“Why come to me?”
Tomas looked toward the bedroom.
“Because Elena insisted.”
Corvin frowned.
Tomas continued.
“She told them that before deciding what to do with Gideon’s son, Naya had to meet you.”
“And?”
Naya said something softly.
Tomas smiled faintly.
“She said she found a man standing beside a well.”
Corvin waited.
Tomas added:
“And he offered water before asking her name.”
Elena awakened shortly before noon.
Corvin sat beside her.
For a long time neither spoke.
Naya stood near the window.
Tomas translated from a chair in the corner.
Elena studied Corvin’s face as though trying to reclaim three lost decades all at once.
Finally she spoke.
“You have Samuel’s eyes.”
Corvin frowned.
“Who is Samuel?”
Something passed across Elena’s face.
Grief.
Naya lowered her head.
Corvin felt the room grow colder.
“My father?”
Elena looked at him.
“No.”
Corvin’s heartbeat slowed.
“Gideon?”
The old woman closed her eyes.
Then opened them again.
“Gideon was never your father.”
Every thought in Corvin’s mind stopped.
Elena reached toward him.
“Samuel Torne was your father.”
Corvin stood abruptly.
“Samuel was Gideon’s brother.”
“Yes.”
“My uncle.”
“No.”
Elena’s voice broke.
“He was your father.”
Corvin stared at her.
Samuel Torne.
He knew that name only from stories.
Gideon had described Samuel as a younger brother who died before Corvin was born.
Reckless.
Weak.
Killed in a gambling dispute somewhere in New Mexico.
Another lie.
Elena continued.
Samuel had been nothing like Gideon.
He had traveled west as a carpenter and horse doctor.
He learned languages easily.
He treated anyone who came to him.
Settler.
Mexican.
Apache.
It made no difference.
Samuel met Elena near a trading settlement years before Corvin’s birth.
They married quietly.
Naya was their first child.
Corvin their second.
Samuel built the first stone ring around the well with his own hands.
“He had one rule,” Elena said.
Corvin waited.
“Anyone who reached the well thirsty received water.”
Something tightened inside Corvin’s chest.
Elena continued.
Then Gideon arrived.
Samuel’s older brother had spent years moving between mining camps, gambling houses and land companies. When he learned a proposed rail corridor might one day cross the valley, he understood what Samuel possessed.
Water.
Permanent water.
Enough to supply ranches, travelers and eventually trains.
Samuel refused to sell.
Gideon tried intimidation.
Then bribery.
Finally, violence.
One night, armed men attacked.
Samuel was shot outside the barn.
Elena tried to reach him.
Gideon struck her down.
When she awakened, Samuel was dead.
And three-year-old Corvin was gone.
Naya had survived by hiding in a dry wash.
Gideon took his brother’s son, forged land documents and raised Corvin as his own.
