“Mine.”
“Not Cain’s?”
“He doesn’t even know I’m here.”
George Lenihan surveyed the farm outbuildings and the small house. “You won’t find anything.”
“I hope I won’t.”
The son looked even more like the father when concern shadowed his face. “He’s a good man. I worry about him. People will believe anything sometimes. That’s why I stay on the farm here. I’ve had enough of people to last me a lifetime.”
Fargo wondered how much George’s dislike of people came from the woman who’d left him.
“I want to believe your father, George.”
“Why?”
“Maybe because I’m like you. I believe that people will believe anything if they hear it often enough. You start accusing somebody of something and pretty soon everybody around begins to claim it’s true.”
“That’s what’s happening to my pa.”
“Well, then let me look around and we’ll prove that they’re wrong.”
The son shrugged. “There’s a collie roaming around here. She’s very friendly. She won’t give you any trouble.”
“A friendly dog,” Fargo said. “Imagine that.”
“Where do you want to start?”
“In the house.”
“Pa and I ain’t exactly housekeepers.”
“I’ll probably get over the shock.”
“This pisses me off.”
“Figured it would. But maybe it’ll help your father in the long run.”
“Yeah, sure it will.”
The wood-framed house was pretty orderly considering there was no woman living in it. The furniture was old, most likely bought by Lenihan’s wife, running to flowered curtains, doily-covered furniture and numerous framed religious paintings on the wall. The place hadn’t been dusted in a long time and the air was sour with cooking smells. Fargo spent most of his time going through the rolltop desk and six wooden boxes that were stuffed with everything from pans that had been burned through to old clothes that could no longer be patched up. He found nothing.
The collie was waiting for him at the back door. She was a handsome golden girl. Fargo had no doubt that she could rip open a human body anytime she chose to but he enjoyed the fact that when he bent down she let him pet her. She had restored his faith in the canine world.
George Lenihan had gone back to his haying near the fence running in back of the barn. From what Fargo could see, the crops were typical for this part of Colorado—onions, sugar beets, vegetables.
He headed downslope to the barn, the affable collie following him. The haymow door was open, allowing light into the shadowy interior. Smells of hay, horse manure, damp earth greeted him. A buggy stood to one side of the barn while farming tools lined the opposite wall. There were four stalls for horses and a makeshift bench for carpentry. Saws, hammers, a keg of nails surrounded butt ends of lumber that had been sawn.
As with the house, he had no idea what he was looking for, just some vague notion that he needed to find something physical to connect Ned Lenihan with the robbery.
The collie stayed with him. During his search, he took several opportunities to pet her. She was a good companion. Beautiful face and such clean gold and white fur.
The first half hour turned up nothing more interesting than a few stacks of yellowed magazines, a small box of toys that had probably been George’s, a few old saddles. The only interesting items were in a box—equipment for gold mining, a sluice box, pans, a pair of pickaxes. Fargo wondered if Ned had gotten caught up in the gold rush and then the silver rush that had brought so many people to the Territory. Everybody who could wield a shovel had gone crazy for sudden riches—and were still doing so. But Lenihan struck Fargo as sensible. He might have spent a few foolish weeks or months in the mountains but he couldn’t see Lenihan spending any more time than that.
Then he noticed that the box with mining equipment in it wobbled slightly. It was sitting on something that made it tilt. He lifted it up and saw that there was fresh earth underneath it. Somebody had dug a hole and buried something in it.
Fargo got down on his haunches. The collie was right next to him. He could smell her hot breath. She was as interested in the loose earth as he was. He started digging with his hands. His first surprise was how shallow the hole was. His second surprise was what it contained.
He got to his feet again. The thing in his hand dripped fresh dirt. He hadn’t bothered to brush it off. He walked out of the barn and into the mountain sunlight. He wasn’t sure what to think. If a man was in a hurry he wouldn’t have had time to bury it deep. But why on his own property would he be in a hurry? On the other hand, being that it was his own property, he probably wouldn’t have to care about it being buried deep. Especially since it was in the barn. Especially since it was covered up by a box.
Then there was another question. Why would a man keep this at all? What good would it do him?
He didn’t like any of this. Maybe he was somehow sorry for Ned Lenihan and coming up with all these questions just to exonerate him. Maybe it was just as simple as it looked. He’d lifted up the box and found the fresh earth and dug it up and found the thing. The thing that would lead any reasonable detective, Pinkerton or not, to conclude that Ned Lenihan had been involved in the robbery for sure and very possibly in the murders.
He walked over to the fence. The collie trotted alongside him. He cupped a hand to his mouth and yelled for George Lenihan. Lenihan stopped his haying, planted his pitchfork in the earth and came over.
Long before he reached the fence, Lenihan saw what Fargo was holding. When he reached the Trailsman, he said, “What’s that?”
But he knew what it was. And he knew what it meant, too.
Fargo held it up. “It’s got the name of the bank stenciled right on it.” The bag was the size of a regular satchel. It had a lock attached to a leather section at the top. The lock had been shot off.
“Where’d you find it?”
“You know what it is and you know where I found it.”
“My pa didn’t put that there.”
“Somebody did.”
George Lenihan’s arms came across the fence and tried to grab Fargo’s throat. “You sonofabitch! You brought that with you and then claimed to have found it in the barn!”
Fargo might have felt sorry for him if the man’s hands weren’t struggling to strangle him. Fargo hit him hard with the heavy bag, knocking him off-balance, sending him stumbling backward and finally falling to the ground on his ass.
“He didn’t do it! My pa didn’t do it!”
The beautiful collie started barking sharply, as if in sympathy.
Fargo dropped the bag and went over and offered George Lenihan his hand. Lenihan slapped it away. “You put it there. You had it on your horse when you came in. You put it there when I was out haying.”
“You know better than that.”
“Do I? This whole town has turned against him.” He put a palm flat against the grassy soil and started the process of pushing himself to his feet. “Cain sent you here to do this. And now you’ll take my pa in, won’t you?”
“I won’t have any choice. I found this in his barn.”
Lenihan’s shoulders slumped in defeat. “Don’t you see what’s going on here, Fargo? All right, say you didn’t do it. But don’t you see that somebody else planted it? Somebody who wants to ruin my pa.”
“Who would that be?”
“Who do you think? Who’s been chasing after Amy all these years?”
“Cain says he’s given up on her.”
“Cain says, Cain says. Cain says a lot of things and half of them are damned lies. Think about it. He sets up the robbery, he gets all the money after he kills the three boys and now he gets to destroy my father. Maybe he can’t have Amy but he can get the satisfaction of seeing my father hang.”