"It's changed a lot, hasn't it?"
Hannibal Heyes looked where his old friend was pointing.
"Not that much. At least, not since Jed and I were last here."
"It's been longer for me. Almost feels like I'm here for the first time, following you up a trail I couldn't see."
Heyes laughed. "You said a mouthful there, Lom. You followed me up a trail you couldn't see and look where it led you to. Running with the Devil's Hole Gang and then becoming the famous Sheriff Trevors from Wyoming."
"Don't claim credit for his lawman career, Heyes. He did that all by himself."
"Ain't that the truth, Jed. Sorry, Lom."
"I ain't a lawman anymore, remember? Just an unemployed citizen of the great territory of Wyoming."
Curry and Heyes exchanged a quick glance, reacting to the bitter tone in Trevors' voice, but neither responded. The three men stood together, holding the reins of their horses. It was already mid-afternoon, and they were hours from their destination.
"Let's ride," Curry said. "I'd like to set up camp in the daylight."
"I thought we were going to stay in the cabin, Heyes. I'm getting too old to sleep under the stars any more than I've already done this trip."
"I hope we can use one of the leader's cabin or the bunkhouse, but who knows? From what we've heard, ain't nobody been seen there since the winter of '87-'88."
"We're not going to find out by standing around." Curry swung onto his horse.
"Always the man of action," Heyes commented, as he mounted his horse. "It's midsummer. We got plenty of sunlight left," He shifted around in the saddle, trying to find more padding for his sore backside and failing.
"Yeah, and it's a good thing, too. We'll need the sunlight to find the trail. Looks overgrown to me. Ain't nobody been here in a while."
"That is a good thing," Trevors agreed. "I don't want to surprise anyone who's staying at the Hole."
"Not much chance of that," Curry said, moving his horse to lead the small column uphill.
"Haven't you forgotten something?" Heyes asked. "We should fire three shots, in case anybody from the old gang is still there.'
"Haven't you forgotten something?" Trevors replied. "We're supposed to be going in quiet-like. If someone's up there, I don't want them to be greeting us with drawn guns."
"We wouldn't want to surprise anyone either," Curry added. "But it don't matter anyway. The old gang is long gone. Ain't nobody left who remembers the signal except us."
"Supposed to be long gone. We never did hear for sure about Wheat or Kyle once we moved to Canada."
"They weren't the sharpest tacks in the box, but I'm willing to guarantee they ain't waiting for us upstairs right now. Let's limit the shooting, alright?"
Heyes grinned. "I love the irony of that statement, Jed. You want them dime novel writers to know Kid Curry said, let's limit the shooting? It'd ruin your reputation."
Curry's response was a hard stare. Heyes was not intimidated.
"Alright, alright," he said, still smiling. "It just don't feel right to me, that's all. That's not how we did things in our day."
"Our day as crooks is done, Heyes. And believe you me, all the old gang is gone, too. Ain't that what we're counting on?"
"Yeah, I guess so." With Curry in the lead, the men gently guided the animals up the old trail to the high meadow that was the Devil's Hole Gang's famous hideout. Trevors was content to bring up the rear. Curry maintained a slow pace, as he slowly picked his way along what seemed to be no trail at all.
"You doing okay back there, Lom?" Curry called back after they made several switchbacks and squeezed through some tricky openings in the rocky hills.
"Aren't we almost there? I don't remember it being this far."
"Not much farther at all. Just after this last notch."
Trevors followed them through a narrow passage. When he emerged on the other side, he drew up alongside his guides. The entire clearing lay before them.
"Sheesh. That ain't the way I remember it. Not at all."
"Me neither," Heyes said. "It looks like Gettysburg after the battle."
"Not quite that bad," Curry commented. "The leader's cabin looks pretty solid. But I sure didn't expect to see everything else looking like it all burned to the ground. Even the fencing around the corral is gone."
"The stable looks halfway decent."
"If no roof looks halfway decent, then I guess it does." He urged his horse forward. "Let's get the animals settled, then we can get our gear set up in the cabin. Sun's already starting to set, and the damn wind's picking up. We can check the hidey-hole in the morning."
Once the animals were eating comfortably in the roofless stalls, the men walked through the overgrown meadow towards the leader's cabin, the distant roar of the waterfall echoing across the flat ground. Heyes moved away to study the ruins of the bunkhouse. The others followed him. All three stood and surveyed the destruction.
"Looks like it was a particularly hot fire," Heyes said. "See how the timbers are charred? Even years later you can still tell."
Curry stared at the derelict building. "A fire that hot had to spread fast. I hope everybody got out."
"Shit." Trevors dropped his saddlebags. "I wish you hadn't said that." He stepped carefully onto the charred floor, testing the rotten floorboards before putting his full weight on them. Near the remains of the chimney that stood like a lonely sentinel, he got down on one knee and touched a lump of charcoal. "This looks like bone."
Curry and Heyes exchanged shocked looks.
"Could be animal," Curry suggested, hopefully.
Heyes crouched down next to Trevors. He cautiously touched the scorched object with one gloved finger.
"Could be but isn't. This is a human femur." At Trevors' uncomprehending look, he explained. "It's the long bone in the thigh. You can tell by its length and by this lumpy part at the top. It's called the greater trochanter." He leaned back on his heels. "And there's more. All this lumpy, charred stuff there, and there? That's bone, too. Most of it was disintegrated by the heat of the fire, but if you look at the pattern of stains on the floorboards, you can see the outline of at least one body."
"How do you know? You're not a doctor."
"Since we relocated to Vancouver, I been studying medicine." Trevors looked skeptical.
"It's true, Lom," Curry said. "After we gave up on the amnesty and got the orphanage started, he's been hitting the medical books and studying with one of the local doctors. Since we took in the sick kids that nobody wanted, our initial costs were high. We couldn't afford to pay for too many doctor visits, so Heyes had to learn. If he says that's a human bone, that's a human bone."
"Well, hell." Trevors groaned as he pushed himself up. "I thought we were coming here to find buried money, not skeletons."
Heyes stood up, too. "The only reason for crooks leaving money behind is that they didn't get a chance to spend it, which is why we're here." Hands on hips, he stared at the blackened bones. "We suspected that something bad happened to the gang, and now, I think we got proof of that. Death and prison are the only reasons a crook doesn't spend his money fast as he gets it." A wry grin crossed his face. "Jed and I know that all too well."
"Somebody must've gotten away to tell the tale," Curry objected. "There's only a few bones here."
"Have you forgotten how many years have passed since the hard winter of '87-'88? Animals have had plenty of time to clear away body parts. There's no way of telling how many men might've died in this fire."
"Happy thought," Trevors said. "It's getting dark. Let's get settled in the cabin and figure out our next move. I always think better on a full stomach."
"That's Jed's line, Lom." Curry rewarded Heyes with another sidelong glance, which Heyes ignored. "I just hope the cabin's okay."
"I know I'm going to hate myself for asking, but I'm asking anyway," Curry said. "How would it not be okay?"
"Lots of ways, Jed. Lots of ways."
The door to the leader's cabin was stuck. Trevors twisted the handle and pushed hard, but the door resisted.
"Locked. You still carry your lockpicks?"
"Always. Can't quit the habit of a lifetime." Heyes pulled the lockpicks from his jacket and got down on one knee. Within two minutes, the lock was released. The door open creaked as it slowly swung open.
The men stepped inside cautiously. Dust mites rose and fell as they advanced. They heard mice skittering away.
"Roof looks solid," Trevors said, looking around the room. "But why's all the furniture gone?"
"You think the beds are gone, too?"
"You weren't thinking of sleeping on one of them, were you, Jed? They'd be full of bedbugs by now."
"Can't be sure without checking." Curry pushed the bedroom door open. Trevors and Heyes exchanged a quick smile of understanding that faded when they heard him take in a deep, gasping breath.
His subdued voice echoed in the stillness. "You better come see this."
A pile of tattered blankets and quilts covered something lumpy on the floor where the bed used to be.
Trevors pushed his way past Curry and pulled back the faded bedding, revealing a complete human skeleton. The man had been crouched in a fetal position when he died.
Heyes stepped over to look at the remains. "No bullets or broken bones. Skeleton looks intact. No ropes or leather ties around the neck, so he probably wasn't strangled. No signs of violence."
"How long you think he's been here?"
"Got to be years. It'd take that long for the flesh to deteriorate so completely. With the door locked, we can be sure big predators didn't get in." He regarded the specimen with sadness. "Probably died right here, all alone, of some illness."
"Pitiful." Trevors looked around the remains. "Anything here to indicate who he was?"
"Not immediately. Clothes have rotted away too, although the boots are still there. Looks like he was tall, maybe as tall as you." He shrugged. "Could be anybody, really."
"I've seen enough," Curry said. "Let's set up the bedrolls and see to dinner."
"Nothing ruins your appetite, does it, Jed?" Trevors asked.
"I've seen plenty of death. I can't do anything to help him. Better to focus on why we came here."
"Amen to that," Heyes said. "Let's leave this poor fellow where he is for now."
The men spread bedrolls out in the parlor. Trevors and Heyes went out to find firewood for the stove while Curry unpacked and organized the food they'd brought with them. By the time the others returned with arms full of wood gathered from the nearby forest, he'd set everything up to cook. While they unloaded the firewood and set up the pot-bellied stove, he went out to fill the canteens.
The last few rays of sunlight crept over the surrounding mountains, still covered with snow in late June. Curry went to the stable to check on the horses. Finding them content, despite the cool of the night, he walked over to the stream of ice-cold water that ran from the distant waterfall. He got down on his knees and held the canteens and coffee pot in the clear water. The constant Wyoming wind felt refreshing. He let the sharp breeze wash over him and clean away thoughts of skeletons and charred bones laying inside burnt-out buildings.
When he got back to the cabin, it was warm and comfortable. Heyes and Trevors were seated on the floor, passing a bottle of whiskey between them.
"You started without me?" Curry asked, in mock outrage. He shook his head sadly. "Can't trust you two with a full bottle of whiskey, can I?"
"Sure can't," Heyes agreed cheerfully. "Once a crook, always a crook. Right, Lom?"
Trevors didn't smile. "The citizens of Porterville would agree with you."
Curry sat down next to him, silently accepting the bottle Heyes passed to him. He took a satisfying drink.
"You got to let it go, Lom. The people in Porterville always knew you'd run with us, years before. Sometimes you lose an election just because people think a change is good, any kind of a change. Even a bad one."
"Give me that." Curry passed the bottle back to Trevors, who took a long swallow. "Is supper ready yet?"
Supper was a silent affair, dominated by Trevors' low mood. He held onto the whiskey bottle, taking long drinks throughout the meal, and lay down with it afterwards, his back towards the others, who were clearing the dishes and tamping down the fire for the night before they, too, lay down to sleep..
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Trevors groaned when the bright sunlight hit his red eyes in the morning. He rolled over reluctantly and groaned again when he saw the other bedrolls were not only unoccupied but rolled up and put away. It had to be late morning.
He pushed himself to a sitting position, then rubbed his aching head. He pulled on his boots to go outside. When he returned, Heyes was on the porch, holding out a tin cup.
"Thought some fresh, sweet coffee might help, Lom." Trevors grunted his thanks.
"Jed and I are checking out the old hidey-holes. Care to join us?"
"No."
Heyes covered his smile with one hand. He knew all too well the signs of a serious hangover.
"See you later then." Trevors nodded, then winced in regret. Too much head movement was painful. He watched Heyes walk away and sipped his coffee. The headache seemed to be fading, slowly.
He went back into the cabin and, after a moment's hesitation, into the haunted bedroom. He stared at the skeleton, at the bedding, and around the room, and then he sat down on the floor and thought about things like the hard winter of '86-'87, the Hole, and what people do when the times and circumstances are worse than they've ever been. And suddenly, something caught his eye. There was something under the battered pillow where the skeletal head rested. He reached carefully under the pillow and found a book.
When Heyes and Curry returned to the cabin late in the afternoon, they found Trevors sitting on the porch steps, reading.
"I didn't think you brought reading material with you, Lom."
Trevors closed the book. "I didn't. This is a diary. I found it under the pillow, where the body was laying."
Heyes' and Curry's eyes widened in surprise.
"Whose is it?"
"Man calling himself Josiah Wilder. Ever hear of him?" The two men shook their heads.
"I have. Petty criminal from Nebraska. Stole his way through every territory he crossed. Usually kept one step ahead of the law. Your old friend Wheat brought him here in summer '87. He did a few jobs with the gang, nothing big."
"The gang definitely went small-time after Wheat took over," Heyes said. "You remember him, don't you? Not much imagination. Not much for planning. Not smart enough to realize he wasn't smart enough to run the gang."
Curry gestured at the book. "Does that diary tell you what happened here?"
Trevors nodded. "Everything. Every awful, stupid thing." He sighed deeply. "It's a tragedy, really. Bad decisions, bad planning, bad weather. The result was, a lot of men died here. Wilder was the last survivor."
"Let's get us some coffee and then we'll hear it out, Lom." Heyes' face was grim. "I think we'll need some fortitude to get through this."
Twenty minutes later, each man was drinking from a fresh cup of coffee, as they sat together on the porch steps. Lom picked up the book and flipped the pages idly as he talked.
"It started October of '86. The gang was here, laying low with their latest haul until they thought it was safe to leave the Hole. They hadn't laid in stores because nobody planned to winter here. The first blizzard came in October, and Wilder says, they thought, well, there's always a thaw after the first big blow, we'll head out then. But there was no thaw. Storm after storm came, and the temperature dropped. You remember that winter."
"We heard all about it," Curry said. "We were staying with an old friend, Mac McCreedy, in Texas."
"I was in Porterville. The town might not've survived but for the train bringing in supplies. Even so, a lot of people died. But here," Trevors said, tapping the book with his index finger, "nobody brought in supplies. Hardly any stored food. No stocks of firewood. They burned the furniture – that's why no chairs, no wardrobes, no beds – and they took down the corral for firewood. By January, there rations were nearly exhausted. They slaughtered the horses for meat, and there still wasn't enough to eat. They were exhausted and cold and getting sick. Pneumonia, sounds like, and dysentery. Men started dying. Somebody got careless with the oil lamps in the bunkhouse and ignited some blankets. Men were trapped and died there. Strong winds that night spread the fire everywhere. Only the stable and the leader's cabin didn't burn because the wind changed direction at the last minute. And the only people who survived were your pals Wheat and Kyle, in the leader's cabin, and Wilder, who'd been out hunting for meat."
He paused, shaking his head. "Everything that could go wrong, did go wrong. They were trapped. No food. No firewood. Lots of money from their summer jobs, but useless to them, unless they burned the cash for heat. And they couldn't even do that, because it was mainly coins."
"So there is money around here somewhere," Heyes commented.
"Yes," Trevors affirmed. "You'll be happy to know that Wilder drew a map. It's here." He held the book open for the others to see.
"I know exactly where this is," Curry said. "How much do you think is there?"
"Wilder says, about $20,000."
Heyes pushed his hat farther back on his head. "If we can get that, Jed . . . "
"I know. Not only can we pay off our debts, but we can expand the residential area and the school. Probably double the amount of kids we've got now."
"You know, boys, of all the things I thought you'd do after amnesty, starting up an orphanage and boarding school was not even on the list."
"It wasn't," Curry said. "But that was when we still held out hope we'd get an amnesty. Once we realized that wasn't going to happen – and we know, Lom, you did everything in your power – we had to rethink everything. That's why we went to Canada. Fresh start in a new country where they speak English."
"And it was a natural fit for Jed. He always did like helping the needy people." Heyes added.
Curry stood up. "Helping our needy people calls for cash. Let's get that haul, right now."
"Don't you want to hear the rest of Wilder's story?" Trevors asked.
Heyes stood and stretched. "Yes, and no. Let's see if Wilder's map is right. Looking at a pile of cash will make it easier to hear about what happened here."
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"Right about $20,000," Heyes said. Both paper money and gold coins were spread out on the floor between the three men. "We can do a lot of good with this, Jed."
"I never dreamed I'd see you two looking at a haul like this without planning some big blowout at a saloon."
Heyes and Curry exchanged smiles. "Well, I won't deny that we'll probably spend a few dollars on ourselves, but definitely not the way we did in the old days."
"Heyes is getting too old for that anyway," Curry said, ignoring the glare Heyes sent his way.
"You've done better without the amnesty than without," Trevors told them.
"No, Lom, that's not so," Heyes argued. "We're still wanted. Somebody could still shoot us dead and get rewarded for it. At least there's less chance of it in Vancouver."
"I see your point." He watched as Curry and Heyes started packing away the currency in their bags. "How you going to explain all this money when you get back?"
"Simple. We said we were trying to sell property in Colorado." Heyes grinned. "We sold the property."
Trevors' smiled with reluctant admiration. "You sure thought it through, Heyes. Too bad you weren't here for the hard winter. Maybe those men might've lived."
"I doubt it, Lom. Even if the Hole had been supplied to carry the gang through winter, it might not have been enough for that particular winter."
"I suppose that's the cue for the rest of the story, Lom," Curry said. "But give us the short version. I don't know how much more I want to hear about death, especially with what's left of Wilder in the next room."
"Did he say what happened to Wheat and Kyle?"
Trevors nodded. "In February, there was a break in the weather. Wheat and Kyle decided to try and walk out. Wilder was too sick to go with them. They left him food and firewood and headed out on foot. That was the last he saw of them. He wrote as long as he had the strength, but he says, at the end, he knew he was dying, and he asked that someone let his family know what happened to him."
"Damn. There's no way Wheat and Kyle survived on foot when they were already weak from hunger."
"Yep."
The men were silent, contemplating the fate of their old friends.
"Well." Heyes almost visibly shook himself, trying to change the mood. "That kind of leads me to another former gang member." Trevors gave him an inquisitive look. Heyes pointed his index finger at Trevors' chest.
"Who, me?"
"What are your plans, Lom, since the idiot voters of Porterville have cut you loose?"
Trevors shrugged. "Look for lawman work, I suppose. Somewhere."
"We were wondering, Lom, now that you're footloose and fancy-free, if you'd be interested in moving to Vancouver and working with us."
"What? And do what? You need a sheriff?"
Heyes smiled. "Not a sheriff, no, but an administrator. A manager, someone used to dealing with all types of people, especially orphaned boys who might've gotten in a little bit of trouble already." His grin widened. "Kind of like Jed and I were, when we were just petty crooks."
Trevors' mouth opened and closed a few times. It was evident he was looking for words and not finding any. Heyes was ready to fill that gap.
"We need you to keep us, as well as the boys, on the straight and narrow. Your experience is perfect for the job, Lom. And, if we didn't already tell you, Vancouver is a fine place. It's right on the ocean, so it's got a milder climate than the rest of Canada. And definitely a lot more pleasant than freezing your butt off in Wyoming."
"I don't know, boys. . . " the men smiled at his hesitation. It meant he was seriously considering their offer.
"Lom, we can fill you in more on the way back. We can answer any questions you have. And, as you can see, we got the financial backing to make it all happen."
Trevors looked around the room. He looked at Wilder's diary. He looked at his hands. He looked up at his friends and said, "I'll do it."
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