“The bullet went through,” she said, looking up at Elias with grim urgency. “It missed the artery, but the flesh is turning bad from the cold. He won’t last twenty-four hours without warmth and clean dressings.”
Pike reached with a trembling, blackened hand into the deep inner pocket of his coat. With a groan of agonizing effort, he produced a thick, leather-bound daybook, its edges charred and water-stained.
He held it out to Clara.
“Take it,” Pike whispered, his breath whistling in his throat. “Crowe kept two sets of books for the ditch company. The real payments... the bribes to the surveyor... the names of the court clerks in Cheyenne who took his gold... they’re all in there. I took it out of his desk after he shot me.”
Clara took the book. Her fingers touched the cold leather, her eyes widening as she flipped through the pages of handwritten entries, vouchers, and notarized affidavits.
“This is everything,” she breathed.
“Yes,” Pike coughed, spitting a fleck of dark blood into the snow. “It’s Crowe’s noose. But his men know I have it. They tracked me to the creek yesterday... that’s why they were at your headgate.”
A sharp, distant crack shattered the stillness of the draw.
A rifle bullet chipped the granite wall three feet above Pike’s head, showering them with icy stone fragments.
From the crest of the hogback ridge behind them, a loud, triumphant shout rang out through the freezing air:
“They’re down in the pocket! Circle the rim and pin 'em against the rock!”
“Get him up!” Elias shouted, dropping his snowshoes and grabbing Samuel Pike by the collar of his buffalo coat.
Clara shoved the daybook into her satchel, slung the strap over her shoulder, and grabbed Pike’s other arm. Together, they hauled the half-delirious foreman across the snow toward the picketed horse.
“Can you ride, Samuel?” Elias demanded, shoving the reins into the old man’s shaking hands.
“I can stay in the leather,” Pike groaned, his teeth clicking together like dice.
“Then kick him into the trees!” Elias yelled, slapping the horse’s flank with the flat of his carbine.
The animal surged forward through the deep drifts, carrying Pike down the steep, wooded ravine toward the creek bottom where the wagon was hidden.
Above them, on the rim of the canyon, three horsemen appeared against the blinding white sky. One of them was Vance, his left arm bound tightly to his chest with a bloody bandana, firing his pistol with his right hand. The other two were armed with long-barreled Winchesters, methodically working their levers as they rode along the ridge to cut off the escape route.
“Run for the rocks!” Elias roared, pushing Clara behind the shelter of a massive granite outcrop.
He dropped to his knee, leveled the Winchester, and began firing with steady, rhythmic precision. Every shot was calculated; he had eleven cartridges in the magazine and no time to reload. His first round struck the dirt beneath the feet of the lead rider’s horse, causing the animal to shie violently. His second round caught the saddle horn of the third rider, shattering the leather and driving the man back into the brush.
“Clara, move!” Elias shouted without looking back.
They retreated from boulder to boulder, trading fire for ground, their snowshoes kicking up plumes of powder. Clara moved with remarkable speed, stopping behind every cedar trunk to level her brass carbine and fire a steadying shot toward the ridge, forcing the snipers to keep their heads down.
By the time they reached the frozen floor of Black Creek, the team was waiting, snorting and pawing at the snow. Pike had collapsed across the bench of the buckboard, his face gray as ashes, barely clinging to consciousness.
Elias shoved Clara onto the wagon seat, vaulted into the rear bed beside Pike, and seized the lines over her shoulder.
“Hang on!”
The buckboard burst out of the timberline onto the flat snowfields of Black Creek. The open expanse was a death trap—half a mile of flat, unobstructed snow with no cover between the creek and the ranch house. Behind them, the three riders broke out of the trees, their horses galloping at full stretch, kicking up clouds of snow like charging cavalry.
Bullets tore through the wooden sideboards of the wagon with deafening thwacks. A splinter of pine sliced Clara’s cheek, drawing a line of bright crimson, but she didn't duck. She took the Winchester from Elias’s side and began levering shells into the chamber, handing him fresh rounds as he fired from the bouncing bed.
They reached the ranch yard on two wheels, the wagon skidding sideways through the corral gate before smashing into the heavy snowdrift beside the kitchen porch.
“Inside! Inside!” Elias bellowed, hauling Samuel Pike out of the wagon bed by the belt and dragging him up the stone steps.