Chapter 4 - Silas RourkeCole read his father’s confession beneath a moonless Arizona sky.
Only three paragraphs survived.
The bottom half had been torn away.
Jacob Harper admitted helping “the company men” obtain Red Mesa land deeds.
He wrote that Silas Rourke was innocent of the massacre itself.
Then the letter ended.
“Where is the rest?” Cole demanded.
Nora shook her head.
“My father received it that way.”
“Who tore it?”
“I don’t know.”
Cole looked again.
His father.
Jacob Harper.
The man Cole remembered teaching him to ride, mend fences and never sign a paper he had not read.
He had helped murderers.
“No.”
Nora did not argue.
“We meet Rourke.”
Cole folded the letter.
“If he sees me, he may shoot me.”
“If he wanted you dead, you wouldn’t have crossed that ridge.”
Cole knew she was right.
Rourke’s men had fired around him repeatedly.
His hat and coat were torn.
His skin was untouched.
Three hundred armed men did not miss one rider for two hours accidentally.
Nora led him through a drainage ditch beyond the north side of town.
Two riders intercepted them.
One raised a lantern.
“Harper.”
Cole reached instinctively for the revolver Nora had insisted he carry.
“Easy,” Nora said.
The riders escorted them to a camp beneath a rocky bluff.
Hundreds of men waited.
Not a uniform outlaw gang.
Ranchers.
Freighters.
Former miners.
Older men.
Young men.
Several wore patched coats.
Some carried old Army rifles.
Others hunting carbines.
They looked more like an angry county than an army.
Silas Rourke stood beside a fire.
He was larger up close.
Forty-seven, perhaps.
Gray at his temples.
A scar along his left jaw.
His eyes settled on Cole.
“You look like Jacob.”
Cole’s anger surfaced immediately.
“You knew my father.”
“Yes.”
“He says you’re innocent.”
“Of Red Mesa?”
“Yes.”
Silas looked toward the fire.
“Your father said many things late in life.”
Cole stepped closer.
“Did he help the men who killed those families?”
Silas did not answer.
“Tell me.”
“Yes.”
Cole punched him.
The entire camp reacted.
Rifles shifted.
Silas stumbled one step, wiped his mouth and raised his hand.
Nobody touched Cole.
Silas said:
“You deserved that less than he did.”
Cole breathed heavily.
“What did he do?”
“He forged deeds.”
“Why?”
“Money.”
Cole hated how quickly Silas answered.
“No.”
“You wanted truth.”
“My father wasn’t rich.”
“He was in debt.”
Cole remembered the drought years.
The Harper ranch nearly gone.
His mother sick.
His younger brother Caleb still a boy.
Silas continued.
“Vale needed signatures showing Red Mesa families had sold voluntarily.”
“They hadn’t.”
“No.”
“And my father made them?”
“He prepared six.”
“How many families?”
“Twelve.”
Cole looked away.
Silas said:
“Your father believed they would be pushed off the land.”
“Not killed.”
“No.”
“What changed?”
“Some settlers discovered silver.”
There it was.
Not land.
What lay under it.
Silas drew a map in the dust.
“Red Mesa sat over the eastern edge of what became Vale’s Crown Silver claim.”
Cole stared.
“Vale’s fortune.”
“A large piece of it.”
“Why blame you?”
“I managed freight for the settlement. I argued with Vale publicly. I had men. I had guns. I was convenient.”
Cole remembered the child photograph.
“Who’s the girl?”
Silas froze.
For the first time, the hard leader disappeared.
A father appeared underneath.
“Where did you see her?”
“In the saddlebag.”
Silas stepped forward.
“You opened it.”
“Yes.”
“Describe her.”
“Seven. Dark hair. Standing by a barn.”
Silas’s breath changed.
“My daughter.”
Cole stared.
“She died at Red Mesa?”
Silas looked into the fire.
“That’s what I believed for twelve years.”
“What changed?”
“Jacob came to me before he died.”
Cole’s skin went cold.
“My father found you?”
“He told me Lydia survived.”
Cole looked again toward town.
“The photograph was taken after the massacre?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
Silas looked at him.
“Your family’s ranch.”
Cole remembered the barn.
That was why it looked familiar.
He had not seen it in twelve years, but the roofline, the split corral fence—
It was home.
“My father hid your daughter?”
Silas nodded.
“Then he moved her.”
“Where?”
“He refused to tell me.”
“Why?”
“He said Vale watched me.”
Cole’s anger returned.
“So you chased me with three hundred rifles because of a photograph?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
Silas’s face hardened.
“Because the saddlebag belonged to Asa Boone.”
“The courier.”
“He worked for me.”
“He’s dead.”
Silas closed his eyes briefly.
“He had evidence.”
“What?”
“The last records Jacob Harper left behind.”
Cole thought of the silver watch.
“Bell has it.”
Silas swore.
“What’s in the watch?”
“I don’t know.”
“You chased me across half Arizona for something you don’t understand either?”
Silas looked at him.
“No.”
Then he said:
“The watch contains the name of the man who ordered Red Mesa.”
Cole almost laughed.
“Gideon Vale.”
Silas shook his head.
“If it were that simple, Jacob would have written Vale’s name.”
Cole stared.
“Then who?”
Silas looked toward Mercy Ridge.
“Someone inside Gideon Vale’s family.”
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And across the dark desert, the church bell struck eleven.
One hour remained until Silas’s deadline.
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