After learning about Hale’s suspicious activities, White and his group of Cowboys investigate him. They discover that Hale set fire to his own land for insurance money. They find out that Hale has tried to buy the headright of an Osage man, even though such a purchase is illegal. Hale believes that enough pressure from a white man would change the law. When he cannot buy the headright, Hale pressures the Osage man to get a life insurance policy in which Hale is the main benefactor; Hale goes so far as to create fabricated loans to the man to ensure that Hale is the legal benefactor of the life insurance policy. This man soon becomes one of the 24 dead Osage. Hale even jokingly admits that he would kill this man for the policy, and soon after, the man turns up dead. Hale then serves as a pallbearer at his funeral and is never questioned in the murder investigation.

After Hale fails to buy the headright, White realizes a sinister pattern. After the death of all three of her sisters and her mother, Mollie became the benefactor of her entire family's wealth. As her husband and guardian, Ernest now controls Mollie’s family’s wealth under Uncle William’s direct influence.