“They’ll do it for you,” Wallace laughed. “Arnie is already sweet on you, and Dobie is young enough to be dazzled by you if you put your mind to it.”
Sarah wasn’t sure what Wallace meant, but she didn’t intend to ask. She just wanted to keep his attention on her. Jared had stopped moving. Hopefully, he’d changed his mind about what he intended.
“Maybe I can convince them to change their story,” Sarah allowed, “but you know how hardheaded Texas men can be.” Jared was just standing behind Wallace, testing his balance without the cane. That didn’t make any sense. He couldn’t walk without the cane.
“You’ll do it if you want your daughter back.”
“What are you going to do with her?”
“She’ll be with me. If I get rained on, she’ll get rained on. If I get cold and hungry, she’ll get cold and hungry. Tell that to your new husband. Tell that to—”
Jared swung his crutch and hit Wallace in the back of the head. He staggered and dropped his gun, which went off when it struck the floor. The bullet struck Sarah in the leg, knocking it out from under her.
“Mama!” Jared’s voice and the pain came at the same time.
“I didn’t do that!” Wallace shouted. “Make sure you tell the deputy it was your damn son’s fault.” He picked up his pistol and ran out the door.
Sarah didn’t care whose fault it was. Uppermost in her mind was that she couldn’t get up and Wallace was leaving with Ellen.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for him to shoot you.” Jared had crawled to her on his hands and knees, and his tears fell on her clothes and face as he clutched her.
“It’s not your fault,” she assured him. “It all started with Mr. Wallace. If he hadn’t taken Ellen, none of this would have happened.”
“Are you going to die? Your leg looks real bloody.”
“No, but I can’t get up. You have to find Salty. If Mr. Wallace takes Ellen to his hiding place, we might never find her. Hurry.”
She hated to ask Jared to undertake such a long trip, but there seemed no alternative. And while her son and Salty found Ellen, she had to bind up her leg, try to keep the wound from bleeding too much.
Salty would get Ellen back. He would take care of both of them. He would take care of everything.
* * *
Salty was looking forward to his supper. It had been a long and tiring day, and he was relieved that they had found only eleven cows that needed branding and no signs of a wolf or of Henry Wallace. He was heading home ahead of Arnie and Dobie to watch the children enjoy some time outside before it got dark. He thought Sarah was being overly cautious, truth be told, but it was better to be safe than sorry. To hear Ellen tell, it was practically solitary confinement.
When it was all over and there was no question about the legality of his marriage to Sarah, he was going to move into the new bedroom with Sarah. Just thinking about that made his body tighten. The nights had been hell, and the days weren’t any better. It was agony to see her, to be able to touch her and even steal an occasional kiss, but do no more. Dobie had said he was foolish to force on himself such restraints, but Salty knew he’d never be comfortable being Sarah’s husband the way he wanted to be her husband until the ghost of Roger Winborne was wholly laid to rest.
It seemed Nature had conspired to make everything around him remind him of her. Today the clear blue sky matched her eyes, the sun’s warmth her radiant smile, and its rays her golden hair. The wind was the sound of her sighing, the noise of the stream the sound of her laughter. The clip-clop of his horse’s hooves reminded him of her beating heart when he held her close. The down that lined a duck’s nest was as soft as her cheeks, the swelling buds of the Indian Paintbrush her lips. His memory of her was so vivid he could almost believe he was seeing her, touching her, holding her in his arms…
He had to stop! He was becoming so uncomfortable in the saddle he’d have to walk home, and he didn’t need Ellen to tell him that no self-respecting cowboy walked when he could ride. Thinking of Ellen made him smile. She was so much like her mother. When she grew up, she was going to give fits to every boy within a hundred miles. It would take a special man to win her heart. Ellen swore she didn’t want to get married, but he was sure she would change her mind. She was a girl who needed family to—
His thoughts broke off as he saw a horse and rider coming toward him at a fast canter. At first he thought it was Jared, but that was impossible: the boy couldn’t capture, saddle, and mount a horse by himself. But no sooner had he convinced himself it was impossible than he realized it was Jared, who was riding bareback. That meant something was terribly wrong. Salty was caught between fear and pride that the boy was riding the horse.
Spurring his horse into a gallop, he rode to meet Jared.
“Mr. Wallace shot Mama and stole Ellen!”
The boy’s face was wreathed with determination, his hands gripped the horse’s mane. Their mounts came together. Jared couldn’t turn his, so Salty reined around alongside him. “What did you say?” he asked, crowding Jared’s horse to face him back in the direction of the house.
“Mr. Wallace shot Mama! She said I was to come get you so you could get Ellen back. Mr. Wallace ran off!”
A wave of relief swamped Salty, so powerful he swayed in the saddle. He’d been imagining Sarah dead. But she was obviously wounded, and he didn’t know how bad. He started picturing how he would make Wallace suffer before killing him. If Sarah was not seriously wounded, he might take pity on Wallace and just shoot him.
Jared looked exhausted. Salty wasn’t sure the boy could make it back to the house on his own. He moved closer until their two horses were almost shoulder to shoulder. He reached over and put his arm around Jared’s waist. “Let go,” he commanded. “You’re going to ride double with me. Sit behind me, put your arms around my waist and hold on tight.”
He lifted the boy over. Jared pressed his head between Salty’s shoulders; he wrapped his arms around Salty’s waist and locked his fingers. Salty felt a rush of warmth at the way the boy clung to him, at the way he trusted that Salty would make everything right. The love Salty felt for Sarah was strange and wonderful, but what he felt for this boy and his sister was just as powerful in its own way. It was humbling and wonderful at the same time.
“Tell me what happened,” he said after the boy was safely settled behind him. He left Jared’s horse to find its own way home.
Salty couldn’t catch all the words, but he heard enough to understand. He was glad Sarah had only been shot in the leg, though that was still dangerous. He wasn’t surprised that Ellen had sneaked out on her own, but he was shocked that Wallace would kidnap her. Had the man completely lost his sanity?
“Did he say why he kidnapped Ellen?”
“He said everybody had to say some stranger killed Papa if we wanted her back.”
“What did your mother say?”
“She told him the deputy probably wouldn’t believe us if we lied. Then she said she’d try, but I think it was just so he wouldn’t hurt Ellen.”
Salty had to find her. The deputy’s hands would be tied if the men changed their stories, and the little girl was one of the things Salty loved most in the world. He didn’t know how he was going to find Wallace in one afternoon when no one had found his hiding place in more than a week, but first things first. Right now all he could think about was making sure Sarah was okay.
It seemed like hours rather than just a few minutes before he rode into the yard. He brought his horse to a halt, jumped down, and lifted Jared from the saddle. He ran into the house through the open door, the boy in his arms. Sarah was sitting in a chair, her leg bound with strips torn from her petticoat.
“You’ve got to find Wallace,” she said before he could take a single additional step toward her. “He’s got Ellen.”
Salty put Jared down. “I need to make sure you’re a
ll right.”
“I’m okay. Find Ellen.”
He crossed the room. “In a minute, Sarah. First—”
“If you don’t go after my daughter this minute,” Sarah nearly shouted, “I’ll get out of this chair and do it myself.”
The expression on her face was a mixture of rage and fear. Her voice vibrated with an urgency that only a mother could feel, and behind it all was a spine of iron, a will that had refused to break despite everything life at thrown at her. If he didn’t go after Wallace right now, Salty knew Sarah would do it herself. How could he leave the woman he loved, knowing she’d been shot and not knowing how bad the wound was? Yet, how could he not try to find Ellen?
Salty had never expected to have to make such a difficult decision, but he didn’t have to. Sarah had already made it for him. She chose her daughter.
He turned to Jared. “I need you to go back up the trail. When you find Arnie, tell him to take care of your mother. Tell Dobie to ride for a doctor and notify the deputy sheriff.” He turned to Sarah. “I don’t know when I’ll be back. If you start to feel—”
Sarah shook her head. “I don’t matter.”
Wallace would pay dearly for what he’d done. The pain in her eyes wasn’t a pain caused by any physical injury but rather one in her heart. He’d never seen her eyes so bleak, so empty. So scared.
“I’ll find Ellen,” he told Sarah. “I won’t come back until I do.”
It didn’t take him long to saddle a new horse for Jared. While he did that, the boy explained how he’d taken the bars down, lured the first horse to the fence with corn and managed to climb onto its back. He apologized for any of the other horses that got out, but he couldn’t put the bars back up without getting down off the horse again.
“I’m really proud of you,” Salty said. “I’d round up a hundred runaways if I could have been around to watch you pull off that trick.”
Jared rode off a tired but proud boy.
While he caught and saddled his own mount, Salty tried to think of where to look for Wallace. He couldn’t stop worrying about Ellen. She was a brave little girl, and bright, but she was only seven, still a child. She had to be frightened and wondering if anyone was going to find her. He wondered if she regretted having ignored her mother’s wishes. Would he find Wallace before it became too dark? It was fortunate he’d come home early, but he wouldn’t have more than a couple hours of daylight.
The trail wasn’t as difficult to follow as he expected, and he headed in the direction of Wallace’s ranch. The standard route between the two ranches was little more than a faint track. They’d had rain the previous day and the ground was still soft enough to show hoof prints. Some were deeper than others, indicating an irregularity of stride. Nor did that horse keep a straight path. It turned toward the hills. Now Salty had to depend on bruised grass and fresh growth that had been broken off.
He was surprised to come to a spot where the ground was badly cut up; he didn’t understand why the horse should act up just because Wallace had changed direction. But when it happened a second time, he grinned broadly. Every time Wallace changed direction, Ellen found a way to cause the horse to mark their track. The girl was bright as well as courageous. He just hoped Wallace didn’t figure out what she was doing.
The rancher was heading to a part of his land that merged with a group of low hills composed of jumbled boulders and covered with stunted trees. If Salty lost the trail, it would be difficult to pick up again. He followed the path carefully, looking for broken branches, marks of shod hooves on stone, any disturbance in the new growth that even these barren hills couldn’t entirely discourage, and he reached the other side more quickly than he expected.
The land that lay before him was rock-strewn and veined with dry streambeds carved by swift running water. Covered by a combination of dry grass and isolated stands of oak and tangled vines, it was a perfect place for Wallace to hide; he could change thickets every day to avoid detection. The lengthening shadows made it hard for Salty to find the trail. He thought he knew where Wallace had come down from the hills, but he couldn’t find anything to tell him where he had gone. He was stymied.
For the next half hour he searched one thicket after another. During that time, the evening shadows progressed from twilight to darkness. The decision became whether to stay for the night or go home and come back tomorrow. He hadn’t brought any food, water, or his bedroll; he’d have to sleep on bare ground, hungry and thirsty. That prospect didn’t appeal to him, but he knew he couldn’t go home. Not yet. Not leaving Ellen to Wallace’s questionable mercy.
He might not be able to do anything by staying here, but he surely couldn’t do anything if he went back to the house. In the meantime, needing to find a place to rest, he checked out several thickets. None was both dry and offered a carpet of leaves to keep him from having to lie down directly on the rocks. He had just rejected a fourth thicket when he saw what he thought was a faint glimmer of light in the distance. It vanished immediately, but he took heart. If he was lucky, he’d just seen a flicker of light from Wallace’s campfire. At the very least it might be someone else who had seen Wallace and Ellen. But he wanted to see it again, just to make sure he wasn’t imagining things.
The light remained invisible for so long Salty began to wonder if it had been moonlight reflecting off a fleck of silica embedded in a stone or a piece of broken glass, but then the light reappeared, and it flared forth with such a burst of color there was no doubt it was real. Within a few moments it had assumed a formidable size. One of the thickets was on fire! Salty drove his tired mount into a gallop. He didn’t know what had caused the blaze, but if Ellen was there, she was in danger.
There were perhaps as many as fifty trees in the grove when he reached it, and the perimeter was composed of an impenetrable tangle of thorny vines that would cause serious damage even to the most careful rider. Salty searched for the break in the barrier that Wallace must have used, assuming he hadn’t hacked his way in with a bush ax. His search became even more intense when he heard a voice which he identified as Wallace’s followed by Ellen’s high, clear, penetrating sound. The girl was alive and in fighting form, but he would have to get her out quickly. The fire was growing. It wouldn’t be long before the whole grove was on fire.
Despite the moonlight, Salty almost missed the break in the vines that proved to be the only way to enter. He turned his mount toward the opening, but its fear of fire was so great it refused to enter. Salty dug his heels into the horse’s side, but the animal squealed in fright, wheeled, and tried to run away. Salty managed to stop him, but he’d never get the horse inside. With a curse of frustration, he leapt to the ground. He didn’t look back as the frightened animal ran away, instead headed straight into the thicket.
At first he couldn’t see in the nearly total darkness. Then he was blinded by the light from the fire. He nearly knocked himself down on a couple of low-hanging branches, but at last he reached where Wallace was struggling with Ellen. She bit Wallace’s hand, which caused him to scream curse-filled threats. She kicked and scratched as well. Wallace had tangled with a wildcat.
The fire had gained such a strong foothold, Salty was more concerned about getting Ellen to safety than apprehending Wallace. After running into several more limbs, one that came perilously close to putting out his eye, he reached the kidnapper.
The noise of the fire had covered the sound of his footsteps, but a sixth sense must have warned Wallace of Salty’s approach. He struck Ellen a savage blow that knocked the child to the ground; then he turned on Salty, gun in hand. Fortunately, he was as blinded by the fire as Salty. His shot went wide. A second shot passed so close to Salty’s ear he could hear the whine of the bullet. The next sound, the hammer falling on an empty chamber, was music to Salty’s ears.
Wallace stood before him, silhouetted against the fire. Rather than waste time, Salty ran to Ellen and lifted her t
o her feet. “We’ve got to get out before the fire traps us.”
The little girl was still groggy from the blow, but her anger-filled eyes searched for her abductor. “Where’s Mr. Wallace?”
Salty looked to where the man had been, but he was gone.
“He probably ran away to escape the fire—something we’d better do.” Taking Ellen firmly by the hand, Salty rushed for the way out.
“He’ll get away!”
“Not for long,” Salty promised. He searched for the exit to the thicket, but it was impossible to see past the blaze all around him. He told himself not to panic. Wallace had found a way out. They would, too.
The fire had leapt from dry leaves and dead limbs on the ground into the treetops; Salty could hear the sound of wood popping and splitting over its roar. They had only seconds to find the way out, he knew. Stumbling over fallen limbs and dodging low-hanging branches, Salty fought to stay ahead of the blaze while struggling for the opening that would lead them to safety.
Ellen started to cry. “We’re going to burn up. I’ll never see Mama again.”
“We’re not going to burn up.” He and the little girl were going to get out of this if he had to go headfirst through the worst tangle of thorny vines in Texas. He snatched up a dead branch and told her, “Get behind me.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Use this branch to force our way out.”
He might as well have been confronting a solid wall for all the good his pushing on the branch did. The fire was getting closer, hotter. Salty thrust the end of the limb into the tangle of vines to pry an opening. While the vines had refused to break or be uprooted, they did bend to either side. The tangle was more than six feet in depth, but he managed to make an opening large enough for Ellen to scramble through. By now the fire was in the trees directly overhead and smoldering in the leaves at his feet. The heat was terrible, and the smoke was making his eyes water. He could hardly breathe without gasping, which only made things worse. He had to get out now or it would be too late.
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