"Your fever's gettin' worse. Pa went out to fetch some aspen bark so I can brew you some tea."
"Aspen bark?"
"It helps with a fever sometimes. Your wound's gettin' worse. Pus is comin' out of it now."
"I've gotta get back to that valley. Pine and Vanbergen will get away from me again ... I lost 'em once, but it won't happen again."
"Pa says they're still there, only today two more men come ridin' into the ghost town."
"Two more?" Frank tried to clear his head.
"Pa slipped down close on foot the other night. He heard their names."
"The other night? How long have I been asleep?"
"Two days. You woke up every now an' then so I could give you some soup an' whiskey."
Frank couldn't quite believe that he'd been unconscious for two days. He could see Karen's face clearly now. "The names of the other two..."
"What about 'em?"
"What were their names?"
She frowned a moment. "One was named Cletus. They called the other one Conrad. Pa was sure hopin' it wasn't that boy of yours."
He tried to bolt upright on the cot and could scarcely move. "That isn't possible. Conrad is safe down in Trinidad in the south part of the territory."
"Pa only said that was his name. You can ask Pa soon as he gets back."
Frank couldn't imagine how anyone could have taken Conrad from Trinidad a second time. Pine and Vanbergen were in Ghost Valley. Who was left among them that could take his son captive again? "Your pa must have been mistaken ... about one of 'em being named Conrad."
"He told me that he slipped up right close in the dark an' heard 'em talking."
"Go find Buck. I have to ask him if he's sure about that name."
"He'll be back right soon. There's aspens down by the creek and you've got to have the bark so your fever will go down."
Frank closed his eyes briefly. Had he been so careless as to leave Conrad alone when he went after Ned and Victor? Had one of their gunmen taken Conrad captive again?
"Where are my boots?" he asked feebly.
"Right at the foot of the bed ... only you ain't gonna be needin' 'em for a day or two."
"My shirt. My mackinaw," he continued, ignoring what the girl said for now.
"Hangin' on pegs over yonder on the wall," she replied, giving him a strange look. "Only you ain't strong enough to get dressed yet."
"I'll be the judge of that," he said. "If my boy is in that valley, I'm going after him right now."
"You're too weak to climb on your horse," Karen said flatly as she put her hands on her hips. "And if you did get in the saddle, you'd fall off on your head. You've got a bad fever from your wound."
"I can manage it. Bring me my shirt and my boots."
"Not till Pa gets back, I won't."
"Then I'll do it myself," he said, swinging his legs off the cot, closing his mind to the waves of pain racing from his left shoulder.
Dog left his place by the potbelly stove and came over to him. Frank braced himself to stand up, leaning forward, placing his feet wide apart.
Suddenly, a wave of swirling black fog enveloped him and he knew he was losing consciousness.
"I told you so," the woman said, sounding as if she said it from far away as everything went dark around him.
--------
*Twenty-one*
Cletus watched Conrad being tied to a sagging hide-bottom chair with coils of lariat rope. A coal-oil lamp lit up the room, illuminating the faces of hard men gathered inside the shack.
"Here's your prize," Cletus said, aiming a thumb at Conrad Browning.
Ned Pine nodded. "What happened to his ear?"
"Diego had to cut it off to keep him quiet. He was makin' too damn much noise."
"What happened to Diego Ponce?"
"I had to kill him."
Victor Vanbergen gave Cletus a one-sided grin. "You can be one mean hombre, Cletus."
Cletus looked around the shack. "I don't take shit off nobody. Now, where's this kid's old man? An' where's my ten thousand dollars?"
"Morgan is here. He's already taken down a few of our men," Ned said. "Then we gave him a little dose of his own bitter medicine."
"He surely ain't out in this snowstorm?"
"He's found himself a hidin' place. Seems like he's got a partner too. There was this rifle shot from up on the valley rim while Morgan was down here."
"Where's Morgan now?"
" Skeeter swears he got him with a rifle shot in the back a few days ago," Victor said, inclining his head toward the man called Skeeter.
"How in the hell am I gonna get my money if the son of a bitch is dead?" Cletus demanded.
"He ain't dead. Skeeter found blood, an' tracks in the snow. Two sets of tracks, so we know his partner, whoever the sumbitch is, helped him hide from us."
"I ain't gonna wait here all spring to get my money, Vic. You said ten thousand dollars for bringin' the kid out of Trinidad to this valley. By God, that's what I've got comin' to me an' you know it."
"We'll find Morgan," Ned promised. "You know damn well he's got the money, much as he cares for this snot-nosed sissy kid of his."
"I ain't gonna wait long," Cletus said. "I damn near froze my ass off gettin' him up here. This wasn't no easy place to find on that map you give me."
"It won't be long," Victor said. "As soon as this snow lets up we'll start lookin' for him and whoever his partner might be. He won't get away from us. There was a helluva lot of blood on that snow where Skeeter got him."
Cletus walked over to the fireplace, warming his hands above the flames. "Pass me one of them jugs of whiskey. An' some of them beans in this here pot. I'm half starved, half froze, an' damn sure thirsty."
He noticed that the kid was shivering. The bandanna covering his missing ear tip was covered with frozen blood. "You might oughta feed this skinny bastard too, so's we can keep him alive until Morgan comes up with the money."
Ned handed Cletus a bottle of Old Rocking Chair. "This'll help warm your innards until this damn spring storm lets up a bit."
Cletus pulled the cork and took a big swallow.
"How come you had to kill Diego?" Victor asked.
"He was gettin' on my nerves," was all Cletus said, drinking again. "Somebody fix me some of them leftover beans. An' put them horses outside in the shed. We rode 'em mighty hard to get here."
One of Ned's gunmen picked up a tin plate to fill it with beans. Another cowboy left by the front door to take care of the horses. But for the moment all eyes were on Cletus.
"Morgan better have that money," he said, gulping down more whiskey to warm his insides.
"He'll have it," Victor said. "He's worth a ton of money, an' this kid is all he's got. He wouldn't have rode all this way without it."
"I've heard about Morgan," Cletus said, taking the plate of beans, resting the bottle on the hearth. "He was supposed to be fast with a gun some years back. Smart too."
"We've got his kid. It changes things," Ned said as he came over to the fire.
"Maybe," Cletus said, filling his mouth with spicy red beans and chunks of salt pork. He glanced at Conrad. "Better feed the little bastard. He ain't got much meat on his bones. If Morgan has the money we'll give him the boy. If he don't, I'll kill the boy and his daddy myself."