Chapter 2 - The Marshal Who Should Have Been Dead
Elias pushed Clara behind a water trough.
The federal marshal rode straight toward them.
Pike called out, “Marshal Rusk!”
Clara whispered, “That isn’t his name.”
Elias kept one hand on his revolver.
“Then what is it?”
“Silas Creed.”
The name meant nothing to Elias.
The fear in Clara’s voice meant everything.
Rusk—or Creed—dismounted in the middle of the street with eleven armed men behind him.
He was tall, silver-haired, calm.
Men like Pike performed cruelty.
Men like Creed did not need to.
“Mrs. Vale,” he said.
Clara remained behind Elias.
“You’ve caused considerable inconvenience.”
“You murdered Senator Wren.”
A ripple passed through the crowd.
Creed smiled.
“That accusation already failed in court.”
“Because you killed the witness.”
“Careful.”
“I watched you do it.”
“You watched Senator Wren die while holding the murder weapon.”
“You put it in my hand.”
Creed turned to Elias.
“Mr. Boone. I’m Marshal Gideon Rusk. I have authority to return this fugitive to Helena.”
Elias held out Pike’s warrant.
“This says she’s to be captured.”
“Yes.”
“Alive?”
Creed paused.
“Preferably.”
Clara laughed once.
There was no humor in it.
“Ask him about Matthew Boone.”
Creed’s eyes changed.
Barely.
But Elias saw it.
“You knew my brother.”
“Many people knew Matthew.”
“What happened to him?”
“He disappeared.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“It is the only one I have.”
Elias reached into his shirt and showed Matthew’s letter.
Creed went still.
Pike swore under his breath.
That was enough.
Elias folded the letter and put it away.
“You’re not taking her.”
Creed sighed.
“You’re making an emotional decision.”
“No. I’m making a very simple one.”
“Which is?”
“You knew my brother.”
“Yes.”
“He warned me about Pike.”
Harland Pike’s face darkened.
“And Clara says she saw you murder Wren.”
“That woman is condemned.”
“Then you won’t mind if I hear her story before I decide who’s lying.”
Creed looked past Elias toward Clara.
“You always were clever.”
Clara stepped out.
“And you always underestimated desperate women.”
For an instant Elias saw something unexpected between them.
History.
Not romance.
Something colder.
Something older.
Creed reached into his coat.
Elias drew.
So did half the street.
Creed stopped.
Slowly removed a folded document.
“Search order,” he said. “I’m authorized to inspect Boone’s property for stolen federal evidence.”
Clara whispered, “The ledger.”
Elias looked at her.
“You have it?”
“Not exactly.”
“Where?”
She looked toward the mountains.
“At your ranch.”
Elias nearly laughed.
“You’ve never been there.”
“No.”
“Then how could it be there?”
“Your brother put it there.”
Creed heard.
His expression hardened.
That was when Elias understood.
This wasn’t about Clara.
Not entirely.
The thing Creed wanted had been waiting on Black Pine Mountain for nine years.
Elias turned to his neighbor, Thomas Reed.
“Tom.”
The older rancher nodded.
“Take Clara’s bag.”
Creed spoke sharply.
“Nobody leaves town.”
Thomas ignored him.
Elias faced Clara.
“Can you ride?”
“I can stay on a horse.”
“Good enough.”
They moved fast.
Elias’s gelding was tied outside the blacksmith.
Thomas brought another horse from behind the stable.
Pike stepped into their path.
“You run, Boone, you become a fugitive too.”
Elias mounted.
“I’ve been called worse.”
Clara climbed awkwardly into the saddle, green skirts gathered around her.
Creed raised his voice.
“Boone!”
Elias looked back.
The marshal’s composure was gone.
“Your brother died protecting something that never belonged to him.”
Elias answered quietly.
“Then I guess I’d better find out what it was.”
They rode.
Gunfire erupted behind them.
Not aimed to kill.
Not yet.
Warning shots.
They left Stevensville under a cloud of dust and climbed toward Black Pine.
Clara rode badly but stubbornly.
Twice Elias slowed.
Twice she told him not to.
After an hour they entered the timber.
Only then did he speak.
“You said my brother saved you.”
“He did.”
“When?”
“Nine years ago.”
“How old were you?”
“Nineteen.”
“What happened?”
Clara kept her eyes ahead.
“My father was an accountant for the Northern Star Mining Company. He discovered that Senator Wren was buying homesteads through false foreclosures, then selling the mineral rights to companies he secretly controlled.”
“And Matthew?”
“He surveyed some of the disputed land.”
“He found something.”
“Yes.”
“What?”
“Graves.”
Elias looked at her.
“Whose?”
“Homesteaders who supposedly abandoned their claims.”
Cold settled through him.
Clara continued.
“Matthew realized people weren’t leaving. They were being killed.”
“My brother told me he was working a railroad contract.”
“He lied to protect you.”
That hurt more than Elias expected.
“Where did you fit?”
“My father kept the accounts. He copied everything into a private ledger. Payments. Names. Dates. Judges. Deputies. Land agents.”
“Pike?”
“Yes.”
“Creed?”
“Yes.”
“Wren?”
“At the top.”
Elias absorbed it.
“Your father gave the ledger to Matthew?”
“He tried. Creed’s men came first.”
“What happened?”
“My parents died that night.”
Elias looked at her.
She said it without tears.
Some grief lived past crying.
“Matthew got me out through a cellar window. He took the ledger. He promised he would send for me.”
“But he didn’t.”
“He disappeared three days later.”
Elias looked toward the mountains.
“Why did you say the ledger was at my ranch?”
“Because Matthew once told me if things went wrong, he would hide it where no politician would ever think to look.”
“That could be anywhere.”
“He said, ‘My brother has a place where the mountain itself keeps secrets.’”
Elias’s reins tightened.
He knew exactly what Matthew meant.
There was an abandoned prospecting tunnel behind the old Boone cabin.
Elias had sealed it after a cave-in killed their father.
Only family knew.
Clara saw his face.
“You know.”
“Yes.”
Behind them came the distant crack of a branch.
Elias raised one hand.
They stopped.
Voices.
Riders.
“They’re following us,” Clara whispered.
“Of course they are.”
He led her off the trail.
They crossed a frozen stream, rode through shallow water for half a mile, then climbed a rocky ridge.
At sunset they reached Black Pine homestead.
Clara stared at the cabin.
It wasn’t large.
Two rooms.
A barn.
Smokehouse.
Fenced pasture.
A life built by hand.
“This is where I was supposed to live?” she asked.
Elias glanced at her velvet gown.
“You disappointed?”
“No.”
Her answer surprised him.
“It’s beautiful.”
He almost smiled.
Then he remembered the men behind them.
Inside the cabin, he lit lamps.
Clara changed quickly into a plain brown traveling dress from her bag.
When she returned, Elias barely recognized her.
Not because she looked less beautiful.
Because she looked more real.
She rolled up her sleeves.
“What do we do?”
“Eat first.”
“You’re feeding me?”
“You rode five hours.”
“Men are coming.”
“They’ll come whether you’re hungry or not.”
For the first time, she smiled.
Small.
Tired.
Real.
They ate beans and bread.
Then Elias took a lantern from the wall.
“The tunnel.”
Night had settled hard over Black Pine.
They walked behind the cabin, climbed through pines, and reached a rock face half-covered in snow.
Elias found the old entrance.
The boards he had nailed across it years earlier were still there.
Except one.
One board lay broken in the snow.
Freshly broken.
Clara stopped.
“Someone’s been here.”
Elias crouched.
Boot prints.
One set.
Going inside.
None coming out.
He drew his revolver.
Clara picked up the lantern.
They entered.
The tunnel smelled of earth and old timber.
Twenty yards in, Elias saw marks on the wall.
Matthew had carved them when they were boys.
M.B.
E.B.
Clara touched the letters.
“He really was here.”
They went deeper.
At the collapsed section Elias found a gap.
Someone had dug around it.
Recently.
Beyond it was a narrow chamber.
And inside sat an iron strongbox.
Clara gasped.
Elias approached.
The lock had already been broken.
The box was empty.
“No,” Clara whispered.
Then Elias saw something scratched into the dust beneath it.
Three words.
NOT SAFE. CHURCH BELL.
Clara looked at him.
“Matthew wrote that?”
“I don’t know.”
A gun clicked behind them.
Elias turned.
A figure stood in the tunnel entrance.
Clara raised the lantern.
The man stepped into the light.
Elias forgot how to breathe.
The stranger was older.
Scarred.
Gray at the temples.
But Elias knew those eyes.
The man looked at him and said the name nobody had called him since childhood.
“Eli.”
Elias’s revolver slipped lower.
“Matthew?”
His brother raised one finger to his lips.
May you like
Then whispered:
“Don’t say my name. They think I’m dead.”
