Three hours after leaving camp, she imagined she could still feel Joseph watching her, gripping her hands as he begged her not to leave. But in the end she’d given him no options. By now he would have his company of travelers well down the trail, and Victoria hoped Heidi was tucked safely amongst the friendly brood of Reich children, healing from her loss. She may well meet up with them in Neosho, since Joseph had drawn the map for her late last night. If she got lost, all she had to do was follow Shoal Creek.
Victoria hated to admit it to herself, but she discovered that she missed Joseph’s badgering; his warnings continued to sound through her head. Every splash in the water, every birdcall had made her jump for the first hour of her ride. How her brothers would tease her if they knew she was being so skittish.
She hadn’t realized how alone she would feel, attacked by thoughts and haunted by memories, with only Boaz for company. She had allowed Joseph to talk her into trading horses, but now she missed Sadie, and Boaz didn’t yet know how to anticipate his new rider’s touch on the reins.
A battle raged inside her heart, the same battle she and Joseph had engaged in last night. It was a sin to out-and-out shoot the man she followed. It would have been much easier to kill him in self-defense, but as the captain had told her when she’d collected Boaz, quiet and discreet observation would go much further toward discovering whether he rode with others and what their plans were for the near future; whether or not the wagon train would be safe.
Joseph had the kind of maturity she had always admired in Matthew...and perhaps a little more. A wisp of a breeze reached her as she recalled her husband’s voice. She closed her eyes, though she knew what would come....
His white skin glistened with her tears in the afternoon sunlight. She traced the strong outline of his face and pressed her fingers to his still-warm lips. She couldn’t tell how long her sobs echoed, how long she raged at God, screamed at Him in fury.
“How could You do this to him?” she’d spat, her gaze jabbing the sky. “You’re supposed to be all-powerful and just? Is this what You see as justice? Allowing murderers to kill Your servant before he even gets started?”
Boaz jerked and Victoria opened her eyes, still reeling at her own audacity on the day of Matthew’s death, to challenge God with such boldness.
Boaz stepped sideways, his hooves grinding into creek gravel. He nickered softly, and Victoria froze, studying the lay of the land. She pulled the leather hat lower over her face, glad she’d dressed in Matthew’s riding clothes, though oversized on her. She was grateful for the cowhide chaps.
She heard nothing save the splash of the creek beside her, saw nothing out of place in the primeval forest. Oak and sassafras, ash and birch hovered over the spreading branches of fir and pine. A narrow trail, barely discernible, wound westward through the woods, past tree trunks as thick as Conestoga wagons. What had made that trail? Human? Animal? At any rate, she suspected she wasn’t alone in this place. Joseph’s description of the dangers continued to cause her disquiet.
She guided Boaz away from the water and was preparing to adjust one set of the saddlebags behind her when the gelding’s chest rumbled. The sound of multiple hoofbeats echoed from the cliff. Victoria turned. Someone was closing in.
Reaching for the rifle beneath her right saddle skirt, she guided her horse away from the brightness of the clearing. There were two animals, at least, coming toward her, their movements louder with each step.
Heart hammering, breaths uneven, Victoria fought the fear that had pursued her on this journey. She could not let it stop her, but there were times, like now, when she could barely force herself to move forward and focus on her task. As if finally in tune with his rider’s thoughts, Boaz backed more deeply into the shadows.
The hoofbeats became a threatening rumble as the animals reached the solid stone surface that edged the creek for about twelve feet. She had crossed it only moments ago. Boaz whinnied before she could think to silence him with the tap on the ears Joseph had taught her. Whoever was coming now knew she was here.
“Victoria!”
The sound of her name echoed along the cliff side, and she was at once relieved and greatly alarmed. Heidi Ladue! Had something happened at the wagon train? Had more travelers fallen ill?
“Dr. Fenway!” Again, Heidi.
Victoria rode out into the open and back along the creek. Multiple hoofbeats meant multiple riders, didn’t they? Who was with Heidi?
But as the first animal emerged from the trees—Heidi’s mule, Bacon, with Heidi astride, followed by her pet donkey, Pudding—Victoria saw that the second animal was riderless, loaded down with bags and a clanking cook pot.
Heidi’s eyes lit with obvious relief as she raised her hand in greeting. “I thought I wouldn’t catch you, but I knew you were staying close to the creek, so I kept riding.”
Her cheeks were flushed, her hair was tangled with pine needles and she had a scrape across her chin that told of a run-in with brambles. Her blue eyes held concern that she was obviously trying not to reveal.
“Where is the rest of the wagon train?” Victoria asked.
“Along the wagon trail apiece by now, I’d imagine.” Heidi didn’t stop when she reached Victoria but guided her animals down to the water. “We’ve been goin’ so fast, I didn’t want to take time for a drink.”
Victoria followed her and gave Boaz some rein so he could drink his fill, as well. “I know Captain Rickard didn’t allow you to come out here by yourself.” To be honest, however, Victoria had given Joseph no further details about what she had planned. When he’d approached her last night about sending others with her, she’d shut down the conversation and bid him good-night. Even he would not have expected her to leave hours before first light. Now she wished she hadn’t taken his horse.
Heidi slipped from her saddle and knelt by the flowing stream. “Think this is clean enough to drink, Dr. Fenway?”
“I saw a spring back a few yards. Drink from there, and then you’re coming with me. I’m taking you back to the train.”
Heidi’s shoulders stiffened. “I’m not goin’.”
“It’s too dangerous for you out here, my dear.”
“I made it this far, didn’t I? And if it’s so chancy, you shouldn’t be here, either.” Heidi straightened and turned toward Victoria.
“I have other responsibilities to attend to.”
“How far’ve you got to go?”
Victoria fought her rising irritation. Despite her loneliness, she couldn’t take the girl on this dangerous path, and catching up with the wagon train would cost a day’s travel. This shortcut was turning out not to be nearly so short. “For me alone, it would be only one day’s hard riding. I could have been there late this evening.” Her only hope was that Joseph would realize where Heidi had come and would send someone after her. Lives could be at stake.
“I’m not afraid of hard riding. I’m comin’ with you.”
Victoria felt an unwelcome rush of the anger that had become familiar to her since Matthew’s murder. “No!” She sank her teeth into her lower lip for a few seconds to calm herself. Easy irritability was yet another symptom of the change that had taken place in her heart since Matthew’s death. “I must make this trip alone,” she said more gently.
Heidi dabbed at the water on her face with her sleeve. “That don’t make sense. Since I aim to head the same direction, we might as well do it together. Besides, I brought more of your things on Pudding, medicines and such. You said you’d teach me your skills.” She gestured toward her pet donkey, and Victoria recognized her medical supplies.
“When did you do all that packing?” Victoria asked.
“Soon as you left. Then I put a note on the wagon for Captain Rickard and hightailed after you.”
The anger returned, and again Victoria repressed it. The girl had suffered enough; one must be gentle.
And yet, for most of Victoria’s life, she had been told what to do and with whom she would do it. Though
these past months had been unnerving and difficult, she’d learned to be stronger and more independent. Neither Joseph Rickard nor this child would take that away from her.
“Heidi Ladue, we will meet again, and I will be prepared to apprentice you, but this is not that time.”
“I’m ready now.”
“I have other things—”
“I’m not going back to that wagon train.”
“You are not taking this journey with me.” Victoria nudged Boaz in the side and reined him away from the water, hands shaking with frustration as she turned her back on the willful girl. “I will take you to Captain Rickard, who will no doubt be on his way after you.” Perhaps this day would be salvaged, after all, if they met up with him soon enough.
Victoria was leaning forward to avoid a low-hanging willow branch when a deep-voiced shriek from across the water on the hillside froze her with terror and sent Boaz shooting up the creek’s steep bank.
That scream didn’t come from Heidi. The gelding mingled his own scream with the unseen presence and scrambled sideways, nearly unseating Victoria. She looked over her shoulder at Heidi to find the girl gaping with horror at the top of a rocky promontory that hung over the creek.
A sleek cat crouched above them. Blacker than night, it appeared to be twice Heidi’s size.
Boaz fought the reins and neighed with fear. Victoria struggled to control him while reaching once more for the rifle she’d shoved back into its brace.
The mule and the donkey lunged up the bank and galloped into the forest, cook pot clanging. Heidi turned to run after them.
“Don’t!” Victoria cried. “It’ll give chase!”
The huge cat flew from the rock and landed on their side of the creek with a scatter of gravel. One more leap brought it to Heidi’s heels. Victoria leaped from Boaz, rifle in hand, but Boaz swerved to escape, knocking the weapon from her grip.
She launched herself forward and landed between Heidi and the panther, shouting in her deepest voice, reaching into her pocket for her pistol.
Before she could draw out her gun, claws like a surgeon’s blade sliced into her right thigh. With a cry of agony, Victoria lost her grip on the pistol. The animal jerked her forward, ripping flesh. She couldn’t fight. Pain slashed through her.
The cat released her leg and leaped forward to straddle her torso, fangs inches from her face. Victoria could only close her eyes, her heart threatening to explode inside her from pain and terror as she awaited death.
A crack of thunder echoed against the cliff. For one peculiar moment, as if all time and movement had slowed, Victoria stared at the break in the treetops above the creek and wondered why she saw no rain clouds. Then time resumed, and the cat collapsed, crushing the breath from her. Its eyes glazed over, with blood fresh and dripping on the dying animal’s claws.
“Victoria!” Heidi screamed, crumpling to the ground beside her. She dropped the rifle and shoved at the heavy animal.
Each movement sent streaks of pain up and down Victoria’s right leg, but she helped Heidi push as the smell of spent gunpowder mingled with the smell of blood.
“You shot it.” Victoria’s voice wavered from lack of oxygen.
“What did you think I’d do, let it eat you?”
There’d been no time to think.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.” Heidi burst into sobs. “I didn’t know this place was so savage. Never thought something like this could happen. I thought I’d be your helper, so you wouldn’t be alone.”
Too absorbed in her own pain to reply, Victoria fought to pull herself from beneath the dead weight. As she did so, the amount of blood that covered the right leg of her chaps alarmed her. The tough hide had protected her to a point, but it had been no match for the panther’s claws.
Heidi finished pushing the animal free, then turned back and saw the blood. She gasped. “Victoria!”
“Keep your wits, young lady! Where’s your knife?”
“But you’re bleeding!”
“Listen to me, Heidi.” Victoria’s mind swam with inertia for a moment. She forced herself to breathe through the overwhelming power of the pain. “I need your help. Stop looking at the blood and look into my eyes!”
Heidi’s face grew pale.
“No! Heidi, this is no time for a swoon.” Victoria slapped the girl’s face only hard enough to make it sting. “Look at me! Keep your wits about you, Heidi Ladue, because I’m not sure how much longer I can!”
The girl swallowed and blinked, and then placed her hand against the place where Victoria had slapped her. She took a long, even breath and let it out slowly, as she’d been taught when working with injured animals or patients. She finally looked Victoria in the eyes. “I’m so sorry. T-tell me what to d-do.”
“Help me with my coat. Rip the sleeve from my shirt and tie it around the wound until we can find some yarrow root to help staunch the flow. Where is your knife?”
Heidi blinked at tears as they flooded her eyes.
“Straighten up and listen to me! Pay attention.” Victoria allowed all of the fury she’d suppressed earlier to explode through her voice. “Are you going to let your patient die because you’re too weak to handle the case? Was I wrong to choose you as my assistant?”
Heidi jerked and looked again into Victoria’s eyes. “No, ma’am.” She swallowed and took a deep breath.
“Get a knife.”
“Mine’s on Bacon. He ran off.” Her face scrunched with another wave of tears.
“My life’s in your hands, Heidi! Save those tears for later. You’ve got to see what you’re doing.”
Heidi bit her lip and nodded. “Keep a level head, don’t give in to imagination,” she murmured by rote.
Victoria glanced over her shoulder in the direction the animals had run. “Bacon hasn’t gone far.”
“He’ll run back to the wagon train.”
“Not if Boaz is the animal our captain has told me about. Help me with this, and then I want you to catch your mule and get the knife. Find Boaz and get the whiskey out of my saddlebag. I want to wash these wounds.” Victoria needed to slap her own face as well, but she had long ago learned to keep the blackness away by focusing her attention on the one single need at hand, not the complications surrounding her. She had to stop the bleeding. “I’ll be glad when Captain Rickard catches up.”
Heidi paused as she tugged on the right sleeve of Victoria’s coat. “He ain’t comin’.”
“Hurry, get this off me. Of course he’ll come. He won’t leave you out alone in this wilderness with no one but me to protect you. He doesn’t even want me here.”
“Doc, he doesn’t know we’re alone!”
The coat came off, and Victoria jerked at the right sleeve of her shirt until it ripped. It was sewn well, with strong cloth, and she tugged again. She didn’t want to hear what Heidi had done, but there was no choice. “Tell me.”
“The letter I left him was from you,” Heidi said.
Strength waning, Victoria ripped the sleeve lengthwise and made a bandage. “What do you mean?”
“I can copy your handwriting.” Heidi’s voice was so low Victoria had to strain to hear it. “I learned watching you write in your journal, and I always try to write like you when I make labels for the medicines.”
No. Oh, no. What had this girl done? “Okay, then, what did I tell Captain Rickard?”
“That you met with some other riders going your way, and so you were taking me with you since it’d be safe, after all.”
“Safe!” Victoria gasped as she wrapped the bandage around her thigh and pulled it tight. She could think of nothing more to say, and the pain distracted her from her initial reaction to the girl’s dangerous manipulations.
“I’ll catch the animals.” Heidi straightened and rushed away, obviously afraid Victoria would grab her and strangle her.
Seldom given to panic, Victoria watched the fourteen-year-old running into this forest of death and felt gripped by a terror such as she had
never felt before. She was alone, in danger, and she didn’t know from which direction an attack would come next. She suddenly had to become mother to a willful orphan. Heidi Ladue had the heart of a warrior, but she was obviously still a child, after all, considering this latest stunt. Victoria must protect this child.
* * *
Joseph crumpled the note in his hand as he controlled his breathing and wished he could control the thumping of his heart, the betrayal of nerves in his voice. “Where’s McDonald?” he growled.
“Checkin’ the south trail,” Buster said. “What you need him for?”
“Get him and bring him back, and if you can’t find him yourself, get that brother of yours to go with you.” At least Gray had a sense of direction.
The person Joseph needed he had already sent into the woods to follow the creek that marked Victoria’s route—and Heidi’s, including that strong, noisy little donkey, which could quickly call attention to their presence if anyone was there to listen. And there would be. McDonald had come in at early dawn this morning with word of churned-up mud at least two miles up the trail. Looked to have come through last night—and the riders hadn’t taken Victoria’s route; they’d taken a main route in the direction of the mill town.
Deacon had a swift horse and was tracking Victoria and Heidi now—if there were, indeed, tracks to be found. What if this note had been left behind to throw off any rescue? Border ruffians were on the march, apparently toward Jolly Mill, where too many travelers took refuge. Even if Victoria and Heidi were safe on their own trail, they might be riding into trouble once they reached their destination.
If Joseph ever caught up with Victoria, he was going to break the promise he’d made to her yesterday. He was going to hog-tie her and toss her into the back of the Ladue wagon until they reached their final destination. At this moment, he doubted anyone would argue with him except for Heidi, who was likely to receive the same treatment.
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