Chapter 10

Nick and Heath took Cully Storm at a decent clip toward Clayton, but before long Nick wished that they had taken the time to wire ahead and let them know they had the man with the broken nose. He also started to think that he and Heath could have used some extra help. He wasn't sure why. He wasn't sure if he was afraid Storm would try to break free, or whether his buddies the Stones would try to break him free, but he was uneasy.

Everything rested on getting Storm to Clayton and getting him to talk. If they lost Storm, they would lose Jarrod. That thought scared Nick to his very core.

But the farther away they got from Modesto, the more the frightening thoughts Nick was having eased off. The sun was climbing high and they were miles away when Nick decided the Stone boys were not coming for their partner. They were probably twenty miles in the other direction from Modesto, Scott free and with the money they no longer had to share with Storm. At least, Nick thought, if he were a stagecoach robber, that's where he'd be.

They were very close to the place where the stage had been robbed when Heath said, "Nick, we got somebody behind us who's been with us for a while."

"You seen anybody?" Nick asked.

"No. Just heard them."

Storm started to laugh. Nick had been leading Storm's horse all the way from Modesto. He tightened his grip on the lead. "Let's speed up, see what happens."

The sped up to an easy gallop, Heath holding back just a bit. When Nick looked over his shoulder toward his brother, Heath shook his head. The sound of the horses behind them was keeping up with them.

There were some rocks up ahead that would hide men on horseback. Nick pointed wordlessly, and in a moment they were hidden, waiting for whoever was following them.

Now Nick could hear the followers too. He took his gun out and pointed it at Storm, saying, "You drop first, so keep your mouth shut."

Storm laughed. "You need me too bad."

"I need myself and my brother even more," Nick said.

Storm quieted down.

Heath spotted two riders coming. "Here they are," he said.

Nick and Heath kicked their horses into the road and blocked the way, holding their guns out. Nick still kept his on Storm. The riders stopped.

"Hey! What's this about?" one of the new riders asked.

"Why are you following us?" Heath asked.

"Not following," the man said. "Just going to Clayton."

"We didn't even know you was up ahead," the other man said.

Nick looked at Storm for any hint of recognition, but the man with the broken nose wasn't giving anything away. Nick and Heath both felt trapped. Maybe these two new riders were Storm's partners, come to break him free, or maybe they were just two innocent cowpokes on their way to town. The question was, what to do with them?

They all heard more horses approaching.

The two new riders staring at Nick and Heath were the ones who now looked trapped. They started to pull away, off the road.

"Stay where you are!" Heath ordered them, his gun pointed straight at them.

Storm began to look for a way out, figuring there were just enough newcomers to keep the Barkleys confused. But when he tried to move, Nick cocked his gun. "You stay put, Storm."

Two more riders came around a bend in the road and stopped with the men already stopped in the road. "Need some help?" one of the newest riders asked. He asked it of Nick and Heath.

Heath smiled. It was the sheriff from Modesto and his deputy. They both had guns drawn.

Nick finally saw that Storm's eyes gave things away - he knew the two men who had been following them. "Sheriff, I think we have the Stone brothers."

They were, in fact the Stone brothers. They sat silently, looking for a way out that wasn't there. They looked at each other. Nick could have sworn one was angry with the other, and he could guess why. The one being glared at was the one who had this stupid idea to try to spring Storm.

"Is that right, boys?" the sheriff asked. "Are you Sam and Joe Stone?"

They didn't answer.

"Well, no matter," the sheriff said. "We're not that far from Clayton. We can sort out everything there."

"What made you follow us, Sheriff?" Heath asked.

"Just a hunch," the sheriff said. "We saw these two heading out of Modesto while I was getting my horse saddled. I didn't think they were gonna let Storm confess on what these two did. You're just lucky they didn't decide to shoot Storm from a distance and take off."

Nick finally relaxed a little bit, and without further talk, the seven men began to ride toward Clayton again.

XXXXXXXX

The day wore on so slowly for Jarrod that he was about to bend those bars with his bare hands and make a run for it. He scarcely touched the lunch his mother had brought him, and that was when she really began to worry. When Jarrod was worried, he didn't eat, and he'd go somewhere far away in his head, thinking.

"You do need to eat," Victoria warned, as she stood outside the cell and watched the stew she'd made go cold on the tray sitting on the cot.

Jarrod shook his head. "Too much on my mind right now. Trying to find anything else we can use in my defense."

Victoria said, "Your brothers still have time to find the robbers. Don't give up on them yet."

"I haven't," Jarrod said. "But I need to come up with every defense that I can. If I were standing where you are, advising my client in here where I am, I would need to be able to tell him honestly that I was working as hard as I could to come up with ways to get him free."

"And what are you coming up with?"

Jarrod snorted. "Nothing. That's the problem."

"Trust Mark, Jarrod," Victoria said. "You've never asked your clients to come up with their own defense, have you? Haven't you always considered that your job?"

"You're right," Jarrod conceded. "And I do trust Mark, but I'd be a fool to quit thinking about possible defenses myself. I am a lawyer. I know how these things work, and when they don't work."

Victoria said, "You also know how you get when you don't eat. Your thinking gets fuzzy. You've even been known to lose all your senses until you get some food into you."

Jarrod snorted again. "You're right, as usual," he said and picked up the bowl of stew and piece of bread. He began to eat.

Victoria smiled. Inside she was worried sick, but for now, the fact that he was eating was enough.

Then they heard a commotion out in the street. They looked at each other, and Victoria pounded on the cell block door.

The sheriff let her out, but then he ran for his rifle rack, leaving the door open, saying, "Mrs. Barkley, you stay right in here and away from the door." He took a rifle down, checked it was loaded, and went outside.

In his cell, Jarrod knew what was happening. The quick trial set for Monday hadn't calmed men down enough. "Mother, do what the sheriff says," Jarrod said, his first worries for her because he knew her inclination would be to run out the door and defend her son in front of an angry mob.

Victoria didn't pay any attention to him. She went outside, unarmed.

She took her place beside the sheriff just at the edge of the boardwalk. There were ten or twelve men there, standing with the banker, who was holding his own rifle. Victoria had walked in on the middle of what the banker was saying.

"I know and you know that this trial isn't going to mean anything!" the banker yelled. He looked at Victoria. "She's already had men with her, and they've gone to get more! They are not gonna let this Barkley fella hang!"

"Samuel, you get yourself under control," the sheriff said, trying to sound calm, noticing Victoria was beside him and now having to worry about her safety, too. "Barkley's gonna get a fair trial on Monday, and whatever the jury decides is what I'll see is carried out, but we're not gonna have a lynching in Clayton. You men go about your business, and do it right now."

Two or three men moved slightly away, but they did not leave. The banker said, "He's a murderer and I'm gonna see that he pays for it!"

Victoria knew every man in front of her had been drinking already and would probably not listen to reason from the sheriff - if they were inclined to reason they wouldn't be so drunk at this hour that they'd be out here in the first place - but there was no way she was going to let any of them take Jarrod out of that jail and hang him. "If my son is found guilty, he'll pay for it!" she yelled, and couldn't believe what she was saying. It was just tumbling out, out of panic that was rising up. "He's a lawyer! He's been a man of the law all of his life, and he's not about to change now!"

"Lady, I don't believe for a minute you'd let your son hang!" the banker yelled.

"Well, I'm sure not gonna let you hang him!" Victoria yelled back. "Do what the sheriff says and get out of here, all of you! Let the judge and the jury do their job! I'm willing to let them because my son did not kill anyone, and I will not let you or any man on this street take him out of this jail!"

It worked. Maybe every one of those men had faced his own angry mother in his time. Maybe they weren't that keen on a lynching anyway but had been drinking too much not to go along with it. Whatever the reason, they all instinctively backed away. Slowly, the banker was left standing by himself in the street.

"Samuel," the sheriff said more quietly. "Go home."

The banker lowered his rifle and wandered away.

Victoria closed her eyes and let the tension run out of her body. Without saying anything to the sheriff, she went back into the jail.

She saw Jarrod back in his cell. Since the sheriff had left the cell block door open, he had heard everything. He smiled and reached between the bars toward his mother. Victoria wandered in there, and in a moment he was embracing her and trying to keep her from shaking. He was embracing her with the bars between them, but they hardly felt them at all.

XXXXXXX

Victoria left with the lunch tray at about two o'clock. As she crossed the street, she spotted seven riders come into town at a clip that made her take notice. And she saw Nick and Heath, leading the way. Thrilled, she hurried into the hotel, left the tray with the kitchen staff, and ran back outside. She saw her sons and the other men heading into the jail.

The banker and other people in the street saw it, too, but they saw badges on two of the men. They knew the Clayton sheriff had help now, legal help. The banker went back to his job.

Oh, dear God, please let those be the robbers that they have, Victoria thought as she ran back to the jail. For a moment she thought she ought to go get Mark Bromley, but she couldn't wait.

"Nick!" she said as soon as she was inside, and she ran to him.

Nick put an arm around her.

"Are these the real robbers?" Victoria asked.

"They are," Nick said with a smile.

Victoria felt like she was breathing again for the first time in days. She watched as the sheriff and two of the other men took three of the men into the cellblock.

Heath went with them. Once inside, he saw Jarrod leap to his feet. "Better put some space between these men and my brother," Heath said to the sheriff. "Jarrod's likely to be pretty mad about now."

The sheriff took his advice and put Storm in one cell and the Stone brothers in another, across the narrow pathway from Jarrod's. Jarrod watched, clutching the cell bars. Nick came through the cellblock door and over to his brother, smiling.

"Is that them?" Jarrod asked.

"It's them," Nick said. "The one with the broken nose has ratted out the other two."

Jarrod felt his whole being go limp. He wasn't aware until now that he'd been holding so much tension in.

"I want my brother out of here," Nick said to the sheriff.

"Can't, Nick, I've already been arraigned," Jarrod said. "I'll have to go to court on Monday."

Nick looked over his shoulder at the sheriff of Clayton. "I guess we'll be sticking around until our brother is free," he said, but he was really saying it to Storm and the Stone brothers.

The sheriff of Modesto and his deputy were already going back into the office from the cell block. As soon as he locked the newcomers in, the Clayton sheriff went back into the office as well. Heath joined his two brothers at Jarrod's cell, and he gave Jarrod a wink. "We had you covered all along, Big Brother," he said with his lopsided grin.

"I never had any doubts," Jarrod said, smiling.

Nick guffawed.