Chapter 5
D uncan Macpherson was dead. Loralee bit her lip, surprised at the swell of emotion. She'd certainly cared for the old man, but in her business it didn't pay to make attachments.
"Are you sure?" she asked, fastening the last of the buttons on her bodice.
The burly miner pulled up his pants, popping one suspender into place on his shoulder.
"Heard it up at the mine. They found him on the road to Clune.
Figure word's spread all over town by now.
" He pulled the other suspender into place and buttoned his fly with a satisfied grin.
"Mighty fine time, Loralee." He reached into his pocket and threw a coin down on the bed.
"I'll be back next payday." With a jaunty salute, he strode out the door, slamming it behind him.
Loralee sank to the bed, reaching automatically for the coin. Duncan was dead. She ran a hand through her hair, trying to make sense of it, wondering what had possessed him to head for home without Jack.
Jack .
She rushed to the window, her heart pounding. The sway-backed sorrel was still tied to the post outside. He lifted baleful brown eyes and whinnied softly.
"Jack." She hustled through the door, skidding to a stop beside the horse.
There was no way Duncan would leave Jack willingly.
No amount of liquor could cause him to forget the beast. So how could Duncan have been found on the road to Clune?
Something was dreadfully wrong here. Loralee patted the horse, trying to calm her rising fear.
"Wait here, sweetie, I'll be right back.
" What she needed was help. Two heads were wiser than one and all that.
She ran up the row to Corabeth's door and pounded on it.
There was no answer. Puzzled, she tried to open the door.
It rattled but refused to budge. Locked.
She pounded again, certain the noise would wake the dead, but there still wasn't an answer.
Several tousled heads poked out of doorways along the row.
Loralee pasted on a smile, waving with a casualness she didn't feel.
The window to Corabeth's room was shut, the curtain tightly drawn.
Corabeth obviously wasn't answering. Which meant Loralee was on her own.
Again . The important thing right now was to deal with Jack.
She had to hide the horse. At least until she had a chance to talk to one of Duncan's sons.
Until then, the fewer people who saw him outside her crib, the better.
Looking up at the sun, she was surprised to see that the day was already well advanced. She stroked Jack's soft nose, and after making certain no one was paying attention, looped his reins over her arm. "Come on, sweetie, let's get you somewhere safe."
She led the horse down the dusty road and around the corner, away from town, up toward the mines. Jack followed placidly enough, his gait slow and steady.
After a steep climb up the canyon, they stopped at the edge of a rushing stream called Willow Creek. Although for the life of her she wasn't certain why. She'd never seen any tree looking remotely like a willow along its rocky banks.
The canyon narrowed here, only wide enough for the rough hewn logs that, laid side by side, formed a bridge of sorts. Jack took one look at the rickety wooden structure and refused to budge. "It's just a little bit farther. And there's bound to be oats to fill your belly. Come on, sweetie."
Jack curled back his upper lip and refused to move, his stubborn stance worthy of any miner's burro.
Loralee wearily pushed a strand of sweat-soaked hair off her face, and stared at the woeful looking horse.
"Serve you right if I just left you here.
" She had better things to do with her time than to try to coerce a washed out old horse across a pile of shifting lumber.
A crack and roar echoed down the canyon. Jack lifted his head and, with a snort of pure fear, raced across the makeshift bridge. Loralee ran gratefully behind. The sorrel stopped just on the other side, relaxing now that the noise had faded.
"It was only the men at the mine. You should be used to blasting by now. Some miner's horse you are." Jack only shook his head reproachfully. She laughed, letting the tension of the past few hours ebb away.
Around the next bend, a makeshift cabin stood smack-dab against the sheer cliff.
Loralee knew from experience that it actually extended cave-like into the rock, a dugout of sorts.
Next to the shack was a rickety lean-to, its flimsy boards, whitewashed from exposure, fading into the side of the mountain. The perfect hide-away.
"Come on, Jack. We're almost there." She pulled the horse behind her, leading him by the reins. The door to the shanty opened a crack and the muzzle of a rifle glistened in the sunlight.
"Loralee, that you?"
"It's me, Ginny. I need some help."
The door inched farther open, and a short, sun-weathered figure emerged onto the listing planks that served as a porch.
"What can I do?" The woman pulled a colorful blanket tighter around her shoulders, her question hesitant.
"I need to leave my horse here."
Ginny eyed the sorrel and snorted. "Not much of a horse."
"He belonged to a friend." Loralee felt the tears rising.
The woman hopped off the porch, her gait belying her wrinkled appearance. "He'll be safe with me."
Loralee handed her the reins. "Thank you, Ginny. Jack's a good horse. Just a little long in the tooth."
Ginny smiled, her slow grin contagious. "We'll have a lot in common then, he and I."
Loralee bit her lip, trying to decide how much to say.
Ginny laid a time-weathered hand on Loralee's arm. "I don't need to know."
Again, Loralee felt the tears rising. She fumbled in her pocket, reaching for the coins she'd brought. She offered them to Ginny.
The woman folded Loralee's open hand over the coins. "I've no need for your money, girl. Now go quickly, before someone sees you."
She hugged the old woman, who gruffly pushed her away.
"Go on with you."
Loralee turned and hurried down the road. At least Jack was safe. No one ever went to Ginny's. She was Ute, and even a town like Silverthread had its untouchables.
She frowned, making her way across the bridge.
She really didn't have much to go on. All she really knew for certain was that Duncan was dead.
That and the fact that he'd left Jack behind.
Not exactly evidence of anything, but she couldn't shake the feeling that something was very wrong.
She rounded another bend and caught sight of the line of cribs.
She needed Corabeth. Her friend would know what to do.
"I don't know what happened. I only know that my father is dead and Michael is missing." Patrick ran a hand through his hair and paced restlessly around the sheriff's office, his mind still reeling from the shock. "There's got to be some kind of connection."
Amos leaned back in his chair, his booted feet propped up on his desk. "Best I can tell your father was robbed."
"His pocket watch was gone." Patrick frowned at the sheriff. "But I doubt he had anything else of value on him."
"I've seen men killed for a whole lot less than a watch, Patrick. And everyone knew he carried it. Hell, wouldn't let the damn thing out of his sight."
"My mother gave it to him. It was all he had left." Patrick tried but couldn't keep the bitterness out of his voice.
"Ain't no way round it, Patrick. Robbery's the most logical explanation."
"Maybe, but that still doesn't explain Michael's absence. And then there's the horses."
Amos leaned forward, dropping his feet to the floor, his brows drawn together in consternation. "What are you talking about?"
Patrick sat on the spindle back chair in front of the desk. "Well, doesn't it seem a little odd to you that my father was found on the road without his horse, and that Roscoe came home, as pretty as you please, only without Michael?"
Amos waved a hand in dismissal. "Jack probably wandered off somewhere."
Patrick frowned. "Not a chance. That horse can smell fresh hay five miles away. And the ranch was in view. If Jack was there, he'd be at home in his stall right now filling his belly."
"Maybe the fellow who robbed Duncan stole him."
Patrick smiled, despite himself. "Only if the thief was addle-brained.
Jack isn't exactly prize horseflesh. In fact, sometimes I wonder how he manages to make it from one day to the next.
" He sobered, his mind returning to grim reality.
"Something here doesn't add up, Amos. I can feel it in my bones. "
"Look, I know it ain't what you want to hear, but as I see it, the facts simply don't support a connection. It's just a lousy coincidence."
Patrick glared at the sheriff. The two events simply had to be connected somehow.
In one fell swoop he'd lost an entire family, and he had trouble swallowing the idea that it was only a lousy coincidence.
But Amos wasn't listening. He'd already made up his mind.
So there was no use in ranting on about it.
"Fine, I'll let it go for now." He stood up and the sheriff followed suit. "But my brother is still missing, and until he's found, I've no intention of letting the matter rest completely."
"Let what rest?"
Patrick turned as Owen Prescott strode into the spartan office, his face worn and haggard. Patrick breathed a sigh of relief. Owen was his father's best friend—a second father. He'd sort through all of this.
"I came as soon as I heard." He clasped Patrick's hand and pulled him into a quick embrace. "I'm so sorry, son."
Patrick nodded, trying desperately to hold onto his emotions.
He suddenly felt like a kid again. Seeing Owen, hearing the sympathy in his voice, somehow lent a cruel reality to the tragic events of the morning.
He sucked in a breath and quelled the urge to give in to tears.
He was a man after all, and men didn't cry.
"What aren't you going to let rest, Patrick?"