Chapter 14 - The Deed Beneath the Floorboards
Harriet reached Jessup Ridge after sunset.
Harlan's cabin stood dark.
The barn door swung open in the wind.
“Harlan!”
No answer.
She dismounted.
Tracks covered the snow.
Several horses.
Men.
Harriet followed them toward the spring.
Moonlight showed broken fence posts.
A pumping pipe lay smashed.
Then she saw blood.
Only a little.
Dark drops on snow.
“Harlan!”
Something moved near the trees.
Harriet grabbed a fallen branch.
“Who's there?”
“Hate to disappoint you.”
Edwin Price stepped into view.
Harriet raised the branch.
He lifted both hands.
“I've quit.”
“What?”
“Vale.”
She stared.
“Convenient.”
“Yes.”
“Where's Harlan?”
“I don't know.”
“You were with them.”
“I came after.”
“Why?”
Price looked exhausted.
“Because Mr. Vale stopped listening to attorneys three days ago.”
“You expect sympathy?”
“No.”
“Good.”
He pointed uphill.
“I found this.”
Harlan's hat.
Harriet's stomach turned.
She took it.
“Where?”
“Near the old survey shed.”
They climbed.
The shed door was broken.
Inside they found rope.
Blood.
An empty whiskey bottle.
No Harlan.
Price examined the floor.
“Someone was held here.”
Harriet found fibers from Harlan's coat caught on a nail.
Fear became rage.
“Vale?”
“Possibly Rusk.”
“The foreman Harlan hit?”
“Yes.”
Price swallowed.
“Rusk handles problems.”
“What does that mean?”
“You know what it means.”
Harriet stepped close.
“And you worked for these men.”
Price looked away.
“Yes.”
“Why quit now?”
“Because there is a difference between intimidating property owners and murder.”
“There shouldn't be.”
He flinched.
Good.
Outside, a horse whinnied.
Harriet ran.
Harlan stumbled from the trees.
“Harlan!”
She reached him before he fell.
His lip was split.
One eye swollen.
Hands tied.
But alive.
Harriet cut the rope using Price's knife.
“What happened?”
“Rusk.”
“Where?”
“Gone.”
Harlan looked at Price.
His body tensed.
“Easy,” Harriet said.
“Why is he here?”
“I resigned,” Price said.
Harlan laughed painfully.
“Congratulations.”
Harriet touched his face.
“Can you walk?”
“Yes.”
“That's what you said when your shoulder was dislocated.”
“Still walked.”
She almost cried.
Instead she kissed his forehead.
They brought him to the cabin.
Price explained.
After financing collapsed, Vale ordered workers to seize documents proving spring ownership.
Rusk believed Harlan kept the original deeds in the cabin.
He did not.
“Where are they?” Harriet asked.
Harlan looked confused.
“County records.”
“Not the covenant.”
“Samuel had it.”
“A copy.”
Harlan sat straighter.
“What?”
Harriet pulled out the old deed.
“Gideon thinks this is a certified copy, not original.”
Harlan frowned.
“My father kept papers beneath the floor.”
Everyone went still.
“What floor?”
Harlan pointed toward the bedroom.
They removed a plank beneath the bed.
A metal box rested inside.
Harlan stared.
“I haven't opened that since Caleb died.”
Inside were his father's documents.
Tax records.
Letters.
Land purchases.
And at the bottom—
An original deed.
Harriet recognized the language immediately.
The Bell-Jessup water covenant.
Both family signatures.
Notary seal.
And a filing receipt.
Gideon had been right.
It had been recorded.
The record had simply disappeared from the courthouse archive.
Price looked at it.
“Vale probably paid someone to remove the book.”
Harlan's face hardened.
“We have the receipt.”
Harriet examined the number.
Record Book 14.
Page 283.
The courthouse clerk had claimed nothing existed there.
Now they could prove tampering.
But something else lay beneath the deed.
A letter addressed to Samuel Bell.
Harlan opened it.
His father's handwriting.
Samuel,
If anything happens to me, see that Harlan and Caleb understand the water agreement. Eleanor's father insisted on it for good reason. The basin beneath these properties is larger than most know. Men will eventually come for it. Water will be worth more than silver when the valley fills.
Harriet read the final sentence twice.
Water will be worth more than silver.
Harlan looked at her.
“Our fathers knew.”
“And Mama.”
Price whispered, “Vale would kill for this.”
Harlan looked at him.
“He nearly did.”
They rode to town at dawn.
Harlan refused the wagon.
Harriet argued.
He won only because riding slowly hurt less than bouncing over frozen road.
The courthouse opened at eight.
Gideon examined the original deed.
His eyebrows nearly reached the ceiling.
“This,” he said, “is beautiful.”
Harriet smiled.
“I thought lawyers weren't romantic.”
“We are when properly notarized.”
The county clerk was questioned.
He denied removing records.
Then Gideon produced the filing receipt.
The clerk became pale.
By afternoon, investigators found Record Book 14 hidden in the courthouse furnace room.
Page 283 had been cut out.
Now Vale faced possible fraud, bribery, and obstruction investigations.
But Cyrus Vale himself had disappeared.
His private train had left without him.
His hotel room was empty.
Sheriff McKenna searched.
Nothing.
Two days passed.
The town began repairing the boarding house.
Harriet baked.
Harlan recovered.
For the first time in weeks, life almost seemed calm.
Then Samuel vanished.
Harriet discovered his bed empty before dawn.
His coat was gone.
So was the original deed.
On his pillow lay a note.
Harry, forgive me. I have to finish what I started.
Harriet could barely hold the paper.
Harlan read it.
“What did he start?”
She looked toward the empty road.
Then remembered something Cyrus Vale had said the first time they met.
Your father was more practical.
Samuel had met Vale many times.
More times than Harriet knew.
She ran to Samuel's desk.
Inside, hidden beneath invoices, she found a railway ticket.
Dated six months earlier.
Destination:
Silver Junction.
Harlan frowned.
“Why would your father go there?”
Price, who had remained in town under protective custody, heard the question.
His face changed.
“Vale owns a hunting lodge near Silver Junction.”
Harriet stared.
“You think Papa went there?”
Price's silence was answer enough.
Harlan reached for his coat.
Harriet was already wearing hers.
This time he did not say no.
Because somewhere in the mountains, a sick old man carrying the most valuable deed in the county was traveling alone toward Cyrus Vale.
And Harriet knew her father well enough to understand the worst part.
May you like
Samuel Bell did not intend to come home until the fight was finished.
Even if finishing it killed him.
