by My Desperado
She bit her bottom lip, swallowing again and trying not to think of the food that wagon might hold. Surely this couldn’t be Dellas’s gang, she decided, for a wagon would slow them down. Wouldn’t it?
But what if it were Delias? What would she do then? March back up the hill to inform Travis they wouldn’t be eating for a few more days. It was very likely he didn’t have that much time left unless he had some nourishment.
Though her fingers felt stiff, Katherine’s body shook as she tied Dancer to a tree. There was nothing she could do now but obtain food in whatever way possible. And since she had no way of knowing who these men were, she would have to assume they were unfriendly and take every precaution.
The revolver seemed heavy as she pulled it from its holster. The pines through which she stole were huge, allowing little undergrowth, leaving her to feel exposed even in the moonless night.
Voices drifted from the camp now. The old man brayed a sharp cord of laughter, startling Katherine with the sound. She stopped abruptly, breathing hard and trying to conjure up some shred of courage.
But in the end it was the smell of bacon that drew her irresistibly toward the fire. She clung to the last tree for sometime, until she could wait no longer, and then, cocking the revolver, she walked into camp.
“Put down your guns.” Her voice sounded strange, as if coming from another source, but the three men by the fire turned immediately toward her, proof that the words had indeed come from her mouth. They stared, not moving, hands held stiffly away from their hips.
“I said put them aside.”
She watched them do so, but was surprised that they obeyed. “Good. Now I want to know two things. Who are you? Where’re you headed? And is there anyone here with some medical knowledge?”
For just a moment there was silence.
“I ain’t no scholar, mister. But it seems to me that’s three things,” said a small man to the left of the fire.
“I don’t give a damn!” Katherine spat, and feeling the revolver shake, she grasped it with both hands.
“Listen. We’re peaceable folks,” said the old man. “Why don’t you just sit a spell, and we’ll dish you up some vittles.”
At the thought of food Katherine’s throat ached again, almost choking her with her painful need. “Who are you?” she rasped, moving the revolver from one man to the next in a nervous motion.
“Take it easy now, boy,” soothed the old man.
“We ride with Cody Blackfeather,” said one of the others. “No need to—”
“Who’s that?” she asked, pointing the gun at the man who spoke.
“Who? Blackfeather?”
“Yes.”
“It’s me.”
He came from out of nowhere, and suddenly the gun was grabbed with ease from Katherine’s hands by a dark man named Blackfeather.
Katherine stumbled backward a step.
“Who are you?” He asked the question quietly. His face was impassive. His hair long and black as a raven’s wing, with sharp, strong features that could only be Indian.
“Me?” She backed away again, feeling sick for having failed Travis.
“It seems that’s who we were talking about.”
“I’m Kath…” She stumbled on her answer for a moment, realizing with abrupt panic that she would be a fool to give her real name. “Kat! I’m Kat…Gilbert.”
He gave not the least impression that he might believe her, but remained silent, watching.
“He was sayin’ something about a medic,” said one of the men, approaching rapidly. “You hurt, boy?”
She shook her head, not daring to mention Travis until she knew more about them.
“Then he must have him a friend who is,” reasoned the old man, hurrying up at a stiff gait. “Delias is—”
“Hey! Horse coming!” warned someone.
But Katherine could make little sense of the words, for she thought with sudden panic that they were Dallas’s men! Dear God! She backed away, hoping they wouldn’t notice. Hoping she could slip away while they went to meet the newcomer.
“Blackfeather, look at this. It’s some poor bugger tied to a horse.”
“Is he dead?”
“Can’t tell.”
“No.” Katherine only breathed the word, finding she had no strength to move. How had Soldier broken free? But there was no time to wonder, for already they were reaching for Travis.
“No!” she screamed, and throwing herself at the nearest gun, grabbed it and pointed. “Back away! All of you!”
Every man remained immobile.
“We ain’t planning to slow-roast him over the fire, mister.”
“Back away, I say!” she threatened, trying to cover them all with her shaking weapon.
“Let us get him down. Take a look. Maybe we can help.”
“No!” Even to her own ears she sounded hysterical. “I know you’re Dellas’s men. I know what you’re like.”
“Calm down now,” ordered the Indian softly.
“I’ll shoot!” She swung the gun toward him. “I swear I will!”
“Let’s just…” His hand whipped out a second time. And again, with the speed of summer lightning, the revolver disappeared from her hand. “Talk!” he said, and thumping her hard against the chest, he pushed her to the ground.
She hit the earth with a jolt, and before she could recover, two men were holding her down. “No!” she screamed. “Don’t hurt him! It was my fault! All mine! I stole the money and wanted Delias dead. He had nothing to do with it.”
“What the devil’s he talking about?” one of them asked.
“How the hell would I know?” muttered another.
“Damn! Blackfeather. Come quick!” called the old man.
He did so, leaving Katherine and hurrying up to Soldier. “Get him down.” His voice was hard as flint. “Here. Use my knife.”
“Please.” She quit struggling and remained as she was, half-reclining against someone’s chest. “Please don’t hurt him,” she begged. “He’s a good man.” She thought fast. Perhaps these weren’t Dellas’s men after all, and maybe, if they did not know what could be gained by turning Travis in, they could be persuaded to help. “He’s a man of God, traveling from town to town, ministering to the poor miserable sinners of the West.”
The men suddenly stared at her in blank, utter silence.
“He is,” she whispered, then swallowed hard and dredged up her courage. “We were attacked by outlaws, heathens. They shot poor…” She shifted her gaze nervously and remained still, leaning back against a strange man’s chest, and praying for an improvement in her lying ability. “Reverend Swenson. Shot him in the head, and he fell. They stole what little money we had… and his bible.”
The old man’s mouth had fallen slightly open Katherine noticed, and she blinked, wondering what to make of that fact.
“It’s all true.”
“Why didn’t they shoot you?” asked the Indian evenly.
“I got away.” She nodded woodenly. “Fast horse. I tied her near the bottom of the hill.”
“And your…partner. He’s a preacher, you say?” questioned one of the men that held her.
If she hadn’t known better, she would have sworn there was amusement in his tone. She thought fast, planning to assure him again that it was the truth, but the man called Blackfeather spoke first.
“Shut up, Finch, and keep the kid out of trouble. Saws, clear a spot in the wagon. Jimmy, spread a bedroll by the fire for the reverend here, then fetch Kat’s horse.” Men scurried to obey orders as Blackfeather eased Ryland from the saddle.
“How do I keep him out of trouble?” asked the one man who still held Katherine.
“Feed him,” said Blackfeather, and taking Travis in his arms, he hurried him toward the blaze.
“Him?” murmured Finch, raising his brows and smiling directly into Katherine’s face. “All right. I’ll feed ‘im.”
Sometime later Katherine sat with her knees pulled to her c
hest and her head spinning. She’d eaten something warm and filling without taking time to identify it. “Is he going to live?” Her voice cracked with the question.
“I’m no physician. How long ago did it happen?” asked Blackfeather.
Katherine shook her head. Fatigue lay on her like a smothering blanket. “Maybe five days. Six.” A lifetime ago. “Is he going to live?”
“How long has he been unconscious?”
She shrugged weakly and, shivering, reached out to touch Ryland’s hand. Something wet dripped from her cheek onto the blanket that covered him. “He’s been in and out,” she whispered. She sniffed, not wiping away her tears, and tightening her jaw to draw her shoulders slightly straighten “But even then he was out of his head.”
“It’s a marvel you got him here,” said the young man they called Finch.
“Marvel! Hell, it’s a goddamn miracle,” countered Saws in his lispy voice, but Blackfeather merely lifted his gaze to stare at Katherine as if examining something about her that others couldn’t see.
“You’ll stay with him tonight,” he ordered, finally lowering his eyes. “There’s room for you both in the chuck wagon.”
Chapter 24
The wind rose with the coming of the day, shaking the wagon and urging forth ghostly, creaking noises. Katherine lay in silence, watching the heaving movement of the canvas overhead. It was gray and weathered, and stretched over its arched wooden frame like hide over the ribs of a gaunt steer.
Perhaps she should have tried to escape from the camp during the night she thought foggily. If she were heroic, she supposed she would have somehow managed to get Travis safely to Latigo’s ranch by now. But she was not heroic. She was tired and scared, and although there was no way of knowing if Blackfeather was friendly or deadly, she found she had no more strength to try to survive alone.
“Where are we?”
Travis’s voice was low and his face very pale when Katherine rolled to her side to stare at him.
“You’re awake.” They lay very close together, and seeing him conscious reminded her how empty her life would be without him.
Their eyes met in the dim light of dawn, but Katherine could not tell which Travis Ryland he thought he was—the small boy who displayed his gentle soul in his eyes or the man who denied having a soul at all.
“How is he?” asked Blackfeather from the end of the wagon.
Sleep deprivation and uncertainty made Katherine jerk nervously at the sound of the man’s voice. “He’s awake.”
The tall Indian pulled himself lithely onto the metal-bound wooden tailgate, carrying a bowl and easing himself carefully up to Travis’s head. “Are you planning to survive?” he asked quietly. “Or should we arrange funeral proceedings?”
Travis lifted his gaze, scowling into Blackfeather’s face. “Would it matter to you one way or the other?”
For just a moment Katherine thought she saw the glimmer of a smile reflected in Cody’s black eyes, but it disappeared like the fleeting shadow of a hawk in flight. “Kat would be distraught,” he said.
Katherine bit her lip and winced, but Travis only shook his head very slowly, as if it would be too painful to show his bewilderment in any other way.
“Your partner here. Kat…Gilbert, wasn’t it?”
She nodded, her eyes not leaving Cody’s, but he did not seem to notice her nervousness as he continued to study Travis’s face.
“How does your head feel?”
“It hurts.”
“Anything else hurt?”
“Everything else hurts,” Travis said quietly.
“Good.” Cody nodded, not explaining his reaction, and handed Katherine the bowl he still held. “Make him eat this slowly. Keep him quiet. Keep him still.” Straightening as much as the wagon’s low roof would allow, he turned to leave.
“Mr. Blackfeather,” Katherine called before she could guess what she intended to say.
He turned back, his expression unreadable beneath the canvas.
“Why are you doing this?” she murmured.
His gaze flitted to Travis for a moment. “The truth is, Kat,”—he turned his attention back to her—“I’ve never seen anyone tie a man to a horse and take him through the Rocky Mountain Range before.” His eyes showed that unreadable, almost amused, expression again, though it did not touch his lips. “I’m wondering if he was worth the trouble.”
He was gone in a moment, leaving Katherine to stare at the wooden box that held salted jerky.
Travis ate the broth without complaint or commotion, not seeming to feel the ravenous hunger that had plagued her. His eyes rarely left hers, as if he could not recall her name, but remembered something of her face.
“Tell me a story,” he said finally, his tone very soft.
Katherine settled him gently back against a rolled blanket and smiled, not allowing herself to consider the fact that his mind might never heal. Only thinking what a beautiful child he must have been, beautiful and brave and very charming.
Rain pattered against the canvas top, but inside their little haven the two were warm and dry, for the wind came from the east and did not blow through the circular openings at the front or back of the wagon.
Katherine’s bold knight, Sir Valemeer, came again, wielding his sword for right and justice, and his beloved Lady Catrina.
Travis fell asleep as Kat wove her tale, but long after his eyes closed and his breath became shallow, she watched him.
The wagon was pulled by two mules, Stupid and Dunce, if Katherine understood the cook’s ravings correctly. Old Sawdust drove the conveyance they rode in, even though most of his huge supply of sundry culinary necessities was now packed, rather precariously, on a trio of horses tied to the end of the tailgate.
They moved just slightly faster than a slug over a sunny rock. But Katherine found no need to complain, since the men headed north as directly as possible, and kept the two of them fed and well hidden.
At noon she took her meal with the crew. There were five men in all, the small, blond-haired Finch being the youngest and weathered Saws, the oldest.
In between there was Jimmy, who rarely spoke but played a harmonica in a way that made Kat want to cry; Elky, whose legs were comically bowed; and, of course, Cody Blackfeather.
Following supper, Travis fell asleep only minutes after Kat began her continuing story, and so she crept silently from the wagon. The night was very dark, for clouds still covered the moon. Jimmy sat with his back to a fat log and his face to the fire, while Cody cleaned his saddle not far away.
Filling a bowl, Saws handed it to Kat in silence. She murmured her thanks and moved to the fire, where she tasted a few bites and cleared her throat. “I was wondering if, by chance, any of you might have heard of a man named Latigo.”
For three heartbeats no one answered.
“Yeah.” It was the venerable old cook who finally spoke. “Yeah, I heard of him.”
That news seemed almost too good to be true, but Kat knew she must be careful, for perhaps there was a price on Travis’s head. She could not afford to give these men a clue to his identity by allowing them to somehow connect Latigo’s name to Travis Ryland.
“Was Latigo’s soul in particular need of saving?” ventured Saws in his lispy tone.
Katherine scowled. “I beg your pardon?”
“The good reverend. I was wonderin’ if he’d heard Latigo’s soul needed saving.”
“Oh!” Katherine remembered her lies with a start and silently reprimanded herself for not keeping her fabrications more firmly planted in her head. “No.” She took several bites to allay their suspicions. “I just heard he had a ranch somewhere in this vicinity.”
“What does vicin’ty mean?” questioned Saws, tipping his battered bowler hat back to scratch his head.
“His property is not far from the ranch we work for.” Cody lifted his attention from his saddle. “We’ll be passing near there.”
“Yeah. Real close,” Saws agreed, “if we can
push these fat old hogs that far.”
Katherine could only assume he referred to the cattle they were driving. She’d seen the animals earlier in the day, and noticed even with her inexperienced eye, that they did not look like the scrawny long-horned type of bovine she had seen driven through Silver Ridge.
“Herefords! Bah!” Saws spat disgustedly. “Don’t see what L—”
“We should reach Latigo’s ranch in less than two weeks’ time,” interrupted Cody smoothly. “Do you know him?”
“No!” Katherine flushed now, realizing she had used a bit too much emphasis on her denial. “No.” She ducked her head to eat again. “I was simply curious.”
Katherine figured there were perhaps fifty horses in the herd that followed the white-faced red cattle. From her place in the wagon near Travis she recognized Moondancer and Soldier. They stayed apart from the rest of the herd. The stallion’s artificial color had been mostly washed off by the rain, but he and Dancer had seemingly found a soft place to roll, for they were covered with a reddish mud that made it difficult to distinguish them. Or was it possible one of the men had intentionally disguised the horses?
“What are you looking at?” Travis asked.
She smiled down at him, grateful that he spent more and more time conscious now, and intentionally smoothing the worry from her expression. “The horses.”
“Do I have a horse, Kat?”
He had taken to calling her Kat, and rarely referred to her as Rachel now, except at times when the dreams would haunt him. Still, he did not know who she was, and seemed to be building his life solely from the things she told him.
“Yes.” She smoothed the hair back from his forehead, taking some comfort in the fact that this new Travis would not disallow her touch. “You have a horse. An enormous, beautiful stallion.”
“Like Sir Valemeer’s?”
“Yes, rather like that, but not black.” For a moment the realization that Travis could not sort fantasy from reality plagued her, but she pushed the worry aside, forcing herself to believe he would someday be well. “He’s what they call a buckskin, I believe. Tan, with black legs and…”
Travis reached out, taking her hand in his callused palm to pull it gently to his chest and distract her attention.
