"You always sleep with a gun?"
"Usually."
"Do you always wake up looking like you're about to kill someone?"
"Usually."
She leaned against the doorway.
"I found something."
She handed him a folded piece of paper.
Elias opened it.
A list of names.
At the bottom was his.
Elias Ward.
Beside it was a date.
And beneath the date:
Alive.
His face changed.
Clara noticed.
"Who are they?"
Elias folded the paper.
"People I used to know."
"Rusk?"
"No."
"Then who?"
Elias stared into the darkness.
"Men from the Seventh Cavalry."
Clara waited.
Ten years ago, Elias had served as a scout.
His unit had been sent to escort a supply wagon through hostile country.
The wagon never arrived.
The official report said the convoy had been attacked.
Twenty-three soldiers died.
But Elias knew the truth.
The soldiers hadn't been killed by Indians.
They had been murdered by their own commander.
The supply wagon carried government money.
The commander had stolen it.
Elias had discovered the truth.
He had survived the ambush.
Three others had survived too.
Then those men disappeared.
Elias had spent ten years moving from town to town because he believed the commander was hunting them.
His name was Caleb Rusk.
Not the cattleman.
His older brother.
Dead, supposedly.
But Elias had never seen the body.
Clara listened without interrupting.
"So the man threatening me isn't the same Rusk?"
"No."
"Brothers?"
"Yes."
"And the dead one?"
Elias looked at the paper.
"Maybe not dead."
Clara's expression tightened.
"What does that have to do with my ranch?"
"I don't know."
"But you think it does."
"I think nothing is coincidence anymore."
Outside, Ranger stamped his hoof.
Elias looked toward the darkness.
For ten years, he had run from ghosts.
Now one had finally caught up.
The Hidden Spring
The next morning, Clara took Elias south.
They rode through dry grass and scattered cedar trees until they reached a shallow valley.
At its center stood an old stone well.
Water shimmered beneath the surface.
"This is what Rusk wants."
Elias dismounted.
He examined the surrounding ground.
Tracks.
Several horses.
Men had been here recently.
Then he noticed something else.
A metal box partially buried beneath the roots of a cottonwood.
He pulled it free.
Clara stared.
"What is that?"
Elias opened it.
Inside were documents.
Land deeds.
Bank records.
Government seals.
And a revolver.
Elias recognized the weapon immediately.
His face went pale.
"This belonged to Captain Silas Rusk."
Clara stepped closer.
"Your old commander?"
Elias nodded.
The documents proved that the cattleman's land had been acquired through fraudulent transfers.
Worse, the records showed payments made ten years earlier.
Payments to soldiers.
Payments for silence.
Clara looked at him.
"You found the proof."
Elias shook his head.
"No."
"What?"
"Someone wanted us to find it."
A rifle cracked.
The bullet struck the tree.
Elias grabbed Clara.
They fell behind the stone well.
Three men appeared on the ridge.
Then five.
Then eight.
"They followed us," Clara whispered.
Elias drew his revolver.
"Stay down."
"You can't fight eight men."
"I don't intend to."
He pointed toward the horses.
"Can you ride?"
"Yes."
"Then when I say go, you go."
"What about you?"
"I'll follow."
"You're lying."
"Probably."
He fired.
One rider fell.
Clara ran for her horse.
Elias followed.
They rode hard through the valley as bullets struck the ground behind them.
For the first time in years, Elias felt something he had forgotten.