The Little Girl Asked a Stranger to Wake Her Mother, and He Could Not Walk Away

“Fire!”

Silas smelled smoke.

The livery roof glowed orange through the broken window.

Dugan ran outside. Mercer followed. Men poured from the saloon and hotel carrying buckets.

Silas remained.

Mae came to the bars. “The horses.”

“Pike will get them out.”

“What if Jonah’s pony is there?”

“Jonah does not own a pony.”

“He says the gray one is his.”

“He is mistaken.”

Nora rose from the cot, unsteady. “The fire is meant to draw you away.”

“I know.”

A crash sounded in the rear room.

Silas drew his revolver.

The back window frame gave inward. It was too small for a man, but an arm reached through, holding a hooked iron rod. The hook caught the cell keys hanging on the wall.

Silas fired into the ceiling.

The arm vanished. The rod clattered outside.

Jonah screamed.

Silas crossed the room and looked through the broken window. A figure ran down the alley.

He opened the front door long enough to shout for Mercer. No one heard over the bells and frightened horses.

When he turned back, Mae stood in the middle of the office clutching the doll.

“The door,” Nora said.

The cell door hung open.

In the confusion, Mae had reached through the bars with a broom handle and pulled the keys from Dugan’s desk.

“You said it locked from both sides,” she told Silas.

He almost smiled. “Your mother has taught you too much.”

A shot cracked outside.

Not a warning shot.

Silas pushed the three of them into the cell and locked it again. “Stay low.”

He moved to the broken window. Smoke rolled over the alley. The livery doors burst open and horses thundered into the street, eyes white, reins flying. Men shouted and scattered.

A shadow appeared at the rear wall.

Silas aimed.

“Rourke,” said Albert Sweet. “Don’t shoot.”

Sweet climbed awkwardly through the broken frame, one shoulder at a time. Blood darkened his sleeve.

“What happened?”

“Cole came back.”

“Rance Cole?”

Sweet nodded. “Been hiding at Voss’s south camp. Voss sent him for the papers.”

“Did he shoot you?”

“Missed mostly.”

Nora gripped the bars. “Albert, did you see Caleb fall?”

Sweet looked at her.

Nine months of silence stood between them.

“No,” he said.

Nora’s face tightened.

“But I saw the rope after. It was cut. Caleb said to tell you about the west book.”

“I found it.”

“I know.”

“How?”

“Voss tore the ranch apart after the fire. Figured you had pages.”

“Why did you lie?”

Sweet glanced at Mae and Jonah.

“Because I was afraid.”

Nora’s voice remained level. “Caleb was afraid, too.”

“I know.”

“He still went on the roof.”

Sweet looked at the floor.

Silas said, “Where is Cole?”

“Behind the barber shop. Maybe waiting for the fire to spread.”

“Will you tell Dugan?”

Sweet’s mouth twisted. “Dugan already knows enough to choose.”

The front door opened.

Sheriff Dugan entered with soot on his face and his revolver drawn.

He took in Sweet’s wound, the broken rear window, and Silas’s gun.

“Put it down,” he said.

Silas lowered the weapon but did not release it.

Dugan shut the door. “Livery fire is contained. Two horses burned. Pike broke his arm. Rance Cole is dead behind the barber shop.”

Sweet went pale.

“Who shot him?” Silas asked.

“Do not know yet.”

“You just came from there.”

“I know where he died. That is not the same thing.”

Dugan looked at Sweet. “You see it?”

“No.”

“Anybody see it?”

Sweet shook his head.

The sheriff’s gaze went to Nora.

“Give me the pages,” he said.

“No,” she replied.

“I can put them in the evidence safe.”

“Voss bought that safe.”

“He donated it.”

“That is what I said.”

Dugan wiped soot from his cheek. “Cole came to steal them. Now Cole is dead. By morning, Voss will say Rourke killed him.”

“I did not,” Silas said.

“Truth continues to suffer from poor witnesses.”

“Who fired the shot?”

Dugan’s eyes shifted away.

Silas understood.

“You did.”

The sheriff sat heavily at his desk.

“Cole raised on me,” he said. “I fired. He turned. Bullet went through the back. Three men saw him fall, none saw his gun until afterward. Voss will say I planted it.”

“Did you?”

“No.”

Nora said, “Now you know how it feels.”

Dugan’s face hardened. “I am trying to help you.”

“You are trying to save yourself.”

“Yes,” he said. “I am.”

The bluntness silenced the room.

Dugan placed his revolver on the desk.

“I have looked away for twelve years,” he said. “First because Voss kept the jail heated. Then because he paid my wife’s doctor. After she died, I kept doing it because stopping would mean admitting what I had been. I told myself there was a line. Tonight he crossed it.”

“Burning the livery?” Silas asked.

“Sending Cole after children.”

“How do you prove Voss sent him?”

Dugan glanced at Sweet.

Sweet reached inside his shirt and removed a folded note stained with blood.

“Cole dropped it,” he said. “Might be Voss’s writing.”

Nora opened it through the bars.

The note contained one sentence: Retrieve the missing account pages before the judge arrives. Beneath it was the letter G.

“Not enough,” she said.

“No,” Dugan agreed. “But it begins.”

Silas looked at the safe behind the desk. “Open it.”

Dugan did.

Inside lay warrants, tax receipts, two bottles of confiscated whiskey, a stack of land contracts, and a packet tied with red string.

Nora stared at the packet.

“What is that?” Silas asked.

Dugan untied it.

The papers were statements from homesteaders surrendering land to Voss in payment of debt. Some carried signatures. Others carried marks witnessed by Justice Shaw.

Nora took one and held it close to the lamp.

“This is my writing,” she said.

Mae watched her mother through the bars.

Nora’s fingers began to shake.

“I wrote these names,” she said. “Voss told me the men had made marks on other copies.”

“Did they?” Dugan asked.