Under a Painted Sky

by Stacey Lee

  “And to the rest of you, you raised me three feet higher at a time when I needed the boost. I’m ever grateful to you.”

  “Oh, you mean by giving you a horse,” says Cay, beaming. I dip my head at him.

  As I put down my cup, I glance at West’s boots, and again picture Sophie tangled up in him. Everything turns bright and blurry as I fail at being a boy once more. My violin calm vanishes.

  “Thank you for this, Andy, but I’m not hungry.” My voice is suddenly too high.

  “What’s biting you, Sammy?” Cay asks.

  “Nothing.”

  “Then why are you—?”

  “Go mind the bees in your own bonnet,” Peety cuts in.

  I spy a fortress of sagebrush a hundred yards out, perfect for hiding dark thoughts. “Chinese boys like to be alone on their birthday.”

  Halfway to the sagebrush, a voice startles me.

  “Chinito,” says Peety. The man moves as quiet as a sunset. People born under the sign of the Rat are known for their extreme stealth. He hands me a bow and a quiver with ten arrows. “We got this at the fort for your cumpleaños.”

  I swab my face with my sleeve and take the gift with both hands, as is the Chinese way to show respect. Father never received a gift without giving something in return, a bag of candied ginger, or an étude on his cello. I have nothing, and even if I did, it would not be enough. I owe these boys more than I will ever be able to repay.

  Peety shifts from foot to foot and rubs the stubble on his cheeks. Though I want to fling myself at the vaquero and sob into his solid shoulders, I just hug the quiver.

  “Peety, this is the nicest—” I can’t finish my sentence. I wipe my eyes and take a deep breath to get the tremors out of my voice. “Muchas gracias, mi amigo.”

  He nods. “You want to try it out?”

  The landscape around is arrayed in black and gray shadows, though the sky is putting on a light show for us. “It’s too dark, but we could shoot the stars.”

  His face pinches, and he slips his hands into his pockets. Then he blows out a lungful of air. “Someone stole mi hermana when she was only five.”

  His sister? Esme. “Oh, Peety.”

  “I taking her to buy sandals, getting mad ’cause she so slow. I let go her hand, and when I look back, she not there. They took her because I no looking back, and she had no shoes.”

  “Who took her?”

  “Salvajes. They steal children away to sell them.” He shakes his head as if to clear it of bad thoughts.

  “I’m sorry, Peety.”

  He nods. “She love horses, always say she want to be a horse when she grows up. So, I decide to become wrangler, because I always looking for her.”

  Suddenly, the vinegar pickling my heart loses its bite.

  We glance upward. Everywhere I look, there are stars and more stars, coalescing like white dust.

  “Sometimes I think she is gone from this world. If it’s true, that means she’s a star now, because that’s what happens to the innocents. That is why you cannot shoot the stars.”

  • • •

  Over the next week, we pass hundreds of wagons grinding deep ruts into the soft sandstone outcroppings. Andy asks me why I’m so mopey, and when I don’t tell her, says, “When you’re ready, I’m all ears.”

  I try to forget what happened with West by concentrating on finding Mr. Trask. Andy keeps a lookout as well. Who knows? He might be right under my thumb. I examine everyone who wears trousers, perfecting the art of moving my eyes without moving my head. Mr. Trask, as captain, will likely lead the caravan, but I don’t overlook anyone.

  When the trail empties, I rest my eyes on the prairie grass. It shimmers as we wade through its waves, each blade tossing back the rays of the sun. We pass white-tipped Laramie Peak, an orange sunset at its crown.

  “Dig in for a second, boys,” breathes Cay. “My eyeballs are full.”

  We stare at the splendor in silence.

  Lately, after giving halfhearted language and math lessons in the evenings, I wander off by myself. I keep my hands busy, shooting snails with my bow and arrow, and splicing Andy’s baubles into a stronger bracelet made of rope.

  When I return to our fire, West is usually gone, which makes things easier for me when I curl up.

  But I am always awake when he drops quietly beside me, not realizing I excel at feigning dead. Another survival instinct, I imagine.

  31

  AFTER THREE MORE DAYS OF TRAVEL, INDEPENDENCE Rock towers before us, a giant sandstone shoe that got stuck in mud and was left behind. Clusters of sagebrush ring the landmark, and wagons sprawl over the landscape, at least two hundred schooners amassed at the midpoint of the Oregon Trail.

  Farther up the trail, the boys play follow the leader, a game they use to keep the remuda sharp.

  Andy rides beside me. She shows me the neat row of numbers she wrote in our journal. “Ten more days ’til the Parting, in case you changed your mind.”

  “I haven’t changed my mind. According to my estimates, the pass to the Yellow River lies at least two days’ ride from here. You recall, the one called Calamity Cutoff, in case you want to change your mind.”

  She snorts, then jams the journal back into her saddlebag. “Nope.”

  The boys spin their horses around and walk backward. They are out of earshot, but I can sense West’s eyes upon me.

  “You ever gonna tell me what happened with West?” Andy asks, watching me.

  Ten days have passed since La Disgrâce, what I’ve started calling the French party. My wound has healed, partially. I can at least recount the mortifying events without shedding a tear.

  After I tell her, Andy tilts her chin toward me and tsks her tongue. “Lots of things surprise me, but that ain’t one of them. And so you know, what West did, it don’t mean a thing. You just confused him, so he had to test his rooster in the ring.”

  She might be right, but it still fails to cheer me. I don’t understand the constant need to prove one’s manhood, as if it is always on the verge of slipping away. We never need to prove our womanhood.

  “You miss being a girl?” I ask her.

  “Not as much as I thought I would. Just feels like when I’m being a boy, I can cut a wider path.”

  I nod, knowing exactly what she means. Cay spins around on his saddle so he’s riding backward. “If we were them, we could cut the path in reverse.”

  Andy’s face grows serious. “Yeah, though I’m done with wanting to be them. I was done with that a long time ago.”

  “What do you mean?”

  She doesn’t speak for a long time, and I think this might be more trash in her mind she’s not ready to dump. But then she glances at me. “After Tommy died, I cursed God for giving me this body, for making us slaves.”

  I wonder if I heard right. The notion that Andy could curse God for anything puts grease under my heel.

  “What good’s a black face if it means I’m just someone’s property? Why give me these arms and legs just to carry someone else’s load, not my own?” She stares through the road, as if watching a memory. “Just like that prince, I struggled, wanted to be something I wasn’t, even though the answer was here all along.” She pats the spot over her heart. “See, God gave me this harp, which is my soul, along with the promise of sweet redemption.” Her posture is as poised as a feather on a cap, flexing in time with Princesa’s gait. “I don’t need anything else. Never thought about being white again after I figured that out.”

  I smooth a spot on Paloma’s mane, sobered by her words. Father always made me feel proud to be Chinese, that ancient race who roamed among dragons, who exploded gunpowder into the air to make flowers of fire. We might be a rare breed in this country, but I never wished to be white. Then again, I was also never a slave.

  The boys begin walking their horses back to us
.

  Andy flicks the reins at a fly. “You ever wondered what West’s face would look like if you pulled off all you’s shirts and yelled, surprise?”

  “No!” I protest too loudly. I swear West straightens up in the saddle at my outburst.

  “Well, I have,” she says around a smile. “Not West, a’course.” She flicks her eyes toward my hands. “Now take that out since we’re still rattlesnakes.”

  I let go of Paloma’s mane, scowling. Somehow, I managed to braid my mule’s hair from her crown to her withers.

  Tonight is one of my last chances to look for Mr. Trask. If I don’t find him in these two days before Calamity Cutoff, I must accept that he is lost to me.

  • • •

  A celebration to mark the trail’s halfway point starts even before the sun dips. Cay accepts an invitation to join the largest wagon circle, seventeen schooners in all. Andy and I tag along after the boys, hats low. I watch them with an ache in my heart, grieving the loss even before it happens.

  Peety accepts a plate of stew with a hardy muchas gracias and compliments for the woman serving him. Andy must feel the same as me because she sits closer to Peety than normal, and even lets him steal one of her corn cakes.

  Cay chats up a doe-eyed girl with a cloud of white-blond hair. All she needs is a halo. How fitting that my last memories of him will be of charming the ladies.

  Somewhere behind me, West fields a volley of questions from a lad who admires our horses. I cannot watch him. Just the sound of his voice makes me giddy and tearful at the same time.

  Before I turn stupid, I lean over toward Andy. “You finish,” I whisper, setting down my untouched bowl of black-eyed peas. “I’m going to start combing the crowds.”

  “I’ll go.” She begins to rise, but I pull her down by the sleeve.

  “You barely touched your food. I’ll be fine.”

  “Lots of people here,” she says in a low voice.

  “We haven’t seen a marshal since the Little Blue.”

  “That’s ’cause we’ve been trying not to.”

  Peety catches wind of our whispering. He moves his mouthful to his cheek. “You no like your food, chicos?”

  “I was just telling Andy I need to walk off a dead leg. I won’t be long.”

  I adjust my hat over my eyes and pretend to limp off, leaving Andy frowning after me.

  As I finish examining a neighboring group of diners, the strains of a violin float toward me. I follow the sound.

  In the middle of a circle of adults stands a girl, six or seven, fat braids like yellow bellpulls on either side of her head. She is sawing on her violin. “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.” I drop to my knees. I have only heard one little girl play the fiddle before, and that girl was me.

  The simple strains of the lullaby return me to the world I used to live in, each bow stroke conjuring a memory. Father with his ear cocked as he tuned Lady Tin-Yin. The two of us flapping like herons to help me loosen my arms. Father telling me not to rush the second movement of the Vivaldi if I wanted my audience to cry.

  The crowd claps, rousing me from my stupor.

  When the little girl bows, I head back to the remuda. But moments later, someone tugs on the back of my shirt. The girl pans her freckled face at me, her violin tucked under her arm.

  “Are you Chinese?” she asks.

  “Marianne,” reprimands her father from behind her, his eyes darting about like blue minnows under the glassy pools of his spectacles. A stiff gray hat trimmed with a blue jay’s feather sits primly atop his head.

  “It’s all right.” I kneel so that I’m her height. I shouldn’t socialize, but I cannot turn my back on her sweet face. “You play that fiddle quite well.”

  She beams, her eyes lighting up in that way that comes natural in children.

  “I bet I could give you a few pointers,” I say before I can stop myself.

  The father holds out his hand. “Dr. Raymond Highwater. I think Marianne would love some instruction. She has been on her own since we left Boston.”

  We sit on milk stools. Lifting my chin, I align my posture, and she copies me. One glance at her eager face puts a lump in my throat. Suddenly I’m back with one of my pupils, waiting on the edge of my seat for a flawless G to reach my ears.

  Since that dark day, I have been scurrying around like an ant with no purpose after someone has stepped on its nest. Father, you told me music is a world that measures virtue by grace notes, and truth by the vibration of pitch against your soul. Will I ever find my way back there? Or is that world gone forever, now that you are no longer a part of it?

  Marianne begins to play, drawing me out of my thoughts.

  “Straighten your wrist. Walk on the tips of your fingers,” I instruct. “You’re making the nightingales jealous.”

  I teach her “Mississippi River,” and she plays it perfectly after two tries.

  “One more, just one more,” she begs.

  “It’s past your bedtime,” says her father. “Mind now, and I will let you comb Jory’s tail tomorrow.”

  She wraps her arms around my neck and I kiss her head. “I see you one day performing in the great concert halls of Europe.”

  As Dr. Highwater settles her into their wagon, Andy appears by my side, her face crimped into a frown. She jerks her head, Let’s go, and I follow her.

  The doctor calls after me. “You obviously have much skill.” He holds up the instrument. “Mind if we impose on you?”

  There’s no way I can do that. “I’m sorry.”

  He tucks the violin under his arm. “I understand. Quite a crowd here, probably everyone will want to come hear you. Not everyone likes the stage. Well, thank you, again.”

  “Wait,” I say, my mind spinning. Mr. Trask, a clarinetist himself, heard me play on several occasions. Do I dare?

  “We’re s’posed to be laying low,” Andy grumbles in my ear.

  “Maybe the mouse will come out to see the cat play,” I whisper back.

  Andy shakes her head. “What if the mouse turns out to be a dog?”

  She is right, as always. Who knows what law enforcement or mercenaries lurk about? Even if there are none, I would not like to make a lasting impression. Still, I am so close to Mr. Trask. I can feel it in my bones. And maybe just this once, for Father, fate will look the other way. “We’ll never get to everyone,” I press. “It’s like a mass migration of buffalo here. I can knock out the pins with one ball.”

  She still doesn’t look convinced. Dr. Highwater’s gray eyebrows push together.

  An awkward moment passes, and I clear my throat, knowing I must give this up. If Andy knew how much losing Mr. Trask pains me, she might change her mind on letting me go with her to Harp Falls. “All right, I won’t,” I say at the same time as she throws up a hand and grumbles, “Fine, do it.”

  I smile at Dr. Highwater. “I’ll do it.”

  Dr. Highwater grins and hands me the fiddle. It’s too small, but I can work with that. If I had you in my arms again, Lady Tin-Yin, we’d rip up the prairie. How I miss you.

  Andy stands back and crosses her arms. “I don’t like it,” she mumbles, “but I’ll keep watch.” Then she slips back into the crowd.

  “We have a fiddler, folks! Make way for the fiddler!” cries Dr. Highwater.

  I breathe deeply to release my butterflies, then hitch up my trousers. This is the biggest group I’ve ever performed for, and I don’t just mean the violin. But I have the boy act down by now. I stalk out toward the main bonfire where most of the pioneers are assembled.

  “Look, a coolie!” someone yells. Ripples of curiosity follow me. Fingers lift like hunting rifles tracking a duck as I pass. I keep moving.

  Twenty feet from the fire, I stop by a barrel, my back to an overstuffed Conestoga wagon with fruit trees poking out the rear. The violin calm washes ove
r me, and I poise the bow.

  “Hold on there, yella,” says a man’s voice. The crowd parts to let a pair of red suspenders through, the color of firecrackers. My bow slides off the strings.

  But it’s not Mr. Trask, not even close. This man is West’s height but brawnier. What could he want from me? He grins like he knows a secret. Dear God, a mercenary. Andy was right. A dog’s on the loose. Why didn’t I listen?

  I collect myself as he draws near. Then I notice the suspenders are not suspenders at all, but straps securing a banjo to his back. I nearly moan in relief.

  Pulling his instrument to the front, he quirks an eyebrow. Nothing draws a crowd like a duel between a banjo and a fiddle. Father and I dueled often back in New York, especially when we were short on rent money.

  The man shows me the crown of his head with its combed waves of chestnut hair, and I return the bow. His copper eyes take in the child-sized violin, and he says in a silky voice, “I’m Jack. That baby fiddle mean you play like a baby?”

  The men in the crowd call out, “Hear, hear!” to egg us on.

  I size him up and set my jaw. “Why don’t you stay and find out?” I challenge, leaving off my name, as I did with Dr. Highwater.

  He grins rakishly from beneath a neat slash of mustache. The rest of him is neat, too, not a single wrinkle on his shirt or his face.

  The crowd cheers. Familiar cat whistles pierce the noise, and a real smile replaces my fake one. The remuda’s only a stone’s throw away though I can’t make them out among the masses.

  “What do you have in mind?” I ask.

  Jack’s muscles bulge under his rolled-up sleeves, the skin tanned and flecked with copper hair. “Been a while since my banjo ate a fiddle.”

  I put on my rooster comb. “Well, I know where it can get a good slice of humble pie.”

  The crowd laughs. Jack places his banjo pick between his teeth and tunes his instrument, not lifting his eyes from me. As soon as he hits the first four C’s, I recognize “What Shall We Do with a Drunken Sailor?” A crowd pleaser.

  The emigrants, already in high spirits, jump to their feet. More people gather ’round, and soon Jack has the whole caravan’s attention.