“How many copies exist?”
Elias smiled.
“Enough.”
Marsh looked up.
“Good.”
“You believe us?”
“I believe numbers.”
Mara said:
“Numbers can lie.”
Marsh looked at her.
“So can maps.”
She nodded.
He smiled slightly.
“Then I believe inconsistencies.”
Better.
Marsh sent telegraph messages to Prescott.
Requested federal land review.
Asked Judge Ward to issue temporary orders preventing further sale of listed parcels.
That was the first official action.
It also alerted Harrow.
By sunset, Victor Harrow knew.
By midnight, men were looking for Elias throughout Tucson.
Frank wanted them to remain inside the courthouse.
Mara refused.
“Too obvious.”
Tomás agreed.
They split again.
Samuel left with the ledger.
Tomás carried deed copies.
Frank retained sworn statements.
Mara took Daniel’s notebook.
Elias objected.
“Why you?”
“Because Harrow searches you first.”
“He’ll search you too.”
“He thinks I am only helping you.”
“Only?”
Mara looked at him.
“Men like Harrow see what they expect.”
Elias nodded.
“He expects me to be the threat.”
“Yes.”
“And you?”
“The woman beside him.”
Her voice carried contempt.
“Useful.”
They hid that night inside the stable loft of a Mexican freight company owned by Tomás’s cousin.
Elias lay on hay.
Mara sat beside the opening.
“You need sleep.”
“You say that frequently.”
“You ignore it frequently.”
He watched her silhouette.
“What happens if Red Willow comes back?”
She looked at him.
“Water?”
“Yes.”
“My family may use it again.”
“Will you?”
“I do not know.”
“Why?”
“It is not 1878.”
Elias understood.
Restoration did not rewind life.
People had moved.
Children grew elsewhere.
Some died.
A legal victory could restore access.
Not lost years.
“I keep imagining fixing it.”
Mara looked at him.
“Why?”
“Because I helped break it.”
“You cannot fix everything.”
“That is convenient.”
“No.”
Her voice sharpened.
“It is responsibility.”
He frowned.
Mara continued.
“If you make fixing everything your goal, eventually you will decide other people must accept the repair you choose.”
Elias thought.
“You sound like your mother.”
“Yes.”
“Terrifying.”
“Yes.”
He smiled.
Then asked:
“What do you want?”
Mara looked toward the city lights.
“From Red Willow?”
“From any of this.”
She took a long time.
“I want Harrow unable to decide whose memory counts.”
Elias stared.
“That’s not land.”
“It becomes land.”
“What else?”
“I want my father’s name on the record.”
“Not yours?”
Mara looked at him.
“My name is already mine.”
He smiled.
“Anything else?”