Chapter 5 - The Man Who Sold Her Route
“Elias!”
Anna fell beside him.
Blood spread across his coat.
Amily stared at Branson.
The lawyer’s pistol shook.
“I didn’t mean—”
She hit him.
Not with a rock this time.
With the heavy ledger.
Branson staggered.
Nathaniel Cole rushed upstairs.
He kicked the pistol away.
Elias groaned.
Anna pressed both hands against his shoulder.
“He’s alive.”
Amily turned on Cole.
“Why are you helping us?”
“Because Creed plans to kill me next.”
“Convenient.”
“Yes.”
Elias opened his eyes.
“Everyone in this valley has convenient timing.”
Even wounded, his voice was dry.
Anna nearly laughed through tears.
Cole helped move Elias into a bedroom.
The bullet had passed through the upper shoulder.
Painful.
Bloody.
But not fatal.
Anna cleaned the wound.
Amily tied Branson to a chair.
The lawyer finally confessed.
Creed had paid him to report Charles Harper’s movements.
After Charles died, Branson was told to direct Amily toward Nathaniel Cole.
“But Cole refused to cooperate,” Branson said.
Amily looked at the banker.
Cole nodded.
“I knew your father.”
“You helped poison him.”
“No.”
“Your name is all over those records.”
“My father’s name is.”
Amily stared.
Nathaniel Cole Senior.
The current Nathaniel was his son.
“My father worked with Creed,” Cole continued. “I inherited the bank and his sins.”
“Why didn’t you expose them?”
“Cowardice.”
The answer came without excuse.
Amily almost respected it.
Almost.
Cole looked at the original ledger.
“Until now.”
They needed someone beyond Creed’s reach.
A federal circuit judge was arriving in Silver Creek in two days.
So was a territorial marshal.
If Amily could put the ledger in their hands publicly, Creed could not bury it.
But reaching town was dangerous.
Creed expected them on the main road.
Elias, pale from blood loss, gave another option.
“The old logging trail.”
Anna shook her head.
“You can’t ride.”
“I can.”
“You were shot.”
“I noticed.”
Amily stepped between them.
“You’re staying.”
Elias looked at her.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“You don’t order me in my own wife’s childhood bedroom.”
“I’m larger than you.”
For one stunned second, no one spoke.
Then Elias laughed.
It hurt him.
But he laughed.
Amily smiled despite herself.
“Stay.”
He did.
The next morning, Amily, Anna, and Cole left by wagon.
Branson remained tied under Elias’s supervision.
They carried the ledger inside a flour sack.
Rain followed them through the valley.
At noon, they passed the first abandoned farm.
An elderly man stood beside the road.
Anna recognized him.
“Thomas Bell.”
He stared at her.
“Anna?”
She climbed down.
Thomas touched her face.
“You’re alive.”
Word spread.
At the next farm, two families joined them.
Then another.
People whose land had been taken.
People whose fathers had died indebted to Creed.
People who had believed nothing could change.
By evening, twenty riders followed the wagon.
Amily looked back.
“What are they doing?”
Anna smiled.
“Coming with us.”
At every crossroads, more joined.
Farmers.
Widows.
Shopkeepers.
Former miners.
By the time Silver Creek appeared ahead, nearly seventy people rode behind Amily Harper.
Creed had expected a frightened woman carrying papers.
He got a procession.
They entered town at noon.
People stepped onto sidewalks.
Businesses emptied.
Nathaniel Cole directed them toward the courthouse.
Then church bells began ringing.
Not celebration.
Warning.
Armed men appeared on rooftops.
Creed’s men.
Anna whispered, “He knew.”
A gunshot struck the wagon.
Horses screamed.
Crowds scattered.
Amily ducked.
Cole shouted, “Courthouse!”
They ran.
Citizens surged around them.
Another shot.
A farmer fell.
Then the courthouse doors opened.
Federal Marshal James Carter appeared with six deputies.
“Put down your weapons!”
Gunfire stopped.
Temporarily.
Silas Creed stepped from a black carriage.
He wore a perfect suit.
Silver hair neat.
Nothing about him looked criminal.
That was his power.
He smiled at Amily.
“Miss Harper.”
She held the flour sack against her chest.
“Mr. Creed.”
“I believe you possess stolen property.”
Amily laughed.
The sound surprised even her.
“You’re accusing me of theft?”
“Ironic, isn’t it?”
The marshal stepped between them.
“Enough.”
Creed produced a document.
“A warrant.”
Cole took it.
His face changed.
“What?”
Amily asked.
Creed smiled.
“Miss Harper is under arrest for the murder of her father.”
Silence fell.
Amily stared.
“That’s insane.”
Creed held out another paper.
“A sworn statement from her father’s attorney, Mr. Branson, explaining that Miss Harper purchased arsenic shortly before Charles Harper’s death.”
Amily’s blood went cold.
Branson.
Of course.
Cole whispered, “He planned both sides.”
The marshal looked uncomfortable.
“Miss Harper, I have to take you in.”
Anna stepped forward.
“She has evidence against Creed.”
“And it will be reviewed.”
Creed’s smile widened.
Amily understood the trap.
Once the ledger disappeared into evidence, Creed would make sure it vanished.
She pulled it from the sack.
People gasped.
Creed’s face finally changed.
Fear.
Amily held the ledger high.
“This contains every land theft committed by Samuel Holloway and Silas Creed for thirty years.”
Creed shouted, “That book is forged!”
“Then you won’t mind reading it in front of everyone.”
A crowd had gathered.
Hundreds now.
The marshal looked from Creed to Amily.
Then courthouse doors opened again.
A frail man in judicial robes stepped out.
Federal Judge Horace Bennett.
“What is happening here?”
Amily stepped toward him.
“Your Honor, my father died trying to put this ledger in federal hands.”
She held it out.
Before Bennett could take it, a shot cracked.
The ledger flew from Amily’s hands.
A bullet had struck its cover.
People screamed.
Deputies fired toward the rooftop.
A man ran.
Creed turned toward his carriage.
Amily saw it.
His escape.
She ran after him.
“Stop!”
Creed climbed inside.
Anna grabbed Amily.
“Let him go!”
“No!”
The carriage surged forward.
Then another rider appeared at the end of the street.
Elias.
One arm tied against his chest.
Rifle resting across his saddle.
He positioned his horse directly in Creed’s path.
The carriage stopped.
Creed stared through the window.
Elias said one sentence.
“Get out.”
Creed slowly stepped down.
Deputies surrounded him.
Amily looked toward Judge Bennett.
The ledger lay in the mud.
The bullet had torn through several pages.
But not all.
Bennett picked it up.
“We will examine this.”
Creed shouted, “It proves nothing!”
A voice answered from behind Amily.
“Yes, it does.”
Everyone turned.
Charles Harper’s doctor stood at the edge of the crowd.
Dr. Samuel Price.
He carried a medical bag.
And in his hand was a sealed bottle.
“I kept what was left of Charles Harper’s medicine.”
Creed’s face went blank.
The doctor continued.
“It contains arsenic.”
Amily’s eyes filled.
“Who gave it to him?”
Price looked toward the courthouse.
May you like
“Your mother.”
Amily stopped breathing.
