Chapter 5 - The Barrel's Secret
The heavy oak cellar door rattled violently as something massive slammed against the outside, followed by the sound of thick iron chains being wrapped around the exterior handle. Caleb cursed, throwing his shoulder against the wood with all his might, but the door held fast, reinforced by heavy iron brackets.
"Save your energy," the sheriff panted, sinking back down onto a crate of rotting apples. "Once they lock the root cellar, nobody gets out of Red Creek alive unless the debt is paid in full."
Caleb turned away from the door, his chest heaving with suppressed rage and adrenaline. He lifted the tallow candle off the shelf, casting flickering, distorted shadows across the damp stone walls.
"What debt?" Caleb demanded, stepping close to the sheriff and grabbing him by the collar of his blood-stained vest. "My family didn't borrow anything from any syndicate in Denver. We worked our own land until men with guns burned it to the ground!"
The sheriff let out a bitter, humorless laugh that ended in a wet cough. "You think the syndicate only takes gold, Caleb? They take time. They take memories. Look at the back wall behind those whiskey barrels. Go on, look!"
Caleb shoved the sheriff aside and strode toward the dark recess of the root cellar. He kicked aside a pile of empty crates, revealing a hidden alcove carved deep into the natural rock of the cavern wall. Inside the alcove sat a second wooden barrel, identical to the one outside the saloon, but this one was sealed tightly with melted red wax around the rim.
Using the blade of his hunting knife, Caleb hacked away at the hardened wax, prying the heavy wooden lid loose with a sharp crack.
He held the candle lower, peering down into the barrel. Instead of rocks, the barrel was filled to the brim with hundreds of small, folded slips of yellowed paper, each one tied with a lock of human hair. Caleb reached in blindly, pulling out the paper closest to the top. He unfolded it by the flickering candlelight.
Written in his own handwriting—a handwriting he hadn't used since he was a teenager on the Missouri farm—was a ledger entry detailing the exact date of his mother's birth, her maiden name, and a promissory note signed with a drop of his own blood.
"You signed it when you were six years old, Caleb," the sheriff said softly from the shadows. "When your father made the deal to save the homestead from the drought. Only, the homestead wasn't saved. It was just leased."
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Before Caleb could absorb the paralyzing truth, the wooden floorboards directly above them gave way with a deafening crack, and two small, dirty pairs of yellow shoes appeared in the ceiling joists.
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