Johannes shot him a hard glance. “Reuben, how do you feel about Rebecca? You’re in love with her, aren’t you?”
Reuben hoped Johannes could not see his surprise in the dark. “Yes, Johannes, matter of fact, I am.”
“Have you told her?”
“Matter of fact, I have.”
A soft laugh, tinged with irony, escaped Johannes’s mouth. “See, my friend, you’ve always thought that I had a way with women. But the truth is, you know more about them and about yourself relative to them, than I do. Or should I say, until last week. Like you, I am in love. Unlike you, I have not yet told that to the woman I love. I mean to tell Inga tonight.”
Reuben reached across the long distance between the horses and slapped Johannes’ thigh. “Congratulations. I suspect you will have one happy, very beautiful, glowing Norwegian blonde on your hands.”
Johannes laughed. “Well, whatever shall Johannes Svenson do with a beautiful, lanky, golden-haired Norwegian woman—and she with him? I’m sure I can come up with something.”
They pulled the lapels of their coats up over their mouths to muffle the sound of their laughter.
CHAPTER 34
MAY 10, 1855
BUCK’S RUN
From her perch on the wagon between Rebecca and Inga, Sarah shielded her eyes against the sun, calculating its zenith in the sky. Suspended over them like a giant blue dome, the sky stretched as far as one could see, until it finally fell into the uneven edge of the earth. Here and there, bright, small cumulus clouds floated with unhurried nonchalance. About twenty yards ahead of them were sickly Dr. Leonard and his wife Thelma, in their oxen-pulled wagon and, beyond that, the lead rig.
She turned to Inga, “I really should’ve been riding with the two of you much more often. What was I thinking?”
Rebecca, driving the team and paying close attention to the lines, gave Sarah a quick sideways look. “You weren’t!”
All three women laughed. Inga hugged her. “It’s a pleasure to have you with us, Sarah. Johannes told me that he will be horseback far more often on this homestretch to Cherry Creek.”
Rebecca leaned forward to see Inga better, “Pray tell. Mr. Svenson actually lowered himself to speak to you?”
Inga smiled, the first genuine smile Sarah had seen on her friend’s lips since the blizzard, but there was a reserve in her eyes. Obviously in better spirits, but she is still unsure.
Inga smoothed the light green wool of her traveling dress over her legs as Rebecca leaned forward again. “So, what did he say?”
“He said that we will take a walk tonight, just the two of us, to talk things through, and that he has something to tell me, which he believes will make me happy.”
“Have you told him yet?”
Inga looked down at her hands, then back at Sarah, then her eyes shifted to Rebecca. She glanced down at her hands again then raised her eyes.
“No, I… I have not told him yet. I’ve tried. God knows I’ve tried, several times when he walked me back from the ceremony at the Mormon wagons. And once last night, and then this morning. I felt sure this morning he would take a moment to listen, but he put his hand on my lips with the promise that we would settle things tonight.”
“What I think,” Rebecca said, adjusting the lines, “is that after Mr. Svenson gets over the shock of knowing he will be a father, he will be the happiest, tallest blond-haired man on the wagon train.”
Sarah sighed with a mock serious air. “But he’s the only tall, blond-haired man on the wagon train.”
Rebecca shot her a look then smiled, “Right you are.” Up ahead, a small river stretched across the land, its rapid, shallow current flowing golden-silver in the sun. The land was flat, a dry spring green. To the southwest, five or six miles, were low rolling hills that rose from the flats like the rough grain of heavy leather. Sarah could see Mac on Red, at the head of the train, trotting toward the crossing.
Inga mimicked the pseudo-serious tones of the two women next to her and, Sarah noticed, tried to change the subject. “I am glad that we dressed up today. It’s been weeks since we have had on stylish clothes.”
Rebecca looked at the two of them, bringing the conversation right back. “When are the two of you expecting?”
Sarah looked at Inga and smiled. “Honestly, Rebecca, we haven’t figured that out, but given the circumstances, I’m sure the due dates are very close together.”
Maybe I had better change the subject, Sarah thought. She pointed at the river ahead, which the Leonard wagon had just entered. “What is the name of that little stream we are crossing today?”
“I think it’s Two Otters Creek,” Rebecca answered. “Mac told me there’s not much to it. Fairly fast current but shallow, maybe knee-deep.”
“How are you and Reuben getting along?”
“We are…oh, damn!”
Up ahead, the wagon driven by the Leonards was having some type of problem in the water. The right rear wheel canted at an odd angle, and the rear corner of the wagon was tipped to a level just above the current of the rushing stream. Their team of oxen, which had rapidly gained a reputation around the wagon train as being “better for meat than for pulling,” in Reuben’s words, was obstinately refusing to move.
Rebecca pulled on the lines, and their prairie schooner creaked to a stop several feet from the water. Mac and Red splashed back across the creek, the big red-haired Irishman stopping for a moment to talk to the Leonards.
“He does not look like a happy wagon master,” commented Rebecca.
Inga shook her head, “Uh-oh.”
They could hear Mac’s raised voice. “If I told you once, I told you one hundred times, Doc. You simply must keep these wagons in excellent repair.”
Red came through the stream toward them, and, when Mac came abreast of their driving seat, he took off his hat, nodding his head quickly at each of three women in turn, before replacing it. “Good morning, ladies. We have a little accident, as you can see, that we will have to contend with, but, I don’t want the train spread out in a single line like this for long, not in this territory. Hold up here for just a few minutes. I will be right back.” He spurred Red toward the end of the column of wagons behind them.
Sarah felt Rebecca’s anxiety. “This morning has not started out well,” complained the brunette. “First we’re awakened far too early by Johannes and Reuben, then we were not allowed to use the oil lamps, which almost ruined our plans to dress up today, and now this.”
Inga looked over Sarah’s head at Rebecca and said quietly, “Yes, and Johannes and Reuben are somewhere far behind us, just the two of them in country Mac obviously feels is dangerous.”
Rebecca pursed her lips, opening her mouth and surely intending—Sarah was convinced—to proclaim some snappy thought, but then her mouth shut. To Sarah’s dismay, Rebecca’s lower lip trembled, and she took a deep breath. “You’re right Inga, that’s what’s really set me off this morning. I don’t feel good at all about the two of them back there. That is Zeb’s usual position to the rear and out on one of the flanks. I’m quite sure that’s where Zeb rides because it is the most dangerous and requires the most experience.”
A sudden thought struck Sarah. She looked closely at Rebecca, who had now suppressed the quivers in her lip, her facial features partially restored to their usual alert but aloof status.
“May I ask a personal question, Rebecca?”
Rebecca looked at her, eyes wider than normal, surprised at Sarah’s lead-in. “Of course, Sarah, we are all friends.”
Sarah took a deep breath. Afraid of the answer but already knowing what it would be, she blurted out, “Have you been with Reuben?” She realized her hands were clenched tightly in her lap.
Rebecca was obviously shocked at the question. She took her eyes off the lines and looked into Sarah’s. There was no annoyance in her gaze, just a soft understanding. She colored almost scarlet, took a deep breath, swallowed, and said, “Yes.” And then she snapped the lines across
the backs of the horses, who began moving toward the creek.
“Wait, Rebecca, wait! Mac told us to wait!” Inga exclaimed.
Rebecca drew hastily back on the lines, and the horses stopped their forward movement, shaking their heads from side to side, confused.
“I forgot.”
Sarah felt a wave of deep disappointment wash over her, but something else, too. This news moved her away from an uncertain path, a dream perhaps, and clarified her direction. She reached her hand, rested it affectionately on Rebecca’s thigh for a moment, and squeezed. Rebecca glanced at her quickly and they exchanged smiles.
“I’m happy for you, Rebecca. Truly. A bit jealous, yes, I’ll admit. But very happy.” A thought struck her and she laughed.
The two women looked at her, eyebrows raised. “And, what is so humorous?” asked Rebecca.
Sarah smiled, “I was just thinking about the three of us, here in the middle of nowhere, we are quite unique you know…”
Six miles to the southwest of the women chatting in the prairie schooner, the hair on the back of Zeb’s neck felt prickly. Buck felt the energy, too, his ears alert and rigid, nostrils widely flared, palpitating as they sniffed the air, a slight quiver in the tobiano’s front right shoulder.
Zeb wrapped the reins, one loose loop over the horn, swung one long, fringed, buckskin-clad leg over the horse’s head and slipped silently from the side of the saddle, the Enfield in his hands, at the ready. He paused, half crouching, and looked carefully in all directions. Then he straightened, reached into his pocket, and brought out a ball of rawhide string. He quickly knotted each end to the swivels on the Enfield musket, one on the forestock, one halfway toward the butt on the rifle, and slung it over his neck and shoulder, careful it did not overlap his back scabbard. He looked down at the Colt and, cap and ball pistols jammed tight in his belt, paused, his eyes searching every rock, swale, and contour of the rolling hills around him, his ears straining for any sound. He carefully withdrew the Sharps from its scabbard, checked the load, and, with a look at Buck, accompanied by a motion of his hand, signaled for the horse to stay put.
Hunched slightly forward, he crept silently up the little bowlshaped draw toward where its rim disappeared into the startling blue sky, dulled only by the lazy movement of a few scattered puffs of clouds. He moved just a few steps at a time, careful to stay on the hill’s slope, halfway up the north side from the tiny creek that gurgled through the bottom, but close enough to the shallow edge above him to duck over the top, or, if a crucial moment called for it, to make for the brush cover along the water. Each few steps he paused, listening, his eyes searching the rim above the spring where the little creek originated, and the ground around him, keenly searching for any sign. I feel ’em. They’ve been here.
His thick, elk hide moccasins moved silently. He was so intent that he missed a small prickly pear cactus hidden under a tuft of blue grama grass. The sharp spines dug into his heel and he bit his lip. Keeping the weight off his foot so as not to drive the tough, barbed needles in further, he eased himself to the ground, his eyes continuing to rove. He pulled the spines out one at a time then lightly pressed the heel of the moccasin down to his skin to make sure none of the cactus were still under the leather. Satisfied, he rose again, crouched for a moment, and then continued his silent stalk.
A warm breeze swirled lazily through the little draw, just enough to stir the early morning air. Slender wheat stalk and needle grasses wavered in the breeze, setting the low hillsides above him in subtle motion. He knelt by the spring, cupped his hand, and raised it to his lips twice, his eyes never leaving the area around him, continually glancing behind him at Buck, now about a hundred yards away. The mustang stood patiently watching. That’s a good sign. Ain’t nothin’ else got his attention. Best rearguard I’ve ever had. He took four steps above the spring and stopped. Good Lord.
The tracks were plain, and they were fresh, very fresh. He knelt down, lightly running a dirty forefinger in the slivers of shade formed by the edge of the impressions, granules of dirt working under his nail. The tracks were dry. Made this morning. Just hours ago. After the dew had dried. He quickly counted, as best he could, the numbers of unshod ponies that had moved above the spring a short time before. Several moccasin tracks lead from the hoof prints to the water. I ain’t the only one this morning to taste this sweet water.
He narrowed his eyes, concentrated on the count, deciphering— as taught to him long ago by Tracks on Rock—each different print by size, shape, drag, and depth of indentation. At least forty, maybe more. He knelt on one knee, leaning on the Sharps, its butt in the grass, and stroked his mustache, thinking hard. They were moving west, parallel with the train, just five or six miles away.
He heard Buck snort, sensed a disturbance in the air behind him, and instinctively rolled to the ground, dropping the Sharps, the blow from the tomahawk glancing off his shoulder ineffectually. The short, stocky, powerfully built brave, his face painted for war, leapt at him. Zeb rolled again, and the warrior landed with a heavy thud next to him, quickly pushing his upper body up from the ground with one thick arm and rapidly raising his war hatchet with the other. Zeb’s pistols were scrunched into his stomach. Would take too long. The Sharps lay three or four feet away, and their eyes were locked only two feet apart, the Warrior’s dark, angry, and intent as he launched himself sideways at Zeb, the tomahawk blurring the air as he swung it.
Zeb reached over his shoulder, felt the hilt of his knife in his hand, and desperately drew the blade, slashing at the hatchet , parrying the blow, the sharp blade slicing the warrior’s upper arm as he did so.
Both men sprang to coiled crouches—two badgers gathered for attack—eyes fastened in a stare of deadly enmity. Four feet between them, Zeb gauged. The brave’s look darted to the Sharps. Zeb followed his gaze. The Indian sprang from his crouch, like the strike of a rattlesnake. Zeb rose to meet him, his left hand catching the warrior’s wrist just below the clench of the deadly hatchet, the warrior’s free hand vise-like on the mountain man’s forearm below his knife. The momentum of the man’s powerful body drove Zeb backward, the brave on top of him. The warrior’s weight pushed him against the ground with a thud. The Enfield at his back seared Zeb’s side. Two ribs popped, separating from his spine. The pain jarred him, lent him strength. He broke the strong defensive grip below his knife hand and thrust the fourteen-inch blade straight up into the Indian’s chest, then twisted it savagely. A look of disbelief flashed across the warrior’s face. His eyes, dimming, fastened on Zeb’s. Zeb twisted the knife again, driving it to the hilt. The brave coughed, splattering blood on Zeb’s face. His chest convulsed and his eyes glazed over, lifeless.
Zeb shoved the body off of him quickly. He withdrew his blade and wiped it on the Indian’s leather shirt, took two quick steps to the Sharps, and paused in a half-crouch, both knees bent, one leg extended forward, the quiet, close-in weapon still dripping from its blood groove in one outstretched arm, the long-range weapon ready in the other. Like an eagle guarding its kill, he rotated his shoulders, searching. He saw no other Indians. He sank down to one knee, the pain in his side sharp and biting, the taste of blood on his lips. Might have punctured a lung.
Zeb glanced quickly back at the inert form, thick red seeping down into the coarse, sandy soil. The grasses downhill of the body were oddly discolored. Pawnee. Must be rearguard. With each breath, pain stabbed his chest. He spat. The spittle was a frothy pink where it clung viscously to blades of grass—lungs, sure enough. Charlie must have seen ’em—he will warn the train—but what if he doesn’t, or can’t? Reuben, Johannes, Mac—my friends. Sarah—SARAH!
He rose and leapt down the little draw, a full frantic downhill run toward Buck, each contact with the ground driving pain into his chest and back like a dagger. The Enfield, still on its sling, bounced wildly against him as he ran. Buck shook his head and trotted to meet him.
He waved his hand in the air in a circular motion. Buck stopped, and turned hi
s rump toward him. With a wheezing grunt, Zeb vaulted up over his back into the saddle and, without taking time to stirrup, dug his heels into the mustang’s sides. “Go, Buck, go!” With a whinny, the mustang lunged forward at full gallop, Zeb’s mind racing. Poor Charlie, sure as hell hope he ain’t been kilt. Sarah! Buck bounded up several low hills and careened down their backside, barely braking.
Once in the lower, rolling country, which tapered off to the flats, Zeb hunched low over the saddle, his face almost in the horse’s mane. Buck’s powerful muscles rippled and worked below him. He gripped the Sharps tightly in his left hand, casting painful, furtive backward glances low over both sides of his shoulders as they sped in the direction of the wagons.
He heard a faint shrill, terrible, far off scream of pain and surprise—its dull, muted echo lost in the frantic sound of Buck’s pounding hooves and heavy breathing. In flatter country now, the mustang fairly flew, gaining speed. Far, far in the distance, he could make out the barely visible white canvas wagon tops that marked his unaware friends. Good God, they’re stopped. Damn. He dug his heels into Buck’s flanks again. “By the Lord, if you have ever run boy, you run now—go, Buck, go.”
Incredibly, the mustang sped up, his hooves a blur underneath Zeb’s buckskin-clad form, his neck fully extended, his nose pointed toward the distant wagons, his tail straightened behind him.
Zeb looked over his shoulder and his blood ran cold. Indians were pouring over the nearest ridge, maybe two miles out. He could faintly hear their whoops and cries. They had been spotted! “Buck, run. Run!” He leaned down, grimacing with pain, and shoved the Sharps back into its scabbard. He wrenched the Colt Army revolver from his belt, raised the pistol in the air, and fired. “Dammit, listen up!” he shouted into the wind. He fired again. Behind him—at full gallop on his trail with a cloud of dust swirling in their wake—was the wall of Indians, bent over their ponies and mustangs, their rifles, bows, and lances held high, coming like the angry boil of a swarm of enraged hornets.
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