Chapter 3 - What Hargrove Remembered
Reeves Hargrove received Caleb at noon.
Hargrove's ranch house was twice the size of Caleb's, built from pale stone hauled from the northern hills. A veranda wrapped around the front, shaded by canvas awnings. Three hired hands worked near the corral.
Everything about the property looked permanent.
Power always did.
Hargrove came through the front door carrying two glasses.
“Whiskey?”
“No.”
Reeves looked amused.
“You rode six miles in this heat to refuse my whiskey?”
“I came to ask about Mary.”
The amusement vanished.
Only for a second.
Then Hargrove gestured toward a chair.
“I wondered when that woman would start putting ghosts in your head.”
Caleb remained standing.
“You saw them yesterday.”
“I see most things happening near my land.”
“My land.”
“Of course.”
Hargrove sat.
Caleb placed the cartridge casing on the table.
Reeves did not touch it.
“What is that supposed to be?”
“Fort Lyman issue.”
“Looks like brass to me.”
“Kalisa says your men received ammunition from Fort Lyman before Mary died.”
Hargrove sighed.
“Caleb.”
“Did they?”
“We bought surplus ammunition like every large ranch between here and Prescott.”
“From the army?”
“Perfectly legal.”
“Was Silas there?”
“Probably.”
“Were you?”
Hargrove leaned back.
“You want to know where I was the day Mary died?”
“I want to know everything.”
“I was searching for her.”
“That's not what I asked.”
Hargrove's eyes sharpened.
Then his voice softened.
“I held you while you cried over that woman's body.”
Caleb's jaw clenched.
“I know.”
“I helped you bury her.”
“I know.”
“I spent three days tracking the raiding party.”
“You said Tokala led it.”
“I said men recognized him.”
“Which men?”
Silence.
Caleb waited.
Hargrove finally said, “Dead men.”
“All of them?”
“Most.”
“Convenient.”
That changed something.
Reeves set down his glass.
“You need to be careful.”
“Is that a threat?”
“It is advice from a man who remembers what grief did to you.”
Caleb stepped closer.
“What did grief do to me?”
“It made you willing to believe anything that gave you someone to hate.”
The words struck too accurately.
Caleb hated him for that.
Reeves continued.
“Now another stranger comes along and gives you someone else.”
“Kalisa didn't give me you.”
“No?”
Hargrove glanced at the cartridge casing.
“Looks like she did.”
Caleb picked it up.
“Why did Mary know Tokala?”
This time Reeves failed to hide his reaction.
His eyes shifted.
Barely.
But Caleb saw.
“You knew,” Caleb said.
“Knew what?”
“You knew they met.”
Reeves stood.
“You are walking toward something you do not understand.”
“Then help me understand it.”
“I am trying.”
“No. You're trying to frighten me.”
Hargrove moved closer.
“Mary was not the woman you thought she was during those last months.”
Caleb's chest tightened.
“What does that mean?”
“She lied to you.”
“About what?”
“Where she went. Who she met.”
Caleb grabbed Reeves by the shirt.
The older man did not resist.
Instead he whispered, “There it is.”
Caleb froze.
“The anger,” Reeves said. “That is exactly why she didn't tell you.”
Caleb released him.
He stepped back as though burned.
Hargrove straightened his collar.
“Go home.”
“Not until—”
“Go home and ask yourself why your wife spent months meeting Tokala without telling you.”
Caleb stared at him.
Reeves turned away.
Caleb left.
From an upstairs window, Silas Boone watched him cross the yard.
When Caleb disappeared down the road, Silas entered Hargrove's study.
“He's asking questions.”
“I noticed.”
“She showed him the casing.”
“I noticed that too.”
Silas swallowed.
“You said those were all collected.”
“I thought they were.”
“What if Tokala kept more?”
Reeves faced him.
“Then we remove the problem before Caleb sees them.”
Silas looked toward the closed door.
“Like before?”
Hargrove's eyes went cold.
“You should be very careful what you mean by that.”
Silas said nothing.
Reeves opened a desk drawer.
Inside lay a map of the Whitlock property.
A blue pencil line crossed Caleb's ranch from north to south.
Beneath it someone had written:
PROPOSED RAIL WATER DEPOT.
Reeves tapped the stone well marked near the center.
“Five years ago,” he said, “Mary nearly cost me everything.”
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He folded the map.
“I will not let her husband finish what she started.”
