Chapter 8 - The Letter Clara Never Meant Him to Read
They returned to Gideon’s cabin the following afternoon.
Anna came with them.
So did Sheriff Bell.
The barn was a black skeleton against the snow.
Clara stared at it from the saddle.
“This happened because of me.”
Gideon dismounted.
“This happened because a criminal likes fire.”
“You had a barn before I came.”
“I’ll have another.”
“You say everything like rebuilding is simple.”
“It isn’t.”
“Then why?”
Gideon looked toward the burned beams.
“Because if I say impossible often enough, eventually I’ll start believing it.”
Clara had no answer.
Inside, Anna slept nearly twelve hours.
Bell returned to town to quietly gather records of land purchases associated with Judge Keene.
Gideon prepared to inspect the North Star mine.
Clara insisted on going.
“No.”
“Why?”
“Old shaft.”
“So?”
“Collapsed timber. Ice. Bad air.”
“You need someone holding the lantern.”
“I have hands.”
“You also have an unreasonable need to argue.”
He looked at her.
“So do you.”
“Then we’ll be efficient together.”
She won.
They left before noon.
The North Star entrance sat in a ravine thirty minutes from the cabin.
Gideon had not entered since he was seventeen.
His father once warned him that the mine was more grave than tunnel.
Now snow half-covered the rotting entrance.
Someone had been there recently.
Tracks.
Boots.
Two men at least.
Gideon crouched.
“Yesterday.”
Clara held the lantern tighter.
“They brought something here.”
“Or took something.”
Inside, the tunnel narrowed.
Water dripped from stone.
Old timber supports groaned under mountain weight.
Clara stayed close.
Not touching him.
Close enough that he could feel her presence.
They reached an old equipment room.
Empty.
Then Gideon noticed scrape marks on the floor.
A crate had been moved.
Behind it was a small recess cut into stone.
Inside sat a metal strongbox.
Clara stopped breathing.
“That’s it.”
“How do you know?”
“Anna described it.”
Gideon pulled.
Locked.
Clara removed the brass key.
Number 17.
It fit.
The lid opened.
Inside were ledgers.
Letters.
Land deeds.
Bank drafts.
Clara’s hands shook.
“All of it.”
Gideon lifted one ledger.
Names filled every page.
Women.
Men.
Amounts.
Beside several women’s names were words like noncompliant, transferred, additional debt.
Gideon’s jaw tightened.
Another book contained land purchases.
Companies.
Shell names.
And there it was.
COBB, GIDEON.
Status: resistant.
Proposed acquisition method: marital encumbrance.
Clara covered her mouth.
Gideon kept reading.
Potential bride: Clara Wynn.
Liability level: high.
Useful leverage: debt contract.
Clara turned away.
Gideon closed the book.
“Don’t.”
She whispered, “They picked me because I was easy to use.”
“No.”
“It says—”
“It says what Rusk thought.”
Her eyes filled.
“He was right.”
Gideon walked toward her.
Stopped at the distance she preferred.
“No.”
“You don’t know me.”
“I know enough.”
“What?”
“You crossed six states after someone took your shoes.”
She stared.
“You carried evidence that could destroy men more powerful than you.”
He pointed toward the ledger.
“You had every reason to throw that key in a river.”
Her throat tightened.
“You didn’t.”
She looked away.
“That doesn’t make me brave.”
“No.”
He waited.
“Doing it while scared does.”
For several seconds neither spoke.
Then a sound came from the tunnel.
A boot scraping stone.
Gideon extinguished the lantern.
Darkness swallowed them.
Clara’s hand found his.
Not because he reached.
Because she did.
He squeezed once.
Voices.
Two men.
“We know you’re in there, Cobb.”
Dodd.
Gideon moved Clara behind the stone recess.
He whispered, “Stay.”
She whispered back, “You’re becoming predictable.”
Even there, he almost smiled.
Dodd entered with another man.
Lantern light approached.
“Rusk only wants the papers.”
Gideon remained silent.
“Give them over and nobody gets hurt.”
Clara leaned close.
“There’s another passage.”
“How?”
“Map.”
She pointed.
A narrow ventilation cut branched from the equipment room.
Too small for a large man comfortably.
Large enough.
Gideon gathered the most important ledger and land book.
Clara took the letters.
They crawled.
Behind them, Dodd shouted.
“They’re moving!”
The passage descended sharply.
Clara slipped.
Gideon caught her wrist.
She froze.
He immediately loosened his grip.
“I’ve got you.”
For a moment she stared at his hand around her wrist.
Old fear flashed.
Then she looked at his face.
Not the past.
Gideon.
She nodded.
“Don’t let go.”
He didn’t.
They emerged through a collapsed side opening fifty yards downslope.
Snow blinded them.
They ran.
A gunshot cracked behind.
The bullet struck a tree.
Gideon pushed Clara behind a boulder.
Dodd appeared above.
Then another sound rolled across the ravine.
A rifle from the opposite ridge.
Dodd ducked.
Sheriff Bell.
“Move!” he shouted.
Gideon and Clara ran toward him.
Minutes later, they reached the horses.
They escaped with the ledger.
Not everything.
Enough.
That evening Bell spread the documents across Gideon’s table.
“This could bury Keene.”
“If it survives court,” Anna said.
Bell nodded.
“We need a federal marshal.”
“Where?”
“Cheyenne.”
Clara sighed.
“Back to Cheyenne.”
Gideon looked at her.
“We can wait.”
“No.”
“You’re exhausted.”
“So are you.”
“True.”
“Then neither of us gets to use it as an excuse.”
Anna laughed softly.
Gideon shook his head.
Later, while packing, Clara found one of Gideon’s shirts beneath the bed where it had fallen.
A folded envelope slipped from the pocket.
She picked it up.
Her name was written across the front.
CLARA WYNN.
She hesitated.
It was already open.
Inside was a letter.
Not from Rusk.
Not from the bureau.
From Gideon.
Or rather, a letter Gideon had written months ago and apparently never sent.
She should have put it back.
Instead she read the first line.
To the woman who may one day come here—
Clara sat on the bed.
The letter was not romantic.
That made it worse.
It said he did not know what kind of husband he would be.
That he was quiet.
That winter made him quieter.
That his cabin had two bedrooms and she could have whichever she wanted.
That he did not expect a servant.
That if she hated Wyoming after one winter, he would pay her return fare east.
That if affection came, he would be grateful.
If it did not, he would still keep his promises.
And at the bottom:
You will never owe me gratitude for giving you a home. If you come here, it must become yours too.
Clara read that sentence three times.
Then heard Gideon outside the room.
She folded the letter quickly.
Too late.
He stopped in the doorway.
Saw it.
Neither spoke.
Clara’s face flushed.
“I’m sorry.”
He looked embarrassed.
A new expression on him.
“You weren’t supposed to find that.”
“Why didn’t you send it?”
Gideon leaned against the frame.
“Sounded foolish.”
“It didn’t.”
“I didn’t know you.”
“You still wrote it.”
He shrugged.
“I wanted whoever came to know.”
“Know what?”
“That she had a choice.”
Clara looked down at the letter.
Her voice broke.
“No one ever told me that before.”
Gideon did not move closer.
Clara wiped her eyes.
Then noticed something written on the back.
A second note.
A date.
And a name.
Walter Keene.
She frowned.
“What is this?”
Gideon looked.
His expression changed.
“I forgot that was there.”
“What?”
“That letter was the same paper I used when I wrote down the name of the man who offered to buy my land.”
Clara stared at the date.
Six months earlier.
Before Gideon contacted the bureau.
Before her photograph was taken.
Before her journey west.
Rusk’s plan had started much earlier than they thought.
And if Judge Keene had approached Gideon personally before the mail-order arrangement began, then the ledger was not simply evidence of fraud.
It was evidence of conspiracy.
Enough to destroy powerful men.
May you like
If they lived long enough to deliver it.
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