Three days after Garrett Vance's arrest, rain finally came to Kansas.
Not enough to break the summer heat.
Just enough to turn Dodge City's dust into streaks of mud and send people hurrying beneath awnings.
Nora Whitcomb sat in Harriet Cole's boarding house reading the same letter for the fourth time.
The railroad company wanted to negotiate.
Not someday.
Now.
Its representatives were prepared to offer Nora a substantial payment for a right-of-way along the eastern edge of her property, plus annual compensation for access to water.
The first figure made Nora stare.
Twenty-two thousand dollars.
More money than Harden had earned in years.
More than enough to settle every legitimate debt associated with the Whitcomb farm.
Enough for Nora to begin a new life.
Harriet leaned across the table.
“Well?”
“I think I'm going to be sick.”
“Good sick or bad sick?”
“I don't know.”
Harriet took the letter.
“Twenty-two thousand.”
She whistled.
“Garrett Vance nearly started a private war over this.”
“Not just this.”
Nora looked toward Margaret's ledger.
“He wanted control.”
Harriet nodded.
“Men like that often do.”
Eli entered through the back door, rain on his hat.
Nora looked up immediately.
“You're limping.”
“No.”
“You are.”
“Boot's wet.”
Harriet snorted.
“Apparently water only affects one leg.”
Eli ignored her.
He had spent the morning inspecting his ranch after Judge Bell ordered Mercer’s seizure lifted.
The house had been ransacked.
Two horses stolen.
Fence cut.
Furniture broken.
But the ranch still stood.
“Judge wants us at the courthouse tomorrow,” Eli said.
“Why?” Nora asked.
“Federal deputy marshal arrived from Wichita.”
Harriet grinned.
“Vance's day continues improving.”
Eli didn't smile.
Nora noticed.
“What is it?”
“One of Vance's men is missing.”
“Which?”
“Silas Crowe.”
She knew the name.
Crowe was the man Eli had seen watching them after the hearing.
“Think he's planning something?”
“Yes.”
Harriet poured coffee.
“When do you not think somebody is planning something?”
“When they're asleep.”
Nora almost smiled.
Then a bell began ringing outside.
Not a church bell.
A fire bell.
Harriet ran to the window.
Smoke rose above the courthouse.
Eli was already moving.
They reached the street as people ran toward the center of town.
Flames licked from a rear courthouse window.
“Records room,” Eli said.
Nora's stomach dropped.
“The evidence.”
Margaret's original ledger had been transferred there that morning.
So had Harden's signed testimony.
Pike's statement.
Mercer's documents.
Everything.
Eli ran.
Men formed a bucket line.
Smoke rolled through the courthouse corridor.
Judge Bell shouted orders from the front steps.
“Everybody out!”
Eli ignored him and headed toward the rear entrance.
Nora grabbed his sleeve.
“No.”
“Evidence is inside.”
“You'll burn.”
“Stay here.”
Before she could stop him, he disappeared.
Nora's heart slammed.
Seconds stretched.
Flames broke through another window.
Harriet seized a bucket.
“Don't stand there, girl.”
They joined the line.
Water passed hand to hand.
A clerk stumbled from the building coughing.
Then another.
No Eli.
Nora stepped toward the doorway.
Harriet grabbed her.
“He told you to stay.”
“I've spent enough time doing what men tell me.”
She pulled free.
Before she reached the door, Eli emerged through smoke carrying a metal document case.
His sleeve was burning.
Nora threw a bucket over him.
Eli coughed.
Harriet stared.
“You stupid, impossible man.”
“Got it.”
He dropped the case.
The metal was black with soot.
Judge Bell rushed over.
“Please tell me that isn't why you went inside.”
“It is.”
Bell looked ready to strike him.
Then he noticed something.
“The door.”
“What?”
“The records room door was locked.”
Eli nodded.
“From outside.”
They all understood.
The fire wasn't accidental.
Someone had trapped the clerk and set the records room ablaze.
An hour later, firefighters found an empty kerosene can behind the courthouse.
Stamped on its side were the initials G.V. Freight Company.
Too obvious.
Eli didn't like it.
“Crowe wouldn't leave that,” he said.
Samuel, who had joined them, nodded.
“Unless he wanted us to find it.”
“To make it look like Vance ordered the fire.”
Nora frowned.
“Why would one of Vance's men frame Vance?”
Eli looked toward the jail.
“Maybe he's not working for Vance anymore.”
That possibility became worse by afternoon.
Garrett Vance demanded to speak privately with Judge Bell.
Bell allowed Eli and Nora to attend.
Vance looked different in jail.
No polished coat.
No cufflinks.
No control over the room.
Still, arrogance clung to him.
“Crowe started the fire,” he said.
Bell folded his arms.
“At your direction?”
“No.”
“Why should I believe you?”
“Because Crowe wants me dead.”
Nora stared.
Vance continued.
“He knows I kept records.”
“What records?” Bell asked.
“Insurance.”
“Against whom?”
“Everyone.”
Vance smiled faintly.
“Men who do business the way I did tend not to rely solely on friendship.”
Eli's expression hardened.
“Where?”
Vance shook his head.
“First I get protection.”
“You're in jail.”
“From Crowe.”
“You scared of him?” Nora asked.
Vance looked at her.
“Yes.”
The admission was unexpected.
Bell leaned forward.
“What records?”
Vance sighed.
“Payments. Bribes. False deeds. Freight manipulation. Sheriff's accounts. Judges.”
Bell's eyes sharpened.
“Which judges?”
“Not you.”
“How flattering.”
“Crowe believes those records could hang him.”
“So why burn Nora's evidence?”
“To convince everyone I'm still running things.”
Eli understood.
“Then kill you before trial.”
Vance nodded.
“Dead men make convenient masterminds.”
Bell paced once.
“Where are your records?”
Vance hesitated.
Then looked at Nora.
“On your land.”
Nora stood.
“What?”
“Old irrigation well near the northern boundary.”
“You buried them there?”
“Three years ago.”
“You were trespassing on my mother's property before she died?”
“I needed somewhere nobody associated with me.”
Nora's face flushed with anger.
Vance continued.
“Crowe knows the general location. He doesn't know exactly where.”
Eli said, “He will now.”
“How?”
“Courthouse fire failed.”
Eli looked through the barred window.
“He'll assume you talked.”
Nora's property became the next battlefield.
By sunset, Eli, Samuel, two deputies sent by the federal marshal, and Nora rode toward the old irrigation well.
Harriet was ordered to remain in town.
She objected violently.
Judge Bell confiscated her broom.
They found the well near dark.
Its stone rim had collapsed on one side.
Eli lowered a lantern.
“There's something down there.”
Samuel tied a rope around his waist.
“I'll go.”
Eli shook his head.
“My arm's better.”
“Your judgment isn't.”
Nora stepped forward.
“Neither of you.”
Both men looked at her.
“It's my land.”
Eli stared.
“No.”
Nora raised an eyebrow.
“At what point does helping me become controlling me?”
Samuel coughed to hide a laugh.
Eli scowled.
Five minutes later Nora descended the well.
The walls were dry.
Twenty feet down, she found a small opening cut into the side.
Inside sat a wooden case sealed with wax.
“Found it!”
Above, Eli exhaled.
Nora secured the rope.
They hauled the box up first.
Then her.
The moment her boots reached the ground—
A rifle cracked.
One deputy fell.
Not dead.
Shot through the shoulder.
“Cover!” Eli shouted.
Shots came from the tree line.
Crowe.
And at least four men.
Samuel dragged the injured deputy behind the well.
Eli pushed Nora down beside him.
“Stay here.”
She glared.
“This argument can wait.”
Gunfire continued.
The federal deputy returned fire.
Darkness made targeting difficult.
Crowe shouted from the trees.
“Leave the box and walk away!”
Eli yelled back.
“You first!”
Crowe fired again.
Stone chipped near Eli's cheek.
Then hoofbeats thundered from the south.
More riders.
Eli's heart sank.
Reinforcements.
But the newcomers fired toward Crowe's men.
Crowe cursed.
His men scattered.
Eli stared.
At the front of the arriving riders was Harden Whitcomb.
Still pale.
Still bandaged.
Barely strong enough to remain in the saddle.
But there.
Behind him rode six farmers from neighboring properties.
Nora stood.
“Papa?”
Harden raised a revolver with shaking hands.
“Thought you might need neighbors.”
Crowe fled into the darkness.
Two of his men were captured.
One was wounded.
No one on Nora's side was killed.
When the shooting stopped, Harden almost fell from his horse.
Nora caught him.
“You shouldn't be here.”
“I know.”
“You could've torn your wound open.”
“I know.”
She glared.
“Why?”
He looked toward Eli.
“Apparently I learned terrible habits.”
Eli almost smiled.
Nora didn't.
Not immediately.
Then something in her expression softened.
Not forgiveness.
Not yet.
But perhaps the first inch of road toward it.
The wooden case changed everything.
Inside were years of Garrett Vance's private records.
Receipts.
Letters.
Signed agreements.
Evidence linking Crowe to arson, extortion, and two suspicious deaths.
Evidence also proving Vance had ordered crimes far beyond those involving Nora.
When Judge Bell saw the documents the next morning, he removed his spectacles.
“This isn't a trial.”
Eli frowned.
“What is it?”
Bell looked at the stacked papers.
“This is an earthquake.”
Crowe was still free.
But now nearly every lawman in southwestern Kansas wanted him.
Vance had lost the last leverage he possessed.
Mercer entered a plea and agreed to testify.
Pike did the same.
Harden surrendered his remaining property interest in Nora's river land and formally withdrew every claim over her finances.
Then, two mornings later, Nora stood before the mirror in Harriet's room wearing a clean blue dress.
Eli waited downstairs.
The federal hearing would begin at ten.
Harriet adjusted Nora's collar.
“Nervous?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
“Why is everyone saying nervousness is good lately?”
“Because fearless people are usually fools.”
Nora smiled.
Then bells began ringing outside.
Not fire bells this time.
Church bells.
People ran into the street.
Harriet looked from the window.
“What now?”
A rider galloped toward the courthouse shouting.
“Crowe took Hart!”
Nora's smile disappeared.
She turned.
Eli was no longer downstairs.
The back door stood open.
On the table rested his hat.
And beneath it, a note.
COME ALONE TO THE WHITCOMB FARM.
OR HART DIES BEFORE NOON.