Nathan continued.

“I was sent after Samuel mailed copies of the freight records.”

“Why didn’t you come sooner?”

“Because your sheriff intercepted my first two telegrams. And because someone shot my horse forty miles outside town.”

“Victor?”

“Probably.”

“Probably?”

Nathan’s expression darkened.

“There’s something I still don’t understand.”

“What?”

“If Caldwell killed Samuel, why stage a wagon fire?”

“To hide the murder.”

“Maybe.”

He looked toward the scrap hidden inside my dress.

“But if Samuel had the deed and Caldwell needed it, killing him before finding it would have been stupid.”

A chill ran through me.

“What are you saying?”

Nathan looked at me.

“I’m saying I don’t think Victor knows what happened to your husband either.”

Before I could answer, the church bell began ringing.

Once.

Twice.

Again.

Nathan moved toward the bars.

“That’s not Sunday.”

Then another sound came.

Shouting.

Many voices.

We heard boots upstairs.

Furniture scraping.

Someone yelled.

A gunshot exploded.

I jumped.

Then another.

Nathan cursed.

The basement door burst open.

Jonah Pike stood there holding a massive blacksmith’s hammer.

Behind him was Martha.

Martha had a shotgun.

I stared.

She shrugged.

“My husband left me two useful things. The store and this.”

Jonah hurried to Nathan’s cell.

“Rusk’s gone.”

Nathan blinked.

“Gone where?”

“Rode south twenty minutes ago.”

“Victor?”

“Barricaded in the hotel with six men.”

Martha unlocked my cell with keys taken from a deputy.

“The town’s had enough.”

I stepped out.

“What happened?”

Martha looked at me.

“After they took you away, Lefty tried to make Jonah kneel in the street.”

Jonah smiled grimly.

“I declined.”

Martha added, “With enthusiasm.”

Nathan rubbed his wrists.

“We need my gun.”

Jonah handed it to him.

Nathan checked the cylinder.

Then looked at me.

“Where’s the paper?”

I pulled it from my hem.

“Cedar Shaft. Third Level.”

Jonah’s face drained of color.

“What?”

I showed him.

He whispered, “That mine has been closed for twelve years.”

Nathan looked at him.

“Closed?”

Jonah nodded.

“Officially.”

Those words hung in the air.

I knew exactly what Samuel would have done.

If he had discovered Victor was secretly mining beneath Cedar Ridge, he would have gone there.

Nathan knew it too.

“We’re going to the mine.”

We rode west beneath a sky the color of old brass.

Nathan insisted I remain in town.

I refused.

He argued.

I refused again.

Finally he said, “You are the most exhausting woman I have ever met.”

I climbed onto Martha’s mare.

“My husband used to say that.”

Something softened in Nathan’s face.

Then we rode.

Jonah came with us.

So did six townsmen.

Nobody asked Victor Caldwell’s permission.

The Cedar mine stood in a canyon eight miles from Copper Ridge.

Its main entrance had been boarded years earlier.

Or appeared to be.

Behind the rotten boards we found fresh wagon tracks.

Nathan crouched.

“Recent.”

Jonah touched the ground.

“Two days. Maybe less.”

We removed the boards.