“I seen yer brother,” the cunning man said simply. “He’s in a right bad place—”
“Told ye he tried t’ cheat me of Pappy’s prope’ty, didn’t I?” the rich man crowed. He swung out of the saddle. “But where’s the gold, thin, tell me thet?”
Hardy’s horse, with a patch of mud on its side that hadn’t been curried off, would have bumped Old Nathan on the way to the water if the cunning man hadn’t stepped back. The mule raised its huge, bony head from the trough and said, “Tsk! Watch it, purty boy, er they’ll find yer ribs in the middle uv next week.”
“But I’m parched!” the horse whinnied.
“Let the poor feller drink, mule,” the cunning man said. “He’s jist the way he was born. Hain’t nothin’ he kin help.”
“What’s thet?” demanded Bascom Hardy. “What’s thet you say?”
“Hit don’t signify,” Old Nathan said tiredly.
He rubbed his eyes, then met the rich man’s nervous glare. Hardy shifted from one leg to the other, ready to bust with frustration.
“Bynum said where the gold was,” the cunning man continued, “and ye’ll hev thet in a moment, so don’t git yer bowels in an uproar. But he said you’re t’ pay the money out t’ all the folk he took it from. You would’ve took his papers off first thing whin he died, so I reckon you kin find a few of them folks, anyways.”
Bascom Hardy’s mouth gawped open and let out something between a snort and a hoot of laughter. “Bynum was a fool airy day he lived,” the rich man said. “But he warn’t no sich fool as thet!”
His face hardened into fury. “What I figger,” Hardy rasped, “is thet you reckon t’ keep the gold fer yerse’f, old man. Well—”
He lifted his left hand and snapped his fingers. The half-breed cocked the hammer of his musket, though he kept the muzzle pointed down on the far side of his mare. Hardy’s own walking horse skittered sideways in panic at the metallic warning.
“Oh, yer a fine brave crew,” Old Nathan whispered. His voice sounded like a file setting up sawteeth. “Ye want the gold, d’ye? Well, I reckon you kin hev it.”
Anger sluiced the stiffness out of the old man’s joints. He stepped onto the well curb, then gripped the pivot log with both hands as he shouldered the nearer of the support poles aside.
“What’s thet you’re doin’?” Hardy demanded.
The pole gave enough for Old Nathan to spring the turned-down end of the pivot from the auger hole in the support. He pulled the log free, letting the well rope tumble down the shaft.
The pivot log was red oak. A heavy wood in all truth, but this was far heavier than wood.
The cunning man turned. Ned swung his musket over the mare’s neck to half-point in the old man’s direction.
“You do thet, boy,” Old Nathan said. “And you better be quick with the way you use it.”
“Ned,” said Bascom Hardy. “There’s no call . . .”
But the bodyguard had already hidden the weapon again, behind his body and the horse’s.
Old Nathan reached over his head. His fingers touched, gripped . . . came out into open air with the bone-scaled case knife. He stood on the stone curb, smiling coldly and staring at Ned. The half-breed refused to meet his eyes.
The cunning man used the knife’s larger blade to pry at the faint seam in the end of the pivot log. The plug dropped. The cavity within was the diameter of a man’s fist. Bascom Hardy’s breath drew in.
Old Nathan tilted the log and slid out the long leather poke that filled the hollow. It was so heavy that it clanked with a sound more like a smithy than a banker’s till.
Hardy snatched the sack from the trampled dirt. “Ned,” he gabbled in a high-pitched voice as he trotted up to the cabin, “you watch the door, ye hear me?”
The cunning man tossed the empty oak cylinder away and stepped to the ground. He didn’t reckon Bascom Hardy meant him to follow to see what was in the poke; but—he smiled grimly at Ned, who twisted his face away to avoid the hard green eyes—he didn’t reckon there’d be anyone try to stop him, neither.