Chapter 4 #2
Delaney set the broom aside. “It’s right to have folks pay their respects. I can say some prayers while we bury him.”
Owen would say his prayers for Stan, too. He’d’ve liked to go along, but Morgan was right—he had plenty to keep him busy.
Delaney paused to take a long look at her brother, then followed Morgan out the door.
Owen said to Marley, “Try and sleep. You haven’t had much of a chance so far.”
Truthfully, Delaney had been praying since they left Denver. She wasn’t about to stop now as she stood beside Stan’s grave.
Boone had to be all right. But he’d been still for so long now.
She felt like she was putting too much on Morgan. She’d’ve helped dig the grave as well as cover it, but there was only one shovel, and she knew men well enough to be sure Morgan wouldn’t stop working to let her handle things.
“What next? Do we just hole up here forever?”
Morgan stopped throwing dirt over his saddle partner, turned, and gave her a grim smile.
“As soon as we’re sure Marley and your brother can handle the ride, I got a way out of here.
We’ll go through an abandoned ranch that used to neighbor us, and then we’ll ride the winding back trails out of the mountains on our way to Fort Russell and your folks.
And if we do run into any of those consarned Duncans again, we’ll see if we can round up more of them. ”
Morgan emptied one last shovelful of dirt onto the grave. He dropped the shovel and removed his broad-brimmed hat and held it over his heart. Delaney appreciated that he offered a silent moment of reverence for the departed one.
She recited the 23rd Psalm, a favorite she’d memorized long ago, slowing to the part about “the valley of the shadow of death,” then ended with another moment of silence.
“I should get back to tidying the cabin.” Her throat had tightened as she’d talked, thinking of the young man, dead before his life had gotten a chance to really start.
She didn’t know him that well, but it could easily have been her brother, and he still might not make it. She felt a tear run down her cheek.
She and Morgan walked together back toward the ramshackle cabin.
“Do you have any idea where your pa got to?”
“Nope. I thought he might be here, but I reckon living here alone wasn’t much fun. He probably went out into the wild. I wonder if he’s still alive. I doubt I’ll ever know.”
Back inside, Owen had venison steaks sizzling while Marley slept and Clive glowered at the whole world.
God forgive her, but Delaney intended to be on hand for his hanging. Against her better judgment, she said, “We can’t let the Duncan Gang kill a good man and be satisfied with avoiding them until we get to safety.”
Marley’s eyes popped open, and she regretted waking him.
“My family isn’t a ‘gang.’ Why do you call them one?” Clive tried to shove himself to a sitting position but groaned and slumped back to the floor.
“Bank robbers, the lot of you,” Owen snapped.
“I’ve heard of your reputation. And you’re far from innocent.
You killed a soldier in Cheyenne. That’s a federal crime, which is why the Marshals got the job of transporting you back.
Add to that your family broke you out of a military brig, not just a town jail. ”
“We may live a rough life, but we live free. We’re honest men. I shot that man in self-defense, and they were building a gallows right outside my window. My brother saved me.”
“You can’t claim honesty because I just buried a good man who died under your family’s guns,” Morgan growled. “I intend to hang every man jack of them. I counted seven men, killed one of ’em. Six to go, and you’ll make another.”
Clive gasped. “You killed one of my kin? Then you’re a marked man.” But furious as he was, Clive didn’t try to sit up again.
Delaney’s eyes slid to Marley, hurt mighty bad too but sitting up, not groaning.
“I killed that man in self-defense,” Clive repeated.
Morgan shook his head. “A military court didn’t see it that way.”
“They weren’t there when it happened. Of course they’d side with their own man. I saw a man grab a woman off the street in Cheyenne. Him and another man dragged her into an alley. I ran after them, Finlay MacNeil drew on me, and I defended myself.”
“What did the judge say when you told him that?”
“He believed the only witness, a man called Calan MacNeil. Calan is a cousin to Finlay MacNeil, and he was after the woman, too. She got away and ran off, and then the gunfire started. She never came forward to support my story. No one believed me. If there was any way to keep fighting, I’d’ve stayed and faced up to it.
But they said I’d hang soon. When my brother Leland came to rescue me, I did the only thing that made sense and rode away fast.”
Delaney hadn’t heard this part of the story.
“Maybe your family isn’t a gang, Clive. Maybe they’re a choir of angels.
Maybe that killing was justified. But I doubt it.
” Owen shook his head. “Judge and jury is the system we have in this country, and I believe in it. ’Course, that was before one of your kin killed a U.S.
Marshal. If the judge is feeling merciful, he might pluck one of your own out and accuse him alone of murder.
But the rest of ’em will be locked up for being involved in a jailbreak.
Until then, we’ll hang on to you, watch our back trail for more Duncans, and head for Fort Russell. ”
Owen turned his steaks again. The smell of frying meat set Delaney’s stomach to growling, though it felt almost wrong to think of enjoying food when Boone was so badly wounded.
“We should waylay the whole lot of them and take them back to Fort Russell with us.” Delaney crossed her arms.
“I’d as soon stay and grab them too,” said Owen, “but we have to get you and Boone to safety and Marley to a doctor. Then we’ll come back.”
“I’m coming back, too. I don’t intend to sit idle somewhere while the men who shot my brother go on their way.”
Owen narrowed his eyes and studied her for too long.
“Your pa would kill me if I deliberately let you hunt down outlaws. Not sure that’s enough to stop me from allowing it, though.
If it was my brother, I’d want the same.
And the word is”—Owen glanced at Morgan, whose word was the only word he had—“you’re mighty handy on a trail, and handy with a gun. ”
“It’s decided then. We’ll get Boone and Marley to a doctor, then turn Clive in and go looking.”
Owen didn’t nod, but neither did he tell her it was out of the question. Instead. he went back to his steaks. It didn’t matter if he approved or not. Delaney seemed determined to hunt those men down, every one of them, and make them pay for what they’d done.
How Owen felt about it didn’t interest her much.
“Something else you should know.”
Owen turned back to her. “What’s that, Delaney?”
“My pa expects us in a couple of days. I wired him when we left Denver and again in Elk Point. When we don’t show up on time—and on time is tomorrow morning—he’ll expect a wire from Fort Collins. And if he doesn’t get it, he’ll be coming. He’ll probably bring my ma along.”
“Will he bring the cavalry, too?”
“Probably not. The cavalry would just slow Ma and Pa down.”