by Nancy Bush
Then suddenly she saw her wagon, parked a bold as you please on the side of the road! But her joy turned to dismay when she saw the way it listed. The left rear wheel was missing spokes, the rim elliptical and weak.
And the horses were gone.
With a sharp glance in both directions, Miracle scurried across the road. Dimly she could make out the faded lettering on the side of the wagon, imploring one and all to try “Uncle Horace’s Tinctures and Elixirs for Uncommonly Good Health.”
Miracle unlatched the back door, which squeaked eerily on worn hinges as she pushed it open. “Uncle Horace?” she whispered.
The only sound was the faint tinkle of bottles gently touching as the wagon floor jolted beneath Miracle’s weight. The rattle of leaves against the roof made her jump. Heart beating wildly, she searched the dark confines of the wagon, crunching broken glass beneath her boots. Uncle Horace was gone.
Miracle’s blood ran cold with fear. Her next thought was for her tin of money. She dug her hand into the shelf where it was hidden along with other innocuous tin boxes and pans. Gone! The bandits had stolen her money.
Fury surged through her veins. Clenching her fists, she grabbed one of the tin lids and threw it against the wall. The clanging clatter brought her back to her senses. This was no time to draw attention to herself. She had to get back to Harrison.
Gathering up as many unbroken bottles as she could hope to carry and searching rapidly for some of the dried herbs she’d hung against the rear wall, Miracle also grabbed several blankets, some tinware, and Uncle Horace’s “medicinal” bottle of rotgut liquor. She shoved everything into one of the blankets, adding a few tins of food and the dried deer jerky Uncle Horace chewed as a substitute for drink during his spells of soberness. Then she tied the blanket ends together and heaved the whole bundle over her shoulder.
It seemed to take twice as long to get back to where she’d left Harrison. Half her time was spent within a few hundred yards of the place, but the tiny lake was so well concealed, she only found Harrison by straining her ears for the water’s soft lapping. This was encouraging. If she couldn’t find it, no one else could either.
Harrison was just as she’d left him. It was too dark to do more than crush some of the dried herbs with rock, add lake water, and create a poultice. She slipped the dank smelling mixture beneath her petticoat bandage and against the small knife wound. On a shallow wound, the poultice would draw out any poisons, but something as small and deep as a knife wound could be beyond its capabilities. Miracle could only hope no inflammation occurred, for if the wound suppurated, all she could do was treat the pain with rotgut liquor and a special elixir of Uncle Horace’s which, though a potent painkiller, tended to bring on vivid hallucinations.
She laid the blanket over him, then considered what to do. She felt sticky with smoke and sweat. Unable to stand it another moment, she stripped off her clothes and ran into the lake, diving under the surface. The water was icy; September’s heat hadn’t warmed it. Teeth chattering, Miracle scrubbed herself clean, then hurriedly pulled on her clothes again. Too cold to worry about propriety, she slid beneath Harrison’s blanket and curled up beside him.
She was surprised when sleep didn’t overtake her immediately. As exhausted as she was, her mind spun in useless circles. For the first time since her capture she really had a chance to take stock.
A sense of injustice swept through her. She’d been abducted and sold to the highest bidder! The highwaymen who plagued the road between Malone and Rock Springs had chosen her as their latest victim. Jeb and Bushy Eyebrows (now deceased) and Gruff Voice. They’d mentioned another man, too, she remembered with a shudder. Lord, she was lucky to have escaped!
Miracle instinctively moved closer to Harrison, trembling a little. Then she gasped.
I can identify them!
Her heart nearly stopped. The thought brought more worry than comfort. Who would listen to her? Who would care? She was a half-breed Chinook with a history of thieving. No one would care that she’d stolen as a child only because she’d needed to feed herself. And no one would care that she’d been raised to adulthood by a doting spinster and a lovable, if sometimes drunken, medicine man who’d taught her a strict moral code of right and wrong.
The man beside her groaned in his sleep, one arm draping casually over Miracle’s hip. She froze, belatedly alerted to the impropriety of where she was and whom she was with. Up to this moment she’d been intent on saving herself and this man. He was sick. He needed comfort, care, and warmth. But now she realized that her method of providing warmth could be totally misconstrued.
Well, hell fire. What did she care about propriety now? She needed his warmth almost as much as he needed hers. But he didn’t have to be this close, did he?
She gingerly lifted his hand from the folds of her skirt, but his fingers crawled to her stomach, curling comfortably around her white shirtwaist, his face buried in the silky swath of her black hair. He murmured incoherently.
Miracle was afraid even to breathe. It bothered her that he was so close. Hadn’t her mother learned by experience how foolish it was to become involved with a man – a white man?
But he was wounded – by her hand – and she owed him all the knowledge and help she could give. She would cuddle next to a sick child, wouldn’t she? If sleeping next to him gave him comfort, what could be wrong in that?
Closing her eyes, Miracle willed herself to relax. She felt almost ill. Her head throbbed and her wrists were chafed. Every muscle ached. And she was sick with worry over Uncle Horace, too. He was like a father to her. He’d taken her in after she’d tried to steal from him, given her a home, raised her, and answered her questions about her mother. Everything she knew of the Chinooks, all tales of spirits and healing, she’d learned from Uncle Horace.
Harrison’s hand curved possessively around her narrow rib cage. Miracle dozed until she felt an unfamiliar warmth. His hand had somehow slipped beneath her shirtwaist, his palm cupped on the underside of her breast.
Now this was carrying comfort too far!
She moved his hand. He was still unconscious, but his hand crept back to her breast automatically. Miracle was astounded by the desire that licked through her veins. She wanted to press his hand closer around her, and to that end she cupped his hand, squeezing it around the mound of flesh.
Good Lord, what was wrong with her!
Miracle jumped to her feet. He let out a sharp cry of pain, and she instantly knelt down beside him. “Sorry,” she whispered.
The moon had risen above the fir trees on the hill across the lake. Rippling white moonlight lay on the water and sent weak streams of illumination over Miracle’s makeshift camp. She could see Harrison face clearly. When his eyes opened she gasped.
“You’re awake! How do you feel?” she asked anxiously.
“Godawful.” He moved his tongue around his lips. “Where am I?”
“By a small lake.”
“I don’t remember,” he murmured, scowling.
“You don’t remember rescuing me?”
“You’re Indian,” he said on a note of discovery.
Miracle’s long black hair hung in a swath of black silk, nearly touching his face. She yanked it back and twirled it into a loose rope, slinging it over her shoulder. “You don’t remember leaving the barn?”
He paused. “Was it burning?”
“Yes! Yes, it was. And there were gamblers there, and kidnappers, and you were trying to help me.”
“You stabbed me,” he remembered, his voice fading.
One thing Miracle had never forgotten from her years of scavenging alone was fear. The layers of sophistication and social graces could be peeled off when she was face-to-face with real fear. Like thinking she might be thrown in jail for stabbing a man who, from his clothes and manner, was obviously someone important, someone with money.
Until that moment Miracle had been toying with the idea of taking Harrison to a doctor in either Rock Springs or Ma
lone. But a sordid vista opened up before her eyes. She could see herself trying to explain, to convince all and sundry of her innocence. But no one knew her. She and Uncle Horace had traveled from up the Columbia River. Aunt Emily, the only person who could vouch for Miracle, was nearly a hundred miles away. No one would bother searching out her innocence. It was her word against his – a half-breed Chinook woman’s against a man of Harrison’s obvious prominence.
“It’s not a serious wound,” she said through a dry throat. “I’ve put a poultice on it.”
His answer was a grunt, and the effort it cost him to talk left him panting, his expression as dark as a thundercloud.
“In the morning I’ll get you something to eat,” Miracle said, encouraged by his show of temper.
“In the morning I’m getting out of here,” he muttered through his teeth.
Knowing there was no chance he would be well enough to leave, Miracle tucked the blanket more thoroughly around him. For herself, she grabbed another blanket, wrapping it around her tightly. Safely away from his marauding hands, she lay down close to him once more. The night was cool, but not cold, and there was no need for a fire. Good. She didn’t want to draw attention to them. Tomorrow she would have to figure out where to go from here.
¤ ¤ ¤
Dawn was just breaking over the hills on the far side of the lake when Miracle woke, stiff and cold. Though the September days had been unseasonably hot, sometimes approaching the nineties, the hours just before dawn were cold enough to chill the marrow. Flinging off her blanket, Miracle spared a glance at her would-be rescuer.
His dark blond hair was scattered with bits of leaves and grass. He lay on the ground, the blanket tossed over his shoulders but leaving his legs and feet to view. His trousers were denim, his boots an expensive scrolled leather. He had the strong, handsome face of a warrior, and a scowl was etched between his brows even in sleep.
His pallor alarmed her. It was pale, too pale, almost bloodless. Miracle rested her fingers just beneath the curve of his jaw, searching for a pulse. It was there. Weaker, but still strong enough. But he wasn’t getting better, she realized with a thumping heart. He was getting worse.
Carefully, she pulled the blanket back. His bloodstained shirt met her eyes, and guilt flooded through her in a rush of heated blood that scorched her face. The poultice was still in place; she could see its lump beneath his shirt.
She had to get the shirt off him.
Straightening, Miracle scanned the horizon. She hadn’t been so alone and responsible in years. Oh, she took care of Uncle Horace during his black periods, but she’d never felt herself responsible for another human life before.
Should she find a way to get him back to town? What if he died?
She refused to think about that. She was a healer. She knew as much as any doctor about the power of herbs and potions – more than most. She was sure she hadn’t pierced his lungs or heart with her knife, so that meant his reversal was probably caused by inflammation.
In sudden decision, she sifted through the jumbled bottles of potions until she found a dark glass jug with a watery green liquid inside. Willow bark. A bitter-tasting analgesic which Miracle normally made more palatable with a healthy dose of rum. However, Harrison was much too ill to appreciate the masking properties of liquor, so she left the rum for later.
Pouring a small capsule of the potion, she lifted Harrison’s head, forcing a few drops past his lips. He grimaced, but some of the fluid went down. Satisfied, Miracle waited until she was certain the painkiller had taken effect, then she unbuttoned his shirt and carefully pulled it down over his shoulders.
The series of scars that ran from shoulder to waist surrounding his right arm made her suck in her breath in horror. His arm had been nearly severed from his body! What horrible accident had befallen him?
Pulling the sticky shirt from his back took nerves of steel. The fabric clung in places, and she had to rip it free. The poultice had slipped down and dried into a gummy paste. Miracle gently wiped away. A red circle of inflamed flesh surrounded the small wound, hot and angry looking.
Hellfire and damnation! Her worst fears were confirmed. The knife had poisoned his tissues. From experience, she knew such poisoning could be fatal.
Sighing, Miracle removed his expensive boots to make him more comfortable, tucked the blanket more securely around his clammy skin, then made a new poultice of herbs she’d taken from the wagon the night before and strapped it to his back with another strip of her petticoats. She would have to go back to the wagon, she realized, and grab the rest of her belongings. Then she would wait through the fever that was sure to take him.
“Now, don’t you go and die on me, white man,” she scolded as she left. “I won’t have your death on my soul!”
By the time Miracle reached the spot where she’d left the wagon, she was hot and scratched and desperate for another cooling bath. It didn’t matter that the sun had not yet crested the hills. This September was blistering. The worst she could recall.
Swiping at her tangled hair, she was relieved to find the wagon just as she’d left it, off the side of the road and listing slightly to the left rear. Cautiously, she opened the door once more. There was still no human presence, so she let herself inside.
A faint jingling sound from outside sent shivers down her spine. Horses! Quickly, she flattened herself to the floor, straining her ears to listen. Approaching riders could be friend or foe, but Miracle was taking no chances.
Silence. She heard a meadowlark break into song and the rustle of branches as a weak breeze tickled the leaves. Soft, almost inaudible, she heard the jingle again. It was no nearer.
Miracle peeked through the back doors of the wagon. The ribbon of brown track was empty, and the yellow and russet leaves had gently fallen across the ruts made by countless wagon wheels. No one had passed this way for hours.
She waited quietly, but when there was still no sound, she decided to risk discovery. Harrison needed her. If someone was watching her, let him see her. She still had her knife, she remembered with a grim smile, although during the course of their escape they’d lost his pearl-handled revolver.
Stepping outside, she scanned the surrounding area. To her amazement she heard a horse’s welcoming nicker. She stared through the dense shrubbery and saw movement.
“Who’s there?” she demanded.
Yanking her knife from the pocket of her skirt, she rounded the shrubbery, then let out a cry of delight. Her team! Tillie and Gray hadn’t been taken after all! They had just been too lazy to run away.
In sudden relief, Miracle flung her arms around Gray, startling the gelding into a nervous sidestep. “Oh, I’m so glad to see you!” She squeezed his thick neck harder, and he snorted into her rumpled shirtwaist. He sounded put off by her behavior, and the thought made her grin.
Patting Tillie’s neck, she grabbed what was left of the horses’ harnesses and guided them back to the wagon. Could she rehitch them? If so, she might be able to limp the wagon back to where she’d left Harrison.
She eyed the road thoughtfully. The ditch on the other side of the road was shallow, the underbrush light for the first several hundred yards. She could drive the wagon back and hide it with some careful camouflage. Maybe not close to their camp, but at least it would be safe from looters who might pass this way.
And then she could nurse Harrison back to help without any interference.
Miracle refused to think about anything else. She could only take one step at a time. First and foremost, she had to help Harrison and thereby keep herself safe from a possible jail cell. Even the thought of confinement made her break out into a cold sweat. She hadn’t meant to stab him! she thought with righteous indignation. How was she to know he meant her no harm? Surely any judge would recognize that.
But from a half-breed Chinook medicine woman?
She re-hitched the horses to the wagon, tying broken pieces of leather harness together, counting on the nags being too slo
w to break through the weak straps. Then she scrambled onto the driver seat.
“Giddyap,” she urged, slapping the reins against their broad backs.
They didn’t move.
Miracle groaned in frustration. Of all the times for them to display their contrariness, this wasn’t it! She slapped them hard again, and her fury communicated itself through the horses’ tough hides. They strained forward, bumping the wagon onto the road. The back wheel ka-thunked its way across the dirt track and down into the underbrush on the other side. Miracle held her breath and prayed that it would hold.
It seemed to take hours to travel that short stretch of ground. By the time they’d reached comparative safety, Miracle was sweating freely and the sun was a bright gold ball skimming the distant mountains. Then they reached a narrow stream, and the horses stopped short.
Climbing down, Miracle clucked her tongue at the nags, grabbing onto Gray’s bridle. She led them cautiously down the bank and through the trickling water. They balked, shaking their heads and shifting their feet.
“Come along, now,” she demanded. “None of that.”
By perseverance and coercion she moved them forward. The wagon rattled and jolted alarmingly behind them. Tillie snorted her fear, picking up her rear feet as soon as she put them down, as if certain the four-wheeled monster behind was going to swallow her up.
They clambered up the opposite bank and managed to drag the wagon to a sheltered plan several hundred yards down the lake from her own camp before they could go no farther. The horses and wagons were now far enough from the road to escape discovery, Miracle decided with relief.
Unhitching the sweating team, Miracle let them graze and drink from the lake, then she tied them to a tree, a fruitless gesture considering the beasts’ laziness, but it made her feel safe anyway. She then trekked back to her own camp.