Chapter One The Returning Cavalryman

Jack had bought it with three months' wages for his brother's twelfth birthday. William had put it on and told everyone he would ride all the way across Montana one day. Jack closed his hand around it. His palm hurt. Not from the spur. From something deeper. He opened the journal. The first page carried his father's handwriting, steady and clean like the hand that had held reins. "If Jack returns, tell him not to trust the sheriff of Hope, not to trust railroad contracts, and not to trust Elias Crowe." Jack's eyes went cold. Elias Crowe. He knew the name. Crowe was Titan Railroad Company's western agent, a man in a black suit with a gold watch chain, always followed by lawyers, surveyors, and gunmen.