Etta made a frantic gesture for Max to come back up. That much noise might alert someone.

But Max stayed where he was.

As she’d feared, the guard they’d seen sitting under the tree came to see what the noise was about. All he had to do was look up and he’d see Max.

“Get the hell out of here,” he yelled at the pigs and began kicking out at them. One of the big boars didn’t like that, so he rammed the man in the back of his legs.

Etta’s eyes widened. She’d heard too many stories of men falling into pigpens. They didn’t get out.

But this man didn’t fall. Instead, he chased the big boar, yelling that he was going to kill it.

When it was quiet again, Etta looked back at Max. He was removing more stones. Minutes later, she heard Wyatt Earp’s voice.

“Who are you?”

“Urilla’s cousin’s husband. We’re practically family.”

“Reckon so,” Wyatt said.

Max slipped the coiled rope from around his shoulder and pushed it through the bars. “Can you tie this up and get yourself down?”

“I can. I sure want to thank you for this. And I especially want to thank your wife.”

Max smiled. “Not if you want to keep living.”

“That I do.” There was humor in Wyatt’s voice.

Max pulled himself up, using the rope to climb in a way that a gymnast would envy. At the top, he stretched out on his stomach beside Etta to watch the men escape.

Wyatt came out first. When he got to the ground, he turned back to look up at the two of them peering over the roof. He put his hand to his mouth, kissed it vigorously, then threw the kiss to Etta.

She lifted her arm, caught it, and started to put her hand to her mouth. But Max’s look made her put her hand to her cheek.

On the ground, they heard Wyatt’s laughter as he ran away.

Max was looking at Etta in disgust, but she just shrugged. “So sue me.”

He looked back at the ground. There were several men coming down the rope. “Who are they?”

“I don’t know which is which but that one is John Shown, whose—”

“Yeah, got it. His wife played with your man, then she lied on the stand to protect her marriage.”

“You’re very clever to have figured that out.”

“I wasn’t even smart until I married a mystery woman. Since then I’ve spent my life trying to figure out what is going on and what I’m doing. I gave up thinking about the why.”

Etta suppressed her laughter as they looked at the men going down the rope. “Two of them are the Perry brothers, in for counterfeiting and attempting to murder a deputy marshal. The other two were supposed to hang for murder.”

“So youdidwant me to help you save murderers.”

“I’m sure that now they’ll become upstanding citizens and be productive members of society.”

“Or politicians, which is one step up from murderers.” He got up. “We better get out of here. When they find that rope, they’ll know someone helped them.”

“Oh! The blankets. They were supposed to use a rope made of blankets to escape. This will change things. They’ll—”

“Oh hell!”