Thomas stepped forward.
“What does that mean?”
Clara looked at him.
“Gideon is alive.”
Eli almost collapsed.
Martha grabbed him.
Thomas stared.
“Where?”
“They took him.”
“Who?”
“Rourke.”
Eli began crying.
“He's alive?”
Clara nodded.
“At least he was yesterday.”
Thomas’s expression changed into something Martha had never seen.
Hope was almost more frightening on him than anger.
“Where?”
“Old Number Four mine.”
Thomas started toward the wagon.
Clara blocked him.
“You go there now and you die.”
“He's my brother.”
“And Rourke knows that.”
“That is why Gideon is alive.”
Thomas stopped.
Clara continued.
“He wants the ledger.”
“The one Eli carried.”
Martha felt everyone look toward her.
She still had it hidden beneath her apron.
Clara said:
“That ledger is useful but not enough.”
“The deed book is what can destroy Rourke.”
“Where is it?”
“County courthouse vault.”
Thomas stared toward town.
Clara smiled without humor.
“Which is why Gideon wanted me.”
“I am deputy records clerk.”
Martha asked:
“Can you get inside?”
“I can.”
“Can you get the book?”
“Not without attracting notice.”
Martha looked at Thomas.
Then toward Covenant Creek.
“Maybe notice is exactly what we need.”
The plan was ridiculous.
Thomas said so repeatedly.
Martha ignored him.
Covenant Creek knew Thomas Vale.
It knew Mercer.
It knew Clara.
It knew Eli might be hunted.
Nobody knew Martha.
At least not yet.
She entered town the next morning wearing her sea-blue dress beneath a heavy cloak.
No rifle.
No visible weapon.
She carried a basket.
A large woman with bread and preserves did not look like an attack.
That was the advantage of being underestimated.
The courthouse clerk barely looked up.
“What do you need?”
“Land registration.”
“Which parcel?”
Martha pretended embarrassment.
“My husband left me a claim near Willow Branch.”
The clerk sighed.
“Name?”
“Bell.”
He checked.
Nothing.
“Perhaps it was filed under his first wife.”
The clerk looked annoyed.
Martha began telling an unnecessarily complicated story involving two husbands, an uncle, disputed boundary stones, and a pig named Abigail.
After four minutes, the clerk looked ready to confess to crimes he had not committed.
Behind him, Clara slipped through the records door using her old key.
Martha continued.
“The pig was not technically ours, you understand.”
“Ma’am.”
“But the magistrate said—”
“Ma’am.”
A bell rang outside.
Thomas’s part.
Two horses broke loose near the general store.
People shouted.
The clerk ran to the window.
Clara emerged from the records room carrying a thick leather book beneath her coat.
Martha smiled.
“I'll come back when you've had time to consider the pig.”
She left.
They regrouped behind the old mission.
Clara opened the deed book.
Page after page contained original property filings.
Then alterations.