Chapter 11 - The Sheriff’s Hidden Debt
T.B. turned out to be Theodore Briggs.
President of Crow Ridge Bank.
The most respectable man in town.
The discovery stunned everyone.
Briggs had financed Mercer's operations.
He had also forged loans against properties owned by dead miners.
Including Jian.
Min's husband had unknowingly “signed” a loan three days after his death.
That was the mistake that exposed everything.
Hilton and Silas confronted Briggs at the bank.
He denied it.
Then Min placed the forged paper before him.
“My husband dead this day.”
Briggs stared.
“You expect me to explain every clerical mistake?”
“No.”
Min placed Jian’s authentic signature beside the forgery.
“Explain this.”
Briggs ran.
He made it as far as the train depot.
Silas arrested him.
The second fire had been Briggs’s attempt to destroy documents Hilton had recovered from his house.
But the documents were not there.
Judge Warren had them.
Briggs had burned the pasture for nothing.
With his arrest, the network around Silver Mountain finally collapsed.
Mercer's power had depended upon many respectable people quietly benefiting.
The ledger made quiet impossible.
Min’s name was officially cleared.
Jian’s name was officially restored.
And Hilton’s ranch began healing.
But one question remained.
Monday morning arrived.
The stagecoach to San Francisco waited.
Min stood beside it with one suitcase.
Hilton stood several feet away.
“You should meet your brother,” he said.
Min nodded.
“Yes.”
His heart sank.
Then she handed the driver money.
“For round trip.”
Hilton blinked.
Min turned.
“I visit brother.”
“Then?”
She smiled.
“I come home.”
Hilton stared.
“Home?”
Min looked toward Crow Ridge.
“Yes.”
For two years, that word had meant a house full of ghosts.
Now it meant something else.
Hilton smiled.
“I'll be waiting.”
Min climbed aboard.
The coach departed.
Hilton watched until it disappeared.
This goodbye hurt.
But differently.
May you like
Because this time, he expected the person he loved to return.
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