Sophie's Daughters Trilogy

by Mary Connealy

  She looked back at the nearly invisible trail she’d found heading for the far north end of the valley. Her map told her the gold was at the end of this trail.

  Trees surrounded them, and she often was forced to slow to a walk as the trail grew steep until they were going up as much as forward. The moon was full, and that helped, but mostly she trusted to her horse to pick his way along the rocky landscape.

  What critter had created this trail anyway? Mandy suspected it was a herd of mountain goats. But Tom’s horses were game and strong and surefooted.

  They scrambled along on the climb until suddenly the forest thinned. The trees were shorter and farther apart. Mandy saw the increasingly gnarled limbs as they moved onward, upward. They must be nearing the tree line. Seconds after she realized it, the sky opened up above her. The moon was so bright she couldn’t see many stars, but there were a few, enough to tell her she was on the right trail.

  She pulled her horse to a slow walk and continued forward. When she finally saw a clearing ahead, she pulled to a stop. The land became impossibly rugged. It was more rock than grass and sloped steeply upward within a few feet of the trees ending. The mountain goats might have been able to scale it, but no thoroughbred was going to.

  Tom came up beside her. “We walk from here?”

  Nodding, Mandy dismounted. “There’s grass. The horses won’t mind standing for a few hours.”

  “Let’s see that map one more time before we go. Sidney’s got it marked that he’s hidden his stash on this end of the valley, right?”

  Mandy secured her horse while Tom did the same. Then they mulled over their next step.

  “We’ll be exposed for a while once we walk out of these trees.” Mandy looked at Tom and considered, not for the first time, that getting mixed up with her might be the death of him.

  “Yep. I don’t see any sign of Flatheads around here, and most Indians don’t hunt at night. I think. Besides, why hunt in this steep woods when there are better places to the south?”

  Pointing to the land above the tree line, Mandy said, “We’re going to have our hands full getting up there and over the rim. Sidney’s map says it’s possible.”

  “Your husband drew this map long after he’d found that gold. You know that, right, Mandy honey?”

  “I know. He must have found the gold coming into that valley from the north. Then he scouted a trail to the south to create the map, just to keep anyone who found the map confused. Then he used the night sky as his guide. None of that made sense to me from our house. But once I studied the night sky from where we slept out the night of our wedding, it was easy to follow.”

  “So, you weren’t really fascinated by the stars in the night like you said at first. You were trying to understand the stars well enough to find the gold.” Tom studied the land, as Mandy did, making sure the coast was clear before they stepped out of the scrub pines. He looked around until their eyes met. “You wanted that gold almost as badly as Sidney did.”

  She hated to admit to anything that compared her to her deceased husband. “Not for the same reason, though. I always saw that gold as a way to buy freedom and safety for my children.”

  “Hired killers? Bodyguards?”

  “Bounties, Tom. I’m going to put bounties on the white-thatched head of every Cooter I can find who’s related to this bunch.”

  “You said that before you’d give a reward for their capture. But you’ve got to prove they’re wanted. It’s not enough for you to say a few of them pestered you and you want them all in jail.”

  “I know. But I think I could make things hot enough for them that they’d back off. I can definitely get the sheriff and Marshal Coltrain to name Cord as a wanted man. And they found that one Wanted poster.”

  “But that was for Fergus, and he’s already locked up.”

  “We might find a few others that qualify. I can pay some people to look into it more carefully than the sheriff can. And I can raise those rewards then put out the word that anyone who bothers me can expect the same treatment, even after my death if need be. I can set a reward so high the whole Cooter clan will go away and stay away.”

  “It’s not a bad plan.” Tom looked around again. “I’ve got some money these days. We could probably make your plan work with the cash I have on hand.”

  Which was just Tom saying one more time she should trust him to protect her. “You’d break the ranch doing it, Tom. After all your years of hard work, marrying me might ruin everything you’ve built.”

  “We could make it work, Mandy. We don’t need to sneak into a valley full of very smart, possibly hostile Flathead Indians in hopes of finding a treasure.”

  “It’s got to be huge, Tom. If it isn’t, it’ll just make the Cooters mad and drive them to come at me even harder.” Mandy took a deep breath and stared at her husband.

  “Last chance, Mandy girl. Let’s go home. Let’s fight this out, use the law, do it right.”

  She knew he was right, but she wasn’t turning back. “I’m going. If you don’t want to, I’ll understand. I won’t think less of you if you—”

  “Just go then. Don’t insult me by telling me to leave.”

  Nodding, Mandy turned.

  Protect me, Lord. Protect Tom.

  She stepped into the clearing and almost immediately found herself scaling instead of walking. Her husband grumbled behind her, but she noticed he kept coming after her. That seemed like a real nice quality in a husband.

  Tom had a new respect for mountain goats by the time he’d gotten to the rim of this canyon. And he’d respected ’em quite a bit before.

  The sun was casting the first bit of color across the sky to the east but it was still dark enough. He grabbed Mandy’s ankle, which was just an arm’s reach over his head. “If that map is right, the gold ought to be just a few hundred yards ahead. We can get in there, grab the gold, and get out before the sun has risen fully.”

  She jerked against his hold, but when he didn’t turn loose, she glared down at him. “I heard you. I agree. Now let go.”

  His throat went dry. “I should have talked to Abby first, asked her what to expect. She might have been willing to try and talk to the Flathead. She speaks their language and knows how they think.”

  ‘Too late now.” Mandy, his stubborn-to-the-bone wife, went over that rim like she was a goat herself.

  Scowling, Tom followed the she-goat into the valley of the Flatheads. When he wriggled over the rim, he found the going easier. Steep but not straight up and down like the outside of the bowl-shaped valley.

  Tom couldn’t see much—the rising sun wasn’t up high enough to penetrate this highlands. Good, less chance of being seen. He heard water running nearby and caught a glimpse of a spate, silver in the darkness, gushing out of a rock.

  “The map said there’d be a spring.” Mandy kept moving.

  His wife was slithering down the slope, so Tom tried to catch up and keep a sharp eye out for trouble at the same time. Though she was moving with reckless speed, he had no doubt his wife was being careful. There was just no denying that Mandy was a wily one. He’d learned she could be fast and cautious at the same time with no trouble at all.

  Tom saw no sign of life. He couldn’t make out too much, but there didn’t seem to be a tree line inside this valley. The moonlight helped, but mostly the terrain was shrouded in darkness. He scampered down and down, afraid he’d lose his wife. She had the map after all. So, he stuck with her.

  The land leveled a bit. Not real level of course—there seemed to be nothing purely level in the whole state of Montana—but better.

  Tom was able to walk upright, hurrying to find that stupid treasure and get out of here before the light revealed them to a tribe of bloodthirsty Indians.

  Honesty forced Tom to admit that his sister, on the rare occasion she spoke of her years with them, had always talked of the Flatheads as a gentle people. But then she’d known them as an orphaned child. Tom really didn’t want to count on them be
ing all that friendly to him.

  Mandy stopped so suddenly that Tom ran straight into her. He had to get the woman some clothes that weren’t gray. It was like trying to keep track of a wild cat in the dark. He wondered if her eyes would glow if he carried a lantern.

  Tom caught her so he didn’t knock her flat on the ground, and she hissed—another cat-like attribute. “This is the spot.” She waved the map in his face and pointed at a triangular rock jutting out just to one side of that spring. “That’s got to be the stone from this map.”

  Tom realized his wife, the sharpshooter, had eyes like an owl by night and an eagle by day. If he managed to survive marriage to her, she was going to be handy to have around.

  Dropping to her knees, Mandy began pulling at a small pile of stones stacked at the base of that triangular rock. Tom hadn’t paid that much attention to the map, not the details. He’d never figured to get this close. But now he pitched in, pulling at stones sized from about even with his fist to bigger than his head. They weren’t stacked in here in a natural way. It was clear that they’d been moved in to bury something. He felt a little hum in his veins thinking about finding a fortune in gold.

  Gold fever, was it possible he might be catching it? He almost hoped so. Then he could blame madness on being here treasure hunting. Better to be crazy than to think rationally that this was a good idea.

  They dug industriously for long minutes, the silence broken only by the tumble of stones. They cleared the rocks and found sand. Scooping with bare hands, they dug faster. Dirt kicked up. Sand flew. Tom’s hands were coated with dust and gravel.

  He took a quick look at his wife and saw that she must have touched her nose because her face was streaked with dirt. He reckoned his was, too. He went back to digging.

  Mandy froze. “I found something.”

  She turned to Tom, and he realized he could see her clearly. The sun wasn’t over the canyon rim, but it was pushing back the dark. Indians weren’t famous for sleeping the daylight hours away. They had to get out of here.

  She tugged and Tom’s hand brushed against heavy leather coated with dirt and sand. She pulled hard, and for a long moment everything was frozen—the bag, Mandy leaning backward, even the dirt seemed to stop to catch its breath. Then it gave all at once with a whoosh of exploding sand and dirt.

  Mandy flew backward. Tom snagged her in midair, or she’d have fallen into the stream that rushed away from that spring.

  She sat down hard and began swiping at the dirt on what looked like ancient saddlebags. She uncovered a symbol of some kind. Her fingers ran along an indentation, looked for the edge of the battered leather. What looked like a crest appeared, with a helmet of some kind engraved above the crest.

  Tom would have liked to see it better, but in the dim light there wasn’t much detail visible, even without dirt.

  Tom saw her hands slide under a flap on the edge of the bag. When she went to lift it, a knotted strip of leather held it in place. She fumbled with the leather thong that tied it shut.

  Tom rested one big hand on hers. “Leave that until later. We need to get away from here.”

  Mandy smiled at him. “You’re right.”

  He planted a kiss on her dirty face. “Are you sure there isn’t anything left in that hole?”

  They both dug, but the ground turned to solid rock just inches below where they’d unearthed the bag.

  “There’s nothing else.” Mandy swiped at her forehead.

  Tom saw her leave a damp trail of dirt and knew she was sweating. But though they’d been working hard, it was a cool mountain morning. The sweat came from tension more than labor.

  “Sidney buried it here, probably moved it here from wherever he found it.”

  Nodding, Tom said, “Let’s get out of here.”

  Mandy lifted the heavy saddlebags.

  Tom heard a dull sound from the inside like something hard rattling. Gold. His heart sped up as his wife lifted the treasure.

  “The solution to all my problems is in this saddlebag.”

  “Gold don’t usually fix what’s wrong with our lives, Mandy honey.”

  “This gold will. I just know it.” Rising to her feet, she smiled. “Now I’ve got enough money to buy some safety, some peace, some happiness.

  The sharp crack of a gun being cocked stopped them in their tracks.

  Nineteen

  Luther rode hard for Divide, trusting that the Cooters were busy tracking Mandy and weren’t looking for him these days. It was a hard ride through about the worst that this rugged land had to throw at a man, but Luther was used to it. His horse was game, and his cause was life and death.

  He pulled into the streets of the dusty little frontier town just as the sun lowered behind the towering mountains to the west. Following the instructions in Mandy’s wire, he rode straight to the sheriff’s office.

  A stout man with knowing eyes looked up when Luther shoved open the door.

  Those eyes went straight to Luther’s six-gun. “You huntin’ trouble, mister?”

  “Nope. Not with you anyway. I’m hunting a man named Tom Linscott, and more important his wife.”

  The sheriff rose slowly from where he sat behind a scarred wooden desk. “Your name Cooter by any chance?”

  Luther relaxed. The sheriff was clearly well informed. “Nope. But Mandy sent me a telegraph saying she’d moved here and was ready to accept some help from an old friend. So, I came a runnin’. My name’s Luther.”

  Sinking back into his chair, the sheriff nodded at coffee steaming on a potbellied stove that was casting off unneeded heat in the summer evening. “I’m Merl Dean. Pour yourself a cup. Tom and his new wife have told me their story, and I’ve been doing what I can to see the Cooters brought to justice. Pull up a chair, and let’s talk about what’s to be done.”

  The door slammed open just as Luther reached for a tin cup. Luther had his hand on his Colt as he whirled to face whoever had crashed in. Then he laughed out loud. “Sally!”

  He charged for one of his favorite people in the world and hoisted Sally … McKenzie up in the air. It was hard to get used to her new name.

  “Luther, you’re here. Where’s Mandy?” Sally’s arms wrapped around his neck. He remembered when she was just a little thing, no bigger’n a sprite, tormenting him with her chattering and tagging along, determined to out-cowboy all the cowboys.

  “I’m just in the door, looking to find her. She told me to come to the sheriff’s office and he’d fill me in.” Luther set her down and grinned, then looked past her, and his smile faded at the sight of her husband.

  Logan McKenzie. Strange man. Strange business painting for a living. Not a man’s way to earn his living, to Luther’s way of thinking.

  Logan did make a living, though. And the wandering seemed to suit Sally. Not like the way everything Sidney Gray did annoyed Mandy.

  “We’ll ride out to her place together.” Sally smiled then jabbed her thumb behind her. “Buff and Wise Sister are with us. They’re stabling the horses for the night.”

  “How far have you travelled?” Luther thought his girl looked tired, and Sally was a hearty little lady.

  “We’re riding in from Yellowstone.” Sally quit grinning. “I got such an itch to see Mandy and drag her off that mountaintop she lives in that I couldn’t stand it. It hit me one morning so hard I couldn’t stay still. I’m going to ride in there and drag her and her youngsters out of there.”

  “Mandy left that fool house Sid built, and she’s married.” Luther pulled the wire out of his shirt pocket.

  “Married?” Sally gasped. Her eyes narrowed. “God have mercy.”

  Luther didn’t blame the girl a bit. Mandy would have done better to let someone else pick her next husband. She’d shown no talent for it.

  “Yep, and living here in Divide.” Luther handed over Mandy’s brief message then turned back to the lawman. “‘Is’zat right, Sheriff?”

  “Come on in and I’ll tell you everything I know.” The
sheriff waved a weary hand. “We’ve got two men under arrest and one dead after a run-in with your sister and Tom Linscott.”

  “What?” Sally looked at the empty jail cell.

  “They’re over at the doc’s, but they’re expected to pull through … eventually.”

  “That sounds like my big sister.” Sally wouldn’t have minded a crack at those outlaws herself. She might just go ask them a few questions later. “Tell us what’s going on.”

  Buff came in before they could get settled, with Wise Sister at his side.

  Luther was happy for his old friend to have found a wife, but he missed him something fierce. It had been okay when Luther’d been around Mandy and had someone in his life. But since he’d gotten shot and Mandy had told him to stay away, Luther had hurt with the loneliness.

  The two exchanged a hearty handshake and very few words; then they turned to have it out with the sheriff. “So where’s Linscott live?”

  “His ranch isn’t too far out of town, but he and his new wife are gone.”

  “Gone?” Luther had to fight to keep from growling like a rabid wolf. “Gone where?”

  “Just this morning they hit the trail east for Denver. They’ll be—”

  “We came on the main trail from the east,” Sally interrupted. “We’d have met them if they were heading for Denver on horseback.”

  Luther looked from the surprised sheriff to Sally to Buff. “Did you see anyone on that trail who looked like one of the Cooters?”

  “No, the trail was plumb empty.” Sally pulled off her gloves, and Luther noticed in passing that his girl was dressed like a cowboy. She’d given a lot of that up after she’d married, but it appeared she hadn’t given it up completely.

  He’d have smiled if he hadn’t been so worried. “Well, if there weren’t any Cooters, then they can’t be in too bad of trouble.”