The Travelling Man

The dustbowl swirled with absent-minded neglect beneath the baking sun’s merciless beams. The sound of new shoe leather slapping down upon the deserted road echoed in the desolation like a babe being born on the dark side of the moon.

The man strode with rhythmic purpose but without hurry. There was no need to rush when you were as old as he was. There were truly no more surprises upon this plane for him to marvel and behold. It was a fact that was both morbid and comforting at the same time.

There was little life along this stretch of scorched asphalt that dissected the desert’s arid landscape. The occasional reptile would sink into the earth as he passed, in sheer submission before his shadow as he walked. The insects buzzed and flew in wide circles to avoid his orbit with the instincts of self-preservation. The occasional unlucky one passed too close to his aura and fell to the scorched earth, dead before it hit the ground.

A rattlesnake coiled and shook its tail, sounding a warning with aggression fuelled by fear. The man stopped in his tracks and smiled at the reptile. He raised a cocked finger-gun and pulled the thumb-trigger. The snake went rigid then limp and fell to dust.

The man continued at his regular pace. Despite the overbearing heat he wore a three gray pinstripe suit that should have been suffocating under the sun, but his skin was cool and perspiration free. The cut of his clothes was perfect and tailored with expert hands to his slender frame. Atop his head, in spite of the weather, he wore a dark grey Homburg hat with a brim crisp enough to cut inquisitive fingers. He stood a shade under six feet tall with short brown hair and baby-butt smooth skin without a blemish or a sign of stubble. His teeth were perfectly straight and white and his lips were thin and slightly parted. His eyes flashed and bubbled like a crystal under the sunlight and changed
color from emerald green to crystal blue depending on the angle of light. His shoes were black and gleamed as if the leather was buffed within an inch of its life. Like the suit, they looked brand new and spotless.

He had walked these roads criss-crossing the country from before there was even a country. He carried a small dark leathery briefcase that defied the logic of time and weathering and still appeared to have just rolled off the factory conveyor belt. He sold his wares to those in need of his services. He dickered without care for race or religion or any of the petty differences that seemed to preoccupy man’s time so often and so fruitlessly. All he cared about were the signatures scrawled with trembling hands by the desperate.

A family sized SUV suddenly passed by without seeing him and his mouth turned up at the corners and his eyes darkened with black mirth. He felt the driver shiver uncontrollably as though someone had not just walked over his grave but stayed for a tango on the freshly turned earth. He watched as the car suddenly sped up and he caught a glimpse of the man’s wife grabbing the driver’s hands in a panicked plea to slow down. He was contemplating turning the vehicle into a screaming ball of fire and filling the air with the aroma of burning flesh when he spied the road sign up ahead: “Granton”.

As much as he enjoyed the solitude of the road, it was time to go to work. After all, there really was no rest for the wicked.

CHAPTER 1

Granton

Hey Sheriff, what do you say?”

Cassie Wheeler turned towards the voice and withered the man with an unblinking stare that held his gaze with authority. “I say that you’d better move that car of yours, John, before I give you a ticket. That meter ran out three minutes ago.”

John Stains paused for a moment to try and see if she was serious or joking around; he soon hurried across the town square to his car.

Cassie watched the man positively run and smiled to herself. It seemed like most days were a constant battle of wills where someone was always trying to push the boundaries.

She was 39 and a tall woman pushing six feet one with the sort of broad shoulders that seemed to be genetically handed down through a family line of linebackers. Her hair was a short natural blonde bob cut for easy maintenance rather than style and her eyes were a deep chestnut brown. She had the shape of a swimmer: broad at the top and with a small tight waist that she worked hard to keep. She was in uniform today- a combination of tan and brown with a gold star that she polished religiously.

She had been Sheriff in Granton for going on six years now and while the Wheeler name might have helped get her elected, she had kept the job on merit. Big Bob Wheeler had been a bear of a man who carried himself with the sort of weight that made his job easier. Granton was a small town in the desert without much in the way of serious crime and more often than not Big Bob only had to make an appearance for the bars to
quieted on a Friday night. When he’d passed away from a heart attack, Cassie had returned home to do her duty.

At the time, she’d been working as a cop with dreams of a gold detective shield haunting her nights in Cedar Falls, some 200 hundred miles away. It had been almost far enough to escape her father’s shadow, almost.

Her mother was a small timid woman with a passion for homemaking and a large part of her had died along with her husband. When Cassie had returned it had only been for a visit, but she had soon slipped into her dutiful role to look after her mother and then in turn the town.

Upon her return she had been accompanied by a small bundle of energy that her parents had known nothing about. Ellie was the result of a drunken one night stand with a passing businessman stumbling through a hotel lobby where she had been attending a police function. As far as Cassie had been concerned though, it was a perfect storm. She’d got a daughter without the unnecessary entanglement of a marriage or even a partner. Her parents were deeply religious though and she’d never quite had the courage to tell them as she’d always feared the look of disappointment in her father’s eyes far more than any belt whooping. She’d found that the more that time passed the harder it had become to explain the other person in her life. The funny thing was that she had already started to consider the possibility of returning home to Granton. Ellie was growing up so fast and the city may have been gold for a cop’s career, but it was poison for a child’s development. When she’d received the call about her father’s unexpected passing, she knew that she’d waited too long. Her mother had shamed her further by sweeping Ellie into her arms and showering her with love, without a mention of the child’s father or a prying eye.

Cassie looked across the town square as she spotted her mother and Ellie walking along Main Street. The shops were all attractive boutiques lined up in a uniformed parade. The Town Council was always strict when it came to Main Street and dictated just what could and couldn’t be done to the shop fronts. It was a pretty town, mainly devoid of tourism, but the place was kept as pretty as a picture nevertheless for the benefit of its residents. It was a pleasant place to live and raise a child and she knew that this was home.

She grinned at her mother’s attempts to keep up with Ellie as the 11 year old ran around in circles with an unusual energy. Cassie’s heart suddenly lurched in her chest as she watched her daughter pause outside of the Laura May Bridal store. Ellie’s head tilted to one side, deep in thought, as she stared at the wedding dress on display in the large window. The white gown was suspended and Ellie’s reflection in the glass placed her head atop the dress. Cassie’s normally rock hard interior broke a little as she watched her daughter.

Ellie had been diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia. She had begun to show signs of lethargy and had started to show up with unexplained bruising. At first Cassie had suspected Mrs. Norton’s Day Care, however ridiculous that might have seemed. But after getting her checked out by old Doc Gere, her world had been shattered. Her medical insurance had been full coverage and she thanked God every day for that. Ellie was currently in the “Induction” phase of her chemotherapy and her poor little body was being blasted with radiation. Ellie had another week left of the treatment before she would undergo a bone marrow test to see how effective the chemo had been. Cassie was normally a strong person, but now she knew that she had to find Herculean powers to carry them all.

She waved to her mother across the square and started to cross the road, returning waves from the friendly townsfolk who stopped their cars to let her pass.

“Hey Ellie-Belly,” she called out to her daughter with far more gusto than she felt.

“Mom, don’t call me that,” Ellie hissed under her breath. “There are people!”

Cassie laughed along in good grace, but inside she hated the way that Ellie was having to grow up so fast because of her illness. It always just seemed so unfair.

“How you doing, Mom?” Cassie asked her own mother, who seemed to be flagging. She was a woman who some days looked immeasurably older than her now elderly years.

“Oh I’m fine, sweetie,” she smiled in reply, if a little tired and forced.

“So who’s up for a couple of Dogs for lunch?” Cassie asked lightly.

“As long as we’re sitting, I don’t much care,” her mother smiled wearily.

“Mom?” Ellie asked. “Who’s that guy over there?”

Cassie turned from towards her daughter’s pointed finger. “You mean Harlan Harris from the hardware store?”

“No, dummy, I know Mr. Harris. Behind him,” Ellie said impatiently.

Cassie lifted her hand up to block the strong glare of the sun. “I can’t see anyone, dear,” she shrugged.

“Oh, he’s gone now,” Ellie sighed theatrically. “It was probably just some weirdo.”

“And I suppose you’d know all about weirdos?” Cassie smiled.

“Of course, you see them all the time on the TV,” Ellie said grandly. “I could spot a weirdo from a mile away; you should bring me out on patrol with you. I’d be able to point out the bad guys like that,” Ellie said, snapping her fingers with concentration as though she was still mastering the skill.

“What did he look like?” Cassie asked.

“Who?”

“The weirdo, Columbo.”

“I dunno,” Ellie shrugged.

“Some detective,” Cassie grinned.

“He did have a suit on and a tie and he was wearing a hat, in this heat? That’s got to make him a weirdo in my book,” Ellie announced as she headed for the hotdog cart.

----------

Harlan Harris watched the Sherriff surreptitiously from a safe distance. He knew that a lot of the folks around town thought that she was doing a decent job and he had to agree. She obviously wasn’t a patch on “Big Bob” but then again how could she be when she was saddled with the wrong chromosomes?

He was a big man standing around six feet four in his socks. He had been a husky boy who had spread out in all directions as he grew older, but he could still snap a neck or two if the moment required it. He walked slowly but only because he chose to. He favoured short-sleeved Hawaiian shirts and cargo shorts and he was rarely out of sandals. He had a large bushy red beard and wore his hair in a scruffy ponytail usually under a straw cowboy hat. He was a popular guy around town and he worked hard to keep his hard exterior under wraps and well hidden.

He watched on a little while longer while the cop and her family took a couple of dogs from Jerry Marshall’s cart. He looked on as though inspecting his store front window while taking in the view in the reflection. Word was that the Sheriff’s kid was sick with something serious and that was just fine with Harlan. The more attention that the cop took away from her job, the better things would be for him.

The hardware store had been in his family for four generations but he had little interest in it, save for appearances. He was a smart man, smarter than his father and his father before him for damn sure. He knew when to be seen and when to fly beneath the radar. He was on practically every committee that the town threw together and he made sure that he was first in line for any volunteer work. It hadn’t taken him long to gain a place on the town council. It wasn’t that he cared for this little cowpat town; it was that he wanted to be in the centre of life in Granton with his eyes and ears wide open. In his business, or at least his business behind closed doors, it paid to keep one’s ear to the ground.

The hardware store barely covered its costs and Harlan’s pockets were in need of filling far deeper than shifting a few screws and a couple of pots of paint. As far as the town was concerned Harlan Harris was a pillar of the small town’s community, but Harlan was a man with a far darker shadow.

Once a month he sent a shipment out of town. Granton had acclaimed his ingenuity and acumen when he’d announced that he had secured a contract to supply the city of Greenford with all of their town maintenance requirements. While the shipment of various containers was indeed heading for Greenford, it wasn’t maintenance supplies that he was sending. Deep in the desert, out beyond Granton’s borders, he had a manufacturing lab that worked during the dark nights producing some of the finest chemical products to ever find their way into the grubby hands of Greenford’s junkie population. He dabbled a little in transporting guns and a little white powder here and there and he was also known as a man who could lend you a few bucks until payday.

He was normally a man who tried to keep his private business strictly private but now his stomach was twisted into a churning nest of vipers. Davey Mackie was a sweet-natured guy with a belly full of beer and stories. He was a man who could be relied upon to liven up any evening and Harlan normally didn’t mind footing the drinking bill. Davey also had the added advantage of being an occasional employee of Harlan’s nefarious business. But last Thursday good old Davey had hit him up for a loan when Harlan’s guard had been down, way down. Davey had wanted to buy a new truck and the longer the evening had worn on, the more the beer had flowed and the more Harlan’s guard had lowered. He had a vague recollection of lending Davey $18,500 and had been horrified to find that this had indeed been true the next morning when he discovered the scrawled contract in his pocket. The money wasn’t a problem, or even the fact that he’d lent it in the first place. The problem was that if good old Davey slipped on his payments, then Harlan couldn’t let that lie. In his private line of work all you had for your credentials was your reputation; the moment that the other sharks smelled blood in the water it was over.

He slammed the van door shut behind him as he climbed in and turned on the engine, trying desperately hard to keep his temper under check. Davey had been ducking him for the last week or so with one excuse after another, mistaking Harlan for a whole other person.

He drove out through the main downtown area away from the commercial district, such as it was, and out towards the outskirts of town. He waved and smiled pleasantly to familiar faces with forced levity as the friendly folk recognised the store’s van with the painted logo.

Thankfully Davey lived out in a secluded area, one devoid of potential witnesses. The house was a rundown dump with overgrown weeds that were vying for superiority with their human counterparts. Harlan drove with whitening knuckles as he gripped the steering wheel’s leather cover with anger boiling in his veins.

While Davey was married (for some inexplicable reason), his wife was away for a few days visiting her sister.

He pulled into Davey’s driveway, which still held the man’s beaten to shit old pickup, and his temper slipped another notch. He knew by Davey’s ducking of him that there was scant hope that his money was still intact and unspent.

“Harlan,” Davey greeted him as he stepped out of the van.

The man looked shocked to see him but was trying hard to cover it. Davey looked as unkempt as his property; his face was covered with graying stubble and his dirty robe flapped around him.

“Hey, man, I was just about to call you, swear to God,” Davey said, speaking too quickly.

Harlan held a finger to indicate that Davey should wait while he walked around to the van’s side door and opened it.

“Let me explain,” Davey garbled. “There was this guy, you see... he had this inside tip that couldn’t fail,” he laughed nervously. “Should have known better, no such thing, right?”

Harlan withdrew the sledgehammer and hefted it without much effort as Davey’s face drained of all natural color.

“Look man, I swear I was going to pay you back, fucking horse fell at the last, can you believe that shit? It was leading all the way and it fell at the last,” Davey said, backing away with his hands held up in surrender.

Harlan let his town character slip and he shed the skin of his carefully created and honed persona; it was a liberating experience.

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