Murmurs swept through the crowd.
Sloan’s voice cracked.
“Pike brought me a burned body. Judge Vale paid me three hundred dollars to swear it was Elias Mercer.”
Catherine stared.
Sloan turned toward the crowd.
“Thomas Prescott did not murder Elias Mercer.”
Pike ran.
He made it six steps.
Thomas shouted from the jail window.
“Left alley!”
Jud moved instantly.
He tackled Pike behind the stable.
By the time Catherine reached them, Pike was face-down in snow with Jud’s knee between his shoulders.
Jud leaned close.
“For six years I wondered who ordered the men to my house.”
Pike laughed despite the blood on his mouth.
“You still don’t know.”
Jud pressed harder.
“Vale?”
Pike said nothing.
Jud’s expression changed.
“You’re afraid of him.”
Pike smiled.
“Everyone should be.”
Judge Gideon Vale arrived at seven forty-five in the morning.
Fifteen minutes before Thomas’s scheduled execution.
He rode into a town that had stopped obeying him.
Dr. Sloan had unlocked the jail.
Thomas stood beside Catherine beneath a blanket, weak from imprisonment but alive.
Catherine had not stopped touching him since the cell door opened.
Vale dismounted from his carriage.
He was seventy years old.
Silver-haired.
Immaculate.
He looked at the gathered crowd.
Then he saw Jud.
For the first time, the famous Judge Vale lost his composure.
“Elias.”
Jud stood beneath the gallows.
“Gideon.”
Catherine glanced between them.
Something about the names sounded intimate.
Old.
Vale recovered.
“This is absurd.”
Sloan stepped forward.
“I confess to falsifying Mercer’s death record.”
“You’re senile.”
“Pike confessed.”
Pike, bound beside the jail, shouted, “I confessed to nothing!”
Thomas almost smiled.
Vale pointed at Jud.
“That man is an impostor.”
Jud removed his badge.
Vale laughed.
“A badge proves nothing.”
“No.”
Jud reached inside his coat.
He produced a folded paper.
“But this might.”
Vale’s face drained.
Catherine stared.
“What is it?”
Jud looked at her.
“A letter I carried the night my house burned.”
He unfolded it.
“Six years ago, Washington sent me here to investigate stolen federal gold and fraudulent mining claims.”
His eyes remained on Vale.
“I discovered the scheme went through Hollis Breen’s bank.”
Vale said nothing.
“And that Sheriff Pike protected the shipments.”
Still nothing.
Jud’s voice lowered.
“But neither man gave the orders.”
Catherine suddenly understood.
She looked at Judge Vale.
Jud held up the letter.
“I had obtained authorization to arrest the man controlling the operation.”
Vale stepped backward.
Jud continued.
“Judge Gideon Vale.”
The crowd erupted.
Vale shouted, “Lies!”
Jud didn’t raise his voice.
“You found out.”
Vale’s face twisted.
“You came to my home.”
“I came to arrest you.”
“You threatened everything!”
“You ordered Pike’s men to burn my house.”
Vale suddenly lunged.
Not at Jud.
At Catherine.
A tiny pistol appeared from his sleeve.
Jud moved.
But Thomas was closer.
Thomas struck Vale’s arm.
The pistol fired.
Thomas dropped.
Catherine screamed.
“Thomas!”
She fell beside him.
Blood spread across his shirt.
“No, no, no.”
Thomas gasped.
Jud tore open the coat.
“Shoulder.”
Catherine sobbed.
“Is he—”
“Not if we stop the bleeding.”
Men seized Vale.
The judge fought like a cornered animal.
“You fools! Do you know who I am?”
Jud stood slowly.
“Yes.”
His eyes held no rage now.
Only certainty.
“A man who finally ran out of people willing to lie for him.”
Vale spat toward him.
“You think this ends with me?”
