Chapter 2 - Hoofbeats Around the Cabin
Clara did not open the door immediately.
She stood with one hand on the latch and the other around Thomas's rifle.
Behind her, Keta leaned against the table.
"Who is he?" Clara whispered.
Keta's eyes remained fixed on the door.
"My brother."
That did not make Clara feel better.
Another knock came.
Not impatient.
Not threatening.
Just firm.
"Clara McKe."
The pronunciation was careful.
Accurate.
She looked at Keta.
"How does he know my name?"
Keta lowered his eyes.
"I told."
"When?"
He pointed toward the open rear window.
Clara understood.
He hadn't been trying to escape that morning.
He had been signaling.
"You could have mentioned that."
Keta's mouth twitched.
Again, almost a smile.
Clara opened the door.
The man outside stood several feet away rather than crowding the threshold.
That surprised her.
He looked to be in his forties, broad-shouldered, with long dark hair and a face marked by sun and hard years. Behind him waited more than a dozen riders.
None had drawn a weapon.
But none needed to.
The number alone was enough.
The leader looked past Clara.
He saw Keta.
Something in his face broke.
Not weakness.
Relief.
He stepped forward.
Keta spoke quietly.
The language was one Clara didn't understand.
The leader answered.
Keta nodded.
Then the two men embraced.
Briefly.
Fiercely.
Clara lowered the rifle.
The leader turned toward her.
He placed one hand against his chest.
"My name is Tahen."
His English was slower than Keta's but clear.
Clara nodded.
"Clara."
"I know."
"So I gathered."
His eyes dropped to the rifle.
"You saved my brother."
Clara glanced at Keta.
"I found him."
"You stood between him and six men."
Clara frowned.
"How do you know that?"
Keta spoke.
Tahen listened.
"He saw."
Clara looked sharply at Keta.
"You were unconscious."
Keta shook his head.
"Not all."
Clara felt strangely embarrassed.
She had not thought of herself as heroic.
Mostly she remembered being terrified.
Tahen stepped aside.
One of the riders behind him dismounted carrying a bundle wrapped in woven cloth.
Another carried a small carved box.
Clara stiffened.
Tahen raised both hands.
"No danger."
The first rider placed the bundle on Clara's porch.
The second placed the box beside it.
Tahen said, "For you."
Clara stared.
"What is it?"
"Food. Cloth. Silver."
"No."
Tahen looked puzzled.
Clara shook her head.
"I didn't help him for payment."
Tahen's expression changed.
Respect, perhaps.
Or confusion.
"Debt must be answered."
"Then answer it by taking him somewhere safe."
Keta spoke sharply from behind her.
Tahen replied.
The brothers argued.
Clara crossed her arms.
"What now?"
Tahen looked toward Keta.
"My brother says he cannot go."
"Why?"
Silence.
Clara's patience ended.
"Every man who's come to my door in the last two days knows more about my life than I do. Boone wants something. Keta won't tell me what it is. You arrive with fifteen armed men and call me by name. So somebody is going to explain."
Tahen studied her.
Then he looked toward the riders.
He spoke several words.
The group moved away from the porch, giving them distance.
Tahen entered the cabin only after Clara stepped aside.
That small courtesy mattered to her.
Keta sat.
Tahen remained standing.
Clara placed the flour tin on the table.
Keta's eyes widened.
She opened it.
The leather packet lay inside.
Tahen went completely still.
"So," Clara said, "we start with this."
Tahen reached toward it.
Keta stopped him.
The brothers exchanged another tense conversation.
Clara slapped one palm against the table.
"English."
Both men looked at her.
Clara pointed at the packet.
"What is inside?"
Keta finally answered.
"Names. Routes. Payments."
Clara's stomach tightened.
"Whose names?"
"Men who take people."
She frowned.
"Take people where?"
"South. North. Ranches. Mines."
Tahen said, "Men, women. Children sometimes."
Clara's face hardened.
Boone wasn't hunting Keta because of a theft.
He was hunting evidence.
"What does Boone have to do with it?"
Keta looked at Tahen.
Tahen answered.
"He runs part."
Clara stared.
"He kidnaps people?"
"Some he captures. Some he sells. Some disappear."
Cold moved through Clara despite the heat.
She had heard rumors in settlements.
Travelers who vanished.
Migrant workers who never reached ranches.
Native families attacked along remote trails.
Mexican laborers promised work and never seen again.
Everyone blamed bandits.
Or tribes.
Or the desert itself.
Perhaps the desert had simply been useful.
It left no witnesses.
"How did you get the packet?"
Keta explained slowly.
He had followed Boone's men for weeks.
A trader sympathetic to several local communities had learned that Boone kept records because he didn't trust his partners.
Payments.
Locations.
Names.
Keta entered one of Boone's remote camps and stole the record.
He nearly escaped.
Nearly.
"They caught you," Clara said.
Keta nodded.
"For three days."
Clara looked at his wrists.
The rope burns.
Her anger deepened.
"How did you get away?"
"Storm."
He cut his bindings against a broken wagon brace.
Stole a horse.
Lost the horse after it stumbled in a ravine.
Then walked.
By the time Clara found him, Boone was close behind.
Clara touched the packet.
"Why didn't Boone simply take it from you when he captured you?"
Keta looked toward his boot.
"Hidden."
Clara understood.
He had recovered it before escaping.
Tahen said, "Boone believes my brother gave it to someone."
"Me."
"Yes."
Clara leaned back.
"Wonderful."
Tahen did not understand the sarcasm.
Keta did.
He almost smiled again.
"What happens if Boone gets it?"
"He destroys it," Tahen said.
"And if he doesn't?"
"We bring it to a federal marshal."
Clara laughed once.
Neither man joined her.
"You trust a marshal?"
Tahen's expression darkened.
"No."
That answer made more sense.
Keta reached for the packet.
Clara placed her hand over it.
"No."
Keta frowned.
"You need rest."
"Must go."
"You can barely cross my room."
Tahen agreed.
Keta didn't.
The argument began again.
Clara finally said, "He's staying tonight."
Tahen considered.
Then nodded.
"You too," Clara added.
Tahen looked surprised.
"If Boone comes back, I'd rather have fifteen riders outside who don't want me dead."
Tahen's mouth curved slightly.
"Wise."
"Don't sound so shocked."
The camp formed around Clara's cabin before dark.
Small fires appeared.
Horses were watered sparingly from barrels Clara had collected during the last rain.
The warriors remained respectful of her property.
No one entered without invitation.
No one touched the bundle or silver they had brought.
Clara eventually carried the food inside.
Not because she accepted payment.
Because there were sixteen extra mouths nearby and she was practical.
At dinner, Tahen explained that Boone's network stretched farther than any one group could fight alone.
That was why the packet mattered.
Names connected criminals to legitimate ranchers, merchants, and at least one territorial official.
Clara's stomach turned.
"Who?"
Keta shook his head.
"Not safe to say."
"We're surrounded by your people."
"Still."
Clara stared at him.
"You're starting to annoy me."
Keta smiled.
This time fully.
Tahen looked between them, then laughed.
It was the first laugh Clara had heard in her house in years.
The sound unsettled her.
Not unpleasantly.
Just unexpectedly.
After dinner, Tahen went outside.
Keta slept.
Clara remained at the table with the packet.
She resisted opening it.
For an hour.
Then she stopped resisting.
She untied the leather strip.
Inside were folded papers.
Numbers.
Names.
Dates.
Routes.
Some handwriting in English.
Some in Spanish.
Clara recognized settlements.
Ranches.
Trading posts.
She recognized one merchant from Santa Fe.
Then she turned another page.
Her breath stopped.
A name appeared near the bottom.
THOMAS McKE.
Clara stared.
Her dead husband's name.
Beside it was a date.
Three years earlier.
The month Thomas died.
Her hands began to shake.
Thomas had supposedly been killed when his wagon overturned in a canyon.
Silas Boone had been listed on the official report as one of the men who found the body.
Clara had forgotten the name.
Until now.
A memory surged back.
A dusty man standing beside Thomas's coffin.
Hat in hand.
Quiet voice.
Terrible accident, ma'am.
I'm sorry.
Clara pushed back from the table.
The chair scraped loudly.
Keta woke.
"What?"
She pointed at the paper.
"My husband."
Keta's face changed.
He knew.
"You knew his name?"
Keta said nothing.
Clara stood.
"You knew."
Tahen appeared in the doorway.
He saw the paper.
Then he looked at Keta.
Clara's voice dropped.
"Tell me what happened to Thomas."
Keta spoke slowly.
"Not accident."
Clara couldn't breathe.
"What?"
"Boone killed him."
The room became very quiet.
Clara heard every crack of the fire.
Every shift of a horse outside.
She stared at Keta.
"Why?"
Keta looked toward Tahen.
Tahen answered.
"Your husband found the same road my brother found."
"What road?"
"The road Boone uses."
Clara gripped the table.
Thomas had never said anything.
Not once.
Then she remembered his last week alive.
He had been distracted.
He had burned a letter.
He had told Clara to stay away from the western canyon.
She had thought he was worried about flash floods.
Now everything rearranged itself.
Her grief.
The official report.
Silas Boone's sympathy.
The burial.
The years after.
All of it.
A lie.
Clara looked down at Thomas's name.
Beside it were four numbers.
Keta touched the page.
"Coordinates."
"To what?"
"A place."
"What place?"
Before he could answer, a gunshot cracked outside.
Everyone froze.
A second shot followed.
Then a rider shouted.
Tahen rushed through the door.
Clara grabbed the rifle and followed.
Men were moving toward the eastern ridge.
Tahen's people mounted quickly.
Keta appeared behind Clara despite his injuries.
Tahen pointed into the darkness.
A single rider was racing away.
Watching them.
A spy.
Tahen shouted an order.
Three warriors pursued.
Clara's mouth went dry.
If Boone had sent the rider, he now knew exactly where Keta was.
Exactly where the packet was.
Tahen turned toward Clara.
"We leave before sunrise."
Clara looked at the paper in her hand.
Thomas's name.
The coordinates.
"No."
Tahen frowned.
Clara folded the page.
"I'm going with you."
Before Tahen could answer, one of the pursuing riders returned at full speed.
Alone.
His horse was lathered.
He spoke rapidly.
Tahen's face hardened.
"What?" Clara demanded.
Tahen looked toward the western darkness.
"The spy was not alone."
"How many?"
Tahen reached for his rifle.
"Boone is coming."
May you like
Then, from somewhere beyond the ridge, six lanterns appeared in a straight line.
And behind them moved something much larger.
