The bull named Omar didn’t cotton to Bradley. Earlier that morning, when Bradley had helped saddle him, the camel had drawn out those lips like pinchers and pulled Bradley’s hat plumb off his head. Maybe Ambrosia wasn’t lying about them being dangerous, after all. He walked a wide path around the bull to the smaller female that seemed the friendliest.
“Ruby likes you.” Captain Herald tightened the cinch on the belly of the old cow. “But since she’s the calmest, Ambrosia will ride her.”
Ambrosia stood off to the side with her parasol perched overhead. Her large blue hat completely hid her dark hair, and her split skirt billowed big and loose. It’d still be a trick for her to balance on that saddle, but he figured she was prepared.
He wasn’t. Ambrosia had caught him completely off guard. Bradley was used to being the reckless one, footloose and primed to fire, but Ambrosia changed things. He was responsible for her—responsible in a way he’d never been before. His fellow troopers could take care of themselves, but Miss Herald didn’t understand what lay ahead. She was a delightful mess, but beneath the sass was a young lady who bore looking after.
Bradley watched as Captain Herald strapped their packs onto his framework contraptions. Atop the two pack camels, the mounds of barrels, gunny sacks, and a bundled-up feather tick looked top-heavy, but finally the last of the gear was in place, their canteens were full, and they were ready to go.
Bradley’s canteen still held water despite the ding it had taken from the Gunther gang’s guns. He’d decided to keep it as a souvenir to remind himself that the Gunthers were still out there somewhere, and they’d be looking for him.
“Are you sure all the animals are sound, Father?” Ambrosia called. “If any of them go lame out there, we’ll have to leave them behind.”
“We aren’t leaving anyone behind,” Captain Herald responded. “Stop your lollygagging, Amber. Let’s go.”
With a long riding crop, Captain Herald tapped each animal on the shoulder. One by one, they knelt clumsily, their long knobby legs tucking beneath them.
Captain Herald rushed around, as excited as a bee at a hive, pointing with his prod. “Look at that. Do you see how they sit? Their legs fold and hold them up off the ground. In the desert, that keeps them off the hot sand and lets air get beneath them. It’s just one way they are remarkable. No one but God could create such a perfect vehicle for traveling across the desert.”
To be honest, Bradley didn’t ever want to be in a land so hot that the dirt burned you.
Herald beamed. “Time to start the journey.”
Esmeralda was the name of Bradley’s animal. Her loose, flexible lips puckered at him like she was trying to kiss him from afar. Or spit at him, which was more likely. He angled his hat against the sun and pulled his gloves from where they were tucked into his belt.
“Hop on up and hold on.” Captain Herald pointed to the stirrup, and Bradley settled himself into the saddle.
Perched so high, he felt horribly unbalanced, and the camel hadn’t even stood up yet. Captain Herald turned to take Ambrosia’s hand. Bradley didn’t miss the determined jut of her chin as she approached Ruby. Her hand trembled as she closed her parasol and tucked it into the padded roll on the back of the saddle. Slipping her girly boot into the stirrup, she stretched up on her toes and grabbed the horn of the saddle. He hoped she didn’t mind him watching, but someone needed to keep an eye on her.
The camels made some strange noises to each other that sounded like they were gargling soup. Esmeralda shook beneath him as she answered. The captain climbed aboard Omar, then with a whoop, the whole world moved.
With a mighty jump, Esmeralda lurched up to her knees. Just as Bradley caught his balance and kept from rolling off the back, she shoved forward and straightened her back legs. Now Bradley fell forward. Only by bracing himself with locked arms did he keep his nose from smashing into the camel’s neck. Before he could get his balance, she rocked her front legs beneath her and stood at her full height.
Bradley felt like he’d just ridden a bucking bronco. He hadn’t expected it to be that rough.
“Did you see that?” he asked Ambrosia. “Better hold on tight.”
She leaned forward, nearly pressing the horn of the saddle into her chest. When Ruby bounced to her feet, Ambrosia fought to stay as close to her neck as possible, even bumping into the camel, but she didn’t fall. Once upright, she tentatively settled into the saddle, her back as straight as the camel’s was humped.
“Thanks for the warning,” she said.
The captain’s camel rose quickly, and he hooted and hollered his excitement. He turned the camel and circled back to Bradley and Ambrosia. “It’s been an age since I’ve been on the back of such a magnificent animal!” Omar peered at Bradley through his impossibly long eyelashes, as if daring him to contradict the judgment. “Thank you, Amber, for understanding. I really do have to do this,” he said.
Do what? Get the camels to Texas? Why was it so important to him?
Sitting in the oversized saddle, Ambrosia looked tiny. Bradley looked down, and his feet were a mile from the ground. He wasn’t anxious to try any stunts up here. Not yet, anyway.
“Let’s go,” Herald said. “We’ve got ten days ahead of us.”
Ten days. Not sure what to do, Bradley bumped his heels into Esmeralda’s sides. She easily fell into step behind the captain, and Ruby walked alongside her. Bradley turned to look over his shoulder. The two younger camels loaded with supplies were tied in a train behind him. The lines stretched out as they left the barnyard. The farmer and his wife stood on the porch and waved good-bye to their old friends. The black-and-white sheepdog yapped at their big, floppy feet, but the caravan continued.
“He ignores the dog, but takes a bite out of my hat,” Bradley said.
“Omar dislikes you,” Ambrosia replied. “I think he feels threatened. He’s used to being the boss around here.”
“He doesn’t have to worry about me. I’m just a lowly private. I’m not the boss of anyone.”
“Oh really?” Was that a snort from the proper Miss Herald? “You don’t take kindly to others telling you what to do.”
“Haven’t I done everything your pa has asked?”
“Calm down, trooper. I’m taking your measure, not judging your performance.” After a long look at him, she said, “I’m right, aren’t I? You have trouble with authority.”
“I don’t know that I’d say that, exactly. I just like to think for myself.”
“And not have a woman doing your thinking for you?”
“Not have anyone do my thinking for me.” Bradley tried to keep the thinking to a minimum, actually. Too much worry, and you could talk yourself out of what needed doing.
Esmeralda and Ruby stretched their necks out long, enjoying walking in tandem. Bradley was enjoying it, too.
“I’m sorry for not being friendly earlier.” Ambrosia shooed away a horsefly. “If we must go, then I suppose it might as well be with you.”
He grinned. Sure enough, Ambrosia wasn’t as hard-bitten as she wanted him to think. “You’re in good hands, Miss Herald. And if you don’t watch it, you might end up enjoying yourself.”
She tilted her head up so that the sun bathed all the adorable curves and dimples of her face in light. “And yet, just consider what this is going to do to my complexion. Are you willing to jeopardize my looks in this dangerous endeavor?”
While he could spend many happy hours ruminating over her complexion, he wouldn’t admit it. “You and your complexion could have taken the train home. I would’ve looked after your pa.”
She rotated the parasol to block his view again, but this time he caught sight of a charming smile before she could hide it. Seemed he wasn’t the only one who found orneriness an appealing trait.
Ten days on this journey? It wasn’t nearly long enough.
This trip was nothing like Ambrosia had expected. The flat prairie was denuded of trees. The hot wind drove sharp bits of dirt into
her eyes, which already stung from sweat. She should have brought a scarf or veil. Her wide bonnet and parasol weren’t much protection from the wind.
Another thing she hadn’t expected was a guide like Private Willis. She’d grown up at western forts, living in the officers’ quarters. She was used to handsome soldiers, but this one seemed unaware that he was at the bottom rung of the ladder. In fact, she wondered if he was aware that there was a ladder at all.
Amber could sit a horse, but the camel’s canter felt off. Grabbing the saddle, she readjusted, looking for a more comfortable position.
“Sir,” Private Willis said, “we might want to slow down. Miss Herald is falling behind.”
She wasn’t falling behind, but she was tired. How was it that she couldn’t keep up with her sick father?
“Amber, are you all right?” Her father leaned forward to scrub on Ruby’s neck. “Once you two get better acquainted, we’ll have to turn you loose and see what you can do together.”
“What?” Her heart skipped a beat. Why would he make such a suggestive comment? “I have no intention of becoming better acquainted with Private Willis or being turned loose with him.”
Private Willis coughed into his fist as a gust of scorching air assaulted them. Once the howling wind died down, he found his voice. “I’m sorry, Miss Herald, but I think Captain Herald meant that we should get better acquainted with Ruby and Melda. That’s all.”
Her father’s thick brows pushed together in confusion. “Whyever would you think . . . ?” He shook his head. “She’s usually very astute. I don’t know what gave her such an inappropriate idea.”
“It’s probably the sun,” Private Willis said.
“It’s not the sun. It’s . . .” She shrugged. “It’s the sun.”
Her smiling father, so unlike the desolate man who’d sat in his garden all spring, tapped Omar with his riding crop and jogged ahead, leaving her and Private Willis with the pack camels.
“Ambrosia is an unusual name,” Private Willis said. “How’d you come by it?”
“Ambrosia is the food of the gods.” She lifted her chin and tried to look sophisticated. “The food was only shared with certain men to whom the gods wanted to convey immortality.”
He whistled. “Lucky dogs. I guess a mere mortal like me wouldn’t have a chance.”
“Absolutely not.”
But he didn’t look disappointed. “I like steak and taters, personally. No highfalutin fare like that.”
“Sour grapes,” she said. “Pretending you don’t want something because you can’t have it.”
“Guilty to the pretending, but not convinced on the second part.” With a rocking of his saddle, he urged Esmeralda forward.
Amber’s jaw dropped. How could she not be impressed by his impudence?
The day stretched long and hot before a town finally appeared on the horizon. “We’ll tether the camels under the trees there,” Father said. “And I’ll walk to town and buy us a hot meal.”
“Why walk? Aren’t we staying at the hotel tonight?” she asked.
“You can’t just ride your camel into town, or every horse in the area goes stark-raving mad,” her father said. “We’ll stay out here. Are you coming with me for dinner?”
“I just want to get off this camel and rest.” Ambrosia wiped her handkerchief across her glistening forehead. “Are you sure you’re up to it?”
“I’m feeling stronger every day.”
When Omar stopped, all the camels stopped. Her father uttered some foreign word she’d never heard before, and the camels started pacing like dogs arranging their beds.
“Brace yourselves,” he said. “It’s rough on the way down.”
Ruby lifted her front foot and pawed at the ground. Then, as if satisfied that everything below was ready, she dropped to her knees, pitching Amber forward. Finally, Ruby leveled off and rocked gently, making herself comfortable on the leafy space beneath the trees. From there, it was a simple step off the beast’s back, and Amber had never been more eager to reach the ground.
Private Willis gave a playful whoop as Melda came to the ground, too. He slapped her on the shoulder and gave her a quick scrub. For a cavalryman, he was adapting quickly to a horse substitute.
Her father got Omar settled and then, with a tug on his hat, waved good-bye. “I’ll be back with some supper.”
Private Willis stretched. “For the first time in my life, I’m happy to get out of the saddle.” He took the lead ropes and tied them to various branches on the trees to give the camels some room.
At first Ambrosia’s legs didn’t want to straighten and her back felt stiff, but with a deep breath, she stretched her arms over her head and enjoyed the feeling of the blood working its way back into her extremities.
Private Willis was smiling, but for once he didn’t seem to be ridiculing her. “Feels good, doesn’t it?”
She nodded as she unfastened her canteen from Ruby’s saddle and took a long drink from it.
“Should we take off their saddles?” he asked.
“I have no idea.” Safely beneath the shade of the trees, she untied the ribbons of her sunbonnet and fanned herself. “If it was up to me, I’d drive the camels off with a stick.”
“And that’s why I stayed behind instead of going to town to eat a hot meal. I’m protecting your father’s investment.”
Ambrosia set her canteen on the ground. “I don’t see how these things could make anyone money.”
“Is he going to breed them?”
“I hardly think so.”
“I guess you could eat them. Or maybe you’re going to milk them? You wouldn’t even need a stool to sit on. You could stand up and—”
“Don’t be absurd.”
“I’m not the one buying camels, ma’am.”
She was too parched to argue any further. She picked up her canteen and held it to her lips. Something warm, wet, and disgusting touched her mouth. She spit in the dirt as she turned the canteen over.
“I’ve been nice to you, and this is how you repay me?” She shook the canteen. “It’s empty, and you slobbered all over it.”
“How did I drink your water? I’ve been talking to you this whole time.”
“There was water in it when I set it down.”
“You probably drank more than you thought. Maybe the heat is getting to you.”
She was beginning to regret running off the cowboys. Now she was stuck with the only man in Kansas who had no sense. Amber pushed back her damp hair, frustrated at what a mess everything was. Private Willis’s face softened, and he held out his dented canteen.
“No, thank you,” she said.
He rolled his eyes and snatched her canteen out of her hand.
“You don’t have to refill it,” she said as she chased after him. “I can do it myself.”
But he ignored the offer and picked up the water barrel. “What exactly is it you do when you’re not wrangling camels?”
Watching him handle the heavy water barrel made her grateful that she wasn’t doing it herself, after all. She leaned against a tree and watched him at work. “Besides taking care of Father? Well, when he retired a couple years ago, we moved to Garber, Texas, and bought a nice town lot. Right away, Mother and I started planning our new house, from the newel posts on the front porch to the rose garden in the back. It was completed this winter, about the time Father went into his decline, and it is a marvel. Every stick of furniture and every stitch of curtains, drapes, and tablecloths, Mother and I chose.”
“You ladies did that on your own?” He scrubbed at the canteen and rinsed it. “That’s quite an accomplishment. What’s next?”
Good question. Ambrosia had been asking herself that, as well. “One thing I refuse to do is to dig up our beautifully designed rose garden for a camel pen. My mother has spent her entire married life moving from one government post to another. It’s about time she has a place to call her own, but those animals will ruin it.” The water glistened on his
hands, making them smoother and darker. “Our new house is the talk of the town,” she said. “Just imagine if we started boarding camels there.”
“I’m afraid it’s not if, but when,” he said. “But cheer up. With Omar and Ruby in your garden, you’ll have even more notoriety.”
Was he laughing at her? She tamped down her irritation. He’d cleaned and refilled her canteen, after all.
Once she’d had a good, long drink and arranged her feather mattress to sit on, she felt generous enough to converse.
“And what about you and your family?”
He took a seat and stretched his legs out in front of him. “My sister is the governess for Major Adams’s girls back at Fort Reno. They’re getting hitched this winter.”
His sister was marrying his commander? No wonder he was fearless. “My father thinks a lot of Major Adams,” she said.
“I do, too. Now, whether he thinks a lot of me . . .” There was that teasing again, but this time at his own expense.
“Do you come from a military family?”
His smile faded, as if he regretted the question but was determined to answer anyway. “I don’t come from any kind of family. My ma wasn’t what you’d consider quality, and I never knew my pa. It’s only me and my sister, but we’ve always taken care of each other.” He bounced one shoulder in seeming indifference, but she could tell it did matter to him. She could tell it mattered a lot.
“Private Willis, I grew up at military outposts and have known a lot of troopers and officers.” He wasn’t meeting her gaze, but she held hers steady. “Where you come from before you put on the uniform doesn’t matter a jot. It’s how you handle yourself afterward.”
He raised his eyes, and Ambrosia had never seen anyone as genuinely appreciative for something she’d said. Maybe she had something to offer him, after all.
“I’m trying my best, Miss Ambrosia,” he said. “Trying my best to do my duty, even if it frustrates a strong-willed lady.”
Before she could answer, he added, “And feel free to call me Bradley.”
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