Leaving Epitaph Read online

  “We need to go and see someone,” Shaye said, “and originally I was going to go alone, but I think you b—the three of you deserve to know what I know.” He didn’t feel justified in calling them “boys” anymore, even though they would always be his boys.

  “Which is?” Thomas asked.

  “Come along and I’ll show you.”

  They reined their horses in outside the Church of the Holy Redeemer.

  “We’re goin’ to church?” Matthew asked as they dismounted.

  “Only to see someone, Matthew,” Shaye said.

  They followed their father into church. By coincidence, it was roughly the same time of day that Ethan Langer had entered a day earlier. The church was empty, and the scuffling footsteps of the four men echoed throughout the place.

  They felt funny being inside the church. With the death of his wife, Shaye’s belief that there was a benevolent God had been sorely tested and had come up wanting. If there was a God, he now believed Him to be cruel.

  Thomas felt much the same way his father did, that a God who was good as priests had been telling him all his life would not have taken his mother.

  James and Matthew both dipped their fingers in holy water and made the sign of the cross while genuflecting, purely from habit. They had not quite come to terms with the responsibility God might have had for their mother’s death.

  “Where do we go?” James asked in a whisper.

  “Let’s go right down the center and see what happens,” Shaye said in his normal tone.

  By the time they reached the altar, the sacristy door opened and a man came out. He wore black and a cleric’s collar.

  “Can I help you?” he asked.

  The four men turned to face him. The priest studied the faces of the three younger men before moving on to Shaye’s. When he saw him, he stopped short and squinted.

  “My God!” he breathed. “Shay Daniels?”

  “It’s Dan Shaye now, Vincent,” Shaye said.

  “And it’s Father Vincent,” the priest said. He seemed to suddenly become aware of the badges all four men were wearing. “Oh, no. Are you here for…?”

  “We’re looking for Ethan, Vin—Father Vincent,” Shaye said. “Has he been here?”

  Thomas, James, and Matthew watched the two men with interest. Obviously, they knew each other from another time, and just as obviously there was still more to be discovered about their father.

  “Danny—”

  “Dan,” Shaye said, “or Sheriff.”

  “Sheriff of…what town?”

  “Epitaph, Texas. Ethan and his men hit the bank in my town.”

  Father Vincent hesitated, then said, “The woman…”

  “Was my wife.”

  The priest closed his eyes and shook his head. “I’m so sorry….”

  “What about Ethan, Father?”

  “Yes, yes,” Father Vincent said, “he was here yesterday.”

  “Yesterday!” Matthew said, excited.

  “We’re only a day behind, Pa,” James said.

  “What did he say?” Shaye asked Father Vincent.

  “He came to ask me…he said he was being haunted by…by a woman….”

  “Mary.”

  “He said she came to him in his dreams.”

  “Good,” Shaye said. “I hope she never stops.”

  “I told him the only way to stop the dreams was to confess his guilt and surrender himself.”

  “He’s not going to do that.”

  “No,” the priest agreed, “he is not.”

  “Did he say where he was going when he left here?” Shaye asked.

  “No, but I assume he’s going to meet with Aaron,” Father Vincent said. “I mean, isn’t that their pattern?”

  “Yes.”

  “So Aaron hit a bank in…?”

  “South Dakota.”

  “Did he kill anyone?”

  “I don’t know,” Shaye said. “This time.”

  Father Vincent’s legs seemed to suddenly give out and he sat down heavily in a front pew.

  Shaye moved closer. “I’m going to get him, Vincent,” he said. “I’m going to track him down and get him.”

  The man looked up. “And what will you do when you find him, Daniel?” he asked. “Arrest him?”

  “Kill him.”

  “That is not your job.”

  “I’ve made it my life’s goal.”

  “To kill?”

  “Yes.”

  Father Vincent looked up at the crucifix behind the altar. “God—” he started, but got no further.

  “Don’t talk to me about God, Vincent,” Shaye said savagely. “God sent your brother to my town to kill my wife. If there is a God, then He’s sending me to kill your brother.”

  “No,” Father Vincent said. “He doesn’t do that.”

  “What does He do, Father?”

  They both looked at Thomas, who had spoken.

  “What does God do?” Thomas asked again. “If he didn’t send your brother to kill my mother, why did it happen?”

  “The ways of the Lord are mysterious, my son—”

  “Don’t call me that!” Thomas said. He pointed to Shaye. “That man is my father, and I have more faith in him than in any God who would let my mother be killed…and be killed in that way—”

  Thomas stopped, then abruptly turned, walked up the aisle and out of the church.

  “Pa—” James said.

  “Go with your brother,” Shaye said, “both of you. I’ll be out in a minute.”

  James and Matthew both nodded, followed in their brother’s wake and left the church.

  “They’re angry,” Father Vincent said.

  “The four of us are angry,” Shaye said, “and frustrated. We haven’t had any time to grieve. And we won’t grieve until your brother is dead, Vincent.”

  “And what about Aaron?” the priest asked.

  “Him too, if he’s there when we catch up to them.”

  “How can you do this to your sons, Daniel?” the priest asked. “You’ll make murderers of them.”

  “I’m going to pull the trigger on Ethan, Vincent,” Shaye said, “not my sons. They are duly sworn-in deputies, acting as a posse to pursue a gang of bank robbers.”

  “Out of your jurisdiction.”

  “That may be,” Shaye said, “but when they pull the trigger, it will be in self-defense.”

  “And when you pull the trigger on Ethan?” Father Vincent asked. “What will that be?”

  “That will be vengeance, pure and simple.”

  “Some would call it murder.”

  “I’m prepared for that.”

  “I feel sorry for you, Daniel,” Vincent said. “You’ve lost your way—”

  “Feel sorry for your brother, Vincent,” Shaye said. “When I catch up to him, he’s going to need your sympathy. Can you tell me where he went?”

  “No,” Father Vincent said. “Because I don’t know.”

  “Would you tell me if you did know?”

  “I would not.”

  “To protect your brother?”

  Father Vincent shook his head. “To protect you and your sons. To keep you from doing something that may damn you—”

  “I’m already damned, Father,” Shaye said.

  He turned and stalked up the middle aisle to the back door. He was stopped by the priest’s voice, echoing from the front of the church.

  “‘Vengeance is mine sayeth the Lord,’ Daniel!”

  Shaye turned and shouted back, “He’s going to have to fight me for it!”

  36

  Outside, in front of the church, Shaye found his sons standing apart, Thomas off to one side with his head bowed, James and Matthew together on another side, looking away from their brother. Like most young men—and possibly like most men—they had not learned how to deal with intense emotions yet. The emotions that Thomas was feeling at the moment embarrassed his brothers. Shaye walked over to his oldest son and put his hand on his shoulder
.

  “I’m sorry, Pa.”

  “For what?” Shaye asked. “Speaking your mind? Don’t ever be sorry about that, Thomas.”

  “Ma was a churchgoin’ woman,” Thomas said. “She’d’a tanned me good for talkin’ to a priest that way.”

  “There’s absolutely nothing wrong with having your faith tested, Thomas.”

  Thomas looked at his father. “Is your faith being tested, Pa?”

  “Sorely tested, Thomas,” Shaye said truthfully. “In fact, my faith is shaken.”

  “What do we do about it?”

  “We can’t dwell on it now, son,” Shaye said. “It would keep us from doing what has to be done.”

  “So what do we do?”

  “We set the question aside for another time,” Shaye said. “Come on, let’s go talk to your brothers.”

  James and Matthew had been having a conversation of their own about faith.

  “’Course there’s a God, James,” Matthew said. “How could we be here if there wasn’t?”

  “I don’t know, Matthew,” James said. “I just know that Ma didn’t deserve what happened to her. How could God do that?”

  “God didn’t do it,” Matthew said, “the Langer gang did, and we’re gonna kill them for it. We can’t blame God, ’cause then we’d have to kill God for it, and we can’t kill God.” Matthew’s logic made perfect sense to him.

  “We could stop believin’ in Him,” James said.

  “James,” Matthew said, “if Ma ever heard you say that—”

  Shaye and Thomas joined them then, and both James and Matthew looked embarrassed about their own conversation.

  “You two okay?” Shaye asked.

  “We’re fine, Pa,” James said. “Thomas?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “You’ve probably already figured this out,” Shaye said, “but I knew Vincent Shaye—Father Vincent—years ago, which means I also knew Ethan and Aaron.”

  “During your outlaw days?” Matthew asked.

  “Yes, Matthew,” Shaye said. “We crossed paths during my outlaw days.”

  “So you knew why Langer was headin’ for Oklahoma City,” Thomas said.

  “Not really, but I figured while he was here he might stop to see his brother.”

  “What did the father mean about Langer seein’ Ma in his dreams, Pa?” Matthew asked.

  “Your mother is haunting Ethan Langer, Matthew,” Shaye said. “He’s dreaming about her at night.”

  “Good for Ma!” James said.

  “Father Vincent seems to think this is the way Ethan is dealing with his guilt.”

  “The important thing,” Thomas said, “is that we’re only a day behind the gang.”

  “Yes, Thomas,” Shaye said, “that is important, but we also need rest, and so do the horses, so we’ll be staying overnight.”

  “But we’ll lose some of the ground we’ve made up,” James said.

  “We’re going to catch up to them, James,” Shaye said. “That’s a foregone conclusion. They can’t get away from us. A half a day this way or that isn’t going to make much difference.”

  “So what do we do now?” Matthew asked.

  “We go back to our hotel, we board the horses, and we get something to eat,” Shaye said.

  “Good,” Matthew said, “because I’m starvin’.”

  “You’re always starvin’,” James said as they mounted their horses. “If you ever weren’t starvin’, I’d think you weren’t my brother anymore.”

  Inside the church, Father Vincent rose from the pew he was sitting in, went to the altar and knelt before it. He had to pray, but he wasn’t really sure who or what to pray for. His brothers were evil men. Should he pray for their souls? Daniel Shaye and his sons were after vengeance, but they weren’t bad men. Pray for them?

  He made the sign of the cross and pressed his hands together. Maybe he’d just play it safe and pray for all of them—and while he was at it, toss in a prayer for himself as well.

  37

  They all had steak dinners that night, and there wasn’t much conversation during the meal. Shaye had the feeling they were all having thoughts about faith and religion. He was starting to wonder if accompanying him on his vendetta was going to adversely effect them as men. Or should he simply stop thinking about this as something he had to do and start thinking of it as something they all had to do—their vendetta? After all, they had as much right to it as he did.

  During dessert, however, it was Matthew who finally brought the question of religion up.

  “Pa?

  “Yes, Matthew?”

  “Do you not believe in God anymore?”

  Thomas stole a quick look at his father and James looked away. He was hoping Matthew wouldn’t tell their father what he had said about that subject earlier in the day.

  “Matthew,” Shaye said, “I don’t think we can give God much thought until we’ve accomplished what we’ve set out to do.”

  “How can we do that?” Matthew asked.

  “It won’t be easy, but we have to try,” Shaye said. “If any one of us can’t put aside the question of God while we’re doing this, he’s going to have to turn back.”

  Matthew looked confused.

  “Can you do that, Matthew?”

  “I don’t know, Pa,” Matthew said, “but I know I don’t wanna turn back.”

  “Just give it some thought tonight, then,” Shaye said. “God would not approve of what we’re doing, and your mother certainly would not approve. But we can’t dwell on that. We have to be committed to this, or even when we catch up to them and there’s the slightest doubt about what we’re doing, we could end up dead.”

  “I’m committed, Pa,” Thomas said. “We have to do this, no matter what anyone thinks.”

  “Me too,” James said.

  Matthew looked panic stricken and confused. He wasn’t sure he agreed with the rest of his family, he wasn’t sure he even knew what the word “committed” meant, but he knew that he could not turn back on his own.

  “Matthew,” Shaye said, “no one wants to force you into anything. You could stay here and wait for us to come back—”

  “I ain’t never been on my own, Pa,” Matthew said. “I wouldn’t know what to do. I gotta come along.”

  “Well then, you and I will have to keep talking about it along the way, Matthew,” Shaye said. “You’ve got to be absolutely convinced you’re doing the right thing, or I don’t want you to do it.”

  “The right thing is for me to come with you.”

  “Son,” Shaye said, “that’s just not a good enough reason to kill someone, and that’s what we’re aiming to do.”

  Thomas reached over and put his hand on his brother’s shoulder. “We’ll all talk about it, Matthew.”

  “We’re not gonna leave you behind,” James assured him.

  “Damn right you’re not,” Matthew said. “You guys would get in too much trouble without me.”

  “And we know it!” James agreed.

  “Like that time…” Matthew went on, and Shaye was happy to see the conversation take a new course.

  He had to make sure that by the time they caught up to the gang, they were all ready to do what had to be done. The slightest hesitation on any of their parts could end up being a disaster for all of them.

  Matthew’s face was still a little pale even as he started to banter with his brothers.

  “How about some pie?” Shaye asked.

  Matthew smiled and said, “Now you’re talkin’!”

  38

  With Petry dead, Ethan Langer actually started to miss having someone to talk to, even if it was just to tell him to shut up. For that reason he decided to start talking to Ben Branch.

  As they crossed into Kansas he said, “Ben, I’m actually thinkin’ of making you my segundo.”

  Branch was surprised. “But you said none of us was good enough.”

  “Well, maybe I was wrong,” Ethan said. “Maybe you’re good enough. What do y
ou think?”

  “I been real happy just following you along these past few years, Ethan,” Branch said. “I ain’t really got no hankerin’ to give any orders, myself.”

  “You wouldn’t have to give no orders, Ben,” Ethan said. “That’s still my job.”

  Branch remembered what happened to the last segundo when Ethan left him in charge for just a little while. Terry Petry earned himself a real shallow grave. Branch was sure that a bunch of critters had already taken care of Petry’s remains.

  “Whataya say, Ben?” Ethan asked. “Want the job or not?”

  “Well, Ethan—”

  “There’s an extra share in it for you,” Ethan said. “Petry’s share.”

  Well, if there was extra money in it for him, that was a whole different story.

  “Sure, Ethan,” Branch said, “I’d be happy to be your segundo.”

  “Good,” Ethan said. “Then you ride back and tell the rest of the men about it, and then come back up here.”

  “Right, boss.”

  “He made you segundo?” Hackett asked.

  “That’s right.”

  “Did you ask for the job?” Ted Fitzgerald asked suspiciously.

  “Hell, no,” Branch said. “I saw what happened to Petry.”

  “So why’d you say yes?”

  “How could I say no?” Branch asked. He didn’t want to tell them about the extra share. “I didn’t want to get blown out of my saddle.”

  “So what’s he want you to do?” Hackett asked.

  “Just ride with him,” Branch said, “and that’s what I’m gonna do.”

  Well,” Hackett said, “if he asks you for any advice, why don’t you suggest we stop off in Dodge City? It ain’t far from here.”

  “He ain’t gonna ask,” Branch said, “but I’ll keep it in mind.”

  When he rode back up to ride alongside his boss, Ethan asked, “How did they take it?”

  “They took it fine.”

  “Anybody mention Dodge City?”

  Branch looked surprised.

  Ethan laughed. “We ain’t far from there. I figured somebody would suggest it.’

  “Somebody did.”

  “Dodge is a dead town,” Ethan said. “Besides, we ain’t stoppin’ anymore until we get where we’re goin’.”

  “Where are we goin’, Ethan?” Branch asked, and then hurriedly added, “Uh, I mean, if I can ask.”