This chapter just didn't want to play ball so I hope it has come out okay. Thank you for your kind words so far.

Chapter Seven

Ch 6: It would be many hours later that Harry jolted awake from his dream. The words of a dying man suddenly shouted at him with crystal clarity and he needed to go and find out if what he had dreamed of could possibly be true.


Martin watched as his brother rustled his way through his bedroll before stomping off towards his horse and rifling through his saddlebag. The angry look on his face was enough to keep Martin from speaking, as his brother's temper was notorious. Inside the Nevada State Prison, he was known as somebody to steer clear of and Martin figured it was one of the reasons why he'd gravitated to Morgan Daniels.

As Jack walked back to where he was sitting, Martin felt his gut churning in fear. His brother was not somebody to be crossed.

"You seen my knife anywhere?"

Martin shook his head as he stood up. "Nope."

"It's gone! I had it in my belt yesterday and now it's gone!"

"Well maybe ya lost it when you took on that Cartwright kid yesterday. I mean, it coulda fallen out then."

Luke glared at him as considered the idea. "Or maybe he took it. He was right on top o' me. I'm gonna kill him!"

Before Martin could do anything to stop him, Luke was running up towards the cave entrance and he shoved aside the guard who was still rubbing sleepy grit from his eyes.

He found the interior of the cave was a little darker and he took a moment to adjust to the dimmer light. He soon saw Stacey asleep up against Joe's shoulder and he roared as he charged forward. Joe was barely able to shove Stacey aside before Luke was on top of him.

"Where's my knife?'

"What?" Joe blocked a punch to the side of his head and felt himself being hauled to his feet.

"My knife! You've got it, I know ya do."

Joe stumbled sideways as his feet were still hobbled and held out his bound hands in front of him. "You think I'd still be trussed up like this if I had a knife! What kinda idiot would that make me?"

Jack grabbed at his shirt and began patting down his pockets, looking for the knife. Joe made a show of objecting and protesting loudly while Stacey shrunk back against the wall and crouched down in between two rocks. As she worked the knife clear of her boot and dropped it down behind the rock, she looked terrified as Jack continued his search. Shouts from outside drew the attention elsewhere and she slowly slid back along the wall and away from the rock.

"I don't have your damn knife!" Joe was shouting in frustration as Jack shoved him to the ground once again.

"Get off him!" Morgan's voice roared across the small cavern and Jack only just managed to pull his clenched fist back. "That temper of yours always gets you into trouble, Jack. Time you started using your head and not just your fists."

"You seemed to like my fists in prison," Jack growled back at him.

Morgan grasped the back of his shirt and hauled Jack back towards him. "There's a time and a place for that. When this is all done, I promise you that you can do whatever you want with him. For now, you get on out there and leave him alone. You hear me? Now I gave you and your brother a job to do and you need to get on with it."

Jack sneered at Joe as he nodded. "This ain't over, kid. You're mine when this is done!"

Joe sat on the floor of the cave and watched as Morgan pushed Jack back outside. His heart was still pounding wildly and he stole a glance across to where Stacey was. She looked scared and he found himself wanting to strangle the man who had put that fear there on her face. The only upside to the situation was that Jack had done just what he expected him to do.

It would be another half an hour before he heard several more horses heading out of camp. Breakfast had been a meagre affair with a bowl of lukewarm beans between them and his stomach was growling loudly in protest. Stacey looked up at the noise and he grinned across at her.

"When we get out of here, I'm getting the biggest steak the hotel has on offer."

The comment was worth the smile he got back and he continued on. "Course, it won't be as good as a Ponderosa steak, but we can get us one of those soon enough too."

Suddenly Joe turned serious as he shuffled closer to her. "We need to get out of here while most of them are gone. Nobody will expect us to get loose, so we've gotta be smart about this. Trust me … we are going to get home."

Stacey leaned forward and gripped at the sides of Joe's face with her fingertips. Her eyes shone with moisture and he watched as she forced on a smile. "I do trust you."

When Joe considered it later, he had no recollection of making the decision to do so, but he leaned forward and brushed a kiss across her lips. He pulled back a little to gauge her reaction, but Stacey pulled him closer again. The second kiss was more insistent and both of them were breathless by the time they pulled apart.

"Maybe there's better incentives than a steak to get outta here!" Joe grinned at her once again as Stacey tried to compose herself. "That will be a whole lot more fun without this dang rope." He held up his hands and winked at her as she blushed.


Harry paced around the small kitchen while Hoss tried to aim a mug of coffee his way.

"It's so close! It just … damn it! It's right there … if I could just get it to make sense. I just … I can't …. Actually," he paused for a moment and stared at the floor, "I think I don't want to believe it."

"Why don't you try laying it all out and see if we can't help put it together?" Adam watched as Harry resumed his pacing and his own frustration was building.

Harry finally stopped and grabbed at the mug that Hoss still held out towards him.

"Earl was the sheriff of Deckler Flats for a long time, since I was a kid. He took me on as a greenhorn and taught me to be a good deputy and I respected him for it. When they said that he was in on the heist, I just couldn't bring myself to believe it. His widow … the woman I spoke to yesterday … she's convinced he had nothing to do with it. But that note she gave me … she doesn't know it, but I think that her husband was confessing his guilt and telling her to tell me."

Harry walked to the far wall and leaned a hand against it as if he needed something to hold him up. Nobody spoke as he slowly turned around. They all just watched as Harry paced back across the room as the memories welled up in front of him.

"Mac had a big heart, but he could also hold a grudge with the best of them. That note with all the things he rambled about before he died …" Harry shook his head as if he couldn't quite believe his own conclusion. "It makes a lot more sense than his wife thought it did. He talked about leprechauns. Said he knew where they were."

"Leprechauns?" Adam moved a step closer, trying to draw meaning from the strange comment.

"Earl was a bit like you, Adam. He liked to read and he had all sorts of book learning stuffed away in that head of his. He'd quote weird things at me from time to time and then patiently explain them to a kid who never liked school that much. He was also a bit of a joker and used some of those things like a kind of code, just between him and me... to test me out and see if I was really listening to him. If I didn't, he just upped the ante. He thought it was hilarious and I guess I just always humoured him because he was kinda funny. Being from what he called good Scottish stock, he liked Scottish myths and legends the best. Said Scotland produced the best heroes of all time. Although he also said that they made the best villains too."

Adam found himself almost smiling as he considered the likes of Lady Macbeth alongside a few real historical figures.

"He also hated the Irish with a passion. Said once it had something to do with his grandmother's sister who ran off and married an Irish traveller. The family never forgave her and never talked about her after that. He said that the Irish were deceitful and often said that all the Irish were like leprechauns – only interested in how much of your treasure they could steal. He'd use Irish expressions and twist them to mean something else and then he'd expect me to know the difference. It was his way of insulting them without looking like he was insulting them since we had lots of Irish miners in the area at the time. He'd stand there, large as life and insult them to their faces and they never knew. "

Adam moved over closer to where Harry had sunk down onto the table edge. "What does all this have to do with what he said?"

"He was dying, right there on the main street and he knew I was out of town. Guess he figured he had one last chance to 'fess up before he died. He told his wife that there were Scottish leprechauns. To him, that would have been a huge insult if anybody else had said it. Of course she just thought he was rambling, but the more I think about it, the more I'm sure he was telling me the truth. He may or may not have planned it, but he was in on it, somehow."

Harry's shoulders slumped as Adam reached out for him. "I'm sorry. It's never easy to see a hero that turns out to have feet of clay."

As Harry glanced around the room, he managed a faint smile. "The good news is that I think I have an idea where they stashed the gold."

"Where?" Three voices answered in unison and he really did smile.

"One of the other things he kept saying was, 'sick water'. Anybody around him would have taken it to mean he was sick and needing water."

"Well what else would it mean?" Hoss leaned closer as he considered the two words.

"Deckler Flats has a stagecoach depot. It was moved many years back to where it is now because the old depot had a well that got tainted. Nobody knows how, but horses started getting sick and a couple of folks died after drinking from it. The old depot is on the north side of town and since it's abandoned, it could make a good place to dump a cargo and hide it with nobody any the wiser."

"You think they dumped the gold in the well?" Adam was chewing it over even as he asked the question. It certainly sounded possible.

"It's the best lead we've got so far and it sounds like it makes sense, don't you think? It's on the main route from San Francisco without actually bringing it into town. Nobody around to see what's going on and a well that is boarded up and signposted as unusable. Who'd bother looking in a dead well for anything?"

"Well, what are we waiting around here for? We get looking for Joe and Stacey and you get on over to that depot and take a look!" Hoss was already on his feet and reaching for his hat as he spoke.

"Wait a minute. I can't just go charging off into a town where I'm not the sheriff. The local law is gonna get mighty suspicious if I just suddenly turn up and know what I know. I've already been under that cloud before!"

"Well this time you've got us to back you up. That's what you wired me for isn't it?" Adam stood in front of him and waited for a response.

"Yeah, it's exactly why I sent for you." Harry grinned as he felt a glimmer of hope for the first time in days. "Hoss, you and Glen need to get out there and see what you can find. Adam, I need you with me."

As much as Adam wanted to be riding out with Hoss and looking for his brother, he conceded the wisdom of the plan and simply nodded.

"All right then. We meet back here tomorrow night."


Kennedy walked the length of the boardwalk and tried to keep himself focused. Something bigger than he'd been told was going on and he itched at the frustration of it. Harry had told him some of it, but not enough. He wondered again who the kid was that Harry had sent on his way and he stopped and leaned on the hitching rail as he tried to pull the pieces together. He couldn't figure why Harry didn't trust his own deputy with the details and doubt began gnawing at his insides. Maybe the rumours held a glimmer of truth in them after all. As soon as the thought welled up in his mind, he squashed it back down. Harry Collins had never given him pause for thought before and he didn't want to start doubting the man now when he might be needed.

As he stared into the street in front of him, he heard somebody calling his name. A young boy was running up to him and he recognised him as the son of the telegrapher.

"Deputy Kennedy, my pa said ta come and get you or the sheriff, quick as I could." The boy was breathing hard and he'd clearly run the length of the street. As Kennedy hurried back to the telegraph office with him, he noted a stranger riding past on a bay horse with a couple of white socks. It seemed his senses were on edge with the sheriff's strange behavior and anything out of the ordinary became more notable. By the time he walked out of the office again, he was looking up and down the street for that same horse and rider.

He headed across to the sheriff's office and pulled his own horse free of the hitching rail. The rider had a good ten-minute start on him, but he needed to find his trail before he disappeared from sight. The man had just sent a wire to a Ben Cartwright in Virginia City and fortunately the wire operator was astute enough to be paying attention and kept note of details. The address was the same place where another man had sent a wire only days ago asking for Adam Cartwright to come at once. Like most telegraphers, the man knew the ins and outs of most things in his town, but he didn't know that the sheriff was behind the wire. Kennedy did once he heard the description of the young ranch hand who'd sent it.

He also knew it was too much of a co-incidence that his boss was probably off somewhere with Adam Cartwright and now another Cartwright was being threatened in some way. Of course the wire didn't say so in so many words, but a man who had spent years sending condensed messages across the country could certainly read between the lines. A demand to bring ten thousand dollars to town in two days was a thinly veiled threat. What Kennedy tried to figure as he rode along, was what the money was for and what would happen if it wasn't delivered on time.

It was only a few miles down the road when he caught sight of the rider ahead of him. Trying to stay out of sight and yet not lose the trail would prove to be difficult as the rider climbed up into the hill country, but the deputy was determined to stick with him.


Joe worked at the rope until the fibres separated and he felt the coarse rope drop away. His wrists were chafed raw from the awkward motion, but he quickly sliced at the rope around his ankles before moving onto Stacey's. He made short work of the ropes that bound her and she slowly flexed her cramped hands.

"Stay here." Stacey watched as Joe crept towards the mouth of the cave, the knife tucked into his side. She heard a faint grunt and short scuffle before Joe dragged a limp body back towards her and quickly bound the man's hands and feet with the rope they had just discarded. He stuffed the filthy bandana that had been used to silence him into the man's mouth and tied it tightly behind him. As Joe propped the body up against the rock, he prayed it would delay the discovery of their absence for a while.

Joe held a finger up against his lips as he pointed to the cave mouth again. He tugged Stacey in behind him and edged forward again. Every step felt like a lifetime as she held tight to his hand and she fought to keep her breathing as calm as possible. The few remaining horses were tethered across the other side of the small clearing and it was obvious that getting to them was not going to happen. Joe paused and waited as he scanned the area above them. If a guard was posted on top of the rocks there was no way they were going to get clear. Voices carried up from nearby and Joe slowly edged forward once more. He turned back to flash her a smile as he whispered, "Let's go home."