CHAPTER TEN Buried Alive #2
“Forged,” Gideon said.
Jude lifted another.
Rafael Vega’s claim.
Then Thomas Quinn’s.
All altered.
A second ledger recorded payments.
EDMUND VALE — LAND OFFICE — $400SHERIFF HARLAN RUSK — $750MARSHAL AMOS CUTTER — $1,200
The payments continued for six years.
Beside Cutter’s name appeared route numbers, prisoner initials, and dates.
Gideon recognized several.
Transport from Tucson to Yuma.
Transfer from Prescott to Santa Reina.
Five men officially listed as escaped.
Seven recorded as killed while attempting escape.
Every name appeared again in the San Diablo labor account.
Jude read over his shoulder.
“Cutter sold prisoners.”
“He sold their routes first. If Harrow’s men intercepted them, Cutter filed the escape report.”
“And the men came here.”
Gideon turned another page.
Columns recorded work quotas, food allotments, punishments, and deaths.
Men had become numbers.
Number 14 — broken leg — no further ration.Number 22 — refused shaft — corrected.Numbers 31 through 46 — sealed east drift.
Jude’s face hardened.
“Fifteen men.”
Gideon looked toward the scratched gate beyond the assay room.
“Possibly more.”
Letters filled the bottom compartment.
Some came from Harrow.
Others from Cutter.
One contained the route Gideon had been ordered to follow from Red Mesa.
SHAW IS NOT CORRECTABLE. POSITION MEN AT COTTONWOOD. IF HE DEVIATES, RUSK WILL SIGNAL. CALDER MUST NOT REACH AINSL—
The final word had been scratched out, but Gideon knew the name.
Judge Ainsley.
Jude took the letter.
“This proves everything.”
“It proves enough.”
“Enough?”
“For indictments, removal of Cutter’s authority, and reopening every land claim in Noah’s ledger.”
Jude stared at him.
Gideon closed the chest.
“Enough to clear you.”
Jude’s breath left him.
For eight months, freedom had existed only as distance between himself and a noose.
Now it had weight.
Paper.
Ink.
Names.
He touched Noah’s ledger.
“He did it.”
“Yes.”
“Noah did it.”
“And you found it.”
Jude looked toward Gideon.
“We found it.”
The words had barely left him when a sound moved through the mine.
Not wood.
Not settling stone.
A dull metallic strike from the direction of the north shaft.
Gideon stood.
Another strike followed.
Then the faint hiss of a fuse.
“Down!”
The explosion came from behind them.
The mine convulsed.
Air struck Gideon’s back and threw him across the assay room. The lantern extinguished. Shelves collapsed. Glass and stone fell through darkness.
Jude shouted his name.
“Gideon!”
“I’m here.”
The ceiling groaned.
A beam fell between them.
Gideon crawled toward Jude’s voice.
“Take the chest,” he said. “Service passage.”
“Can you see it?”
“No.”
“Neither can I.”
Gideon found the chest by touch and pushed it toward Jude.
The mine shifted again.
Stone thundered through the east drift.
Controlled collapse.
Someone outside had known they entered.
Jude found Gideon’s arm.
“This way.”
They moved toward the service tunnel in darkness.
Jude went first with Noah’s chest dragged beneath him. Gideon followed, one hand against Jude’s boot.
Dust filled the passage.
Every breath became stone inside Gideon’s lungs.
Behind them, the assay room collapsed.
The shock drove both men forward.
Timber cracked above Jude.
“Move!” Gideon shouted.
Jude pushed the chest through the opening.
The support beam fell.
It struck Jude across the back and pinned his legs.
His cry filled the tunnel.
Gideon crawled forward.
“Jude.”
“I’m here.”
“Where are you hit?”
“Legs.”
“Can you feel them?”
“Yes.”
“Move your feet.”
One boot scraped stone.
The other did not.
Gideon reached him.
The tunnel allowed no room to kneel. He lay beside Jude in the dust and felt along the fallen beam.
It was thick enough to support a roof.
Stone had fallen over both ends.
Gideon pushed.
Nothing.
Jude’s hand found his shoulder.
“Ledger.”
“It’s ahead of you.”
“Take it.”
“I’m freeing you.”
“Tunnel’s coming down.”
“I know.”
“Gideon.”
He pushed again.
The beam did not move.
“Take Noah’s chest and go.”
“No.”
“Listen to me.”
“No.”
“You finally have proof.”
“I also have you.”
More stones fell behind them.
Jude gripped Gideon’s coat. “If you stay, Harrow buries both of us and the proof.”
Gideon dug his fingers beneath the nearest rock.
The edge cut his palm.
He pulled.
The stone moved an inch.
“Go!” Jude shouted.
Gideon dragged it free.
Another waited beneath it.
Jude struck Gideon’s shoulder. “Damn you, take the evidence!”
Gideon caught his hand.
Even in darkness, he found Jude’s face.
Dust covered his skin. Blood ran from somewhere near his temple.
“I will not leave you.”
“You left Samuel.”
The name entered the tunnel like another explosion.
Jude immediately regretted it.
Gideon felt the apology forming.
He did not let him speak.
“Yes,” Gideon said. “I left him.”
He tore another stone from the beam.
“I will regret that until I die.”
Another.
His fingernails split. Blood made the rocks slippery.
“But I will not survive by abandoning another man I love.”
Silence followed.
The mine shifted around them.
Jude’s hand remained against Gideon’s face.
“What did you say?”
Gideon looked toward the shadow where Jude lay.
“I love you.”
The words did not feel like surrender.
They felt like truth finally given air.
“I love you, and I am not leaving you under this mountain.”
Jude’s breath broke.
“Gideon—”
“Help me.”
Jude reached forward.
Together they pulled at the rock covering the beam. Gideon clawed through stone with his bare hands. Skin tore from both palms. Blood ran over his wrists and darkened the dust.
One stone came free.
Then another.
Enough of the beam emerged for Gideon to get his shoulder beneath it.
“I’m going to lift.”
“You’ll tear your side open.”
“Pull your leg when I say.”
“Gideon.”
“Do you trust me?”
Jude answered instantly.
“Yes.”
Gideon braced.
He lifted.
The beam rose less than two inches.
Pain ripped through his side. The stitches tore. Gideon shouted but did not release the weight.
“Now!”
Jude pulled.
One leg came free.
The beam slipped.
Gideon forced it upward again.
Jude twisted and dragged the second leg from beneath it.
Gideon released the beam.
It crashed into the tunnel floor.
Jude crawled into him.
Their foreheads struck together. Hands found shoulders, face, ribs, verifying what darkness hid.
“You love me,” Jude said.
“Yes.”
“You choose a remarkable place to say it.”
“You were arguing.”
“I remain unconvinced by your timing.”
Gideon kissed him.
Brief.
Dust-dry.
Alive.
“Can you crawl?”
“Yes.”
“Take the chest.”
They moved.
Jude pushed Noah’s strongbox ahead of him. Gideon followed close enough to keep one hand against his ankle.
The service tunnel sloped upward.
A faint gray point appeared far ahead.
Daylight.
Behind them, the mine groaned.
Gideon looked back.
Darkness moved.
Not shadow.
Stone.
“Faster!”
Jude crawled.
The tunnel collapsed.
The second blast of air struck them.
A timber swung from the ceiling and hit Gideon behind the head.
He felt no pain.
Only the sensation of falling without space to fall.
Then nothing.
Jude heard the timber strike Gideon.
The sound was small beneath the collapsing mine.
He turned.
“Gideon?”
No answer.
The gray daylight ahead flickered through dust.
Jude crawled backward.
His hand found Gideon’s coat. Then his shoulder. Gideon lay facedown with one arm trapped beneath him.
“Gideon.”
Jude turned him over.
Blood covered Gideon’s palms. His shirt was wet at the reopened bullet wound. A dark mark had begun spreading through his hair.
He was breathing.
Shallowly.
Jude placed one hand against his chest.
“Stay with me.”
Gideon did not respond.
Stone fell nearby.
Jude looked at the strongbox.
Then at the light.
The chest weighed more than forty pounds. Gideon weighed nearly two hundred. Jude’s ribs screamed every time he inhaled, and one leg had begun swelling from the beam.
He could not carry both.
The ledger contained Noah’s truth.
Gideon had refused to leave Jude for it.
Jude hooked both arms beneath Gideon’s shoulders.
“Damn you.”
He pulled.
Gideon moved several inches.
Jude dragged again.
The injured leg nearly collapsed beneath him. He used the tunnel walls for leverage, bracing his back against one and both boots against the other.
“Too broad for tunnels,” he gasped.
Gideon did not answer.
Jude dragged him another foot.
Then returned for the strongbox.
He moved them in stages.
Chest.
Gideon.
Chest.
Gideon.
The gray light grew brighter.
Dust thickened until Jude could no longer see it. He navigated through touch, one bloodied hand against the wall and the other twisted into Gideon’s coat.
The mine settled behind them with the sound of distant thunder.
Jude reached the bottom of the ventilation shaft.
Daylight waited twenty feet above.
The route Gideon had descended backward now seemed vertical.
“No.”
The word came from Jude without intention.
He could not drag Gideon up alone.
He could not leave him below.
He touched Gideon’s face.
“Wake up.”
Nothing.
Jude slapped him lightly.
“Gideon.”
No response.
He placed two fingers against Gideon’s throat.
A pulse remained.
But the shallow breathing had stopped.
Jude lowered his ear to Gideon’s mouth.
Nothing.
“No.”
He opened Gideon’s jaw and cleared dust from his mouth. He tilted his head back the way Noah had taught him after a ranch hand nearly drowned in a flooded stock tank.
Jude sealed his mouth over Gideon’s.
He breathed.
Gideon’s chest rose beneath his hand.
Jude lifted his head.
Nothing.
He breathed into him again.
“Come back.”
Another breath.
“You do not get to say that word and die.”
He pressed both hands against Gideon’s chest.
“Breathe.”
Nothing.
Jude gave him air again.
Gideon coughed beneath his mouth.
The sound was weak but living.
Jude rolled him onto his side.
Gideon coughed dust onto the tunnel floor. His body dragged in a ragged breath.
Jude pressed his forehead against the back of his neck.
“There you are.”
Gideon coughed again.
“Jude?”
“Yes.”
“Chest.”
“Safe.”
“You?”
“Still arguing.”
“Good.”
Gideon tried to rise.
His arms failed.
Jude caught him.
“You are going to let me move you.”
“I can climb.”
“You cannot hold your head up.”
“Temporary.”