He had never learned how to stop.
"Take me to your sister," he said.
Ranger turned toward town.
And for the first time in ten years, Elias Ward rode back the way he had come.
Mercy Crossing Had Run Out of Luck
The Dawson house stood on the eastern edge of Mercy Crossing, a narrow wooden building with a sagging porch and a roof that had been repaired so many times the shingles looked like mismatched pieces of a puzzle.
Smoke still drifted from the remains of the barn behind it.
A blackened wagon wheel leaned against the fence. Two chickens scratched through the ashes, searching for whatever the fire had left behind.
Elias dismounted beside the porch.
Samuel ran ahead and pushed open the door.
"Anna! I found him!"
A woman's voice answered from inside.
"Sam, I told you not to go anywhere near the road."
"But I found him!"
A moment later, a young woman appeared in the doorway.
She was perhaps twenty-five, with dark brown hair tied behind her neck and gray eyes that seemed older than the rest of her face. She wore a plain blue dress beneath a faded work apron. There was a small cut across one cheek, still dark with dried blood.
Her gaze moved from Samuel to Elias.
"You're the man from the livery."
"I am."
"Amos told you about Crowe?"
"Some of it."
"Then he probably told you less than he knows."
She stepped aside.
"Come in."
The house smelled of wood smoke, boiled coffee, and damp plaster. A small fire burned in the stove, although the morning had been warm enough that it should not have been necessary. Two chairs stood beside a table. On the wall hung a framed photograph of a man in a Union uniform, his expression stern and his beard neatly trimmed.
Elias noticed the photograph immediately.
Anna followed his gaze.
"My father," she said. "He died at Gettysburg. My mother lived another twenty years and died believing he had been lucky to go first."
Elias looked back at her.
"Why?"
"Because she spent twenty years trying to feed three children on a soldier's pension."
Anna spoke without bitterness, which somehow made the words harder to hear.
She pointed to a chair.
"Sit down."
Elias remained standing.
"What did you hear last night?"
Anna folded her arms.
"First, I want to know why you're here."
"Your brother found me."
"That isn't an answer."
"No," Elias agreed. "It isn't."
Her expression sharpened.
"Are you a lawman?"
"No."
"Army?"
"No."
"Outlaw?"
"Not anymore."
The words escaped before he could stop them.
Anna stared at him.
Elias looked away.
For several seconds, the only sound in the room was the faint crackle of the stove.
Finally, Anna pulled out a chair and sat.
"My father used to say that men who didn't want to discuss their past usually had a reason."
"Your father sounds like a sensible man."
"He was. He also had a terrible habit of being right."
She studied Elias for a moment, then reached beneath the table and retrieved a folded sheet of paper.
"This is what I found."
She opened it.
The paper was dirty and creased, with a dark stain along one edge. Several lines had been written in hurried handwriting.
Elias leaned closer.
Thursday night. Dawson place first. Bell next. Hobbs after. Clear the northern road before the survey team arrives. No witnesses.
There was no signature.
Elias read it twice.
"Where did you find this?"
"In the mud behind the Dawson barn. I went out after the fire to see whether any of the horses had survived. It was caught beneath a broken fence rail."
"Did you show it to the sheriff?"
"Of course."
"And?"
"He said it could have been written by anyone."
"Was it?"
"No."
She tapped the paper.
"Look at the bottom."
Elias examined the lower edge. There was a small symbol drawn in ink: a circle with three vertical lines through it.
He recognized it.
Not from Mercy Crossing, but from another place, another year.
A cattle company in western Kansas had used the same mark on its freight documents. The company had gone bankrupt after its owner disappeared under suspicious circumstances. Several of its former employees had later turned up working for a rancher who was known for acquiring land through intimidation.
Elias had not thought about that symbol in years.
He straightened.
"Where did you say the survey team was going?"
"North of town. To the spring."
"When?"
"Friday morning."
"How many men?"
"I don't know. Six, perhaps eight."
"Who told you?"
"My employer."
"Mr. Bell?"
She nodded.
"He's been trying to keep Crowe from buying the store for months. He hired a surveyor from Abilene to examine the old land records. The surveyor arrived two days ago and told Mr. Bell that the original boundary markers had been moved."
"Moved by whom?"
"That is what he intends to find out."
Elias returned the paper to her.
"Why do you think Crowe will come back tonight?"
"Because the man who wrote this has made a mistake."
"Which is?"
"He thinks we burned everything we had."
She stood and walked to a cabinet beside the stove. From its lower drawer she removed a small leather ledger.
"My father bought land north of the spring before he went to war. He left it to my mother. She sold a portion of it to pay for Samuel's schooling, but the original deed was never transferred. Mr. Bell helped me locate it last winter."
She opened the ledger.
Inside were copies of old receipts, a handwritten description of the property, and a faded map showing the river, the spring, and the surrounding ranches.
"This proves Crowe's claim is false," Anna continued. "The spring lies on land that belongs to six families, including ours. Crowe knows it. That's why he's trying to frighten everyone into selling before the surveyor files his report."
Elias studied the map.
There was something else.
The spring was not merely a source of water. It lay at the center of an old cattle trail connecting the southern ranches to the river crossing. Whoever controlled it could determine which herds reached the northern grazing grounds and which were forced to travel farther east.
In a dry season, that difference could decide whether a ranch survived.
Crowe was not buying a piece of land.
He was buying control over the entire region.
"Where is the original deed?" Elias asked.