The man vaulted the fence.
Clara moved toward the gate to cut him off.
“Clara!”
She ignored him.
The man reached a horse hidden behind cottonwoods.
Tomás ran.
Too late.
The rider disappeared into darkness.
Clara found something near the fence.
A leather pouch.
She picked it up.
Tomás reached her.
“I told you to stay.”
She looked at him.
“Later.”
She opened the pouch.
Inside lay a glass syringe.
And a small brown vial.
Tomás stared.
Clara looked toward the dark road.
“Now we have evidence.”
The sheriff came before sunrise.
So did Gideon.
The vial went to the pharmacist.
He identified the contents as a concentrated arsenic solution commonly used in tiny amounts for certain pest compounds but lethal if injected into cattle.
The syringe was expensive.
On its brass case were two engraved letters.
E.D.
Earl Danner.
Silas Mercer’s foreman.
Tomás felt vindication.
Clara felt concern.
“Too easy.”
Tomás stared.
“What?”
She looked at the initials.
“A man committing a serious crime carries equipment with his initials?”
“He dropped it while running.”
“Yes.”
“People make mistakes.”
“Yes.”
“But?”
Clara looked toward the sheriff.
“But perhaps someone wants us to find Earl.”
The sheriff sighed.
“Mrs. Reed, at some point evidence has to mean something.”
“It means Earl’s syringe was here.”
“Good.”
“Not necessarily Earl.”
Tomás frowned.
“You think someone stole it?”
“I think we ask.”
The sheriff rode to Broken Spur Ranch.
Earl Danner was gone.
His bunk had been emptied.
Silas Mercer claimed ignorance.
The sheriff searched.
Found no poison.
Silas produced three witnesses who said Earl had argued with him about wages two days earlier.
By afternoon, Dry Creek believed Earl had poisoned Tomás’s herd out of spite after being denied work.
Clara did not.
“Why would he hurt you because he hates Mercer?”
Tomás asked.
“Maybe he wanted to hurt Mercer’s rival.”
“Why?”
“Exactly.”
No motive.
The story was wrong.
But the bank deadline did not wait for mystery.
Three weeks remained.
Tomás and Clara sold hides.
Eighty-three dollars.
Clara began repairing saddles for neighboring ranchers using skills learned from slaughterhouse harness work.
Money came slowly.
Tomás sold five cattle.
Too cheaply.
One hundred eighty dollars.
Still nowhere near enough.
Then Clara noticed something in the ranch accounts.
A line item.
“Spring lease.”
Tomás looked over her shoulder.
“That’s old.”
“What is it?”
“My father leased water to miners years ago.”
“How much?”
“Nothing now.”
“Why not?”
“Mine closed.”
Clara tapped the paper.
“The agreement says twenty dollars per month per hundred head equivalent.”
“So?”
“Who uses downstream water?”
Tomás thought.
“Mercer.”
Clara looked at him.
“He uses your spring?”
“Water flows through his lower pasture.”
“Legally?”
“He has riparian access.”
“That is not what I asked.”
Tomás stared.
Clara’s eyes sharpened.
“How much of his herd drinks water originating on your property?”
“Maybe two hundred.”
“Does he pay?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Nobody ever charged.”
Clara smiled.
Tomás became nervous.