Haxan Read Online Free

next.”
    “But why?”
    “If they believed Larsen was a witch they might think you have powers, being his blood daughter. I know it sounds fanciful, this being the nineteenth century and all. But someone like this, well, that might be how they think.”
    So you can help her instead, Marwood. My daughter, I mean.
    “I was going back to the reservation tomorrow. There’s nothing for me here now that Papa is gone.”
    That was probably why they weren’t here already, I thought. They’re off riding for her in the country. I grimaced at my limited options.
    “Maybe you can stay at the Haxan Hotel until I run these men down,” I offered. “But, I have to warn you, that might take time.”
    She released a dry, ironic laugh. “Marshal, Alma Jean Clay won’t let a half-breed sleep under her roof. Anyway, I have no money.”
    “Then you can stay in my office. You’ll be safe there.”
    “That wouldn’t look right, either. People will talk.”
    “I’m not here to make people like me, Magra. I’ve got a job to do as marshal. Tomorrow morning I’m going back to that hackberry tree and see if I can’t cut their trail.”
    “You’re going to track them down? All alone?”
    “It’s what I get paid for.”
    “When you find these men . . . what are you going to do?”
    “Haxan is part of Judge Creighton’s circuit. I know him pretty well. If they’re found guilty they’ll be taken to Santa Fe, or the county seat in Coldwater, and hanged.”
    Her gaze remained fixed on mine. “Yes. That’s what the law says. But what are
you
going to do when you find them?”
    She had a way of looking inside a man and seeing what was hidden.
    “That’s my business,” I told her. “Now, take what you need for a couple of days and nothing else.”
    “I don’t have a horse.”
    “My stallion can carry us both.” I picked up the break-action shotgun and opened the breech. It was filled with buckshot: killing loads.
    “You know how to use this?” I asked.
    “Papa taught me. He never used it for hunting, only protection. He rode guard for Wells Fargo.”
    “So I heard. Too bad he didn’t have it with him when he died.” I snapped the breech closed and handed it back. “Keep it. You’re likely to need it before this is all over.”

    While riding in I asked Magra about her name.
    “I have a foot in both worlds, Marshal,” she said. “One white, the other Navajo. Papa said I should be proud of both, even if neither one wanted me.”
    “He was right about that. The being proud part, I mean.”
    “When Papa saved a little money, and I got old enough, he sent me east to a boarding school.”
    “Where to?”
    “Pennsylvania. They didn’t want me, either, but I learned how to read and write. Now I teach children on the reservation.”
    Her words got me to thinking about my past. What little there was to remember.
    “How did you hear about your father’s death?” I asked. “I found him a couple of hours before I met you. No one in town could have told you in that time.”
    “He came to me in a dream many days ago. He was never one for writing letters. So he night-walked me sometimes to let me know how he was doing. He told me he was going to die soon. I raced back home to see if I could help, but I was too late. The house was empty.”
    She fell silent. We rode on. Somewhere an owl called across the flats.
    “Why don’t you ask me what you want to ask, Marshal?”
    The girl sure had a way of seeing right into you. “All right, I’ll play along. What did your father say about me?”
    “That one day you would come to Haxan, or a man like you, because it was the centre of things. He said a man had to be here, in one way or another.”
    “You believe that story?”
    “I don’t know.” She thought briefly. “You’re here, aren’t you?”
    “I guess I am.”
    “Maybe that means something,” she added.
    We didn’t talk after that. After a while she rested her chin on my shoulder as we rode through