The tag was stamped with two letters and a number.
"Matthew Bennett."
"Matthew's."
Ethan's eyes found the matching locker.
"27. I've seen this before."
A slip of paper was tucked under the lock. Clara snatched it open. Her face went pale.
"The warning said not to go."
Ethan took the paper from her hand. Read it once. Folded it into his vest.
"That's why we're going."
"What?"
He slid the key into the lock. It turned with a click that sounded, in that moment, like thunder.
Inside lay a leather ledger, thick with water stains. Clara opened it with trembling fingers. A page near the front was covered in cramped, hurried handwriting.
"That's Matthew's handwriting. He knew someone was changing the land records."
"You know it?"
"Used to guide freight through there."
He pointed at a hand-drawn map in the margin, a bend in a creek marked with a small cross. Clara flipped the pages faster. Then slower.
"Six is missing. Page six is missing."
Somebody had cut it out. Cleanly. With a razor.
"Page six."
Ethan's hand slid toward his gun. Across the depot, a man in a gray coat had stopped walking.
"We're not alone. Stay close."
He guided Clara toward the baggage doors, the baby tucked tight.
"Stay here."
He slipped back through the crowd. Minutes later, he returned with a torn scrap of paper, one clean edge, no more than a few words long.
"Someone wants us to know part of it."
The scrap held a single place name, inked in Matthew's careful hand.
"Stone Creek."
Stone Creek wasn't a town. It was a handful of crooked buildings and a land office with its shutters closed.
But a thin, nervous man in spectacles was waiting on the porch, clutching a satchel to his chest like a shield.
"Ethan Cole?"
"Matthew Bennett sent me."
The man didn't smile. He handed Ethan a sealed envelope and glanced over both shoulders.
"You opened locker 27. Read this before you trust anyone."
Ethan broke the seal. Clara read over his arm. She went very still.
"The bookkeeper."
The thin man nodded. Clara kept staring at the page.
"What did he write?"
But before anyone could answer, a new voice rolled across the street. Calm. Cultured. And colder than the creek.
"Voss?"
Gideon Voss stepped out of the shadows of the stable, flanked by four men with rifles. He wore a gray coat and a pleasant expression.
"He knows we found the ledger."
"That's our answer."
Ethan pushed Clara and the baby behind him. Voss walked toward them slowly, as if there were all the time in the world.
Then Ethan looked at the land office door. A brass lock hung open. Fresh scratches around the keyhole.
"That wasn't there yesterday. We're late."
Clara's voice was barely a whisper.
"What was in them?"
Voss smiled.
"Hmm. Only reliable water for miles. He wouldn't sell."
"Matthew always was thorough."
Voss's smile thinned. He held up a document bearing a signature and an official seal.
"Your records?"
"My company, my records."
"Records don't tell the whole story."
Voss's finger tapped the paper.
"Matthew signed this."
Clara leaned in. Studied the ink. Then lifted her eyes.