by R. Kent
A body hit the dirt in front of me. I jerked back against the boulder, silently clawing at the ragged rock with my filthy nails.
A golden body spraying crimson blood had thumped onto the ground. The report from a rifle cracked secondary.
“A man never heard the bullet that killed him,” my White pa had said many times over.
The fallen Indian’s body gurgled and hissed, twitching convulsively.
Horses screamed. Warriors wheeled their mounts in circles.
Through squinted eyes, I scanned for the smoking gun. There. On the ridge. His rifle’s butt rested on a thick thigh. Steel blinked in the sun. A tendril of smoke wafted from the barrel.
With curdling whoops and thundering hooves, the Indians swooped toward the wagon train like a swarm of angry bees.
Clouds of dust obliterated my sight. But I heard sharp snaps of gunfire, shouts from men, cries of children, and the wailing of women. I slapped my hands over my ears, pressing in hard enough that my head should have exploded. Tears rolled from my clenched eyes.
The dust cleared on a hot blast of wind. Grit stuck to my wet cheeks. And the scene came into focus with horrid bursts of red.
Through the slaughter, I scanned for my pa.
He stood on our Conestoga’s bench seat. Ma huddled below in the boot, clutching my two little sisters. Her face was smudged. The clean streaks down her cheeks attested to her crying. Her auburn hair tousled on quick whips of wind. Her pale blue dress strained tightly over bunched shoulders. I knew the material was pockmarked with tiny flowers, too numerous to count. And I had wished I could bury my face in its voluminous folds right then, where moments previous, I was fiercely displaying the independence that I had often been chided for.
Pa looked out at the horizon, searching. He might have been looking for me. His face was tense. He squinted. I remembered he had had blue-gray eyes that could be as hard as steel when he was angry. I had never known him to be scared. I could almost see his white-knuckled grip on the rifle. I knew how strong his hands were. He’d taught me to always grab hold with a powerful grip and keep holding on with all my might. Never quit.
Pa’s gun barrel drooped.
I’d never seen him give up. He’d made me promise time and time again to never, ever give up on anything, especially a dream.
That barrel pointed at my ma and baby sisters. Their forms dropped. They appeared to be sleeping soundly long before I heard the rhythmic report of his rifle.
Horror struck me in the chest, like that bullet that hit the Indian lying on the ground in front of me. Pa. I wanted to run to him. My body would not budge. I bit down on my lip, tasting a metallic tang as my teeth had cut into flesh.
Pa killed my family. He shot his own family.
I stroked at my pained chest expecting gooey, gurgling blood, gushing from a gaping hole. Nothing. Though the pain in my heart crumpled me farther into the dirt.
Through tear-blurred eyes, I watched as Pa dug his Smith and Wesson from the gun belt at his waist. He turned it on himself.
The Indians stopped their whooping and hollering and quieted their frenetic mounts. The air grew still with deathly silence.
I pulled brush on top of my shaking body and held my knees to my chest. Hiccupping, I no longer cried. I had vowed to never cry again.
My gaze locked on the fallen Indian. His large, round eyes were already glazed with the hazy film of death. He lay there quietly, as if pausing to rest. No twist to his form. No mangled bones. He looked whole and at peace, except for the darkening slurry of thickened blood enveloping his torso.
I had been nine years old. Now? “Seventeen,” I said aloud.
“Seventeen what?” The pitter-patter of those fancy shoes scampered up next to me. Delicate footsteps fell in line but not entirely with my steps. My stride was much longer. Stronger.
“I am seventeen summers.” What did it matter? Why tell anything to this girl? She would be gone soon. I flung myself onto my favored colt. He had the majestic head of the cayuses. And though he was too large, he showed a bit of Spanish legacy through his sloping goose-rump.
Sahara’s huff followed my ascent.
“My hogan is ahead. Not far.”
I took Sahara’s offered hand and swung her up behind me. Before she even settled, I squeezed the sorrel into a lope.
A trail of smoke drifted skyward from the distant butte’s top. I slowed the sorrel to a walk.
“What’s that?” Sahara asked.
“Indian sign.”
“Are there really Indians close by?” She sucked a huge intake of breath before continuing. “Ya know, savages?”
“Closer than you can imagine.”
I felt her shudder.
“What are they like?”
“People. They are The People.”
Sahara clucked her tongue from the roof of her mouth, then followed with an exasperated sigh.
I continued. “What is anyone like? Each is different from the other, but we’re all of the Great Spirit who made The People.”
“You sound like an Indian. That’s savage talk.”
“How would you know what an Indian sounds like?”
“I read all about them. How they war and hate. They even fight among their tribes. And they kill anyone trespassing on their hunting lands or sacred grounds. I’ve heard how they covet whiskey and get all liquored up.”
“Sounds like the Whites too,” I said.
“I read about the gold here,” Sahara continued as if she didn’t hear me. “And there’s land for the taking. And the Civil War doesn’t reach this far. Best of all…no big city living on top of one another, with everyone in each other’s business.”
The hogan came within sight. The sorrel picked his way through the rocky landscape. He halted at the built shelter, blowing encrusted mud from his nostrils.
The sullen sky poured rain in earnest.
I pushed open the doorway. Gray light touched what it could reach. Beyond, was darkness. I struck sparks into a mound of dried horse chips and twigs stacked in the fireplace. When I gently blew on them, flames grew to lick at my nose. I stuck a stick to burning from a stacked woodpile, then went outside to retrieve the carpetbag and basket.
Sahara had barely entered, remaining against the wall.
I dropped her baggage on the straw pallet.
“I’m not a whore,” Sahara announced while eyeing where I tossed her bag. “Men just want whores.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “You men are all alike.” Her soiled, white-gloved fingers clawed at her upper arms.
If she was looking for a reaction, she’d be disappointed. What did I care? I’d have her gone as soon as I could arrange passage back to wherever she came from.
“Men kill over whores.” She shifted her gloved hands to her hips. “They kill over whores, and money, and power.”
I pulled my hat from my head and fussed with it in my hands.
“Once they get the fever, it’s like having to put down a rabid dog. Just can’t stop ’em unless you kill ’em.”
That was enough sermon for me. I shoved my felt hat on and left, closing the door behind me. Whatever Sahara was going on about didn’t interest me. I walked the sorrel to the overhang.
With a fist of scrub brush, I rubbed the angular sorrel colt then tossed feed to each of the horses.
I was wet, and cold, and sore around my ribs. I wanted nothing more to do with the White girl and her White ways. I wanted nothing to do with the Whites at all.
Beneath the overhang, I poked at coals inside a stone ring. With kindling and coaxing, a fire leaped to life. I sat feeding it slowly. When I threw green mesquite onto the engorged flames, smoke billowed into the air. A low draft chased it out. The rain fought the signal’s passage into the ever-darkening sky.
I set strips of meat to warming. The doeskin shirt had dried enough to scrape at it with a knife. I was anxious to shuck my wet, store-bought shirt in favor of the fringed hide covering.
When he came in,
I didn’t turn around. “I saw your sign,” I said to TwoFeathers.
Chapter Five
November 6, 1864, Arizona Territory
It had been over a week. Bordering on two weeks. We hadn’t been getting on. I wanted to make peace. But what I wanted more was for Sahara Miller to get gone. There was a way to make that happen.
“I’m going into town,” I said to Sahara through the hogan’s closed door.
Before dawn, I had tied a bead necklace in Charlie Horse’s mane as a peace offering. It would look pretty on the girl. A trinket Sahara could take back to wherever she came from, adding credence to the tales of her frontier adventure.
TwoFeathers had left the string of rolled copper and polished turquoise beads in exchange for five-pound flour sacks of raw materials. I had laid the beautifully strung necklace by the fire last night, to watch the reflection of the flames dance over the tiny copper balls. The turquoise also shimmered in the firelight, not wanting to be upstaged. I had thought of Sahara and her fire-red hair. I thought the necklace truly belonged on her.
I checked that the necklace still hung in the short strands of mane over Charlie Horse’s wither. “I’m leaving Charlie Horse here. I’m heading out.”
When I turned to leap onto the sorrel, she tapped me on the shoulder. “Could you boost me?” She wore my coat and was shoving her fingers into gloves. Her bulging pouch purse swung from a ribbon on her wrist. I boosted her onto Charlie Horse.
The ride to town was long. The feisty sorrel jigged. I held on to him with one hand and ponied a bay colt with the other. We were all held to a sauntering walk by Sahara’s inability to ride. And the trip was made longer by the fact that she twittered nervously with complaints about the horse, the cold weather, the food, even how my coat smelled of animals and wood smoke. My coat.
At least the incessant chatter kept Sahara on top of the horse. She hardly seemed to notice that she was riding. And after a while, Charlie hardly noticed either. He was a good egg. Mostly. Sometimes. Well…he was a darn good riding horse.
“…and I’m going to need a winter coat. Was that a store I saw in town? In Molasses Pond? What a strange name. I haven’t seen a pond since back East. As for molasses, I highly doubt there’s any around for miles. Mm…but sweet bread would be good. Have you ever had molasses bread?”
I hadn’t answered any of the questions. There was no reason to. Sahara jabbered on. Ignoring her left me time to think.
That’s what I’d been avoiding these last days—thinking. I was riding my sorrel. I was thinking about him. Though I’d never part with Charlie Horse, the sorrel had grown on me. I had worked extra hard to finish a bay for something to sell or trade, not wanting to part with my sorrel. All of it was coming down to survival. I could get along on my own with very little. I needed to buy a stage pass to get Sahara Miller gone.
My traps weren’t panning out. Truth be told, I hadn’t put the time into tending them properly. There were days I couldn’t face checking them at all because of the disappointment. Hunting game had become just as difficult. More often, I felt, why bother, as immediate needs in providing for Sahara took precedence. I needed money. So I needed to gentle the unbroke bay. That’s where all of my time went.
I had ridden the bay to the base of the foothills, looking for signs of game. A bull elk surprised us. I got excited and pulled my revolver, taking the shot, not thinking about what I was sitting on.
The bay about busted himself.
He turned inside out. Twisting and bucking. I grabbed a hunk of mane and tried to get his head around with one rein. The revolver in my hand pressed into his neck as he tossed to a frenzy.
I had missed the elk with that shot. To rub salt into my wound, the big bull stood his ground. He lazily turned his head to watch our antics.
I grabbed mane with both hands. I grabbed all the mane I could. As strands pulled out, I grabbed more. Desperate to hang on, I dug my heels into the bay’s sides. I was sure that the death grip of those heels egged him to keep pitching. But what choice did I have? He was all in.
It was getting dark before the bay found his lost mind.
Needless to say, I spent the ride home that day gun training him.
I was low on bullets. I was low on winter stores. With no stake to buy either, except for two bales of tanned pelts from last year, I’d planned to sell the bay.
The bay was as typical as any red horse with black points. He sported a heavy head and Roman nose, declaring mesteño blood. His only difference from every other solid bay was the white crescent shape in the middle of his forehead.
The bay walked lazily beside my sorrel, laden with tied packs. He was a good horse. Sturdy. Not too tall. Not too smart. He had a gentle nature about him after that bucking fit got out of his system. He’d make a quiet lady’s horse, but I could see him pulling a buggy too. The bay was tractable. He wouldn’t get anybody into any trouble now.
The cold, blustery morning kept the street deserted of folks. That was more about being morning and less about being cold and blustery. Not many around town got going before noon. I could still smell coffee on the winds.
We rode to the mercantile. Sahara slid off Charlie Horse in haste. The necklace was gone from his mane.
She had shed my coat and dashed indoors. Which left me a moment to jam a small potato I’d secreted into one of the bay’s packs down the front of my hide britches. With a sigh of relief, I straightened my shoulders and stood taller.
“Well, if it isn’t Austin.”
I jumped.
“You seem as skittish as a spring colt cut from his mama’s teat. I do declare.”
I turned slowly, hoping everything was adjusted properly. “Miss McKade.” I tipped my hat to her with a nod, silently pleading with my face not to turn bright red.
“Call me Lily. Please.” She tucked the ends of her shawl behind her elbows and smoothed the front of her bodice, fussing at the crisscross of lacing.
My face flushed.
I felt the heat rise from beneath my kerchief to flood over my cheeks. I busied myself with untying the bales of pelts from the bay. Then I tossed the packs and the rope onto the boardwalk.
“My, that is a lovely color on you.”
“Ma’am.” I tipped my hat and turned to walk down the road.
She stepped from the boardwalk. Her white gloved hand gently laid over my forearm. “I’ll walk with you to Molasses Pond Livery. If that’s where you’re going. I was headed that way on my stroll.” Lily tossed her head back and laughed.
I didn’t know what was so funny, but I smiled.
Sahara stood in the storefront window, shooting flint-tipped, flaming arrows at me with her eyes.
What? I shrugged. I didn’t understand women.
With Lily on my arm and the colts in my other hand, I waltzed off to the livery.
Her shawl slipped. Lily’s shawl slipped from her shoulders to across her back and around her upper arms. The movement had caught my attention. Then I noticed that her intake of breath heaved her chest to plumping. It was distracting. I cast glances from the corner of my eye. I did like bosoms. I mean, I guess I shouldn’t. But I did.
“How is the mail ordered bride?” Lily asked. “I heard she was the daughter of a whore. And no pappy stuck around.” She fanned herself with a gloved hand. “Those ordered brides don’t come from the best families.” Lily looked downward and fussed with her skirts. She had the decency to at least act demure.
“And what’s with that hair?” she asked next. “Is that color real? Do tell.” She gave a tiny tug to my arm and whispered, “You would know by now.”
I stared at Lily. I blankly stared because my shock wouldn’t allow any expressive facial contortions.
“Oh, Austin, I do believe you’re a man prude. How noble.” Lily threw her head back, opened her mouth wide, and laughed with no hint of shame.
I draped the reins of the sorrel over the hitching post in front of Molasses Pond Livery, keeping hold of the bay.
>
“Well, here we are.” Lily feigned a pout. “Oh, business is so tedious. I’ll leave that to you men.” In a proper ladylike manner, she dropped a slight curtsy and said, “Good day to you, Austin.”
The barn was large, covered by a spacious gambrel. Wings stretched from either side. Inside, stalled horses munched on stored hay, and saddle horses stood patiently in tie stalls. A buggy, a wagon, hanging harnesses, and saddlery were put up neat and proper. Their scents tickled memories from my early childhood. But I couldn’t think on them now.
“Was that Lily? Why didn’t she stop in?” The man’s gaze stared after her. “She tries to be a good girl. There’s not a lot for a young lady to do in Molasses Pond. She tries,” he muttered more to himself than to me and continued to watch her stroll in the opposite direction. “Sometimes.”
He wiped his palm on the leather apron strapped around his generous midsection, then offered his hand toward me. “Justice.”
He had a firm grip that went with his massive size. There was only one man in town as big as this blacksmith. But Justice seemed nothing like Jack McKade. I couldn’t envision this man lording his bulk around.
His large, muscular physique was probably nurtured over years of hammering steel. His eyes were small but bright. Thick, expressive brows made him appear wise beyond blacksmithing and renting horses in Molasses Pond. His black hair, salted with gray, was cut short to the shape of his head. That, and his clean-shaven face, made him look kindly and trustworthy.
“How do I buy stagecoach passage back East?”
“Son, the stage doesn’t run through here for another month or more. If you’re wanting to get out…” His eyes drifted to the bay.
“He’s broke to ride and to pack. Interested?” I fidgeted with the lead rope as Justice took my measure. “I need a cow. A milk cow.”
“So, you’re staying now?” He motioned me forward. “Let me have a look.” Justice gently tugged at the upper lip of the bay. “Not too old. Over four. Not mature.” He stood back to further contemplate the colt. “You take a look in the pens.”
I handed the rope over.