by Nikki Tate
Darn Will and Jackson anyway! I wondered where they were. Hauling nuggets of gold into the bank? Or lying dead at the bottom of some canyon?
Twenty-five dollars a week? It was still a lot of money, more than I could make doing laundry. How many weeks would I have to survive to earn what I needed? Ten more? Twelve?
I closed my eyes and tried to shut out the men’s voices by remember ing how Ma used to sing to me as I fell asleep, her gentle fingers lifting my hair from my forehead and letting it fall again. Still, my thoughts ran back and forth in my head as I lay there: tough it out and save enough to get set up in California or give up, confess I was a no-good liar, and go back to the orphanage in Carson City?
I rolled over to face the rough log wall and pulled my hat forward over my eyes. Well out of view, my face grew hot and soon my cheeks were wet with tears.
Eventually I dozed, but even then there was no rest. In my dreams, I galloped uphill and down, my horse scrambling over rocky trails and thundering across the wide, flat valley on the way into the next rest station. I thought I saw Ma and Pa standing beside Sarah on a hill. I whipped my horse to go faster, but then two wagons, driven by my brothers, picked up Sarah and my parents and carried them away. No matter how fast I went I couldn’t catch them.
I slept fitfully until late afternoon when I sat bolt upright, my heart scrambling to climb right out of my chest.
Crack-crack-crack
Gunfire!
Chapter Eight
I leapt out of bed and dropped to the floor, not caring that I was sprawled right in the mud.
My Lord, what was I gonna do now? Those crazy settlers had chased me here and right now as I hid inside, they were murdering Mr. Thomas, Arnie, James, and the other men!
Bang!
I jumped near out of my skin.
Bang! Bang!
Outside, men were shouting, but they didn’t seem real worried. I recognized Arnie’s voice.
“Your grandmother could shoot better than that!”
Several men laughed and a dog barked.
“Git out of my way, you dumb mongrel,” James snarled.
“Come here boy,” I heard Mr. Thomas call.
Bang! Bang!
More laughter followed the gun-shots, and I slowly let out my breath. Shooting practice.
I sat at the table, my palms pressed flat against the rough grain of the planks until my hands stopped shaking. I had a few stern words to say to myself.
The fact of the matter was I was stuck. I thought of James’s wild blue eyes and the red of his lips like a slash across his black, unkempt beard. The likes of him would not take kindly to finding out I was a girl.
Bang!
“Good shot, Thomas!”
What was the worst that could happen to me? I swallowed hard. If I ran into more trouble I might not live to see my thirteenth birthday. I closed my eyes and imagined I could feel Ma’s hand gently stroking my hair. At least we would be together again — me, Ma and Pa, and the baby, Grace — if it came to that.
My hand moved to the pistol at my side. I might not want to be here, but there was no need to be foolhardy about things. If I was going to do this job right, I had to be ready to shoot and shoot well. Pushing open the stationhouse door, I stepped outside, blinking in the late afternoon sun.
“Well, lookee here,” James said. It was all I could do not to turn tail and run.
Arnie, on one knee with his rifle to his shoulder, sighted down the bar rel and took aim at a scarred stump about forty paces away.
James’s stare never left my face. Just as Arnie pulled the trigger, James gave him a sharp poke in the side with the tip of his boot. The gun jumped back and Arnie leaped to his feet. “Who the — ”
“Why, I bet even this young boy here could do better,” James said, because of course the bullet had missed the mark by a mile. “Right, Joe?”
I took a deep breath. The last thing I wanted was to be the brunt of James’s jokes.
“Go on, Joe. Give it a try,” Mr. Thomas said kindly.
The stump hunkered there like a sullen dog, waiting for me to shoot. If I could just ignore James and the others, I might be all right. Pa had taught me to shoot. It would come back to me.
My pistol slid easily from its holster and I lifted it, feeling its weight in my hand. My arm straight, I leveled my hand and took aim. The tip of the pistol twitched ever so slightly from side to side and even as I pulled the trigger I knew I had missed the target.
“Shoots like a girl!” James crowed and I whirled around. “Just like you, Arnie!”
He was merely letting his cruel tongue wag, but I only just stopped myself from saying something stupid.
“Who’s next?” Mr. Thomas asked. James swaggered forward. He fired off two quick shots, both of which hit the stump dead center.
“That’s how it’s done, boys,” he said. “You keep on practicing and you might get the hang of it.”
There was much groaning and cussing after he said that, and we kept shooting at the stump out back of the corral until it grew too dark to see. James didn’t bother me any more than he bothered everyone else. Hard though it was, I said nothing in answer to his taunts and jeers. I just kept shooting and gave silent thanks to Pa for teaching me how to handle guns.
Though I wasn’t exactly excited to go, when the time came two days after that, I headed out again, this time westbound. After that, I had quite a few good runs working the section of the mail route between Ruby and Butte Stations and on as far as Egan Canyon and Schell Creek. The farthest west I rode was to Robert’s Creek, but only once when the westbound rider that was supposed to ride west from Ruby Valley fell ill from some bad meat.
I was starting to know the trail well. Each week for several weeks I added another twenty-five dollars to my California fund. But with the constant threat of ambush or being shot by confused settlers, the job didn’t get any easier.
In fact, in the hottest part of the summer, things got a whole lot worse.
If I could have stopped my mind from wandering back to earlier times, I might have avoided the trouble I made for myself.
All too often I found myself thinking of Pa, the way he had with the stock, how his eyes lit up when Will first talked about California. Those memories were good, but others were sadder.
Ma and Baby Grace had died when I was but six. I didn’t remember so much of Ma, but those things I could recall seemed as clear as if they’d happened only a few weeks before. “Joselyn,” she’d say, pouring a large kettle of steaming water into a washtub, “Always remember: Cleanliness is next to Godliness.”
When a terrible incident happened in the river not far from Jacob’s Well, I was reminded of those baths that Ma insisted we take each week.
Cookie Townsend got it into his head he was in need of a bath. He stripped off his clothes and waded into the river. Trouble was Cookie Townsend plumb forgot he couldn’t swim! Story goes he slipped when he bent over to wet his head. He didn’t wash up onto shore until he’d drifted two miles downstream.
I suppose accidents like that were one reason why the men rarely bathed — once or twice a year when the weather was warm. They didn’t find it strange I chose not to do so, either. But it never did feel right to me to be as filthy as a beast.
At least Cookie Townsend would have gone straight to the head of the line at the gates of Heaven. You couldn’t get much Godlier than dying while you’re having a bath. Then, I started fretting. What if something did happen to me on the trail and I got myself killed? I was so dirty Mrs. Pinweather could have shared a church pew with me without knowing who I was.
How unclean did you have to be before you couldn’t get into Heaven at all? My fingernails were so black they looked like I’d been scratching at lumps of coal. The rest of me wasn’t much better. I didn’t have a change of clothes so those I wore day in and day out were filthy.
There I’d be after I died, talking to Saint Peter, explaining why I was so dirty. Ma and Baby Grace w
ould be waving at me from inside Heaven. Ma’s face would fall when she laid eyes on me.
So, I decided to have a bath – partly so I would be presentable if I died, and partly to celebrate my thirteenth birthday.
I found a pool in the creek downstream from the horse corral. The water wasn’t overly deep — up to my knees where the creek went around a bend.
Checking that nobody was near, I slipped off my clothes. I gasped when the cold water swirled around my bare legs.
I bent over and scrubbed at my legs and feet with a sliver of black soap I’d put into my pocket earlier that day. My arms and face were next and then, already shivering, I held my breath and plunged my head under the water.
I scrubbed my fingers through my hair, but lasted only a few seconds before I had to stand straight up, coughing and sputtering and trembling with cold.
“Weeeell, lookee here.”
Shrieking, I ducked under the water, trying to cover myself with my hands.
James stood on the bank, grinning down at me. “Joe? I’d say you was missing some parts.”
My legs ached from squatting in the cold water and my heart hammered with terror. I couldn’t run away — not without my clothes. Besides, where would I go? I couldn’t fight him — James was too big, too strong. My tongue froze in my head. All I could do was stare back at him.
“So maybe that’s why you’re so quiet all the time.” His eyes raked over me and I hunkered down deeper into the water.
James took a step toward the edge of the creek. I inched backwards. Should I call out? Did it matter now if the whole camp knew? What would he do to me if I didn’t shout for help?
“Shhhh,” he said, almost like he knew what I was thinking. He crouched at the edge of the pool and raised his finger to his lips. “How about we make us a little deal, you and me.”
Deal? I didn’t care to make any kind of deal with wild-haired James. The water lapped and gurgled around me and my teeth chattered. I was hardly in a position to argue.
“Well, Miss Joe … How about I don’t say nothing about your little secret here and in return…”
He tugged at his beard as if considering the price of his silence. “In return, you can help me with a little job I got planned.”
“What k-k-k-k-kind of — ”
He touched his finger to his lips again. “I’ll let you know in good time. Meantime, you’d best be getting on out of that crick or you’ll catch your death of cold. We wouldn’t want that, would we?”
For a long moment I thought he was going to stay where he was while I climbed out of the water. Then, without another word, he winked and walked away.
I crouched for as long as I could in case he came back. When he didn’t, I counted to three and then burst from the pool, showering water behind me. I sprinted to my clothes and pulled them on, not caring in the least that I was still soaking wet. Tugging on my boots with shaking hands, I cursed under my breath. Darned fool James.
He was the last person in the world I would have trusted with my secret. Now what was I going to do? What was the job he had talked about? Feeling sick, I grabbed my hat and headed back to the stationhouse. Whatever he wanted me to do, it wasn’t going to be good.
Chapter Nine
The weeks passed in a blur of mail runs through the heat of the desert summer. September brought shorter days and cool nights.
When I happened to be on a rest day at the same station as James, he treated me with exaggerated respect and called me Joe-boy. I longed for the days when James had tormented me for my poor shooting. Whenever I saw him, the knot in my stomach tightened as I waited for him to tell me what dreadful chore he had in mind.
Each week I counted my money, praying I would have enough to get away before James gave away my secret.
One night in late September, I was asleep in my bunk at Ruby Station dreaming of a great golden nugget, so big I couldn’t lift it all by myself, when in my dream an earthquake started shaking the walls of my cabin.
“Joe-boy. I said, git up.” A man grunted and I realized my bunk really was shaking. Hard.
“Joe-boy!” James’s voice was loud and close to my ear.
I stiffened and choked back a scream.
“Shut-up and listen to what I got to say.”
I licked my lips, my mouth bone dry.
James took a long, slow suck on a cigarette. Without warning, the bunk jerked again as he grabbed my collar and dragged me out of bed. His cigarette hung from between his lips and his hot breath stank something fierce as he leaned close and hissed at me, Here’s what you’re gonna do.”
He pushed me against the wall, his knuckles pressed against my throat. “I overheard old Billy talking with the militia about a cash delivery headed for Sacramento this week.”
He’d hardly started talking and I knew I didn’t want to hear another word.
“A man like me could use some extra cash, don’t you think?”
I squirmed and the hold on my shirt tightened.
“But it wouldn’t be right for me, a Pony Express rider, to take off with a mochila full of cash now, would it?”
I managed the slightest shake of my head.
“’Course not. That’s why you’re gonna help me.”
“Me?” My knees felt right peculiar, like my legs were made of dough.
“Who’s due to head west tomorrow afternoon?” he asked.
“Me,” I whispered.
“That’s right. And this is what’s gonna happen. You ride west just like always except you’re gonna make an unscheduled stop at them smelly pools just past Diamond Springs. You know the ones I mean?”
I nodded. I knew exactly where he meant. The ponds smelled of bad eggs. No man or beast would stop there without darned good reason. The stationhouse not far from there was known as Sulphur Springs.
“Wait for me there. I’ll bring a second mochila stuffed with paper.” James chuckled and I stared at the glowing tip of his cigarette as it hopped up and down in the dark.
“We’ll switch mochilas and you’ll ride on to Dry Creek with the worthless one and deliver it just like nothing happened. I’ll be back here at Ruby before anyone knows there’s a problem.”
He twisted my shirt tighter. I whimpered and tried to push his hand away.
“Shut-up,” he said. “You do as I say or — ”
By the dim glow of his cigarette his forefinger aimed at my temple.
“You got that?”
I nodded again, my knees buckling out from under me.
“Now git back into bed and keep yer mouth shut.”
I scrambled back into my bunk. Not long after that the door to the station-house creaked open. Uncle Billy slid the bolt home and poked at the embers of the fire. He and his dog had been out checking the livestock.
“Time to rest your old bones, dog.” Springs creaked as the dog jumped onto an empty bunk. “Evening, James.”
“Evening, sir.”
The two men fell to chatting quietly.
I could not sleep for anything, not even after the men were breathing deep and regular. A cash delivery. Bolivar Roberts had talked about them what seemed like a hundred years ago in Carson City.
James was going to rob the mail and I was going to be most important to him if his plan was going to work. James would tell my secret in a second if I breathed a word of what I’d been told to anyone — if he didn’t shoot me first.
I was beside myself. James had worked things so it looked like I was part of the robbery. The only way to explain why I was going along with it was to explain how he had found out I was really a girl. If the Express Company knew I’d lied about that, then why would they believe I was innocent of the robbery? I was so close to being able to go to California I couldn’t bear the thought of having to give up now. For the first time in a long time, I cried myself to sleep.
It seemed but five minutes later and I was up again. For most of the day James never let me out of his sight. Before I knew what had happened, we w
ere outside the stationhouse waiting for the westbound rider.
“Maybe you won’t have too much snow.” James squinted at the gray clouds hanging low over the hills looking for all the world like he was truly interested in the weather. James didn’t always help with the horses. I knew he was there to stop me from saying anything to Uncle Billy.
“Whoa, Jess.” I patted the chestnut mare, the horse that would carry me west. She’d been saddled for an hour and now pricked her ears toward the end of the valley.
“What do you see there, girl?” I asked.
The mare whinnied, her belly tucked up and quivering. A horse and rider, at first just a moving dot, grew larger as they galloped toward us.
A minute later Bart Ridley jumped off a black mustang and gave me a slap on the back.
“Good to see you, Joe. Make good speed, you hear? Smells like snow out there.” He winked and grinned at me, unaware of my near panic.
James slipped the mochila over the saddle and slapped his gloved hand against the saddle. Jess danced on the spot and it took two of us to hold her.
“Up you get, Joe,” James said, as Uncle Billy pulled the time card from the unlocked pouch. I climbed up into the saddle, Billy noted the time, slipped the card back into the pouch, and sent us off with a wave of his hat.
The mare spun in a circle and we were gone.
We settled into a quick canter and I glanced down at the three locked pouches of the mochila.
James would soon set out to follow me. It would be easy enough for him to leave. The men often headed out to hunt. It was such a simple plan — switch mochilas, take the money, and send the empty saddlebags on to California. He must have borrowed one of the spares kept at the bigger stations in case of damage or theft. I supposed he planned to replace it as soon as he’d made the switch and taken the money.
By the time anyone discovered that the money was missing, the borrowed mochila would be back in place, James would have long disappeared, and nobody would be any the wiser. As Jess charged up a short ridge, I wondered how much cash was in the bags.