“She said you might return.”
Caleb’s hand moved toward his revolver.
Mrs.
Talbot noticed.
“If I meant you harm, Sheriff Hollis would be standing here.”
“Maybe he’s coming.”
“He isn’t.”
She looked at Mae.
Then her eyes filled with tears.
“I’m sorry.”
Mae said nothing.
Mrs.
Talbot continued.
“I saw what he did.”
Mae’s expression hardened.
“I know.”
The old woman flinched.
“I saw the bruises.”
“You never said anything.”
“I tried once.”
Mae laughed without humor.
“When?”
“Three winters ago.”
Mae went still.
Mrs.
Talbot swallowed.
“I spoke to Beatrice.”
“And?”
“She told me that if we confronted Owen before you were ready to leave, Gideon would send you away.”
Mae stared.
Mrs.
Talbot lowered her voice.
“Like he sent the others.”
Caleb stepped closer.
“What others?”
Mrs.
Talbot’s gaze moved toward him.
“Your sister.”
Caleb stopped breathing.
“You knew Anna?”
“She came to me three days before she disappeared.”
His hand closed around the porch rail.
“What did she say?”
“She said Gideon was stealing property from widows and families with weak claims.
She had copied documents.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did she say where she was going?”
Mrs.
Talbot hesitated.
Then shook her head.
“No.”
Caleb saw the lie.
He grabbed her arm.
“Where did my sister go?”
Mae touched his shoulder.
“Caleb.”
Mrs.
Talbot looked terrified.
“I promised.”
“She’s been gone nine years!”
“I promised her.”
“Is she alive?”
Mrs.
Talbot began crying.
Caleb repeated the question.
“Is Anna alive?”
Before she could answer, church bells exploded above them.
Not one toll.
Three.
A pause.
Then three more.
Mrs.
Talbot looked toward the street.
Her face changed.
“They know you’re here.”
Lanterns appeared around the corner.
Men shouted.
Mae whispered, “Caleb.”
Mrs.
Talbot opened the vestry door.
“Inside.”
They ran.
The tunnel beneath Mercy Bend church had been built for coal storage.
At least that was the official explanation.
In reality, it stretched beneath two buildings and emerged behind the old print shop.
Mae stared at the passage.
“How many people know about this?”
“More than Gideon thinks,” Mrs.
Talbot said.
That answer changed everything.
At the tunnel’s end waited six women.
Doctor Eliza Bell.
The schoolmistress.
Two ranch wives.
A hotel maid.
And Beatrice Drayton.
Mae stopped.
Caleb drew his pistol.
Beatrice did not flinch.
She looked older than Mae had ever seen her.
Without jewelry.
Without her severe black dress.
Without the Drayton dignity she wore like armor.
“You let him hurt me.”
Mae’s voice shook.
Beatrice closed her eyes.
“Yes.”
The word struck harder than an excuse.
Mae stepped forward.
“Why?”
“Because I was a coward.”
“You could have stopped him.”
“I tried to stop Gideon once.”
Beatrice pulled down the collar of her dress.
Across her shoulder were faded straight scars.
And beneath them—
a crescent-shaped burn.
Caleb stared.
Mae covered her mouth.
Beatrice whispered, “Owen learned from his father.”
For a long moment, nobody moved.
Then Beatrice handed Mae a ring of keys.
“The ledger is still in Gideon’s office.”
Caleb said, “Why help now?”
Beatrice looked at Mae.
“Because she did what I never managed to do.”
“What?”
“She ran.”
The Drayton house was almost empty.
Most of the men were searching town.
Caleb and Mae entered through the servant passage while Beatrice distracted the two guards remaining outside.
Gideon’s office smelled of tobacco and leather.
