by Nikki Tate
As we topped the rise, I saw fires burning in the hills ahead. Indians, most likely. For the thousandth time I thought of Sarah and her people and hoped she had escaped the recent battles alive.
Pulling my hat down over my ears, I put my spurs to the mare’s sides. Jess jumped forward. In places snow lay upon the trail, but not deeply, so I made good time to horse changes in Jacob’s Well and Diamond Springs.
The sun dropped as I left the stationhouse at Diamond Springs and headed up the trail toward James at the sulphur ponds. How long would I have to wait before James would catch up to me?
The impending robbery loomed. What if I were caught with the empty mochila? I’d go to jail where my secret would be discovered. Even if I were found innocent of any part in the robbery, my career as an Express rider would be over. Then I had another thought to add to my worries. What if James was planning to shoot me so I couldn’t ever tell what I knew? That would make the whole thing seem like a good old-fashioned hold-up. Shoot the rider — take the money.
My new horse, Runaway Luke, galloped into the gathering darkness. The first time I’d ridden at night I had been terrified of losing my way. I soon learned that the night is rarely completely black — the stars and moon usually provided enough light that we hardly had to slow down at all. I remembered how Smokey McPhail had told me that I would be grateful to my horse for having such good eyes in the dark. Smokey had sure been right. The horses were far more comfortable in the dark than I was and kept a quick pace in all but the blackest of nights.
Despite my thudding heart, I reached along Luke’s neck and gave him an encouraging pat. There was so little time. I had a job to do — get the mail through — but how?
I reached for the pistol tucked into my holster. Over the past weeks I’d become more than a fair shot, though I’d never had to shoot at anything bigger than a jackrabbit.
But shooting James at the sulphur pools was too risky. He’d likely have his gun drawn, just in case I tried something like that. He’d be quick enough to put a bullet through my head. Bang! That would be me, gone. If I shot him first then I’d be a murderer, not just an accomplice to a robbery.
Back and forth the arguments went in my mind. If I didn’t shoot him, he’d get away with the money. I would have helped, and for that I could land in jail or maybe even be hanged! If I did try to shoot him, I’d likely wind up dead myself.
The mail came first, that was true, but was I really supposed to get myself shot in order to make the delivery? And how, if I got myself shot, was I supposed to save the mail anyway?
There seemed no answer. “Whoa, Luke,” I said, pulling him back to a trot. No need to hurry.
What if I didn’t ride to the station at Sulphur Springs at all? What about turning around and going back to Diamond Springs? I could explain everything to the stationmaster. But James, with his nasty scowl and skill with a pistol, was somewhere behind me.
I looked back over my shoulder. Every shadow loomed huge and threatening. I shuddered and urged Runaway Luke into a faster trot.
We rode into a valley as the moon was rising, bright enough to throw shadows across the trail. We loped along easily, the footing good and Luke still strong and willing beneath me. I glanced south across the valley and noticed a break in the hills. And that was when the idea came to me. Maybe I could ride around the station at Sulphur Springs, bypass the horse change there, and head straight for the next station. That would be Robert’s Creek.
It was the best idea I’d had so far. If nothing else, the extra miles would give me more time to think.
I turned Luke from the trail and headed across the valley toward the small canyon. I’d ridden Luke before. He was a good horse, strong and eager. If any animal could make the extra distance, it was the big roan. We wound our way back up into the mountains working our way westward in what I hoped was a direction more or less parallel to the main trail.
Chapter Ten
Hours later, halfway up the side of a deep gully, Luke stumbled. The roan was tired. His head hung low when I hopped off to lead him the rest of the way to the top. Not far from where we crested the ridge, a stream trickled through the rocks. I led him to drink and he followed close behind me like a big dog.
The moon was high and we’d had little trouble picking our way along Indian trails.
“Have a good drink, boy.”
I kneeled to drink from the icy water but the empty ache in my belly hardly faded. How long had I been in the saddle? We’d climbed in and out of valleys, at first heading southwest and then trying to make our way northwest again so we’d rejoin the trail well past Sulphur Springs. I didn’t think it would be long before we were back on the main wagon trail.
Every so often we saw Indian fires flickering high on the sides of the hills. I steered well clear of these, not wanting any more trouble on my hands. Back in the saddle, I rode on and on, across another wide valley and up into the hills beyond. Still there was no sign of the deep wagon ruts.
I didn’t think I had crossed the trail by mistake. There had been plenty of traffic over the summer and not that much snow yet, even at the highest points. I pulled Luke up again near another stream and tried to get my bearings in the dark. We should have met the trail again by now, but all I saw around us were endless mountains and valleys. We were well and truly lost. I swallowed hard.
Luke snatched hungrily at whatever thin blades of grass he could find. The moon tucked in behind a cloud and the darkness deepened. Luke’s crunching sounded louder than ever and then, suddenly, it stopped. Luke yanked his head up and pricked his ears forward. I strained to see through the dark and fumbled for my gun as two figures emerged from the darkness. Indians.
“Who’s there?” I asked.
A hand reached out and caught Luke’s bridle.
“Hey!” The cry strangled in my throat. I raised my hand to shoot but in the moment I hesitated, not knowing which of the two men to shoot first, the second man grabbed my wrist and wrenched my gun away.
The first man turned Luke and began to lead him toward one of the fires I’d seen on the hills.
My mind, exhausted, was blank. I was no match for the two men, especially without my pistol. Even in my dreadful state, I knew there was a good chance the men were Paiutes.
“Wait! Do you know Sarah Winnemucca?” I asked, desperate to save myself.
The man who was leading Luke nodded brusquely but didn’t stop. “What about Chief Winnemucca? Or Natchez? Chief Numaga?” I tried to remember other names Sarah had mentioned.
The two Indians stopped and spoke in their language. Then they turned away from the fire on the hill and headed in the opposite direction.
“Where are you going? I don’t mean you any trouble. I’ve got to take the mail to — ”
It was hopeless. Even if they understood me, why should they believe me? I was nowhere near the trail.
Soon we came to several stick huts shaped like squat beehives.
“Down.”
I slid from Luke’s back and stood, shivering. Even though it was the middle of the night, people were moving around, most of them going in and out of a slightly larger hut a little away from the others. Someone sang and several others chanted.
One of the men who had led me to the camp called out and a young woman emerged from the bigger hut and came toward us.
“Sarah!”
I took a step forward, ready to embrace her, but she stepped back and stared at me, her arms folded over her chest.
“Who are you?”
“It’s me! Joselyn!” I pulled off my hat. Sarah stared at me for a moment. Then she chuckled.
“Your hair!” she said and reached over to touch my shorn locks.
The two men spoke and pointed back in the direction we’d come from.
“They thought you were a scout,” Sarah said.
“Why didn’t they kill me?”
“You would have more information if you were alive. Why are you here?”
I exp
lained and Sarah shook her head. “This is a hard path you have chosen to get to California.”
I had to laugh at that.
“I am pleased our men found you. The wagon trail is like this—” She made a slashing motion with her hand side to side through the air. “And you are going like this—” The second line she made was just below and parallel to the first. The way I’d been travelling I might never have crossed the trail.
“He will show you,” she said, nod-ding toward one of the men who had found me. “I cannot come. My grand-father, Truckee, is very sick. We, the old, the women and children, and a few men have been hiding here, away from the fighting at Pyramid Lake. But Grandfather is very ill. We have lit fires in the hills to call our people in so they might—” Her voice cracked. “—so they might say goodbye.”
“Sarah — ”
“Shh. Say nothing. There is nothing to say. But I must stay with him.”
I nodded. How well I understood. Ma, Pa, and even Baby Grace, whom I had known such a short time, had not passed over to God’s care alone.
Sarah glanced back over her shoulder at the hut where her grandfather lay dying, her eyes brimming with tears. She turned back to me and took my hands in hers.
“You know what you must say about seeing us here.”
I nodded. “Nothing.”
“And when my people are friends once again with yours, I never met a girl called Joselyn on a Pony Express horse.”
We both smiled. “I’d like to go back to California one day. Maybe I will see you there.”
“I’d like that,” I said and squeezed her hands.
She nodded, then pulled away and returned to her grandfather.
I mounted my horse once again. The man who was to be my guide said nothing but nudged my knee with something solid. My pistol.
“Thank you,” I said as I took it from him.
He indicated I should follow him and then led me some distance before saying, “Go past there.” He pointed at a single scraggly pine tree in the distance, a black shape against the night sky.
I thanked him again. He patted Luke on the rump and disappeared into the darkness.
Never in my life had I felt so alone.
Chapter Eleven
“Come on, Luke. If he says to go past the tree, we go past the tree. We’ll find the trail and the station. What a good feed you’ll have … What a bed there will be for me!”
Sounding cheerful was a strain, but I needed to keep my spirits up as we set off, uphill, toward the big tree.
When we finally stood atop the ridge, we were both blowing and panting. I opened my jacket to the chill pre-dawn air. Back toward the east, the under sides of the gray clouds were tinged with pink and yellow. As I watched, the colors warmed until the clouds were a deep blush of rose.
Turning my back on the rising sun and the scraggly pine, I urged Luke into a plodding trot.
The morning was the strangest I had ever seen. Even as the sun rose higher in the sky, the clouds thickened and built so the day hardly grew brighter. Within an hour a bitter, freezing rain was falling. I pulled my collar up around my neck, my hat down over my ears and hunched into the saddle. Soon the relentless pelt of raindrops had mixed with snow and soaked us both.
Though I wore thick calfskin gloves, my fingers grew numb. I had to tuck first one hand and then the other inside my jacket to keep them from freezing. I imagined James arriving at the stinky ponds and wondered what he’d do when he saw I wasn’t there.
The mud froze into treacherous ruts and bumps. These became more and more difficult to see as the snow thickened and blanketed everything. We pressed on, eyes slits against the driving snow. Once Luke stopped and looked back at me, his long eyelashes white with frost. Every step became a torment as Luke slipped and slid. We had long passed the tree and still there was no sign of the wagon trail. Could the Indian have lied?
I willed Luke to keep going. And he did until, without warning, he stumbled.
“Come on, boy,” I pleaded, putting my heels to the exhausted horse’s sides. “Git up!”
But Luke refused to budge. The poor animal turned his tail to the wind and would not take another step.
I climbed out of the saddle and moved to Luke’s head. Just as I reached for his bridle I, too, stumbled. The trail! That’s why Luke had tripped. We had found the wagon ruts, invisible beneath the freshly fallen snow.
“Hallelujah!” I shouted and slapped the horse on the neck. “Thank you!” I shouted into the swirling snow. It was agony to haul myself back onto Luke’s back.
Buffeted from behind by blasts of wind, I turned Luke westward. Only then did the big horse agree to walk on.
It was impossible to say exactly where we were, but I figured we couldn’t be too far from Robert’s Creek. For a short while my heart skipped and sang with the joy of knowing we would soon be safe.
Hah! Had I learned nothing? The snow began in earnest. Burning pin-pricks whipped across my cheek, searing my face. Soon I was so cold I could barely stay upright in the saddle. We had to move faster or we would never make it to shelter.
“Come on, Luke my friend, let’s git on home.”
Luke dropped his head and reluctantly picked up a jog.
Snow whirled around us as the wind shifted directions — first blasting us from the side, then attacking from the front. My nose, cheeks, hands, legs, and even my mind were numb. With fingers thickened by cold, I fumbled to tie my kerchief across my face. Before I had it in place, it was soaked through. I tried to wiggle my toes inside my boots but could scarcely feel them at all. How I longed to stomp around in front of a roasting fire, a steaming mug of Arbuckle’s cradled in my hands.
Some time after we’d joined the trail Luke tripped again, this time over a tree root. He slithered on the icy ground as he struggled to keep his feet under him. It was hard to say how far we’d come. But we had ridden through the night, so old Luke had been working hard for twelve hours straight and I’d been in the saddle for longer than that.
When the horse slipped again in the wet snow, the time had come for me to dismount and travel along on foot.
“Holy crow!” I shouted, hopping from one foot to the other. Sharp pains shot up my legs. My feet felt huge — ten times their regular size. I had to look down to see that they had not split my boots wide open. I hobbled along, my feet protesting with every step as we slogged through the snow.
“Mail first. Horse second. Me last,” I chanted in time to Luke’s muffled hoof beats. Crazy laughter bubbled and churned inside me. I imagined myself warm and cozy as I lay down in the soft snow, drifting off to sleep.
“Mail first … horse second…”
Once I fell and grabbed for Luke’s mane. He paid no heed but plugged along, his eyes half-closed against the relentless wind.
More and more often he stumbled and then, at the top of an embankment, he stopped altogether.
“Git on up!” I yelled as fiercely as I could, and smacked him across the haunches.
I cried, then, the first and only time of the whole journey, for it broke my heart to hit an animal who had given his all for me under the most miser able conditions.
But what else could I do? Leave him there to freeze or be devoured by the wolves I’d heard howling not so far away? Wolves aren’t so stupid as to take on an armed rider and a healthy horse, but an exhausted animal left to his own devices was another matter.
Weeping, I reached back and gave him another smack with a switch. He skidded down the bank to the creek at the bottom, crashing to his knees.
“Easy, boy. Easy.”
I pressed my cheek against his neck and rubbed him between the ears.
“Come on. You can get up.” I tugged at his bridle and Luke heaved himself to his feet. We splashed through the stream and I cried out as the ice-cold water seared my frozen feet. I staggered away from the creek, sick with the knowledge that neither Luke nor I could travel much farther.
I thought of my beautiful ma and
the sister I never knew. I spoke a word to my dead pa and cursed my brothers who had left me in Carson City. I offered up prayers for me, for Sarah and her grandfather, and for Luke, and then I nearly jumped out of my skin because right behind me Luke let out a loud whinny.
Coming back through the snow was the most welcome sound ever — an answering whinny.
Chapter Twelve
I couldn’t have cared less whether the other horse belonged to a crazy gun-toting settler or even to James himself. I shouted as loud as I could and made my way toward the answering calls.
When, a few minutes later, the station- house emerged from the swirling snowstorm, I near enough fainted away with relief.
“Joe? Where in tarnation are you comin’ from?” the stationmaster asked, inspecting the time card before signing it and slipping it back into the pouch. With much rushing around and shouting, two men readied a new horse in record time. A rider I didn’t know mounted up to continue the ride west.
“This ain’t Robert’s Creek,” I finally had a chance to say.
The stationmaster laughed and shook his head.
“Robert’s Creek is about thirty miles behind you. This here is Dry Creek.”
I opened my mouth and shut it again. How far had I traveled? Ninety miles? A hundred? More?
Far enough, I’d say.
“Come on in out of the cold and tell me what happened. You can tell Simpson and Wood from the militia, too. They arrived not long ago looking for you when you didn’t show up at Sulphur Springs or Robert’s Creek. We figured you’d been robbed. Shot dead.”
The four men huddled by the fire in the unfinished stationhouse and looked expectantly at me. As I told them my story, gusts of wind lifted the canvas tarp they had tied over the space where the roof should have been.
“We gotta get ourselves a roof before we get any bad weather,” one of the men joked.
