Weird West Tales No. 3: Eyes of the Harrowed

Eyes of the Harrowed
By Morgan James

Dust cascades in the air – thousands of twinkling particles suspended in the stale breath of what used to be my family’s grand Victorian home in Silverton. Scully stands deferentially off to the side, quiet and supportive. He is silent, respectful of the dead.

There are two things that amaze me about the house as I look at it now after five years abroad.

The first is how small it really is – even devoid of the furniture and books and pictures that my mind still places into the empty rooms - a corner where my mother’s piano had entertained us on cool summer nights, my father’s large leather chair and smoking table, and my bed placed under the window so that I could lean back and watch the stars at night.

It is tiny compared to the sweeping columns of the King’s College Chapel, the castle grounds in Windsor or the spires of the great cathedrals of London. And yet, this tiny space is both intimate and limitless beyond imagination.

I wonder what Scully is thinking of this fine American home.

I had, in my homesick moments, thought about what it would be like to be back at 13th and Blair after graduation from Cambridge, running the James Silver Mine. I imagined every girl that I had ever been with standing by my side, arm-in-arm, welcoming guests and visitors into this magical realm.

Never had I imagined that I would be back in the summer of 1880 looking at an empty house after visiting my parent’s graves just a few blocks away. I wonder why I never ventured into the cemetery as a boy – a fear of death, probably not. I just was more interested in the future than the past.

Scully shifts and the floorboards creak. Turning, we smile at each other. We both know that I want Montague here. His writing studies at the university come first, however, and I recall our tearful departure at the train station a short month ago. I wonder if I will ever see him again.

But Scully is here – morbidly obsessed with ghost rock. But, that probably makes sense for an alchemist in these strange times. I pat his shoulder as we move onto the front porch.

“We had best be getting over to the bank, Spook,” he says.

The sun is still high in the western sky, but a distinct chill tells me that night is not far away.

A sudden swoosh of familiar gingham and I turn back as we walk past the untended roses lining the front walk. Sarah Smythe stands at the corner of the house. Her furtive gestures beckon me to follow.

“Sarah,” I call moving off the path. But she is gone.

Rounding the corner of the house, strong hands pull me into the snowberry bush. Frightened I look for Scully, who still waits on the stone path.

Sarah’s eyes meet mine. Cornflower blue, but rimmed now with red, wrinkles creasing her perfect young face. As she draws me in for a hidden embrace, her lips move next to my ears.

“Run, Morgan. You aren’t safe here. Finish your business and leave Silverton tonight. Please, my love…”

I feel her body stiffen. I step back to look into her face – in the vain hopes of the seeing that familiar mischievous smile that fills my memories.

The blue is gone, however, replaced by unnaturally large black orbs. There is no smile, there is no emotion. Sarah’s lips move one more time.

“Hurry!”

And as suddenly as she appeared, Sarah turns and flees towards the back of the house. I am too stunned to follow.

Quivering, I return to Scully.

“Who was that?” he queries.

“An old love with a message,” I whisper back too afraid to tell my friend what I have seen.

Mr. Hersham Walker is a rotund man with spider veins running from his bulbous nose across his wide cheeks. Dressed in a fine blue vest and coat, he looks the proper Colorado banker – albeit a bit too much like a stuffed sausage.

“A terrible shame, Mr. James,” Walker says, his eyes watering and sweat beading on his ample forehead. We all loved your mother and father. I can’t believe that he would shoot her and then turn the gun upon himself. But, these are desperate times, I guess.”

“And what happened to the mine?” I ask, still not believing the town gossip.

“Five men led by a Mr. Jenkins came by the office the day after the killing. They had the deed to the mine, and an assignment of claim from your father. I had two witnesses and the circuit judge verify everything. Damnedest thing - Simon never said anything about selling the mine to me.”

“And the house and my parent’s possessions?”

“Well, er, there was the matter of the mortgage on the house.”

“Didn’t the sale of the mine cover that?”

“Well, Mr. Jenkins said that he gave your father $10,000 in cash for the mine. But, we never did find any money in the house. Strange, but the sheriff figured that a thief might have made off with it during the excitement over the shooting.”

Snap. Everybody jumps as the arm of my chair breaks off.

Mr. Walker eyes me with a mixture of fear and pity. His posture is that of a man ready to spring into action, but he says nothing.

“Your father did leave you a few things in the safety deposit box here at the bank. I’m afraid that it’s all I have for you.”

He slides a rusty iron box across his desk. One edge gouges the dark wood, but Mr. Walker’s eyes never leave mine.

I flip open the lid and take out what remains of my life in Colorado: an 1820 Book of Hoyle, four red-backed decks of poker cards, and a letter. Opening the envelope carefully, I notice that the seal has been broken. Inside are several sheets of thin vellum covered with coded text.

“What the hell is this?” my eyes go back to Walker.

“What do you mean?” he asks taking the pages from me carefully – pretending to read them over – as if he hadn’t done so already.

“Curious. Some sort of code. I’m sure that your father gave you instructions on decrypting it.” I take the pages, handing them to Scully, and stand to go. I slip the book and cards into my pocket.

“Why did he do it?” I ask.

“I have no idea, Mr. James. None at all. Very queer business if you ask me. Isn’t there anything your father might have told you that would help you make sense of all this?”

I shake my head, reaching for the door.

The train rocks back and forth as we rumble through the darkness towards Durango. I thumb through the Book of Hoyle looking for any clue as to why my father left this particular book – out of the thousands in his library – for me.

Scully sits down with a bottle of whisky and two glasses. He looks at his geared pocket watch. One minute after midnight.

“Happy Birthday, Spook,” he says. The smile on his face is genuine.

“Oh yeah, it is the third of July. If this is what it feels to turn seventeen, I think being sixteen was just grand.”

“It all gets better from here.”

“I don’t get it, Scully. What the hell is all this about?”

“Well, we have three pieces of information,” he says lowering his voice to a whisper.

“We do?”

“Yes. First of all we know that the letter is a clue to your father’s death and the location of his hidden silver.”

“Go on.”

“Second, Mr. Walker and his accomplices haven’t yet cracked the code. Otherwise, they would have either found the silver themselves or kept the note. From his parting question, they think you have the final cipher key. Who better than a couple of Cambridge chaps to solve the riddle they can’t, eh?”

I stare at Scully as he pours two shots of whisky, hands me one, winks and downs his in a single swallow. Not the finest Scotch, but it tastes like home.

“And the final clue?” I asked.

“Well, that we will get from the thin man with the black hair and droopy mustache that has been following us since we left the bank.” Scully replies nodding towards a sleeping passenger at the far end of the car.

I stand at the back of the train watching the forest slip away as we approach Durango. Scully is pretending to sleep in the last car, a magnificent curtain call after our drunken performance for the mustached man. The way Scully proclaimed that he had solved the cipher had actually convinced me for a minute.

Now, I am the bait.

Pistol ready, I see the mustached man approaching in the window’s reflection.

Just as he passes Scully, a leg juts out - tripping him. In the blink of an eye, my pistol is at his head.

“Tell us what you know,” I hiss as we pull the man onto the back platform of the train, Scully taking his gun and searching his pockets.

He says nothing – just smiles with black crooked teeth. His eyes – brown at first - flatten into black, emotionless orbs.

Thinking of Sarah, my grip loosens. And he jumps – backwards off the train, landing with a bone-jarring crunch on the gravel. Both arms akimbo, he stands up, a bone jutting from his leg.

Harrowed. The word comes back to me unbidden.

A gun shot. I fall.

Looking up, I realize it was Scully who fired the shot, and the mustached man is still standing – with a circle of black slowly growing on his forehead. We watch to see the man collapse, but the train rounds a curve and we lose sight of the figure.

“So much for getting information,” I say panting.

“Well, we know where to go now,” Scully replies.

“How so?”

“I took this train ticket from the man’s pocket while we were pulling him onto the platform. It’s a one-way from Denver to the town of Coffin Rock on the Union Blue for later today.”

“Coffin Rock. Ominous, eh?” I quip.

“Well, you promised me an adventure, young Mr. James. It seems like we are off to a fine start.”

Mr. Halloway sits, quietly having dinner at the Durango Depot.

Nearby, a whistle cuts through the silence announcing the arrival of the train from Silverton. Checking his pocket watch, in the customary habit of a conductor, he has just enough time to finish his steak before the 1:00am departure to Denver.

Suddenly, he feels a cold chill. Turning to find its source, Mr. Halloway catches his reflection in the mirror behind the bar.

“My eyes,” he gasps as he sees the flat blackness reflected back.

Then darkness, silence, and the chill of the grave.