For a while, neither spoke.
Then Noah said, "Tell me about your father."
Hannah looked down at her hands.
"Thomas Reed was a surveyor before he became a rancher. He came to Montana when the railroad was still a rumor. He believed land belonged to the people who worked it, not the men who could afford to buy a judge."
"Sounds like my father."
"He and your father were friends. They hunted together, worked together, and planned to build a small town near the creek. There would have been a school, a mill, and a bridge across the river."
"What happened?"
"The railroad arrived. Elias Crowley came with it. He offered to buy the valley. Your father refused. Mine refused. Then the threats began."
She paused.
"My father discovered that the railroad had been paying officials to alter land surveys. Several families had already lost their farms. When he threatened to expose the scheme, someone burned our house."
Noah turned toward her.
"You were there?"
"I was nine."
He said nothing.
"I remember the fire," Hannah continued. "I remember my mother carrying me through the kitchen while my father shouted at someone outside. I remember the smell of smoke. And I remember a man standing near the gate, watching the house burn."
"Who?"
"I don't know. I never saw his face clearly. But I remember his horse. A black stallion with a white mark above its left eye."
Noah's fingers tightened around the cup.
"Mercer rides a black stallion."
"Not the same one. The horse I remember would be long dead. But the mark was unusual."
Noah thought of the old photographs in his father's study.
He remembered a picture of Sheriff Amos Mercer standing beside James Bennett and Elias Crowley. A black horse stood behind them.
Above its left eye was a white mark.
He looked at Hannah.
"There's something else you need to know."
She waited.
"My father kept a box in his study. He told me never to open it unless the ranch was in danger."
"Do you still have it?"
"Yes."
"Then we need to go back."
Noah stood and saddled Willow.
Before they left, Hannah folded the map and tucked it inside her coat. She then took a small brass pendant from around her neck.
It was shaped like a horseshoe, with a tiny keyhole in the center.
Noah stared at it.
"Where did you get that?"
"My mother gave it to me before she died."
He reached into his pocket and took out the brass key.
The key fit the pendant's lock.
For several seconds, neither moved.
Then Hannah turned the pendant over.
On the back, barely visible beneath the tarnish, were two initials.
T. R.
Thomas Reed.
"My father made this," she whispered.
Noah handed the key back to her.
"Whatever's in that box, I think he wanted you to find it."
They mounted Willow and rode toward the ranch.
The journey took nearly three hours. By the time they reached the property, the sun had climbed above the eastern ridge.
The house stood exactly as Noah had left it, but the front door hung open.
He dismounted and drew his revolver.
"Hannah, stay behind me."
They entered the house.
The sitting room had been ransacked. Drawers lay overturned, chairs had been smashed, and papers were scattered across the floor.
Someone had searched the study.
Noah rushed inside.
The old desk stood against the wall, its drawers pulled out. The portrait of his grandfather had been knocked to the floor.
But the small iron box beneath the desk was gone.
He stared at the empty space.
Hannah stepped beside him.
"They knew about it."
Noah knelt and examined the floor.
A muddy boot print marked the rug.
Beside it lay a piece of paper.
He picked it up.
It was a letter addressed to his father, dated three days before his death.
The handwriting belonged to Sheriff Mercer.
James,
You have until Friday to sign the transfer. After that, I cannot protect you from what happens next.
The north pasture belongs to Crowley now. You know what happened to Thomas. Don't make the same mistake.
Amos.
Noah read the letter twice.
Then he looked at Hannah.
"My father received this three days before he died."
She closed her eyes.
"Then we were right."
Before Noah could answer, a voice came from the doorway.
"Afraid so."
They turned.
A man stood in the hall, holding a shotgun.
He was tall and broad-shouldered, with a gray beard and a scar running from his left temple to his jaw.
Noah recognized him.
Silas Ward.
His father's oldest friend.
And the man who had worked as foreman at the Bennett ranch for nearly twenty years.