Ransom Canyon. Jodi Thomas

whole town.”

      The very proper baker hit him with her empty banana-bread pan. Crumbs showered over him, but Leo didn’t seem to notice. He just grinned and winked at her because he knew he’d flustered her. “She’s Baptist,” he whispered. “Never confesses to a thing she’s done all her life. Taught home economics down the hall from me, and I can tell you there were some wild parties in that food lab.”

      She raised the pan as if planning to hit him again, but decided to laugh.

      Yancy studied the circle of people. “How many of you taught school?”

      To his surprise all but one raised his hand. A tall, frail man in a black suit, wearing hearing aids in both ears, finally lifted his hand to join the others. “I think I qualify, even though I was the principal. I’m Mr. Halls. Many a student made a joke about my name.” His announcement was a bit loud. “A man’s name sets his course at birth.”

      They all nodded as if he were the bravest among the brave. Battle-scarred veterans of decades of fighting their grand war against ignorance might have honed them, but age now left them crippled and alone. One to a house. No husbands or wives surviving, apparently. But they had each other. Somehow in the middle of nowhere, they’d found their place, like a flock of birds huddled together on a tiny lake.

      When the two church vans arrived, most of the group climbed on. Only Leo, Cap and the principal remained in the circle with Yancy. When the principal went inside to get his cap, Yancy had to ask, “Isn’t he going to church? He’s all dressed up.”

      Cap shook his head. “He dresses like that every day. Old habits are hard to break. He’s almost deaf, so whoever sits on his right tends to yell.”

      When Mr. Halls returned wearing his very proper hat, he didn’t seem to notice they were still talking about him.

      Yancy leaned back in his metal chair and relaxed. This is it, he thought, my river of peace that prison preacher used to talk about. They might not know it, but these old folks were offering him the bridge to cross from one life to another. He listened as they told him of Crossroads and their lives growing up, of growing old in the Panhandle of Texas, where canyons cut across the flat land and sunsets spread out over miles rich in history wild and deep.

      Finally when one of the old men got around to asking what he was doing here in Crossroads, Yancy pointed to the post office and explained that he was looking for a job.

      “I’m traveling light. Just a pack.” As he said the words, he stared at the steps and noticed his pack wasn’t where he’d left it.

      “My pack!” he yelled as he stood and ran toward the post office.

      By the time the three old men caught up to him, Yancy had been around the little building twice. The pack was nowhere to be found. No one was around. He’d been in sight of the post office all morning, and he hadn’t seen a soul walk past. The only person he’d observed stop had been the guy in the pickup, and he’d been long gone before Yancy walked across the street.

      “I’ve been robbed,” he said, more surprised that a crime had been committed against him before he’d had time to commit one himself than he was worried about his few possessions.

      “Everything I had was in that pack.” He didn’t mention that most of it was stuff the prison had given him. A toothbrush. All his socks and underwear. The bloody shirt he’d worn when he was arrested and a deck of cards he’d spent hours marking.

      “This is serious,” Cap said, passing like an elderly, short General Patton before his troops. “This is a crime right in the middle of town. This is outrageous.”

      Leo didn’t seem near as upset. “What’d you have, sonny?”

      Yancy didn’t move. He couldn’t tell them how little he had. They’d probably figure out he’d come from prison. All he’d walked out with were his goals. “I had a good winter coat made of wool,” he lied. “And a great pair of boots. A shaving kit in a leather carrier and three hundred dollars.”

      All three old men patted him on the shoulder. They all agreed that that was a great deal to lose.

      Cap spoke first. “Come on home with me, son. We’ll call the sheriff, then you can join the few of us who are lucky enough not to have family dragging us to Sunday dinner. Mrs. Ollie always cooks for us.”

      Yancy was getting into his lie now. “I don’t have the money to make it to Arizona. A friend of mine said if I could make it to Flagstaff I might have a job waiting.”

      They patted him again. “Don’t you worry,” Mr. Halls said. “We’ll take up a collection if we don’t find who did this. And do you know, my daughter gave me a winter coat that’s too big for me. You can have it. I got half a dozen in the closet. She sends either that or two sweaters every Christmas.”

      “Is your coat wool?” Yancy asked. After all, it had to match his dream.

      “It is,” Mr. Halls said, “and if I remember right, it’s got one of them heavy zip-out linings.”

      Yancy tried not to sound too excited. “I think it’ll do, thanks.”

      “Don’t thank me. It’s the least I can do for a man who was robbed right under our noses.”

      “I can cover the shaving kit,” Leo added. “I have four I’ve never used. If you need gloves, I got half a dozen you can try on. Can’t seem to convince my daughter-in-law that I don’t like gloves. Why waste time on gloves when you got pockets, I always say, but I swear that woman never listens. Since my birthday is in November, she mails gloves every year. Lucky I wasn’t born in July or I’d be getting a swimsuit.”

      Yancy choked down a laugh. This was better than stealing. These folks were giving him more than he could carry off. “One thing, Mr. Leo, I’d rather not call the sheriff. You see, it’s my religion to forgive any wrong done me.”

      Leo swore. “Hell, I knew you was one of them van riders all along. Well, if you won’t consider converting to my religion of superstition, I’ll have to be tolerant of yours. But I got to tell you, son, that forgive-and-forget kind of thinking will lead you down a penniless path.”

      Yancy did his best to look thoughtful. “I’m set on my faith, Mr. Leo. For all I know, whoever stole my pack thought he needed it more than I did.” Yancy didn’t add that was usually his philosophy when he robbed someone.

      Leo saw the light. “You’re a good man, Yancy Grey, and we’d all be lucky to call you a friend. It’ll be our pleasure to help you out with anything you need. We might even offer you some handyman work around this place to help you get back on your feet.”

      “Thanks,” Yancy managed as he started a list of things that he’d forgotten were in his pack. A watch. A new wallet. “I’d be thankful for any work. I’ve been laid off for a while.”

      Everyone jumped as Mr. Halls shouted, “A man on a mission is a man who can’t be bested.”

      Leo and Cap nodded, but Yancy had a feeling the old principal was walking the halls in his mind reading quotes he’d seen along the walls of the high school.

CHAPTER FIVE

      Lauren

      THE COUNTY HOSPITAL had its own kind of sounds. Like echoes in Ransom Canyon and the lone clank of a windmill turning on the prairie or the rustle of paper in empty school hallways, hospital noise was unique.

      The place rumbled like a train station. Phones rang, pagers beeped, and machines hummed and ticked like the final clock measuring someone’s life away.

      There was a rush about the people in white one moment and a stillness the next. Lauren had no idea what time it was. She’d seen a clock not long after she’d been wheeled in that said 2:00 a.m., but that had been hours ago.

      In a hospital, only