Chapter 8
Conn offered to go to her, but she told him to stay put and she would come to him.
He stood in the darkness, listening to the sound of her shuffling descent, which was punctuated by the occasional snapping branch or the tap-tap-crash of a tumbling stone.
When she finally reached the base of the hill, she drifted toward him through the gloom, an apparition with pale hair and huge eyes that caught the moonlight as she drew closer.
“Conn?” she said, stopping a few feet away. “It’s really you?”
Conn removed his hat and nodded and stood there awkwardly. Never in a million years would he have anticipated such a meeting.
“They killed him, Mary.”
She nodded and closed her eyes and seemed to sag a little, but she didn’t sob or faint, like he would have expected.
“I know,” she said, her voice a hoarse whisper. “I know what they did. I know they hung him. He was already gone when I escaped from the house.”
“I’m sorry,” he said.
She stared at him for a second then glanced toward the twinkling embers where her house had stood earlier that evening. “Will you make them pay?”
“Yes, ma’am. I will make them pay. I will make every last one of them pay. I made that promise to Cole, and I make it again to you. I will kill them all.”
Some women would have balked at such plain talk, but to her credit, Mary merely nodded. “Good, Conn. That’s good. Thank you.”
He led her back to the valley floor, where she stared into the embers for several silent minutes.
Conn waited, giving her time.
Finally, she spoke. “Take me to him?”
Conn nodded and took her out to the tree, where she finally fell apart.
Mary gave a heartbreaking scream and fell forward and lay atop Cole, holding him and sobbing his name over and over.
Feeling awkward, Conn stepped forward and patted her back.
He gave her a moment then helped her to her feet and led her away from the body and toward the gelding.
“We have to bury him,” she said.
“I will,” Conn said, “but first, I gotta get you someplace safe. Is there a neighbor you could stay with?”
She shook her head. “Don’t ask me to leave him, Conn. I won’t leave him.”
That brought back the lump in Conn’s throat. His brother had married a good woman.
“You can’t stay here, Mary.”
“I must. I won’t let animals get after him.”
“Well, I can’t bury him. Not yet. I gotta get after these men. Any idea who they were?”
She nodded. “I know one of them. A short man.”
“Do you know his name?”
She shook her head. “I’m sorry. I don’t. But he’s my height. I remember that. I remember looking him in the eyes and thinking we were the same height. Back at the store, I mean. I never got close to him here. Cole sent me down into the cellar.”
Conn nodded. “Smart of him. And how tall are you, Mary?”
“Five-four. A little under five-four. I’d say that man is, too.”
“Can you tell me anything else about him?”
“He had scars. Lots of scars on his face. It’s a hard face. The nose is crumpled. And his ears looked strange, like melted wax.”
A fighter, then, Conn thought. He asked, “You said something about a store?”
“Yes, sir. We saw him earlier today at the hardware store.”
“Does he work there?”
She shook her head. “He and another man came out into the lumber yard and looked at us and then went back inside when we did.”
“Did you talk with him?”
“No. Cole nodded to him. That was it.”
“And you said there was another man with him? Was he here tonight, too?”
“I have no idea.”
“What did he look like?”
“He looked like anybody. Brown hair, average height, average build. Nothing special at all. Type of man you don’t really look at, you know? Not without a reason.”
Conn nodded. He had a reason now to look at the man. “Did you see any of the others?”
“Not in any detail. But I counted them. There were eleven men.”
“Are you sure?”
She nodded. “I counted them several times, looking down from the hillside. There were eleven.”
“All right. That helps. Is there anything else you can tell me?”
“Such as?”
“Do you have any idea who might do something like this?”
“No idea. Cole didn’t have any enemies. He was friendly with everyone.”
Which sounded just like Conn’s brother. The man didn’t have a mean bone in his body, and if anybody needed anything, he jumped right up to help.
But then, looking thoughtful, she said, “I suppose maybe those men saw the gold.”
“Gold?”
“The gold coins Cole had saved up. He brought them to town and bought lumber with them. For the barn. The men were standing behind us when Cole took out his money pouch. They must have seen the money and heard us tell the man behind the counter where our property was.”
“That must be it,” Conn said. He thought they had seen more than the gold, though. They’d seen her, too.
Even in the gloom with her scratched and dirty face and puffy eyes, he could see that she was remarkably good-looking. Scoundrels such as these might do anything to have their way with a beautiful woman like Mary.
Of course, he said none of this to her, not wanting Mary to feel like she had in any way caused what had happened.
Which she hadn’t.
Bad men try to pin their wickedness on all sorts of things from drink to lack of opportunity to a pretty woman’s smile.
But in the end, we are all responsible for our actions.
“I wish you’d come earlier, Conn. I wish you’d come to supper, wish you’d been here. Together, maybe…”
Conn nodded.
Then Mary’s eyes swelled again, and she spoke rapidly. “I’m sorry. That’s a terrible thing to say. What happened happened, and there’s nothing we can do to change that.”
He nodded, but her words had already pierced his heart.
If only he hadn’t stopped at that saloon. If only he had skipped the beers and the conversation with Darlene the saloon girl, he wouldn’t have decided to have supper in town. He would have been here hours earlier, in time to help Cole fend off these men.
But as always, he had taken his time at the saloon, drinking and talking to a pretty girl, then taken his time again, riding here.
And he would have to live with that guilt for the rest of his life.
Again, emotion plugged his throat, and again, he fended it off.
Later, he told himself. Later, after you finish what you need to do, there will be time for grief.
Now, it was time to keep his promise.
“I gotta find these men before they decide to run out of the country. Why don’t you let me take you someplace?”
She shook her head. “Help me bury Cole, and I’ll come with you.”
“No, there isn’t time to bury him, and you’re not coming with me.”
“I will help you kill them.”
He shook his head.
“I can shoot,” she said.
“I know you can. Cole told me in a letter. But being able to shoot isn’t the same as being able to shoot a man. Have you ever done that before?”
She shook her head. “But I have a good reason now.”
“A good reason isn’t always enough. I’ll drop you off at a neighbor or take you into town, but once I catch these men’s trail, I will ride it alone.”
“All right, Conn.”
“Which is it, then? A neighbor or town?”
“Neither. If you don’t have time to bury Cole, I’ll stay here.”
“What if they come back?”
She stared back at him. “If they come back, I’ll run into the woods again.”
He nodded, figuring it was a reasonable plan and that she was solid enough to pull it off.
They were silent for a time, just standing there close enough to comfort one another but too unfamiliar to do so.
“It’s strange,” she said. “You look just like him.”
Conn nodded.
“Even the scar,” she said with seeming wonder, tilting her head and squinting to see his face better.
“Yeah.”
“But Cole said he got that mark from a hatchet when he was a kid.”
Conn nodded. “Threw it at a tree. It bounced off and hit him in the face.”
“He said you carried him home. Ran the whole way.”
He nodded again.
“But you have a scar just like it,” Mary said. “Exactly like it. How?”
“A story for another time,” Conn said. “I’m going now. Here.”
He reached in his pocket and pulled out the wad of money he’d been planning to start a new life with. He handed most of it to her, keeping only enough to start after his brother’s killers.
“What’s this?”
“Money.”
“I know that. But why are you giving it to me?”
“In case I don’t come back.”
“You might not come back?”
“I’ll come back unless they kill me. And I don’t count on letting them do that. But you keep the money just in case. I reckon they took all of yours.”
She glanced at the open door of the house and finally nodded. “Cole said you’re awful tough.”
He nodded.
“Don’t let them kill you, then, all right? You kill them and then come back.”
He said that’s what he aimed to do. He took one last look at Cole then whistled to the gelding.
The horse trotted out of the darkness.
Conn opened his bags and gave Mary his blanket and jerky. He offered matches, but she already had some. He considered leaving his shotgun or rifle but reckoned she would probably be all right with the pocket pistol.
He, on the other hand, might need all of his weapons before this night was through.
With that thought, he retrieved the full bandolier from his saddle bag and draped it across his chest so a line of buckshot crossed his heart.
Then, having done everything he could for his brother’s widow, Conn climbed into the saddle, touched the brim of his hat, and set out after the men he had promised to kill.