A/N: Howdy, y'all! It's cfjj, and I'm back in the saddle! I am extremely, extremely, truly very sorry about the (nearly two months?) of inactivity. It wasn't lack of motivation to finish the story, or even writer's block. I've just been tremendously busy. In fact, I think my summer has been busier than my school year was. I'm doing cross country (which is every bit as terrible as you think) and I've had many grueling days of band camp. However, I am in for some long car trips ahead so perhaps I will have oodles of time to write! Once again, so very sorry for the delay, but here, as promised, is Chapter 5!

Chapter 5: To Be A Vigilante

Mrs. Hughes was intrigued. Her ranch foreman had never wanted to talk about anything before, and now all of a sudden he seemed to have something serious to talk to her about?

"My" ranch foreman, Elsie thought. My, I'm getting a bit possessive.

After she had overcome her initial curiosity over Mr. Carson's request to speak with her, she began to worry.

There's no way he could possibly... How could he have known? Did he see me? What am I going to tell him?

Mr. Carson headed into the barn and led Elsie up the ladder and into the hayloft. Elsie couldn't help but remember the thrill she had felt the last time she had been up there with him.

As soon as the pair had climbed up and situated themselves on bunches of hay opposite each other, Mr. Carson began to speak.

"Now, Elsie..erm, Mrs. Hughes.. I have known you to do many an impulsive and careless thing in the years I've known you, but never have I seen anything as reckless as this! You could have gotten yourself killed! You could have been caught, and we all know what the Dowager Mayor does to-"

"Charles!" Mr. Carson was surprised by her abrupt use of his first name. He shook himself from his ramble and looked up to meet Elsie's eyes.

"What in God's name are you talking about?" she questioned angrily.

Charles had thought her better than this. "Mrs. Hughes, did you really think I wouldn't see you?"

Mrs. Hughes smiled playfully. "I didn't know you kept me under such a watchful eye."

Mr. Carson cracked a small smile and replied, "By George, I need to keep a closer eye on you than on the ranch hands at the county fair!"

They both had to laugh at this, but then Mr. Carson resumed his serious demeanor.

"I wanted you to know that I picked up the pieces and perfected your flawed plan." He continued before she could interrupt, "Your plan had shortcomings, and while I respected what you wanted to do, I knew that you wouldn't think it through fully."

Mrs. Hughes was annoyed. The gall! "Oh, is that so, Mr. Carson? Please do tell of these fatal shortcomings in my plan."

Mr. Carson began happily. "First of all, I saw you the other day in the general store. Of course, that in itself is not unusual, and at first I thought nothing of it. But I began to suspect something when you emerged from the store with ammunition for a firearm. I've never known you to wield a weapon; after all, why would a housekeeper have need of a gun? So I said to myself, 'Charles, she's finally gone off the deep end!' But I am a cautious person, Mrs. Hughes, especially when it involves the well-being of someone I care about. My mind worked faster than it ever had, and when I saw Mr. Pegg's Wanted poster, everything made sense. I know you, Mrs. Hughes, and I knew what you were planning. And noble as your cause was, you didn't clean up after yourself nearly well enough. It's a good thing that I was there to do it for you. For instance, did you ever think of what would happen once the investigation into the mystery shooter was initiated? They would ask around the town. And where's the only place that you can acquire bullets in town? The general store, of course. Consequently, the sheriff would interrogate Mrs. Crawley about who had been buying ammunition lately, and you would be found out in an instant. Thankfully, I thought of all this. The day before your little stunt, I headed over to the general store and dropped of some mail for Mrs. Crawley." Here he paused.

"And what did that mail say?" Elsie prompted warily.

"It was a letter from her friend Dr. Clarkson in New York. It asked her for her help in nursing patients back to health at his new hospital. Poor Mrs. Crawley couldn't resist the thought that she might be helpful elsewhere, so she packed up and left. Temporarily, mind you, but long enough for this business to blow over."

Mrs. Hughes was astounded. He was right: she never had thought of what would happen after she had saved Pegg. But he had! She couldn't help repeating his words in her head: ...when it involves the well-being of someone I care about... someone I care about..

Mr. Carson's voice snapped her out of her reverie.

"Mrs. Hughes! I revert back to my earlier statement: you could have gotten yourself killed!"

Charles tried desperately to keep the worry out of his tone, but he couldn't. He didn't know what he would do if anything happened to her.

Mrs. Hughes wasn't paying attention.

"Even if they had known I'd bought ammunition, how could possibly trace the bullet to me?" she wondered aloud.

"Pardon?" Charles snapped.

"The ammunition. There are so many different kinds of bullets in the store, and so many people in the town own guns. I can't be the only person who's bought ammunition recently!"

Mr. Carson smiled. "I thought of this, as well. They couldn't possibly have known what kind of ammunition the shooter used, unless..."

Mrs. Hughes was catching on.

"...unless they found the bullet lodged across the way from where I shot it," she finished, as he pulled the shell from his pocket and held it up for her to see.

"Exactly. So, when I saw you leave the square to do the deed, I climbed up to the roof of the Grantham Arms and then retrieved the casing after you'd fired it. It was lodged in a chamber pot in one of the upper rooms. Nonetheless..." Charles said grumpily.

Mrs. Hughes was once again at a loss for words.

"I-I... How? You thought of all of this... I'm greatly in your debt. If not for you, Mr. Carson, I would have been found out in an instant. I-I don't know how to thank you..." she stammered.

"No need," he shook his head. "I was only helping a friend."

With that, they both fell into silence for a moment before Charles spoke again.

"I did have one more question…" he said carefully.

Mrs. Hughes sighed and smiled. "What else did I miss?"

"Oh, no, nothing, erm... But I was wondering... How did you get to be such a crack shot? There's many a cowboy in the West that couldn't hit that rope like you did."

Mrs. Hughes beamed. "That, my friend, is a story for another time."

A/N: Well, there it is. This took forever to write. I wanted to put a lot of thought into the dialogue exchanged in this chapter. Thanks to anyone who reads this, and please drop me a review to let me know how you liked it!

M/N: (Mother's Note) The hints of Chelsie in this chapter all came from chelsie fan jr., jr. Usually she asks me to write the smoochier parts, but she did this all on her own. A burgeoning shipper, methinks!