Chapter 15
Matilda sat heavily.
Elias stared at the floor.
Jedodiah watched them both in silence.
Outside, Abigail called, “Hollis! Break the door!”
Axes struck wood.
Jedodiah lifted his rifle.
“We're out of time.”
Elias pulled open a trapdoor beneath the rug.
“Tunnel leads east.”
Matilda folded the letter and tucked it inside her dress.
They descended moments before the front door splintered.
The tunnel was narrow, damp, and black.
Behind them came shouting.
Jedodiah led.
Matilda followed.
Elias came last.
After several hundred yards, they emerged beneath a frozen creek bed.
Dawn had begun bleeding gray light across the mountain.
They moved downhill.
“Where are we going?” Matilda asked.
Elias answered.
“To Leadville.”
Jedodiah looked at him.
“That is exactly where they expect us.”
“Yes.”
“Then why?”
“Because Abigail made one mistake.”
“What?”
“She brought the sheriff up here.”
Elias smiled grimly.
“Which means she left town believing she had already won.”
By noon they reached the outskirts.
The streets were half buried in snow.
Smoke curled from chimneys.
People stopped when they saw Jedodiah Boon walking beside Matilda.
Then they saw Elias.
One elderly merchant dropped a crate.
“My God.”
Elias ignored him.
They went straight to the county recorder's office.
The clerk behind the desk nearly fainted.
“Harrow?”
Elias placed both hands on the counter.
“I need every property transfer filed under Thatcher between 1853 and 1878.”
The clerk shook his head.
“I can't—”
“You can.”
“They'll ruin me.”
Matilda stepped forward.
“They ruined families for twenty-five years because everyone said that.”
The clerk looked at her.
Something in Matilda's face changed his mind.
He disappeared into the records room.
An hour later, stacks of documents covered the table.
Jedodiah examined boundary descriptions.
Elias compared signatures.
Matilda studied names.
Then she found it.
THOMAS BELL.
Payment receipt.
Five hundred dollars from Thatcher Mining Company.
Dated four days after Elias's supposed d/e/@/th.
Matilda felt as though someone had struck her chest.
Beneath it was another payment.
And another.
“He was paid for helping them.”
Elias nodded sadly.
She turned toward him.
“You knew my whole life was built on a lie.”
“No.”
His voice sharpened.
“I knew pieces.”
“Enough.”
“Yes.”
“Enough to come find me.”
“Yes.”
“Then why didn't you?”
Elias looked at her for a long moment.
“Because your mother asked me not to.”
Matilda froze.
“What?”
He reached into his coat.
Another letter.
This one addressed to Elias.