Chapter 5 - The Man in the Dust
Gideon returned before noon.
This time he came on horseback.
Alone.
Eli waited beside the gate.
The sale document was folded inside his shirt.
“Ready?” Gideon asked.
“No.”
His uncle's face remained expressionless.
“You understand what happens now?”
“I'd like you to explain it.”
“I demand payment of the outstanding note.”
“Today?”
“Today.”
Eli leaned against the gate.
“You gave me six years to fall behind. Seems strange you're suddenly in a hurry.”
Gideon's eyes flicked toward the house.
“Where are your guests?”
“Around.”
That answer made him uneasy.
Good.
Eli stepped closer.
“Were you in Red Knife Canyon in August 1869?”
Silence.
Gideon took too long to answer.
“No.”
“Think carefully.”
“I don't need to.”
“You owned Grandfather's silver watch chain.”
“I still do.”
“With the black stone in the clasp.”
Gideon's expression hardened.
“What is this?”
“A question.”
“You think because three strangers arrive with an old piece of metal you can accuse family?”
“I didn't accuse you.”
Eli's voice lowered.
“I asked if you were there.”
“No.”
Gideon dismounted.
“You want the truth? Your father nearly ruined this family chasing land schemes. He borrowed against everything. When he died, I kept creditors away from your mother.”
“My mother died before him.”
Gideon stopped.
Eli stared.
A tiny mistake.
Yet enormous.
“My mother died in sixty-eight.”
Gideon's eyes narrowed.
“I misspoke.”
“You just said you protected her after Father's death.”
“I meant the household.”
“You've told me that story for years.”
“Eli—”
“You said she begged you to keep the ranch for me.”
Gideon exhaled sharply.
“She did.”
“She'd been dead two years.”
Neither moved.
From behind the barn, Waya watched unseen.
Eli felt something inside him crack.
Not certainty.
Trust.
“Why would you lie about that?”
“To make you understand the burden I carried.”
“You invented her words.”
“I was trying to help you.”
“My mother doesn't need you putting words in her mouth.”
Gideon stepped closer.
“Do you know what your father left? Bills. Failed cattle contracts. A ranch with half its fencing gone.”
“And a permanent spring?”
Gideon looked toward the canyon.
“There is no spring.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because it's true.”
“Then ride with me.”
“What?”
“Right now.”
Eli pointed north.
“Show me.”
Gideon's mouth tightened.
“I have business.”
“So do I.”
“This foolishness ends today.”
“No.”
Eli removed the sale agreement from inside his shirt.
For the first time fear appeared clearly in Gideon's eyes.
Eli tore nothing.
He simply folded it again.
“I'll be in town tomorrow examining every debt record carrying my name.”
Gideon's face changed.
“You think anyone will believe three Apache women over your own uncle?”
The words hung there.
Eli did not respond immediately.
Then Chaska walked from the side of the house.
“We're not asking anyone to believe us because we are Apache.”
Gideon turned.
Chaska continued.
“We're asking them to look at paper.”
Serina emerged holding the brass marker.
“And numbers.”
Waya appeared from behind the barn.
“And tracks.”
Gideon looked at her.
“What tracks?”
Waya smiled without humor.
“The ones behind Eli's north fence.”
Eli turned sharply.
“What?”
“I found them this morning.”
Gideon's horse shifted.
Waya approached.
“Two riders have been coming onto the property after dark. Same horses at least three times this week.”
Eli looked at Gideon.
His uncle raised both hands.
“You've got trespassers. That's hardly my doing.”
Waya crouched.
She held something between two fingers.
A small piece of cigar wrapping.
“Maybe.”
She handed it to Eli.
A gold merchant stamp marked the paper.
G.M. MERCANTILE — SOCORRO.
Gideon's store.
Eli looked up.
Gideon laughed.
“I sell cigars to half the county.”
“Then you won't mind if I ask which half has been riding my land at night.”
Gideon's patience snapped.
“You ungrateful fool.”
There it was.
Not uncle.
Creditor.
Not family.
Owner.
“You would have lost this place years ago without me.”
“Maybe.”
“You couldn't manage cattle. Couldn't keep a wife.”
Eli's expression changed.
Chaska saw the wound.
Gideon saw it too and deliberately pressed harder.
“Anna lasted what? Eleven months before she returned east?”
Eli's voice became dangerous.
“Don't.”
“You've spent a decade proving you're exactly what your father feared you'd become.”
Eli stepped close enough that their boots nearly touched.
“And what was that?”
“Alone.”
The word hurt because it was true.
Gideon mounted his horse.
“Tomorrow at nine, I file the default.”
He looked at the women.
“And when this ranch is no longer his, you're trespassing.”
Then he rode away.
Dust swallowed him.
Nobody spoke until the hoofbeats faded.
Eli stared toward the road.
Chaska came beside him.
“Anna?”
“My wife.”
“You never mentioned her.”
“You never asked.”
“What happened?”
“She left.”
“Why?”
“Because she was smarter than me.”
That ended the conversation.
Eli started toward the barn.
Waya called after him.
“Where are you going?”
“Town.”
“Gideon said tomorrow.”
“That means today is when he thinks I'm staying here.”
He saddled Calico.
Chaska approached.
“You shouldn't go alone.”
“I've managed thirty-three years.”
“Not very well, judging by your debt.”
Eli looked at her.
She raised one eyebrow.
Ten minutes later four riders left the ranch.
Eli, Chaska, Waya, and Serina.
As they reached the southern ridge, Waya stopped.
She looked back.
A glint flashed from high on the canyon wall.
Sunlight against glass.
She raised a hand.
“What?”
Eli asked.
Waya pointed.
Someone was watching the ranch through a spyglass.
Before Eli could turn Calico around, the observer disappeared.
Serina looked toward him.
“Your uncle wasn't bluffing.”
Eli watched the empty ridge.
“No.”
He touched the folded sale agreement inside his shirt.
“He's scared.”
Chaska adjusted her reins.
“Scared men make mistakes.”
Eli looked toward town.
“So do desperate ones.”
Then he kicked Calico forward.
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Because somewhere inside the county records was a debt that had controlled six years of his life.
And by sundown, Eli intended to learn whether it had ever been real.
