The private added, "You must know somebody." By which they clearly meant somebody male. I wasn't real without somebody male. Which wasn't fair—but there I was.
I didn't have much choice, did I? My pride was only so strong; my fear was stronger. "Benj Cooper. A man named Benj Cooper might be willing to come for me." There.
The two soldiers exchanged looks. Then the corporal asked, "Who?"
"Benjamin Cooper. From Texas."
"Don't recall none of the businessmen in town with that name," murmured the private, and the corporal shook his head.
"He isn't a businessman, he's a cowboy. He's working a trail drive going north."
Now the soldiers exchanged looks of dismay. I recognized that familiar sinking in the pit of my stomach. Life was about to kick me in the face again, wasn't it? "What's wrong?"
"Well, ma'am. It's just...there's a whole passel of Texas cowboys in town; will be all summer. I expect in the morning we could send word around the grazing area south of town, or with one of the buyers, but...."
I imagine my look of dismay outdid theirs. "They aren't selling their cattle," I said. "I'm not even positive they'll be here after tomorrow morning. They're heading north to Wyoming."
A heavy silence descended on the cramped little jail cell. Then the corporal said, "If a few days go by and no one comes, I imagine they'll release you anyhow."
And looking pained, he shut and locked the barred door.
I leaned my head on my drawn up knee—the one that didn't hurt—and tried with everything I had to vanish off the face of the earth.
Not surprisingly, I failed.
Chapter 10 – Dodge City
Uncertainties were all I had to occupy myself, and they grew so heavy I had little appetite for the dinner—"with extra pudding"—the corporal brought for me. Night made things worse. The soldiers brought me several blankets and a pillow, but they also shut a second, outer door on my cell, a wooden one that covered the bars for privacy. I found myself in a four-by-six space of complete blackness.
Complete except for the stars, outside a window so high I could see only the sky through it, checkered by a grating like a chessboard. I didn't get too close to the window. The smelly black hole was somewhere under there.
I found I could cry more after all, much more easily than I could sleep. I tried curling up on the wood floor, as far from the hole as possible...but I still thought I heard things crawling down there. At one point I heard the corporal changing shifts with another soldier, and my combined fears had me rigid—what kind of man was this one? If he was like the other corporal, or the privates, or most of the cowboys, I would be fine. But what if he was like the major, or Thompson-the-pimp?
I wasn't really a prostitute, was I?
I hated having no say in what happened to me.
I shivered. I cried. I stayed awake until the square of checkerboard window grew gray, and a bugle sounded reveille. I eventually had to use the damned hole, which made me less afraid of but more disgusted by it. Dizzy with exhaustion, I picked at the breakfast the new soldier finally brought me. I didn't notice what it was, concentrating instead of staying awake.
If it was morning, Benj might be coming for me.
But the sun rose higher. I heard soldiers drilling on the parade grounds. I heard them finish. I began to fall asleep and then jerk myself awake, on and off in fits, as if I had to be awake or risk missing Benj. My original corporal came back on duty, and muttered angrily with the soldier he'd come to relieve, spitting the word "Major" as if it were a curse. When he saw I was awake, he said something about being truly sorry for this...to be honest, I wasn't paying very close attention. I was so tired, and Benj might be coming any minute.
But Benj didn't come.
I cried again, and finally fell either asleep or unconscious.
The woman has been deleted. There is no boardroom. There is no lawsuit. Attack? Who was attacked? Not she...she doesn't exist.
Drugs pour through her, always more drugs, bending her reality, nullifying her identity. Although her eyes are covered, she starts to see things. Waving grass. Blue sky. Land as untouched as it was hundreds of years ago. The voice tells her where she is. When she fights the words, struggles to reclaim some hold on her identity, she feels the chill of more drugs in her veins. They are more powerful than she, because she is nobody. Reality fades again, and she's floating into a tunnel, a void. Everything fades....
A footstep. Something familiar woke me, pulled me from my nightmare in time to hear the footstep. It hadn't even reached the stockade yet—my cell's outer door was open again, and I could see only the corporal through the grating. And yet, something about that single, solitary footstep called to me.
I lifted my head.
The door to the outside opened; noonday sunlight cut around the silhouette of a sturdy man in a knee-length coat and a flat-brimmed cowboy hat.
In that moment, I gave up something behind me, something that had frightened me, something I'd escaped—and I gave myself to this new reality. I stumbled to my feet even as Jacob Garrison strode into the cramped room to stand, gazing expressionless at me through the bars. Major FurFace Fairchild entered behind him. The corporal tried to melt into a corner.
"Well, there she is," said the Major, his cheer completely inappropriate. "As you can see, she's not been mishandled in any way. We only wanted...to secure...the post...."
The reason Fairchild faltered to silence was, Garrison had turned his gaze from me to him—and maybe gained expression. As I've noted before, a direct gaze from the Boss is a potent weapon.
"Open it," he drawled, low and dangerous.
"Yessir!" The corporal sprang eagerly forward with keys and, at a metallic click, I was free.
Part of me wanted to fire off questions: Why didn't Benj come? How did you find me? Where's the herd? Part of me wanted to defend myself against whatever awful things Garrison must be thinking by now: It wasn't my fault, I didn't do anything wrong, I didn't mean for any of this to happen, I'm really not a hooker. Probably.
I dismissed both choices in favor of throwing myself against the Boss's chest and holding on. Tight.
His whole body stiffened in surprise. If I hadn't been so desperately glad to see him, I would've let go right there, but at the moment nothing would pry me off but him—maybe—and he was shocked enough, or nice enough, to humor me. In fact, one of his hands awkwardly touched my hair, then slid onto my back and stayed there, carefully anchoring me to his rigid strength. The wool of his now dust-free coat scratched at my cheek. He smelled of horses and fresh air and coffee, but mainly of soap, like he'd bathed between yesterday and today.
Shocked enough, or nice enough? I decided in favor of nice enough. He by no means leaned into my embrace, but he hadn't rejected it, and for the first time since reaching civilization, I felt safe. Not loved. Not even wanted, really. But somehow, blessedly safe.
He'd come for me.
"You said she worked for you?" asked Major Fairchild, his intruding tone suspicious.
"She has," drawled Garrison, his low tone a lot challenging—I liked the feel of the words rumbling out of him. He belatedly eased me from his chest as he turned to leave, but his hand stayed on my back, his body against my shoulder.
I wouldn't have recommended the Major dispute his words.
The Major didn't.
Silent, Garrison led me out, matter-of-factly steadying me as we went. There by the wooden sidewalk stood a black horse wearing his saddle, and Valley Boy, my Valley Boy, bareback. We were leaving!
Could it be this easy?
"Is it all right for me to go?" I asked, finally finding my voice.
His answer was merely to let the comforting hand fall from my back, leaving me feeling uprooted, and to wait for me to mount. No, idiot. This is a particularly low-key jailbreak.
I reminded myself that by now I could mount Valley Boy alone, even bareback...but my wrenched knee, stiff from my night on the floor, made a liar out of me. Fo
r a long moment, I stood there against the horse's side, clutching the wiry hair of his mane, wanting to do anything not to ask Garrison for yet another favor...anything, but stay here.
I didn't have to ask. He stepped forward and offered me a hand, boosted me up as if I weighed no more than a calf. I caught my breath as I jerked my hip wrong, and when I peeked down at him to see if he'd noticed—he'd noticed.
The danger was back in his gray eyes, coiled and terrifying. "You mistreated?" he asked.
Well, I wasn't treated well! But his silent fury scared me too deeply to give him an itemized list of annoyances. I hadn't been raped, beaten, or starved. So I shook my head.
Thankfully, his gaze stopped grilling me and he mounted his own horse. Only once he was in his saddle—his natural habitat, you know—did he speak again.
"Colonel will hear from me," he told the Major, who had followed us out.
Fairchild said, "Pardon me if I'm not overly concerned, Reb." Emphasis on the name. I was too exhausted—I didn't get it, until the Major added a snotty, "If memory serves, you boys aren't very good at finishing what you start."
Oh. Johnny Reb. Losers in the War Between the States. These people were Garrison's enemies.
I half expected the Boss to kick Furface's teeth in, right there—surely he could. And he did hold the pompous officer's gaze until Fairchild looked uncomfortably away. Other than that, the Boss just let his warning linger, undiluted by further threats or action. Then, only when the tension got so thick I could have screamed, he eased his horse into a slow walk across the compound, toward the guardhouse and the gate. Not about to be left behind, I nudged Valley Boy to pace him.
I felt the weight of soldiers' stares—some paused in unloading a wagon, several let a conversation of their own falter to silence as we passed—but Garrison refused to hurry. How could he not want to hurry? These men were armed! Some of them might be men he'd fought against. How could he remain so unaffected?
One of the soldiers, standing with his friends, made a whooping sound at us. "Looky the cowboy! Got hisself a filly!"
I stared down at Valley Boy's mane and pretended to be anywhere but here—until the Boss's low, intense voice drawled, "Sit up straight."
What? When I slanted my gaze toward him, he didn't even bother looking at me...but he was sitting up.
Another bluecoat, with less of a sense of humor, yelled "Traitor!" He even took a few angry steps toward us before another soldier intercepted him with quieting words and accusing glances our way. It made my heart hurt.
Garrison didn't flinch. He could have been riding across the empty Kansas prairie, for all he showed concern. Nothing bothered the Boss, right?
"You killed my father, you traitors!" The soldier, still being held, screamed that after us. It bothered the hell out of me! "You killed my brother. You all oughtta hang!"
"They ain't nothin' to you," Garrison murmured under his breath. Had he read my mind? Or maybe it was bothering him, and he was just that good at hiding it. Or talking to himself.
Hard to imagine, to look at him. But I sat up straight, as if I wasn't afraid I'd vomit—and we escaped Fort Dodge together.
We rode quite a ways in complete silence before I felt safe to breathe again. Then I snuck a glance at the Boss and took back that thought.
It still wasn't quite safe.
His expression, even aimed at the road ahead of us, was a thundercloud. With his close-trimmed beard and air of power, he resembled a ticked-off Jehovah in His younger years. Considering how my luck had been holding, I wouldn't bet that the whole of his wrath was directed at Union soldiers, either.
After all, whose misadventure had drawn him in among the soldiers in the first place?
I still could hardly believe he'd come.
"Talk," he commanded finally at the horizon. Then he muttered something that sounded suspiciously like, "Bound to anyhow."
I felt a surge of hope. "You don't know what happened?"
"Not your side."
Oh—he did know. But he wanted to hear my side? That was almost as amazing as his coming to get me in the first place. "Thank you," I said.
He said nothing, and only waited with that tense, don't-try-my-patience posture of his.
"Right," I said, so as not to. "Well, I got to the post just fine—of course. You know that. You were there for that part."
He nodded a single, jerky nod, still scowling between the road and the horizon.
"So I walked in and I thought: I wonder who I should talk to?"
"Commander's wife," he offered.
My mouth opened in surprise—what? It would have been that easy to avoid the last twenty-four hours of hell? I wasn't sure who made me angrier: him for not telling me, or me for not knowing in the first place. "Well thank you Captain Hindsight! How was I supposed to know? There weren't exactly any signs saying 'Lost Souls Keep Left' or anything!"
He scowled down at his saddle instead of at the road. Apparently I would be allowed to continue living long enough to finish my story, anyway. I took a deep breath in an attempt to calm myself. After the experience I'd had, it was a shaky breath. "So I looked around to get my bearings and to forget about the flag—"
His gaze slid toward me, almost against his will, curious.
"Nothing," I said quickly, dismissing it. I had enough stupidity to account for, without sharing my suspicion that there was something wrong with the Army's American flag. "Anyway, I looked around and I saw these two women, and I thought: Hey! Women. They should be safe. So I went over to ask them...for... directions...."
His eyes were narrowing with increasing skepticism. It made me nervous, not just because he had that kind of a gaze—which he did—but because I didn't like his taking his eyes off the road for that long. I don't know why it bothered me. It's not like his horse couldn't see where it was going.
"Women," he repeated with scorn. Yeah, he'd heard the major's version.
"I didn't know they were that kind of women!"
"You ain't stupid," he scolded.
That surprised me—not the patronizing, which I was getting sadly used to, but what he'd actually said. "You don't think so?"
He looked quickly back at the road.
"So how can you recognize that kind of woman?" I asked, as long as we were on the subject. I mean, all the terms—working women, boardinghouses, doing business... they sounded so innocent! And they'd been dressed decently, too.
He rode on in silence.
Maybe he hadn't heard me. I said, "So how can—"
He widened his eyes at me. "You jest do," he conceded, teeth clenched. Clearly we were not going to have that conversation.
"Well I didn't," I reiterated. "There were no signs about them, either. And then old FurFace marched over and ordered us off the post and wouldn't let me talk to him, even when I asked nicely."
For some reason, he wasn't buying that.
"I did. I didn't call him FurFace; I just thought it. And I didn't use bad language—well, not until he'd already had me arrested. I just kindly pointed out...I pointed out to him...."
Oh no. No, no, NO. I'd pointed out to him that I had business there, and I would do whatever he wanted for it! Now that I knew in what context he'd heard me, the words sounded so brazen I couldn't bear to repeat them. Not that FurFace should have taken them like that, but....
I looked the other direction, hoping the heat flushing my face didn't look as obvious as it felt. "I didn't know what he thought," I said, in a frustratingly small voice. "I tried to explain what I was doing there, that I needed his help, but he wouldn't hear it right. I didn't try to...." God, what had the major told Garrison? Could this be any more humiliating?
Yes. It could be more humiliating if Garrison believed it. So despite cringing inside, I made myself meet his gaze. "I didn't," I managed to whisper, trying to keep my head high.
He looked away first.
We rode in silence for a while, and a strange thing happened. I heard an unusual noise, looked
up—and saw a wagon coming toward us! It was driven by a farmer, dressed like me, with a woman beside him, who was dressed more plainly than Belle or Dixie but just as primly, and who wore an honest-to-God sunbonnet. There went my sense of place again. Two children, playing in the back of the wagon, stopped to stare at me.
Garrison nodded at the farmer, as if he didn't resent being slowly forced out of Kansas and his job both, on the whim of just such people. "Good day."
The farmer nodded stiffly back, and his wife pretended we weren't there. After we passed each other, though, I heard the woman murmur, "Don't stare!"
Where had they come from?
Garrison waited until they were out of hearing to ask, "Who hurt you?"
He remembered? I wasn't sure if that was a good thing or not. "Oh. That happened when the soldiers threw me into the cell."
I snuck another peek. His face began to look thunderous again.
"They probably would have been nicer if I hadn't been kicking by then," I pointed out quickly, lest he decide to go back and burn down Fort Dodge. Not that the idea wasn't flattering—but it shouldn't be. Garrison wasn't angry because they'd done anything to me. Just that they'd done something wrong in general. Jacob Garrison, defender of Truth, Justice, and Proper Language...if not the Racially Diverse or Youthfully Bovine.
"Kicking," he repeated, as if visualizing something truly unbelievable.
I couldn't help myself. I choked on a nervous giggle. "And I bit someone."
He did not appreciate the giggle; his eyes narrowed. "You just laugh," he chided, and that went one straw of propriety too far.
"Well it's either laugh or cry, isn't it? They threw me in that nasty place, and it smelled awful, and nobody knew me—not even me. Then they said I could only leave if I went with the other ladies' landlord, except that's a euphemism for what he really was, which go figure, I declined. And then it was dark, and I think there were rats. Or snakes, or spiders—things that crawled, anyway, but I didn't look. And they wouldn't listen—the soldiers, I mean. Mainly the major. I tried to explain but he wouldn't even talk to me, as if I'm not even a person unless I have—" A dick. At least I caught myself. "—Some man beside me! And then I'm still not a person, just something lucky enough to have the patronage of a real person, meaning a man. Do you have any idea how demeaning that is?"
OverTime 1 - Searching (Time Travel) Page 15
