“Don’t I know it. So.” Chisholm eyed him with speculation. “I heard about the fire. Hays says you’re spending a lot of time over at the Haymakers’.”
“They need a hand.” Crockett took a bite of the cookie and chewed the sweet, spicy confection.
“You going to join us in marital bliss anytime soon?”
Carefully, Crockett picked up his mug and sipped the hot coffee, then set it down. “What makes you say that?”
“You like Jane, don’t you?”
“She’s nice.”
“Yeah, but…”
“What?”
Chisholm smiled tightly and picked up his mug. “Nothing. Just … her pa.”
“Oh, yeah, Boyd’s something to consider.”
“I mean, having him for a father-in-law…”
“You’re gettin’ a bit hasty,” Crockett said and took another bite of cookie.
“Well, the year’s waning.”
Crockett eyed him keenly. “Why do you think Pa told us all to get married? Don’t you think that’s odd?”
“Sure, but it’s not the first odd thing Pa’s done. Bringing breeding stock over from Spain—everyone for miles around thought that was odd, when we’ve got so many cattle here to choose from. Pa spent a fortune on that. But it paid off.”
“So, what’s the payoff for us boys getting married all of a sudden?”
“For Pa? Don’t know. Peace of mind, maybe?” Chisholm ran a hand over several days’ growth of beard. “I know I need to shave, though.”
“Can you come to my room for a minute?” Crockett asked. “There’s something I want to ask you about.”
“Sure.”
Crockett drained his coffee mug and stood. He and Chisholm headed upstairs, passing Annie on the way.
“Glad you’re back, Chisholm,” she called over her shoulder with a smile.
“Thanks, sis.”
In his room, Crockett opened his bottom dresser drawer and took out an old biscuit tin. He opened it and fished among the fishing sinkers, odd coins, brass shell casings, and horseshoe nails to pull out the banknote Jane had entrusted to him.
“Here we go. What do you think of this?”
Chisholm frowned and took the bill so he could study it closely. “Where on earth did you get this?”
Crockett hesitated only a moment. “You can’t tell anyone, all right?”
Chisholm nodded.
“Jane gave it to me. She found it in a cave on their place, along with a whole lot more.”
“How much more?”
“A total of five hundred dollars.”
Chisholm whistled softly. “That’d make a big difference to the Haymakers about now.”
“I know,” Crockett said. “But they can’t spend it, can they?”
“Doubt it. Not in Texas, anyway. I don’t know if it’s still legal tender or not. Before the war it would have been, but…” He shook his head, looking at the creased twenty-dollar bill. “Did she say how it got there?”
“She didn’t know, but she was careful not to tell her pa. I don’t even think she told Ben. Just asked me to try to find out anything I could.”
Chisholm’s eyes took on a faraway look. “Well, the last I heard about any quantity of Louisiana Bank bills was when the chief ranger told me about the robbery at the State Treasury in ’65.”
“I remember that,” Crockett said.
“A lot of the stolen money was never recovered. Seventeen thousand was in coin, but there was also eight hundred in Louisiana banknotes.”
“You don’t say. And they never caught the robbers?”
Chisholm shook his head. “They shot one man that night, at the treasury building. The rest got away. But the Rangers were disbanded during the war, and the locals weren’t up to tracking them down.”
“What should I tell Jane? I mean, if Boyd knew about the money in the cave, this could implicate him in the robbery. And I don’t know who else would put it there. He’s owned that land at least twenty years, probably more.”
“I’ll ask one of the older Rangers.”
Crockett’s chest tightened as he imagined a posse storming the Haymaker ranch and Jane’s reaction. “You won’t tell them who has it, will you?”
“I’ll be discreet.”
“Thanks, brother. I might have known lazy old Boyd Haymaker was involved in something like that. But why didn’t he spend the money?”
Chisholm held up one hand. “Wait a second. We don’t know he was involved. Innocent until proven guilty, remember?”
“You’re right. I shouldn’t let my experience with Boyd color my thoughts on this money thing. But you should see him with his kids. He treats them like slaves. I wanted to paste him one this morning when he started ordering Jane around.”
“Take it easy,” Chisholm said. “I’ll see if I can find out anything before the house-raising tomorrow.”
Crockett shook his head. “You just got home. I don’t want to put you to work again already.”
“Maybe I’ll go to town in the morning and join you afterward at Boyd’s place.”
“That sounds good. Thanks.”
“And as to why he didn’t spend the money over the last nine years, if he knew about it, well, anyone local would probably get suspicious if he tried to spend a banknote like that.”