Edge: Ten Grand

Edge dug his teeth into the lobe of her ear and she squealed in pain. “Lady, you do what I tell you, and then you do what he tells you.”

“Ned?”

“Edge killed him,” the woman called, a tremor in her voice so that it barely sounded above a whisper.

“What?”

“The other man’s dead,” she answered, louder now. “They killed each other.”

“A woman?” the marshal said in surprise. “That a woman up there?”

“It’s the way I was born,” she answered. “Did you hear what I said? They’re both dead.”

“I don’t believe you.” A pause. “Not about Edge.”

“Throw down the revolver,” Edge hissed.

“Look, here’s his gun,” she called, and her arm arced.  The Remington clattered down the side of the gully, bounced and thudded to the bottom.

“He had a rifle,” the marshal shouted.

Edge picked up the empty Harmonica and thrust it into her hands.

“Here it comes.”

The rifle went the way of the Remington, making more noise. Moments of silence, then:

“Who are you?”

“Name’s Amy Ridgeway.  Edge picked me up on the desert. I had supplies and I cooked for him.  I didn’t know he was no outlaw, mister.  I’d have known that, I wouldn’t have rode with him.”

“Show yourself.”

She shot a scared glance at Edge, small pointed teeth gnawing at her lower lip. “I’m scared,” she whispered. “He might shoot at me.”

“Take your pick,” Edge told her. “The lawman might. I will.”

She drew in her breath, knew he was not making an idle threat. I’m going to stand up, mister.” she called. “I ain’t armed.”

“Make it slow and easy,” the lawman instructed.

The woman pressed herself against the rock face at the back of the shelf and inched her way up, holding her breath. When she was standing erect, seemingly frozen against the rock face with her face a mask of fear in the pale moonlight, Edge inched forwards. 

“Move so he can see you,” he whispered.

“I can’t,” she hissed back at him. “I can’t move a muscle.”  

“I’ll help you,” he said, swung up the Henry and jabbed the muzzle hard between her legs, felt it sink in.

The woman gave a low moan.  Edge grinned wryly. “You just been screwed by Henry,” he said.

“You kill me,” she muttered, stepping forward.

“Yeah,” he said, rolled on to his side and kicked out.  His boots hooked around her calves and she stumbled forward, a scream of alarm leaping from her throat as she went off the shelf, smashed her skull on a projection of rock and cartwheeled down to the floor of the gully, the snapping of bones accompanying the dull thud of her body as it completed each turn.

“Have a good trip, Amy,” Edge murmured when the final thud announced her fall had ended.

The silence then was solid enough to cut with a knife.  The cold bit deeper and Edge wrapped the blanket around his body more securely, prepared to wait for as long as the marshal deemed safe.

“Edge?”

It wasn’t what Edge wanted to hear.

“Edge, you up there?”

Edge grinned into the darkness. He kept his breathing low and did not move a muscle. There was a vocal sound from below: one word that was inaudible in meaning but said in a tone that meant the marshal had cursed.  Silence for long moments, then a slap of hand on horse flesh, a whinney and pounding of hoofs. One of the animals, either the bay or the piebald, galloped away down the gully.  Edge didn’t look to see which one. It wasn’t the right sound. Then, after another long pause, came the unmistakable crunch of a human footfall on hard rock. Pause. Another footfall. The marshal was making slow progress out of the cover of the cleft of the rocks. Edge raised his eyebrows in surprise, figured the lawman had taken no more than fifteen minutes to make his move.  But Edge remained absolutely immobile, knowing that nervous eyes would be focused upon the shelf, an anxious finger curled around a trigger.

Then the footsteps sounded closer together as the man moved more quickly. Then they stopped and Edge counted to three and shot himself forward on his elbows, angling the Henry down the steep slope. The marshal heard the sounds and came up from his stoop over the woman, face clouding with horror.

“Drop it,” Edge commanded and the man complied, his rifle thudding to the ground.

“You pushed her?”

“She didn’t have a lot to live for. Who put you on to me?”

“Liveryman recognized your picture on the wanted poster,” the marshal answered. “Waitress at the restaurant said you’d headed north. Her boss backed her up. We figured they were lying.”

“Obliged,” Edge said and shot him, cleanly through the heart. The man collapsed on to the woman in an embrace of death.