And then there was that pretty Allison whom Sam had always coveted from afar.He’d envied and hated Tyler when the two courted and were betrothed.
He’d planned carefully to frame Tyler, slowly enticing Randall into the scheme.It wasn’t difficult.Randall was already up to his neck in the payroll robberies and had little choice.But Randall was weak; he’d never understood the violence that was necessary to get rich, and he’d been guilt-stricken when a number of his troops had been killed in the last robbery.McClary, though, had never let him off the hook, regaling him with word pictures of how it felt to hang, what it was like in prison.They could push the blame on Tyler.The Texas captain was strong.Tyler could take it.Tyler was a Southerner, in any event.A traitor to his own people.
Jack Randall closed his eyes as he remembered Tyler’s punishment ten years ago.Hell, he could never forget it.It haunted his nights, as well as his days.He could never forget Tyler’s vivid accusing eyes as the man was branded.Randall had known then that he’d finally made a mistake he couldn’t rectify or slide away from.
He’d panicked when McClary had told him that Tyler was getting too interested in them, that they would soon be exposed and then both of them might well hang.And to his own eternal damnation, he had listened, had agreed to McClary’s plan to frame the young captain.
Randall should have just deserted and taken off, run as he’d always done before when suspicion came too close to him.But McClary had said he could solve their problems, and Randall had actually believed that because of Tyler’s heroic military record he would be shown mercy that Randall couldn’t expect.He’d justified it all in his own mind, just as he had justified so many things.
He’d even considered confessing after the court-martial, but a lifetime of survival stopped him.He was a coward.He’d always been a coward.Even his acclaimed bravery when a Kansas town was raided by Reb guerrillas was a lie.He had organized everyone else to fight so he wouldn’t have to.He hadn’t even fired a shot.But he had been elected an officer, and he hadn’t been able to refuse it.He’d been delighted when his troop was assigned to a backwater post, assigned to organize supply routes.Perhaps one reason he’d agreed to McClary’s scheme was Randall’s resentment of Rafe Tyler.The man was everything Randall had wanted to be but wasn’t and could never be.
He’d lost Sara, the only really good thing in his life, because he’d always taken the easy path, and that often meant taking money that was not his.With Tyler’s conviction Randall had lost the last of any self-respect that remained.
He’d tried to make amends in his own way.He couldn’t help Tyler, not without risking his own life, and his guilt wasn’t quite that strong, but he vowed never to steal again.After his release from the army, he’d found this fine valley in Colorado and bought land, leaving the army and McClary behind.He’d tried to get Sara back, but she’d read an account of the court-martial and had realized he must have been responsible.She’d asked that he never write again and not to send money.He’d kept doing both, hoping against hope that she would understand he’d changed, but she never responded, and he hadn’t had the courage to go see her, to see that sad contempt in her eyes.He had promised so many years earlier when she had left that he’d not follow her; it was one of the few promises he’d ever kept.
He’d tried to help others in this valley, had donated money to the building of a church and school to make up in some way for what he had done, but now he knew his past wouldn’t go away.
He thought about the robberies of his own payroll.The first one occurred six weeks ago, and there had been another since then.Now that he knew Rafe Tyler had been released from prison, he realized Tyler wouldn’t stop until he’d ruined the man he believed primarily responsible for his conviction.The look that day in Tyler’s eyes had promised as much.
And now McClary had appeared again, the third visit in as many years.Each time he’d stayed for at least a month, wandering the mountains.Randall suspected McClary was wanted by the law and used him as a temporary refuge in addition to demanding money.
Randall was already short of cash, having invested so much in land and cattle, and Tyler had evidently discovered his weakest spot.Now McClary was trying to drain him further.Jack didn’t know how to handle either problem.
He looked at McClary.God, Randall disliked the man.But he feared him too.McClary knew too much about him, and Randall couldn’t just chuck him off the Circle R as he would like to do.McClary was smirking, actually enjoying the fact that Tyler was apparently here.But then Randall realized only too well the former sergeant had hated the captain.
Randall suspected that was why McClary had chosen this particular time to reappear, that he had kept track of Tyler and had seized this moment to turn the screws on both Randall and Tyler.
“What do you want?”
McClary leaned back.“You say you don’t have any money.So I have another suggestion.”
Randall eyed him warily.It wouldn’t be a suggestion at all, he knew.
“We know it’s Tyler taking your payrolls,” McClary said.“I think his activities should be expanded to some of the mining claims around here, perhaps a few more stage robberies.Apparently, he’s been most selective so far, from what I hear.”He gave Randall a wolfish grin.“Very undemocratic of him.”
Randall felt as if he would puke out his guts.“I won’t help you.”
“Yes, you will.You’ll find out what I need to know, and I’ll stay at the Circle R.”
“No!I won’t help you frame him again.”
“We won’t be framing him at all.He’s already robbed the stage twice.He’s an unrepentant outlaw,” McClary said smugly.“And if you don’t cooperate, I’ll drop a few rumors here and there, maybe even a telegram to Washington.…”
“You would be implicating yourself.”
“I know how to hide.Do you?Are you really ready to give this up?”
Randall wasn’t.He still had hopes of bringing Sara here.He had built this place, and it had been the first time he’d accomplished anything honestly, even if the foundation was built on someone else’s back.But once under way, the Circle R had flourished under his management.He’d discovered he was good at ranching, and he relished the respect it brought him.He’d never really felt he was good at anything before, which was one of the reasons he’d stolen.Jack Randall had never thought he could make it on his own, that he was smart enough.He’d simply thought he was good enough to fool people for a short period of time, as his father had before him.His father had been the consummate confidence man, until he’d been caught and killed by an enraged mark.Jack Randall had been fourteen at the time, raised with the philosophy that anyone easily parted from his money had no right to it.
He didn’t say a word as he thought of all this, and McClary took his silence as consent.
“It’s settled then, old friend,” McClary said, emphasizing the last two words as he watched Randall’s lips tighten.
“You can stay here,” Randall practically bit out.“But I won’t participate in any … robberies, or blaming them on Tyler.”
“Don’t you want to see him caught?”
Deep in his bones, Randall didn’t.He damn well didn’t have the stomach for it.He’d done enough to Rafe Tyler and preferred to outwit him rather than help apprehend him.He would use different routes for his payrolls.Different precautions.Perhaps Tyler would decide he’d had enough and disappear.It was a weak hope, but it was all Randall had at the moment.
