a nice buggy ride…and she wanted to go to the black walnut grove. They took a small picnic and the little twins and Alexander.

While the ladies were gone, the mail came. I sorted it and put Lom's newspapers in a pile. Ken, our bootmaker and ex-US Marshal got the rest of Lom's mail to review while he was gone. Chrissy had two letters I could tell were about our breeding program and I kept the bills.

But today there was one more letter and it didn't fit into any of those categories. It was addressed to Jedediah Curry. It was postmarked from Philadelphia and the return address was Father John Patrick O'Brian.

I turned it over and over and looked at the small precise writing on the envelope. I even held it up to the light to see if I could see through the envelope. I couldn't. I sat it in a pile by itself in the far corner of my desk, but my eyes kept being drawn to it. I'd pick it up, notice that a bottom corner had been folded in the mail, sigh, and put it back in my desk. It was there when Angie and Chrissy returned. I hadn't meant to show it to Chrissy, but she saw it immediately and inspected it the same way I had before tearing it open.

"Chrissy, it's addressed to the Kid. He should open it," I told her.

She looked at me blankly for a moment, then said, "Jed away. I am Mrs. Jedediah Curry. I opened it because it might be important." As she took out the letter, a picture fell to the floor. I retrieved it and it held my eyes and my memories. Chrissy and Angie looked over my shoulder.

"Why, that little boy looks just like Michael when he was little!" Angie exclaimed.

"Jed?" Chrissy asked, looking to me to answer. All I could do was nod. Standing next to him in the picture was a man I didn't recognize and someone I hadn't seen except in my memory for a long time, Kid's ma, my Aunt Keara. She had her hand on the Kid's shoulder and looked so happy and my childhood memories of her came back and I could smell the sugar cookies she had ready for us after school.

"Yes, that's the Kid and that's his ma," I explained in a quiet voice.

"He favors his ma," Angie said.

Chrissy took a long look at the picture. "Jed will cherish this," she said and then started to read the letter:

"Mr. Curry, my name is Father John William O'Brian. If I have reached the right Jedediah Curry, then I am writing to let you know your uncle, Charles Henry McNamara, is in my care. He came to live with me two years ago when his wife died. I thought he was alone in the world. I believe his sister Siobhan was your mother."

Chrissy looked up. "That's not right. Jed's ma is named Keara," she said.

I took another look at the picture before I explained, "This is my Aunt Keara. I remember her real name was Siobhan after her ma and gramma, and she had an aunt named Siobhan that lived with them while she was growing up. So, the family used her middle name, Keara. Only person I ever heard call her Siobhan was the Kid's pa sometimes when he was teasing her."

"Oh," Chrissy replied. She was staring at the picture for a moment before she continued reading the letter.

"Mr. McNamara's sister, Clare, her husband, and two children died in a buggy accident fifteen or more years ago.

He and his wife lost their three children when they were young - one to smallpox, one to drowning, and one broke his neck falling off a horse. He and his wife continued to be active parishioners in my parish until she died. Then he fell into a deep depression, his reason for living was gone. So, I took him in with me and he helped me here and there. Recently I found I was being reassigned. My new parish rectory will not have room for him and the priest taking my place is young and arrogant and announced Mr. McNamara's help is not needed here.

"This letter is a plea for your help. Mr. McNamara has no means of his own but a small railroad pension. I found this picture when I was preparing his things to leave, and he told me of his sister and nephew's visit here to Philadelphia long ago. He said his sister wrote faithfully once a month and he answered every letter. He has her letters here tied with a string. He also collected newspaper clippings about Jed 'Kid' Curry and Hannibal Heyes. The last one he had was you getting a pardon and amnesty and being released from jail. It said you were planning on settling in Nebraska.

"We priests have a network of our own and I reached out. Father Timothy in Bridgeport knows of you and gave me this address. I pray that you will answer and can help your uncle in his last days.

May the Lord bless you,

Father John William O'Brian."

We were all silent when she finished reading. Angie and Chrissy had tears in their eyes.

Chrissy stood up and moved toward the door. "I go there and bring uncle back," she announced.

"No, Chrissy," Angie answered softly. "We don't want that baby to come on a train somewhere."

Chrissy froze, then rubbed her baby belly. We waited and after a few minutes she left her mind and looked at us. "Then Heyes go?"

While she's been 'thinking', I'd come up with the start of a plan. "I can't leave Phoenix with the Kid gone. How about we ask Father Patrick to go and either get Mr. McNamara settled in a good place there or bring him here to Phoenix?"

Chrissy looked at the corner to the room and slowly brought her eyes to mine. Nodding, she said, "Good plan, Heyes. Give Father Patrick a lot of money. I will go answer this letter that help is coming."

I convinced her to not answer the letter until I got Father's agreement to go as soon as possible. When she mailed the letter, we also had Arnie send a telegram to a telegraph office near the priest's address that help was on the way for Mr. McNamara.

JED 'KID' CURRY

Lom fell asleep from exhaustion when we returned to our hotel room. Last night we came to the conclusion that the banker was probably in on the heist. Now I was rethinkin' that while my friend slept. We weren't meant to recognize Toothless or see the gun he held in the darkness. But we did. One thing is certain now, Lom was right. The Black Brook Gang is gonna rob the bank in Two Roads Junction. We don't know how or when or even if the bank president is part of it. Toothless's gun might have just been so he doesn't back out of their plan. I wish Heyes was here, but he's not. So, me and Lom have to think like outlaws to solve this.

LOM

I woke early. The Kid was stirring. "Lom, I been thinkin' about how we want to play this whole thing," he said, sitting on the side of his bed and stretching his arms up high.

"Any ideas?" I answered.

"Not sure if the bank president is a partner in this robbery or bein' forced to join them. When you read other accounts of the Black Brook Gang robberies, did it mention the bank presidents?" he asked.

And something that I had read struck me. I grabbed the newspaper accounts of their robberies that I had brought with me. "Didn't have much time, but I grabbed some of the articles about their robberies and some from the towns they robbed from a week earlier. I read them the first day we were here while you slept. No cryptic want ads that I could find. I never thought of reading the papers of the time leading up to the robberies."

"We probably should," the Kid answered, looking at the sliver of mirror in our room. "Should I shave? I'm supposed to be a dumb drifter. Anything else relevant in those papers?"

"Can't believe I missed this too, but in every case the bank president of the bank manager was either killed or taken hostage…never said if they were released," I answered as I started rereading the articles. The Kid took half of them and started reading, too.

"Oh no, listen to this. Looks like this robbery happened three months ago. In an earlier paper there's an article announcin' the town hirin' two new night guards to ensure citizen safety. It says the town welcomes them and they will be on duty from an hour after sundown until an hour before dawn," the Kid read aloud.

He closed that paper and took up another. "Here's the article from the bank robbery. It says the two town night guards were shot and killed defendin' the bank when it was robbed."

"I remember reading that. Seemed odd to me that the bank manager showed up at the bank in the middle of the night when it was being robbed and got knocked out…and the two guards were both shot in the back. Two US Marshals checked it out, but no one in the town was willing to say anything except it was a shame about those two young drifters who got killed by the outlaws. I didn't put it together with them being recent hires like us until now."

The Kid took a deep breath, put on his gun belt and tied it down. He pulled out his gun and checked that it was loaded before reholstering it. "Guess us two drifters better watch our backs. I don't think they'll do anything tonight, but I got a plan."

"As good as a Hannibal Heyes plan?" I teased with a grin.

"No, but good enough."

JED 'KID' CURRY

Our second night in the bank was uneventful. This time Lom stayed awake, and we stayed vigilant of every sound outside. I opened the safe again and recounted the payroll bein' held in there. Lom counted and logged everything else in the safe includin' money, bearer bonds, deeds, loan papers, and whatever else we found in there. Then we locked it up again and I reset the lock dial to the number it was on when I started. It was a different number than yesterday, but we didn't want anyone to know we'd been in the safe. We brought in our canteens, and each had a brown sack we said was food. The bank president didn't question it, just warned us not to make a mess. We didn't and they didn't contain food except for a sandwich on the top in case someone looked in.

We did discover a second small safe hidden in the floor under the banker's desk. Lom found the combination underneath the blotter on his desk. It had deeds and loan papers, no money.

By two o'clock we settled into two comfortable customer chairs in the bank lobby. When we heard the key in the door, we pretended we were wakin' up. I heard the man in the shadows behind the banker hiss, "Drifters. They ain't good for much but target practice."

"Huh?" I asked, tryin' to sound dumb.

"Time for the two of you to leave. Come back tomorrow at seven," the bank president said hurriedly.

"We get paid tomorrow, right?" asked Lom.

"Yeah, yeah, you get yours tomorrow," came the reply.