She was standing again, after tossing a log in her basket, when she felt a strong arm around her waist. She opened her mouth to scream. A pair of dirty hands covered her mouth with a dirtier bandana, and tied it tight at the back of her head. She looked into a pair of grim unshaven faces. When she kicked out at them, the taller man tossed her over his shoulder while the other bound her ankles.
Hoisting her onto a horse, they slipped away before the sun was up.
29
Another chilly dawn. Michael shrugged into his sheepskin jacket as he sat up in his bedroll. He inched his legs out, one at a time. The fine hoarfrost glittered in the emerging sunlight. No, they wouldn’t get there a day too soon.
Would he tell her today? Let her know that they at last shared a Lord? He’d put it off for days. What if she still didn’t want him? Or, worse, what if she questioned his motives? He’d questioned them himself, working it all out with God in the quiet moments on the trail.
No, this wasn’t about Caroline.
Father, give me the courage to tell her. And to accept whatever happens.
He felt the new warmth course through his being. Oh, this was different from what the curate had told him, or even what Sister said. He understood their faith, even though he didn’t understand their methods of trying to teach it to him. This was real, something that couldn’t be taken from him, something that would last when everything else was ashes. This Presence would outlast Hawthorne’s men, and whatever they did to him.
But where was the smell of coffee, the crackle of a new fire? Caroline was nowhere to be seen.
Pace was, fully dressed, and wandering around the campsite.
“Where is she?”
“Dunno.” Pace had his “listening” look on. “She’s usually well on the way to breakfast by now.”
Jenny yawned as she clambered down from the wagon. “She ain’t been in there for a while. I woke up once and she was already gone.”
“Where could she—” He stopped. Pace had told him about the dangers that lurked in these mountains. In any mountains.
“I think we’d better…”
But Michael was already buckling on his holster, throwing a saddle over Blaze. “I’m goin’ after her.”
Pace put a hand on his arm. The only man in the world who could stop him from doing anything. “You can’t just go off. Let’s see what we got here.”
Michael swung himself on to Blaze’s back, and he waited while Pace poked around the campsite. Oh, how he wanted to give Blaze his head, to tear off into these trails. Where was she? She’d been fine last night as they’d swapped stories of their childhoods, as she’d told about growing up near the ocean, her face aglow in the firelight.
He had to find her. Could he go on without her? Not with the hole just ripped in his heart.
Pace walked slowly away from the campsite and Michael followed him, with a soft command to Blaze.
Jenny was already saddled up, patting Rebel’s shiny black neck and waiting for instructions.
If Jenny could wait so could he.
Barely.
“They’s one set of footprints leading away, and they’re tiny,” Pace said. “Had to be her. She came out here,” he gestured to the deeper woods, “and she went in a ways. She broke that branch.”
Michael followed him into the narrow path.
“She stopped here.” Pace knelt in the dirt. “See, the twigs are disturbed. And there’s her basket. She was getting firewood.”
“But who…what…” Please, God, not a bear. Or a coyote.
“And see there? Hoof prints. Mike, she was carried off. And it looks like they headed north.”
He didn’t know what to fear most, a creature of the wild or a human who wanted Caroline.
“I need to find her,” he said. “I’ve got something to tell her. I—”
“Yeah, we know,” Pace threw over his shoulder as he ran to saddle Prince.
Jenny wheeled Rebel around. “I knowed since she took sick.”
“I knew the day I hired her,” Pace said. “Let’s go.”
30
Caroline perched on a rock in a clearing marked by stony, sparsely-wooded hills. The grass under her feet was stubby, the sky open around them. Rough ropes bound her hands and feet. The men had untied her hands to let her eat, coarse bread and a bit of smoked meat, before securing the rope around them again. Whatever they’d planned, it wasn’t to harm her.
Yet.
Her shawl had fallen, and her teeth chattered in the chill morning. “You’ll never get away with this,” she said with a bravado she hoped masked her terror. “Mr. Moriarty will come after you the minute he knows I’m missing. Mr. Williams, too.”
The older man, the one in soiled, good-quality clothes, poked at a sputtering fire. “That’s what we had in mind, ma’am. Fact is, they have something we want, and you’re bringing them here.” He grinned at her. His teeth were good, his voice cultured. But his eyes were dead. “Ever play chess, Mrs. O’Leary? You’re the pawn.” He went off to relieve himself.
The younger man came and replaced the shawl on her shoulders. “Long as we get what we want, we won’t hurt you,” he said in a low voice.
He was maybe thirty, with a lean lank body clothed in dungarees and faded plaid shirt. High cheekbones, blue eyes, a thatch of blond hair falling over his forehead. His accent and manner were rougher than the older man’s, but no question he was the gentleman of the pair.
“We won’t hurt you,” he repeated. Was he trying to convince himself?
They weren’t Michael’s thugs. They weren’t Irish. Who were they?
When their backs were turned she tested her hands, working the ropes until her skin was raw. The bond held. These men knew how to tie a knot. If only...she moved a fraction of an inch, searching the rock’s surface with her body. Smooth under her hips. There had to be something…
The fire crackled into life. She strained toward it for the warmth.
The older man bent over it, lit a cigar, took a contemplative puff. “Soon’s we get what we came for, we’ll let you go,” he said. He came closer and really looked at her for the first time since the abduction. “Or maybe not.” His voice took on a purring tone, and with his free hand, he lifted her chin. “You’re a pretty little thing. Not my type, but there’s plenty would like you just fine. Maybe I’ll put you in one of my saloons.” He pressed closer, amused by her fear. “Or maybe we’ll just help ourselves first. I’ll be all set in a couple of hours, but maybe Smith here could use a woman.” He bent closer, scattering ashes on her bare hands and she tried not to cry out. “You wouldn’t mind, would you, Smith? Help to pass the time.”
The younger man shoved him out of the way, knocking the cigar to the dirt. “Leave her alone, Jones. I never forced a woman in my life. Never had to. Don’t tease her. Leave her alone until you…you got to do something.”
The older man shrugged as he righted himself. “You’re no saint, Smith. But you’re right. She can wait.”
~*~
A hawk wheeled overhead, a V-shaped army of birds headed south. Pine and fir trees reached to an impossibly blue sky. No trees in the box canyon and a slim, one-horse-wide trail leading out. How could she pull this off? But one thing was abundantly clear to Caroline. She couldn’t afford not to.
“Still say we should of ambushed them.” The tall, blond man poked at the fire. “That would have been a fair fight.”
“They’re too good, Moriarty and the tall one. Even outnumbered. And it might spook the horses, includin’ yours. Do you ever listen, Smith?”
“‘Course I do.” The younger man poured himself a cup of coffee. But his hands shook as the liquid streamed into the tin cup. “I just don’t see why we gotta hurt no one. I just want what’s mine.”
“I thought you had the stuff.” The older man moved closer, his voice silky and serpentine. “You a coward, Smith?” He rattled off a list of the things he wanted to see done to cowards.
If she’d been anyw
here else, like civilization, Caroline might have blushed. The sun rode directly over her, offering what little warmth this day ever would. Where was Michael? She should have left a trail of something Bread crumbs? Pearls?
He wasn’t coming. Which meant they, or something else, had gotten him too.
But that didn’t mean she couldn’t try. She hadn’t come all this way to endure these men, or to lure Michael into a trap. Funny thing though, they weren’t the Irishmen. Was someone else after Michael and Jenny? It didn’t bear thinking about.
She’d make a run for it, and maybe save her friends’ lives. Daniel and Michael had taught her, long ago, in those sun-kissed Ohio days, that one couldn’t fish without bait. She’d be the bait, but not in the way these men had planned. What did she have that she could use? She was female, for a start. Then she’d see. She coughed.
The men turned from their argument.
“I need to—” She jerked her head toward the woods.
The one called Jones grinned. “Go ahead.”
“But there’s no privacy here.” Her lower lip trembled, and it wasn’t entirely an act.
Jones swore. “Smith, take her. And don’t be too long.”
The Smith one prodded her with the butt of his rifle, up the sandy slope leading away from the box canyon.
She shuffled along, hands still tied in front of her. She wasn’t strong, not like Michael or even Jenny. She would have to depend on the element of surprise. But she was smart. Oh, wasn’t it a good thing God had sent her with Smith instead of Jones?
At the top of the rise, Smith nodded to a thicket of trees. “Go ahead. Ain’t got all day.”
She held out her bound hands.
He effortlessly whipped the rope off. “Go on now.”
She stood staring up at him.
He huffed a little, turned his back and puffed at his cigar.
She did have to go, but not that badly. She kilted her skirts, with a swift backward glance, and kept her back to him while she crouched on the dirt. What would do for a weapon? That slim fallen log, just big enough for a woman to lift, just big enough to do damage. She stayed crouched for more than ten minutes, until she heard his footsteps crunching over the twigs and pebbles. “C’mon now, even a woman don’t take that long. Jones’ll be—”
But he never got the chance to tell her what Jones would be. She swung the log toward his head. She was reaching, panting. He was a tall man. But the log connected and he went down.
And Caroline ran. She would get to the Whitman mission on her own. She could walk, she’d been walking for six months, and these woods and mountains couldn’t be any harder to traverse than the prairie. The Whitmans would protect her. Keep her safe until Michael came. Or didn’t.
Where was the mission? Michael had said they would cross the Columbia River and then head back east for a little ways to get there. Ironic, they’d laughed, that they were headed east again after the monumental effort to reach the West. She’d walk away from the sun, into the shadows of these mountains. It would make it harder for them to find her. She would draw them away from her friends, buy Michael and Pace and Jenny some time until she lost these dangerous men for good.
The sun was already starting its descent toward afternoon. That would be west. She struck out in the opposite direction, running through the woods. It was dark in here, the sun barely visible through the thick pines. With no trail to follow she just ran through the trees, snaking her way between the tall trunks, snagging the thin fabric of her dress on a thicket. Brushing a low branch away from her face.
How much time did she have? Not much. Smith would awaken, either on his own or when an impatient Jones went after him. Either way meant trouble. They’d come after her. She was too valuable a pawn not to.
Caroline plowed through a thicket, ignoring the way the brambles tore at her dress. Who were they, if not Michael’s pursuers?
Jenny. In those long nights on the prairie they’d talked before sleep, painted word pictures of the people in their former lives.
The boy was too young, too rough around the edges.
But could Jones be Mr. Nelson, the saloon owner who had had a soft spot for Jenny?
Caroline pressed her fist to her lips.
He wouldn’t get Jenny.
Could she pull this off? She was young and healthy, but so was Smith. And Jones was mean enough for both of them. The only way was to keep running. She leaped a narrow creek, stumbled and scrabbled for purchase on the damp dirt of the opposite shore. She was hungry, the meat and bread an eternity ago, but she had no time to stop and look for berries. The Whitmans would feed her. Where were Whitmans? East. How many days? And how long had she been running? She leaned against the trunk of a mammoth pine tree and pressed her hand to her beating heart.
A twig snapped and she jerked her head around.
A white-tail doe, brown eyes huge, stared out from under a canopy of branches. It belonged here, so still in the winter forest.
But Caroline didn’t. She had to save Michael and Jenny. She had to draw those men away from her friends, even as she drew herself to Whitmans’. She stumbled once, grazing her cheek on a rock, and she lay face down in the dirt before heaving herself up. She patted the blood away with a corner of her kilted skirt.
There, was that light in the distance? A meadow? A clearing? A settlement?
She stumbled toward the light.
It was a clearing, the woods tapering off to a grassy area and a cliff jutting out sharply over a churning swath of steel-gray river, which tumbled over rocks hundreds of feet below her. And smoke from a campfire on the other side.
If she could only get there. Indians? Trappers? They’d shelter her, give her something to eat, protect her from Smith and Jones if she could only explain her plight. She wasn’t afraid of Indians. They’d have to prove themselves meaner than Jones or Smith.
Yes, they were Indians. A tiny figure came to the shore. She couldn’t tell if it were male or female. Long black braids, a buckskin garment. The person shaded his or her eyes, saw her, and beckoned.
Food. Warmth. Rest. And protection from Smith and Jones.
But she had to get there first. Was there a shoreline? Could she descend the peak and follow the river? Was there a place to cross?
The person on the shore was dragging a boat into the water. Coming to help her.
And were those footsteps, boots thumping through the underbrush? They wouldn’t take her again without a fight. She started down the bank, slipping on the loose dirt, clinging to a branch.
“Can’t of gotten much further,” Smith said.
“No thanks to you.” Jones raged. “If I didn’t have bigger quarry in my sights, I’d pound the life out of you.”
“She ain’t gone over yet.” She imagined Smith, peering down over the cliff. “You think Cayuse got her?”
“Not if they don’t want their village wiped out. All it takes is a match. Wonderful invention, the match.”
She scrabbled for purchase in the loose soil, and heard a gun cock. A hand reached down, lifted her back up on the cliff as though she were a toy.
“Come on up, Mrs. O’Leary. Try that again and I will kill you, pawn or not.”
~*~
He should have told her.
They picked their way through the forest, following a non-trail of hoof prints and broken branches. Pace on Prince, Jenny on Rebel, Michael on Blaze, following the quest that had begun with a set of very small footprints leading away from camp.
Caroline.
He should have told her. Told her he belonged to Jesus now, told her there was no more hindrance to their being together. Would she have believed him? Or would she have thought it another ploy, by a man who’d spent his life bluffing? He didn’t want to be that man any more. A man in Christ was a new creature. Wasn’t he? Could he let go of the Michael who’d flattered and schemed and lied to survive? Who had used his “charm” to get what he wanted? He was a hollow man.
And it was his f
ault again, the blame placed squarely in front of his large, worn boots. He had dragged her in to this. He hadn’t forced her to answer Pace’s advertisement, that was true, but whose fault was it that she’d had to? And he’d dragged her in to the center of the whole Oona/landlord/ Kelly/Kennedy mess, a place no good person deserved to be. If he’d done his duty by her, or never touched her in the first place, she wouldn’t be on this blasted Trail, a journey he didn’t even recommend for people he didn’t like.
How could Caroline love him?
How could God?
But she did. And more importantly, so did He.
“Help me find her.” He spoke the words aloud to the cold, silent autumn woods.
Pace pretended not to hear.
But Jenny swiveled her head back, for one moment of understanding.
Michael gave her a brief nod.
Jenny turned back to the non-trail, snapping a branch out of her face.
What were they doing to Caroline? It didn’t bear thinking about. No, he was the quarry, she was the bait. Unless they got tired of waiting. He nudged Blaze to move ahead, squeezing past Jenny and Pace to take the lead. It wouldn’t help much, this path was too narrow for him to cut loose, but at least he’d feel he was doing something. And he reined up sharply when they came to a box canyon and three figures huddled near a fire.
~*~
Caroline strained to hear. Were those hoof beats? Her captors heard them too. The younger man paused in the act of placing the tin coffee pot on the coals. The older man, Jones, was lighting a fresh cigar. At the sound of horses he stamped it out, and a slow smile spread over his face.
“Showdown,” he said.
“Payday,” the younger man said. He already sounded weary.
The three of them, Michael, Pace, and Jenny, thundered into the clearing. Michael was two horse lengths’ ahead of the others and slipped down before his horse was completely stopped. He stumbled to her side, favoring his bad ankle; took one incredulous look at her hands; and began to work at the knots.
Westward Hope Page 20
