Chapter 4
Nick and Heath led the sheriff and five other men back to the Wayne farm, and again, they took it quiet and slow. But this time there was no one on the porch. All of the sheriff's men waited at the edge of the wood, looking at the house.
"What do you think?" the sheriff asked.
"They could all be inside," Nick said. "They probably expected us to come back."
"Then they might have left," Heath said. "Let me work around to the other side of the barn, see if there are any horses in there."
The sheriff nodded his okay, and Heath quietly eased through the wood. He had to make a quick run over open ground to get to the barn, but he did it without drawing any fire from anywhere. The back door to the barn was open. Heath took a quick look inside, then went in all the way. There was only one horse in the barn.
Heath's heart sank. The men who had been here might have stashed their horses elsewhere, but Heath got the unhappy feeling that they had all pulled out. The only real question was, what would they find inside the house? Nobody, or two dead hostages?
Heath made his way back to the others. "The barn only has one horse. They might have pulled out."
Nick looked at him, frightened. Jarrod could be dead inside the house.
"Let's go," the sheriff said.
They approached with rifles cocked and ready, but the place was completely quiet. By the time they got to the porch, they were all pretty sure they were not going to be meeting any guns around here today. Nick looked into one of the windows. "There's nobody in there," he said.
Heath opened the door, and when no gunfire came their way, they rushed the place. The living room was empty. The door to the bedroom was open, and Mr. Wayne still sat there, bound and gagged, only now he was trying to yell for help.
As the sheriff went to untie Mr. Wayne, Nick and Heath looked at each other. "At least he's not dead in here," Heath said.
"But where in the world is he now?" Nick asked.
"Sandy Bowes!" Wayne started yelling as soon as the sheriff removed the gag. "It was Sandy Bowes and his gang!"
"How many?" the sheriff asked.
"Bowes and four others," Wayne said as he was untied. "They have Jarrod Barkley. They took him with them."
"What do they want with him?" Nick asked as one of the men helped Wayne into the living room.
"Bowes wants to make some kind of deal and he wants Jarrod to work it out, or something like that," Wayne said, and then someone took him out back to the necessary.
"That makes sense," Heath said. "They probably snatched him and Bowes is trying to work out how to get Jarrod to take the deal to whoever he's trying to work it out with. Jarrod had to go along because they had Mr. Wayne."
Nick nodded. "If that's what they're up to, Bowes figured we'd be back and they've gone to find someplace else to hole up and take hostages."
The sheriff sighed. "But finding out where is gonna be tough."
"I'll go out and see if I can find any tracks to help us out," Heath said and went back outside.
Frustrated, Nick just stood there, trying to think. Where would they go now? There were a dozen farms and ranches within a day's ride, probably more. Nick figured they'd have to go somewhere out of the way but with people – they'd need hostages to get Jarrod to go along with whatever it was they were doing. Jarrod would not cooperate the way he was unless someone else was threatened.
The sheriff looked Nick's way. "We'll find him, Nick."
Nick just nodded.
XXXXXXX
Bowes's men had driven Jarrod maybe ten miles before Jarrod felt like it was time to make a move. He couldn't let them find another hostage or maybe more to make him cooperate, but they had him so surrounded he couldn't figure out how to make a run for it. He finally decided on another tactic. He just pulled to a stop.
One of the men hit Jarrod's horse on the rump to get it to move again, but Jarrod held back on the reins and kept his horse where they were. "No," Jarrod said flatly. "This is enough. I'm not gonna let you take another hostage, not a one."
Sandy pulled his revolver on Jarrod and cocked it. "You can die right here, Counselor," he said.
"No," Jarrod said. "I can still do what you want me to do and do it without you taking another hostage. If you're serious about changing your ways, I'll see if I can cut a deal for you. I'll take your offer to town and I'll make sure no one follows me back to you."
Sandy hesitated, but then uncocked his gun and reholstered it. "Any deal has to let my boys go free and get me out of California."
Jarrod decided to try something. "Let your boys go now. You won't need them to keep me corralled. I've got a lot of reasons to help you – every single stage you might rob in the future and anybody else you might take hostage. Let your boys go now."
"Sandy – " one of his men said.
Sandy looked around. "No, he makes sense."
"You believe him?"
"There's no risk to you boys. You can just ride off right now. Stick together or go your separate ways. There's no risk for you. Nobody has your name or your picture. You all take off right now, and you're free."
His men looked at each other. One of them looked like he wanted to stay together and keep robbing stagecoaches, but abruptly the other three took off, heading further south at a quicker clip. The last one gave Sandy a look, but then he was gone, too.
Sandy and Jarrod were left together, alone. Sandy said, "I'm trusting you, lawyer. But you take off on me or try to cross me, I'll kill you."
Jarrod nodded. "I know a place we can hole up. No one will find us. We'll work on this deal you want, and I'll take it to the law in Stockton. I won't run on you even after I'm out of your sight. Like I said, I've got an interest in seeing you change your ways."
"Where are you planning we go?"
Jarrod nodded toward the northwest. "There's an old unused line shack at the edge of Barkley property, about two miles away. It's not in great shape, but it will do the trick and no one will bother us. You work with me and I get a deal I can take to the law, and you might be on your way out of California by this time tomorrow."
Sandy nodded. "All right. Let's go."
XXXXXXX
Heath looked as hard as he could, but the tracks leaving the Wayne place were not very clear. He came back to the house as everyone inside came outside. Heath shook his head. "It looks like they're heading south outta here, but we're likely to lose these tracks again before long."
The sheriff told one of his men to take Mr. Wayne into town to have the doctor look at him. Then he asked, "Well, Nick, Heath, what do you want to do?"
"Follow the tracks as far as we can," Nick said quickly. "Jarrod's horse is still in that bunch, isn't it?"
Heath nodded. "It looks like it."
"Then we gotta keep looking," Nick said.
"Then the rest of us are with you," the sheriff said.
Nick asked the man who was going to take Mr. Wayne to town to go out to the Barkley ranch, but then he stuttered a little bit on what to have him tell his mother and sister. He finally said, "Tell my mother we know Jarrod is all right and we're going after him. Tell her we might be a while."
Heath gave a big sigh as the man took off. "I wish we knew more about why Bowes had him. It might help."
"Well, we don't," Nick said, "so we assume Bowes might kill him if he doesn't keep cooperating and we aren't careful."
"Working on some kind of deal," Heath mused. "You don't think that kid might be planning to surrender, do you?"
"I don't know," Nick said. "I just want to get Jarrod away from him and the sooner, the better."
