The week following Ferris leaving and Razor’s attack was much more hectic for Matt, but in many ways also far less tense.
The entire town quickly started to show new energy now that the people were back in charge of things. Now they were able to seek food without having to worry about Ferris stepping in and confiscating it, and for that matter weren’t encouraged to sit around completely reliant on the ration line for their meals. And Matt felt far safer with a gun at his hip and the knowledge that all his trusted friends and neighbors were armed too. The entire town felt safer, and people actually started wandering the streets once more.
They dealt with the captured members of Razor’s gang the next day, just as Mayor Tillman had promised they would. Chauncey radioed Price first thing in the morning asking about bringing the prisoners down to them for justice, but after some debate between the Price city government and the FETF coordinators they’d come back and insisted that, while they were accepting all newly arrived refugees, criminals were another matter.
Between that and the residual ill will Price had for Aspen Hill after their refusal to help the refugees, either their own or those gathering in the massive camp outside the county seat, the result had been that Chauncey was told they’d have to deal with the prisoners on their own. When the retired teacher pressed for details about just what exactly that entailed the people on the other end had effectively washed their hands of the issue and signed off.
Which meant Catherine’s fears that the town might have to resort to executions were realized. The new Mayor announced trials soon afterwards and the town agreed on Hubert Peterson, one of the two remaining councilmen, as judge. Bert was one of the oldest people in town, who’d retired to a simple life after a long career as a lawyer. He also had a reasonable temperament and had a reputation for weighing the facts fairly, and most agreed he was a good pick for the job.
The trials were fairly straightforward. Witnesses were gathered to testify against each individual member of Razor’s gang, from among both the townspeople and the refugees, about any crimes they’d seen that man commit either during the attack or at any point after arriving in the refugee camp. The witness standards were fairly rigorous, since the intended sentence was death by firing squad and the crimes had to be severe enough to warrant it.
It turned out that wasn’t an issue. Every single man they’d captured had been involved in Razor’s attack and had attempted or carried out rape or murder, and for most there were also plenty of refugee witnesses to similar crimes out in the camp. It only took a few hours for Bert to settle on a guilty verdict and a sentence of execution for every single prisoner except Al, the man Lewis and Trev had captured a month ago who’d been sitting in prison beneath town hall all this time. Al was sentenced to exile.
Although Matt still had reservations about the executions, if it was going to happen he couldn’t justify asking others to do it while he stood by and watched. So he joined a dozen other men in the firing squad while the prisoners were lined up against a wall a short distance away.
Scott Tillman had stocked a few boxes of blanks in his store before the attack, and as he passed out rifles in the appropriate caliber he assured them that half the guns would be loaded with live ammo and half with the blanks. Matt knew that was fairly standard practice in firing squads, to help the consciences of those doing what had to be done, but even so the thought that he might end up with blanks was a bit reassuring.
He’d had too much of killing the day before.
Once the task was complete he discovered his leg was at the ends of its strength. He felt a bit guilty being unable to help with the shoveling for the graves, both the mass graves for the attackers and the individual graves for the townspeople who’d lost their lives, but even if those who cared about him had allowed him to do something that would certainly reopen his wound he could admit to himself that physically he wasn’t up to it.
One bright note was that one of the refugees who’d been working for Razor assured him that even though the man had cut dozens of people with the weapon he was also obsessive about keeping it clean. Matt hoped that meant his chances of infection were lower, although he did feel feverish for the next few days.
After talking it over with Sam and his family Matt sought out Catherine before the funerals for the citizens of Aspen Hill that evening and told her he would take the job leading the town’s defenses. His leg wasn’t up to anything active, but with the help of the new Mayor and a few others, including a similarly wounded Carl Raymond who was off his feet, Matt organized the construction of new roadblocks, planned patrol routes, and began organizing volunteers into shifts for both.
It turned out there were far more volunteers now than there had been back when the town had seen to its own defense before Ferris came. Not only were the residents of Aspen Hill much more invested in defending their town after the attack but the remaining refugees seemed serious about policing their own to prevent someone like Razor from forming another gang. Matt had hundreds of volunteers to work with, most of whom had some experience with firearms.
While he couldn’t go out and about he could carry out interviews for everyone applying, which he did with the help of Chauncey Watson and Scott Tillman. The other two men only thought interviews necessary for refugee applicants, but Matt insisted he wanted to speak to everyone, both out of fairness as well as pragmatism. They’d be entrusting these people with firearms from the storehouse, after all.
Although for that Matt had to coordinate with Catherine about the use of the weapons: finding food was as important as the town’s defense, in some ways even more important. From the first day the new Mayor armed as many people who were good with a rifle and could be spared from defending the town as she could find and sent them out in hunting parties, with equal numbers of townspeople and refugees.
In the last week a few parties had already returned with deer and elk down from the mountains to escape the snowstorms, and one sent word back that they’d found a small herd of sheep unattended in the higher foothills and were bringing them down.
Between that and some of the livestock Ferris had gathered but never got around to butchering the town wasn’t going hungry, although portions had to be spread thin among so many people. True to her word Catherine had returned a lot of that livestock to their rightful owners, but any that remained unclaimed or were donated to the town provided a vital boost to Aspen Hill’s perilously low stores. Matt and his family counted themselves among those that needed that assistance, although he assured Catherine that he’d repay the food once they could get at the cache.
Until then they weren’t going hungry, and busy as Matt was with organizing the town’s defenses his worried thoughts constantly turned to his dad, who they hadn’t heard from since he disappeared the night of Ferris’s first inspection. He was asking the people he sent out on patrols to keep a special eye out, but so far there’d been no luck.
Even more worrisome, the patrols reported sightings of some of Razor’s gang who’d escaped after the attack roaming the area outside of town. Matt had considered forming a group to go out and track the bandits, but he wasn’t in any condition to lead it and when he ran the idea by the Mayor and a few others they decided after a bit of debate that the town should just focus on defense until things had settled down.
Which left him no choice but to worry and hope that his dad would find a way safely back home.
The seventh day after the attack put them on the day before Thanksgiving, and Matt finally decided his leg was healed up enough that he could start following the patrol routes to personally check them out and see if he could recommend any adjustments.