came from. If this is an ambush then it isn't a very good one. She is ready for them.
How many are there? She can only hear one horse. Is it a trap? Are there others? How sure is she of hitting anything with this big pistol? She should run away. Her horse is faster than most and she knows this ranchland better than anyone.
She will go. She sets her heels to her horse. At that moment a horse steps out into the open, its rider slumped in the saddle. Her horse rears in surprise as she hauls back on the reins.
'Billy!' she cries, recognizing the hatless figure on the horse. She rides up alongside and reaches over to the boy.
'Miss Nixon' he manages to say, before coughing. His shirt is soaked with blood.
Billy works for her on the ranch. He is only fifteen but keen and hard-working. And now he sits on a horse, slumped and bleeding and probably dying. She cannot bear it. Guilt consumes her, a tear forming in the corner of her eye. She sent this boy to die. It is her fault.
'...ranch...' he coughs again. '...back...'
That is enough to make her realize that she can still do something. She can't help him here in the gathering darkness. Back at the ranch there are medicines and bandages and people who'd know what to do. It isn't over for this kid, not if she can get him back to the ranch. She reaches over and grabs the reins of his horse and sets off at a slow walk, checking all the while that Billy isn't in danger of falling. Gradually she increases the pace. Somehow he manages to stay in the saddle.
The lights of the ranch are a welcome sight. It has taken them almost an hour to cover the distance. Billy stopped trying to talk soon after they started moving, now he has even stopped coughing. She is worried she might be bringing a corpse back.
'Sanchez!' she cries out as soon as she thinks she is close enough that someone could hear. 'Laura!' she shouts, hoping for her maid.
There is no reaction from the ranch. Billy lets out a quiet groan. Her shouting must have woken him. But still nobody at the ranch seems to have heard her. If only she could somehow shout louder. Then she remembers the heavy pistol hanging from her belt. No need to aim it anywhere but in the air. She fires a shot and is surprised by the violence of the recoil even though she has fired this gun before. The sound of the gun echoes around the valley. She fires again, and again.
Now there is movement in the lights. Someone has heard, and now she can hear voices, distant shouts.
'Sanchez!' she yells again, and spurs the horses to greater speed. Tears run down through the dust on her cheeks as she sees help riding fast towards her.
'Will he be alright?' she asks.
'I don't know Miss.' says Laura, crouching down beside the bed of the injured boy. 'I'll do what I can. He needs a doctor really.'
'Or maybe a priest.'
'Don't blame yourself Emily. You sent him to keep watch, not to get into a gunfight.' Sanchez is, as always, the voice of reason.
'Maybe if you'd dealt with...' she started intending to berate him about the botched attempt to kill McLaren but realized that Laura was still there. Only she and Sanchez knew what had really happened. Billy had been sent to keep watch on the dam, to report back if anything happened there. He hadn't been told about the explosion at the house either.
'There is no maybe, Emily. This is where we are, we must make the best that we can from it. Billy is stronger than you think. He is a fighter. He already looks better than when he came in. He is in good hands with Laura. I go to tell the others what has happened.'
'Don't go yet.' she says.
Sanchez hesitates.
Billy groans loudly and then starts coughing.
'Take it easy.' says Laura. 'You're going to be alright.'
'Miss Nixon?' he asks, trying to sit up.
'What is it Billy?' she says, rushing to his side, worried that he'll hurt himself trying to see her.
'I'm sorry.' he says.
'Sorry?'
'He was hiding in the trees, I didn't see him. I know I should have been keeping watch but I was looking, I really was looking Miss, I just didn't see him.' He coughed again. Laura mopped at his brow and gave a concerned look to Emily.
'Who was it Billy?' Emily asks, drawing an angry glance from Laura. It barely registers though. She is thinking about revenge now. If Billy can tell her who shot him then she can do something. She can't make Billy better, she must leave that to others, but she can protect him. She can avenge him.
'Who was it?' she asks again.
'Deputy.' There is a sharp intake of breath around the room at this word. Billy takes to coughing again.
'You were shot by a deputy? Who? How?' Emily is still seized with the determination to find out how she can make amends.
'I don't know his name. He came out of the trees so suddenly. I didn't see him.'
'Damn.' she mutters.
'I didn't see him, and then I saw him. His gun was drawn and he was talking all this and that about the law and I should do what he says and not what you say. I wasn't liking it much, not with his gun pointing at me and all. He kept waving it at me as he talked and I figured he was just waiting for an excuse to shoot me with it. Then there was a big explosion from somewhere down the valley and he got distracted. I took my chance and drew but he was too quick for me.'
'Damn. If only we knew which Deputy it was.'
'It should be easy enough to tell Miss, I put a couple of holes in him before he shot me.'
'You killed a Deputy?' Laura says, incredulous.
'I don't know that I killed him. I was too busy bleeding to check if he was dead or not.' Billy managed a half- smile.
'You're a good kid Billy.' Emily squeezed his hand. 'We're going to make this alright. You get some rest now.'
'Sanchez, did you hear all that?' she asks, taking him outside the room.
The old Mexican nods.
'I want you to take one of the men to the dam and check.'
'You don't believe the boy?'
'Oh I believe him. I want you to make sure.'
'Make sure?'
'Do I have to spell it out? There's a Deputy out there that Billy here put some holes in and only Billy and the Deputy know what happened. Billy will hang if the Deputy gets to tell his side of the story. I want you to get out there and make sure that you finish the job that Billy started. If he's not dead already, then kill him.'
'Are you sure that's what you want?'
'I'm certain,' she says. 'That boy nearly died doing work for me. I'm going to do what I can to repay him for that. It's what my father would have done.'
'Yes,' Sanchez says sadly, 'yes it is.'
CHAPTER THREE
Riding into Walkers Creek in the late morning sunshine his horses' hooves thud softly over the box bridge that crosses the eponymous river. Between the creek and the steep rocky valley side lies a town whose bustle and prosperity surprises Logan.
He is first struck by the permanence of it. This is no frontier, pioneer town. The buildings on the main street are large and solidly constructed; sturdy-looking wood structures alongside proud and dominating brick buildings that wouldn't have looked out of place on a San Francisco street.
