Chapter 34
The Refusal

The minute we were inside, Pa ordered all us kids into our rooms, but he didn’t pay much attention, and we left the doors open. We were all ears, hanging on every word that followed.

“What’s this all about, Drum?” asked the sheriff. “I know your kid’s in trouble and we’ll do what we can. But I’m a sworn lawman and I got a duty too. So I’m asking you, is this warrant on the level?”

“It’s a pack of the darndest lies that—!” I heard Uncle Nick exclaim. But Pa’s voice cut him off.

“No it ain’t, Nick, and you know it.”

Then he turned to the sheriff. “I suppose you could say it’s on the level, Simon. But there’s always two sides to these things.”

“Well, I’m listening, Drum. You’re my friend, and I figure I owe you the benefit of the doubt. But if this warrant’s in effect and they’re still looking for you, then—well, then I don’t know what! It’s my job, you know, and friend or not, I gotta—”

“I understand what you’re up against, Simon,” said Pa calmly. “How about if I tell you what happened. Then if you figure you gotta take me in, I’ll go with you peaceably—as long as we get Becky back first. After that, well maybe it’s time I faced the music and quit hiding from my past. That’s what I got me a wife for, ’cause I always knew something like this might happen.”

“Sounds like a straight deal to me,” replied Sheriff Rafferty.

“And you gotta let me and Miss Kathryn get done with the wedding first too,” added Pa. “That way, I’ll know the kids are gonna be safe.”

“When is it?”

“Week from Sunday.”

“Agreed, Drum. Now get on with it.”

Pa heaved a deep sigh. The room was completely silent for a minute or so, then he started.

“Well, you know how when I first came here I didn’t let on my name was Hollister. I went by Drum plain and simple, and let folks think that was my last name.”

As Pa spoke I tiptoed to the open door so I could peek out just an inch. I saw Mr. Rafferty nodding his head.

“And Nick, too,” Pa added. “Most folks around here still call him Matthews.”

“You in this too, Nick?” said the sheriff, glancing up at Uncle Nick.

“Never mind him,” said Pa. “If you take me in, you gotta be satisfied with that. You ain’t got no warrant on Nick, and I want to know he’s around to keep the mine going, for the kids’ sake.”

The sheriff seemed to chew on his words a while, then looked over both Pa and Uncle Nick.

“For a man sitting trying to explain to a lawman why there’s a warrant out on him, you seem to be putting lots of conditions on what I can and can’t do.”

I thought at first that he was being serious, then I wondered if he was joking with Pa. But nobody laughed, and I never did know.

Pa just shrugged. “I don’t figure you got much choice,” he said. “You ain’t gonna get my story otherwise. And you and I both know that if I decide to fight, you’d never take me in. I got too many friends in these parts. So I don’t see that you got much choice.”

“Just go on with your story.”

“Well, that’s the reason when we came west, why we—why I didn’t use my real name. That’s an old warrant, before we got caught. We were part of a jailbreak, and after that the law mostly figured we were dead, which was why we thought we’d be safe. But I reckon technically, seeing as how we escaped, that warrant would still be valid.”

“What were you in for?”

“You’re not gonna like hearing it.”

“It was a bum charge—a frame-up!” said Uncle Nick.

“What was it, Drum?” said the sheriff again.

“The worst, Simon—bank robbery and murder.”

The sheriff let out a low whistle. “That’s bad,” he finally said.

“Nick’s right, though,” added Pa. “We’d been riding with the gang, that much is true. So I reckon you could say we were accomplices on the robbin’ part. But we weren’t nowhere near any killin’.”

“And you were part of a break?”

“Yeah, we busted out, along with a bunch of others. We didn’t cotton to the notion of dangling from the end of a rope for something we didn’t do, so when we had the chance we lit out and came out here.”

“And so who’s this fella Krebbs who’s been bulldoggin’ you these last couple of years? He got something to do with all this?”

“He’s part of the original gang that pulled the job. He and several of the others got away clean. Krebbs always figured we had the loot. So when he heard we’d busted out, he got a whiff of our trail, and he’s been tracking us ever since.”

“You got the money, Drum? If you do, turning it back in would go a long way toward proving to the law your intention of living straight from now on.”

“Come on, Simon!” said Pa in disbelief that he would even ask. “Look around! Look at my hands. Look at how hard me and Nick work up there in that mine every day. You think we’d have been bustin’ our backs all these years if we had that fifty thousand stashed someplace?”

Rafferty gave a half-shrug and nodded thoughtfully. “Probably not. But I had to ask.”

Pa settled back in his chair, waiting for what the sheriff would say next. I glanced over at Katie. She hadn’t said a word the whole time. I wondered what she was thinking—probably that she’d gotten herself mixed up with more than she’d bargained for!

“Well, Drum, your story makes sense. I’ve always figured you for a man of your word. So I’m inclined to believe you. But I think you better tell me the whole story. It’s dark now, and those varmints obviously have your young’un someplace we won’t find tonight. We got time, so I want you to start at the beginning.”

Pa let out a heavy sigh, and launched into the tale that none of the other kids but me had heard. I’d tried to explain things to them, but I was glad they were hearing it from Pa’s own lips. I wanted them to know how it had really been between Ma and Pa, and why he’d had to leave us without any word.

Twenty or twenty-five minutes later he was done. He didn’t shed tears this time, like when he’d first told me the story. But I knew it had been hard for Pa nevertheless. There were still hurts he felt from what he’d done.

There was a long quiet in the room.

Sheriff Rafferty was the first to break it. The next sound we all heard was the ripping of the warrant in half.

“I believe you, Drum,” he said. “Like I said, I figure you for a man of your word, so I’m gonna pretend I never saw this.”

I could almost feel the relief that spread over Pa’s face.

“Now we gotta get your little girl back,” said the sheriff. “What do you want me to do, Drum? You got fifty thousand?”

Pa laughed, a bitter laugh that didn’t have any joy in it.

“Are you kidding?” he said. “Fifty thousand? It might as well be a million! Me and Nick’s got maybe $3,000 in the bank. Here we figured that was real good for a year’s work, more’n most men see in their lives. Now it looks like nothin’!”

“You want me to round up some of the boys and get together a posse?”

“And do what?” said Pa. “We ain’t got a notion where they are.”

“With enough men and enough time, we could find them.”

“We ain’t got time! And like he said, Krebbs’d just kill Becky, then snatch one of the others. I know him. He’s a mean one. He won’t stop till he’s got the money. The way I figure it, I gotta pay him or we’ll be runnin’ from him forever.”

“How we gonna raise fifty thousand, Drum?” said Uncle Nick. “There ain’t nobody in this town who’s got that kind of cash.”

“There’s one, Nick.”

“You don’t mean that lowdown—”

“That’s right—Royce.”

“Royce’d never give you that much money!”

“Not give . . . loan. That’s what bankers do, they loan money.”

“How would you pay him back?” asked the sheriff.

“If Nick and me put away $3,000 in a year, all we need to do is work a little harder. Zack’s getting to be a man. He can help. We can make five, maybe ten thousand a year outta that mine. We could have Royce paid back in five years!”

“Work harder!” groaned Uncle Nick.

“For Becky, we’ll put in fourteen hours a day up in that pit!” said Pa. “And you’ll be with me! Besides,” he added after a little pause, “I don’t see what choice we have. We don’t know where they are. Krebbs’ll kill Becky if we don’t give him the loot. You know him, Nick—you know he’ll do it sure as the sun shines. And the only way to get that kind of money is from Royce. It’s all we can do.”

“There’s the claim,” suggested Katie. “What about that?” For the first time since she’d come, her voice sounded timid.

Pa shook his head. “We can’t do that, Miss Kathryn. The mine and this claim’s all we got. Leastways, if we pay him, after five years the mine and the cabin and the land’s still ours. No, we’ll pay him.”

Pa’s voice had a decisive sound to it. No one said anything else for a little bit. Then Sheriff Rafferty got up out of his chair.

“Well, I reckon you’ll be coming to town in the morning to see Royce,” he said. “Come and see me when your business is settled. We still want to do our best to nab this bushwhacker.”

He shook Pa’s hand, then left.

The next morning bright and early we all rode to town.

Everyone wanted to go, and with Buck Krebbs on the loose, Pa was in no mood to argue. He told Katie to keep Tad and Emily with her near the wagon. I guess he figured Zack and I were big enough to take care of ourselves. Uncle Nick stayed with Katie, I went to Mrs. Parrish’s office to see if she’d heard anything, and Pa went to the bank to see Mr. Royce.

The whole town was abuzz with talk of Becky’s kidnapping. Mrs. Parrish knew everything, and the minute I walked in she ran toward me and embraced me. I told her what Pa was doing.

A few minutes later I saw Pa through the window walking out of the bank and back toward the wagon. I rushed outside, not even thinking to close the door.

Pa was walking toward the wagon. Katie was still sitting in it with Tad and Emily. Uncle Nick was on the ground leaning against one of the wagon wheels. Zack was behind the wagon kicking a rock in the dirt. I ran up just as Pa got there.

He just looked at Uncle Nick and shook his head.

“What?” exclaimed Uncle Nick.

“He turned us down,” said Pa. “He laughed in my face. I said, ‘Have you heard about my daughter?’ and he said, ‘I heard something to that effect, and I’m sorry, Hollister, I truly am, but fifty thousand is a huge sum of money.’ I told him we were good for it, and that’s when he laughed.”

Pa couldn’t help sounding angry. But there was more desperation in his voice than bitterness or hatred.

“The oily scoundrel’s probably in on the whole thing!” cried Uncle Nick angrily.

“I thought of that,” said Pa.

“He’s nothing but a double-dealing snake!”

“A snake who’s the only one around here with money.”

“You told him we’d work it off?” asked Uncle Nick, calming a little.

“Yeah. I even said we’d sign over the mine as collateral for the money. That’s when he laughed again. ‘A hunk of ground for fifty thousand?’ he said. ‘And when the mine plays out a year from now, where does that leave me? No thanks, Hollister. Far too risky an exchange! Look, I’m sorry about your kid. But this is business. And this would be a bad loan, pure and simple. Any banker in the country would turn you down flat.’ That’s when I walked out. I couldn’t listen to another word. But I could feel his gloating eyes on my back. I knew the rascal was smiling inside, getting his revenge on us for spoiling his little scheme last year.”

Pa was silent. He and Uncle Nick both stared at the ground, trying to decide what to do. I hadn’t noticed at first, but now I saw that Mrs. Parrish had followed me out of her office. She was halfway across the street and coming toward us.

Pa didn’t see her. All at once he lifted his head and said to Uncle Nick, “Nick, you go over to Rafferty’s. Bring him to the title office. You and me’s gonna sign over a quitclaim on the mine to Krebbs. It’s the only way we’ll ever see Becky again.”

Without another word, he walked off down the street in the direction of the Miracle Springs Land Office.