Open Road

by M. M. Holaday

  Again, she regretted running away. She already missed Win and Jeb. Win was charming and fun; she liked the attention he showed her. Jeb was quiet, but she sensed depth in his stillness and felt safe around him. Now she was traveling with people she didn’t know in a direction she didn’t want to go. Here she was, in another goddamn pickle.

  CHAPTER SEVEN: WIN

  Dutch Ferguson’s train

  Win wiped the blood from his cut lip with tender, bruised knuckles. He surveyed the damage to Jeb’s face, whose left eye was already swelling shut. Considering how his own head throbbed, Win figured he looked the same as Jeb. Their day had begun with a fight with Dale.

  Grace had peeked inside Meg’s tent when repeated calls didn’t rouse her. She found only the dress Meg had borrowed, neatly folded.

  Word spread quickly. No one had seen Meg, or heard anything suspicious. Dutch concluded that she left on her own accord, since no one taken against her will would fold clothes and leave so quietly. Everyone who had met Meg looked concerned or disappointed, except Dale. He looked neither, and that made Win suspicious.

  “Do you know something about this, Dale?” Win asked.

  “ ’Course not. Why would I?”

  “You don’t seem too surprised, is all.” Jeb squared himself opposite him.

  Foster stood up next to Jeb and glared at Dale. “I saw you talking with Miss Jameson last night. What did you say to her?”

  “Nothing . . . except to warn her to keep an eye on the horizon. Something you all should be doin’.” Dale pointed an accusing finger at Win and Jeb. “I swear, those two pay more attention to her than watchin’ for Indians.”

  “You scared her away, didn’t you?” Jeb spoke through clenched teeth.

  “The safety of this train comes first!” Dale shouted as Jeb charged him. The two wrestled in the dirt. Bill and Win tried to separate them, but Win caught a few blows himself, which he returned. Finally, Dutch stepped in.

  “Where did she go, Dale?” Dutch growled as he pulled him off Jeb.

  “How the hell would I know?” Dale wrenched himself free of Dutch’s hold and sneered at them all. “I was right. She brought trouble.”

  “Goddammit, Dale, you’re the one stirring up a hornet’s nest.” With a weary voice, he said to Win and Jeb, “Shew . . . you’d better find her. Get going . . . She can’t be far.”

  But a US cavalry regiment clamored into camp and changed their plans. Lieutenant Carter, from the 7th Iowa Cavalry, informed Dutch and the gathered settlers that Cheyenne warriors were in the area. They would escort the wagon train to Camp Rankin.

  Dutch rubbed his face in exasperation. The safety of the settlers came first, but Win knew he was weighing the time a detour in the opposite direction would take against the risk of continuing on. The lieutenant didn’t look happy about it, either. Win figured he’d rather advance than backtrack, too. So, it didn’t surprise Win when the officer dismounted and the two men stepped out of earshot to discuss the matter privately. Soon, the two men shook hands and returned to the group. The officer announced that the train could continue to Ash Hollow as planned, accompanied by the cavalrymen. Dutch looked pleased. “We welcome your company.”

  “We’ll add whatever protection we can. By the way, are you missing a young woman . . . Miss Jameson?” the lieutenant asked.

  Grace ran up to him. “Oh, dear heavens, is she all right?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” The lieutenant touched the rim of his hat. “She’s on her way to Camp Rankin with one of my men.” Relief spread through Win’s body like a shot of whiskey, followed by the frustrating realization that they wouldn’t be headed in the same direction. To add insult to injury, the lieutenant continued, “She told us where you were and said to watch out for some outlaw named Sutter. She said Robert Dale had seen him.” The lieutenant scanned the group to see if the man might identify himself and share more information, but Dale had disappeared.

  Jeb was quiet as the train broke camp. Once underway, Foster rode up next to Win. “I think your friend is either lovestruck or has a death wish. My bet is the former.” He jerked his head toward Jeb, who was riding away in the direction of Camp Rankin. “You’d better stop him. Want company?”

  Win nodded. Together, they caught up to Jeb and blocked his path. “Where do you think you’re going?” Win asked.

  “To find Meg.” Jeb turned his head slightly to look out of his one good eye.

  “Without saying good-bye?” Win couldn’t keep the sarcasm out of his voice.

  “I was coming back. You said Rankin was just over the hill.”

  “It’s a bit farther than that. And the lieutenant won’t let us go after her; I already checked.”

  “Since when do you follow orders?”

  “Since I heard the Cheyenne are gathering into war parties!” Win spread his arms, exasperated at Jeb’s uncharacteristic foolishness. “Don’t be an idiot. This isn’t the time or place to be traveling alone, partner.”

  Jeb peered at the southern horizon, as though calculating the odds of slipping past Indians undetected. “I’m goin’, Win.”

  “The hell you are.” In one swift move, Win pulled the bridle off Galen and let it drop.

  Jeb swore under his breath and dismounted. While Jeb gathered the bridle, Win dropped a lasso around Galen’s neck. Jeb glared at his friend, who remained unfazed. “We’ve got to get through this dangerous corridor, Jeb. It’s like the cave on Hank Brady’s farm. Remember the ledge we had to squeeze past, with the fifty-foot drop? Safe on either side, but that one spot . . .”

  Jeb had been more afraid of that one spot than anything else Win could think of. He couldn’t stop shaking, even when they emerged safely into the sunlight. Jeb would never go back in the cave again. Win hoped the memory would place the appropriate level of fear on meeting up with Cheyenne dog soldiers.

  “You said Indians are just people, like the rest of us,” Jeb said.

  “Not dog soldiers; they’re unrelenting. No retreat. No mercy. We don’t want to run into them. Look, pretty soon we’ll turn south and be in Colorado Territory. The gold rush settled that area years ago. Lots of little mining towns in the mountains; some brave souls are even farming the plains . . . Hell, Denver’s got nearly five thousand people living there. But here . . . this is Cheyenne country. We don’t want to be here, especially alone.”

  “She’s out there alone, Win.”

  “She’s safe at Camp Rankin, son. Listen to your friend,” Bill said.

  Jeb finally nodded reluctantly. “Give me your word,” Win said. “Say it.”

  “You have my word, goddammit.”

  Once Jeb gave his word, he stuck to it. Confident that Jeb would stay and relieved he wouldn’t have to fight his bigger and stronger friend, Win’s spirits lifted. He removed the rope from Galen’s neck. “Hell, I’ll bet Meg’s got everyone turned up on end at the fort by now. Got their heads spinning, poor saps.”

  “I guarantee you that pretty little thing is safer than any of us right now,” Foster said.

  The truth in Foster’s comment unnerved Win, but he continued to joke nonetheless. “I don’t know if I’d call her pretty. She’s kind of a mess, really. Even cleaned up she’s got all that hair . . .” Win gestured around his head, indicating the way her wavy tresses blew around her face.

  “You don’t fool me, Avery.” Foster shook his head and chuckled.

  Win wondered what Foster meant by his comment, and if it would bother Jeb. Win caught Jeb glancing southward. That Jeb showed concern at Meg’s absence was not as surprising as the ferocity of his anger at Dale. Win couldn’t remember one time from their youth when Jeb lost his temper. Win could tell Jeb liked Meg. Hell, she was pretty and fun. What was not to like about a girl who can ride a horse like she could? But maybe Jeb’s feelings for her went deeper than Win realized.

  The thought needled at him like a prickle weed caught inside his shirt, aggravating him almost as much as Dale. Maybe he was just out of sorts because he
felt trapped by their circumstances. He gave Hippocrates a verbal “Hup!” and galloped up to the front of the train. It felt good to break loose a bit, and he wanted to see open land for a change, not the backs of prairie schooners. As he rode, the sun slipped to the horizon, setting the clouds on fire.

  The cavalry escorted Dutch’s settlers as far as Ash Hollow, a favorite resting spot on the trail. Getting there required the help of every available man, as each wagon had to be pulled up a steep hill, then, with windlasses, eased down a long, sharp decline. The men spent the day with ropes wrapped around them, pulling against the weight of the prairie schooners. At first, Win’s back and arms were on fire—later, he could barely move his sore muscles. The reward was worth the effort, however. Ash Hollow was a peaceful, green oasis where they sat beneath shade trees and drank the first fresh, clean water they had tasted in weeks. Jeb muttered to Win that he wondered how the train could have managed if they hadn’t come along, but Win attributed his sour mood to missing Meg. He had been true to his word and not gone after her.

  A cavalry scout reported that the Cheyenne dog soldiers were heading for the Platte Bridge Station. The lieutenant assured the settlers they would have safe travel to Fort Laramie, and then led his troops in pursuit. No longer under military control, Win and Jeb said good-bye to the Mobergs and left the train.

  Without discussion or conscious planning, Win and Jeb took their time making their way to Denver. However slim the chances, Win hoped they might run into Meg. He looked for her in every little town they passed through.

  CHAPTER EIGHT: JEB

  Colorado Territory, a week later

  Rudderless ships at sea. Once they left Ash Hollow for Denver, Jeb and Win drifted with the wind. Not that Jeb minded. Enthralled by the Rocky Mountains, a striking contrast to the flat prairies of the Nebraska Territory, Jeb had never seen such snow-capped magnificence. The mountains sang to him, drawing him in like dangerous and mythical Sirens.

  He wondered if the Rockies called to Meg, or if the soothing whispers of the prairie spoke to her. Where was she . . . Which way did she go?

  Unlike the unpopulated expanse of Nebraska, little towns had popped up everywhere in Colorado Territory. Gold fever had peaked in ’59, but it was far from over, and folks still arrived in a steady stream. The Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Sioux left the area as white people rushed in. Anywhere miners found gold, a shantytown materialized. But Jeb also noticed that on the route between Denver and Cheyenne—the junction site of the Union Pacific line of the transcontinental railroad—farmers and ranchers were investing in the future. Farms and ranches dotted the countryside along the frontal range, as did towns that supported them with dry-goods stores, blacksmiths, and lumber mills. Freight traffic and stagecoach lines crisscrossed, overlapped, and intersected with each other. Camp Rankin grew into Fort Sedgwick, and its protection, along with Forts Lyon, Garland, and Morgan, encouraged settlement. But Meg Jameson was not at any fort, town, way station, or village. Galen and Hippocrates plodded along, perhaps missing the company of Biscuit as much as their riders missed Meg.

  Stuck in the ground alongside the road, a hand-painted wooden sign read “Paradise,” with an arrow pointing west to the base of the foothills. The word “Paradise” had been scratched through, and underneath it was written “Hell.” Scrawled in smaller letters was the word “Salvation,” with a fresher arrow pointing east. Why no discussion between them occurred Jeb couldn’t say, but he and Win turned west at the same time, pulled by something invisible. Perhaps Sirens were at work, maybe they thought they’d find Meg, or maybe the name and editorial remarks on the sign were just too beguiling to bypass.

  Paradise consisted of two buildings facing a third, as if in an attempted start of a main street. The blades of a windmill squeaked rhythmically as they spun in the constant breeze. No real roads led to the little hamlet—just a wide, worn path from the east made by heavy-footed oxen pulling schooners.

  A giant blacksmith plunged a glowing horseshoe into a barrel of water as they passed by. He nodded amicably. A small, wiry fellow, half the height and width of the blacksmith, sat outside a saloon. He stood up and leaned against the porch supports. “Howdy, strangers. You come from LaPorte? Yer headed for Denver, ain’t ya?”

  “More or less,” Win said.

  “Mick! You owe me two bits!” the small man yelled across the street at the store. The blacksmith laid down his work and lumbered over. The storeowner appeared at the doorway.

  “You dang Scot! You can’t ask ’em until I hear the answer same time as you!” The storekeeper, identified by the dang Scot as Mick, marched over with clenched fists like he was ready to fight him.

  “Honest question, honest answer.” The small fellow remained unperturbed, his chin jutting out defensively. “Just cuz you don’t like what they say don’t make it a lie.” He held out his hand. Mick slapped a coin into it. The man cackled cheerfully and pocketed the money.

  Mick pointed a finger. “Next time, I get to ask.”

  “You old buzzard, you always get to ask . . .” and so the argument continued. The two paid no attention to Win and Jeb.

  A woman appeared at the door of the trading post. She swept across the narrow street, carrying herself with more poise and elegance than one would expect from a woman in the middle of nowhere. “Mick Carter and Angus McPherson, if you two aren’t the orneriest souls on the face of this Earth!”

  Angus McPherson ignored the woman. “I told you, Mick, folks goin’ from LaPorte to Denver will take this route. It makes more sense than what that goofball Holladay’s doin’ east of here.”

  “Holladay can do whatever the hell he wants. He says his way is safer.” Mick stuck his face in Angus’s.

  “Bah! Sayin’ it don’t make it so!” Angus held his ground. The faces of the two men were inches apart.

  “BOYS!” the woman shouted at them, then turned pleasantly to Jeb and Win. “Please excuse them. I’m Georgia Carter. Welcome to Paradise.”

  Jeb touched the rim of his hat and introduced himself and Win.

  Georgia smoothed her apron as it billowed in the breeze. “Nice to meet you. I try to keep these fools in line so people don’t think we’re peculiar, our brains turned queer by the abundance of vast, open country and the lack of human contact. Sometimes I wonder if it hasn’t already happened.” She gave her husband and Angus a stern look. “What can we do for you?”

  “Just passing through. Maybe buy a meal, if that’s possible.”

  “We can accommodate you.”

  Mick brought their horses over to the water trough by the well; Georgia invited Win and Jeb to follow her into the store. The blacksmith and Angus joined them as though invited as well. She put the coffee on and told them to make themselves comfortable at a large round table in the living quarters at the back of their store.

  “You get a lot of business out here?” Jeb asked the blacksmith, who had settled at the table with them.

  Mrs. Carter thought the question had been directed at her, however, and launched into the history of their little town. She said their blacksmith had been on his way to California when his wagon train was delayed. Blackie, as she called him, spent the winter repairing wagons and shoeing mules for everyone. When it was time to leave, he had grown to like it here and decided to stay. Blackie looked scary, with arms as big as tree trunks, but Georgia said he was just an old softie, winking at him, causing him to clear his throat, embarrassed.

  Angus McPherson had been traveling with the same train and opted to stay put with Blackie. After crossing the dry, dusty plains of the eastern Colorado Territory, he hankered for a good shot of whiskey and figured others would surely feel the same way. So he set up a saloon right next to the blacksmith and found that everyone who stopped for repairs also stopped in for a drink. If a large train passed through, he could fill two poker tables at night.

  She and Mick, Georgia said proudly, owned and operated the trading post. With their children grown and married, the couple had
headed west, eager to see California. But once Georgia caught sight of the Rocky Mountains, she had second thoughts about crossing them, saying she’d just as soon look at them. They ran into Blackie and Angus, twenty miles west of the Latham Station and thirty miles south of LaPorte, and felt like they had stumbled upon the perfect spot for an outpost. They’d just celebrated their first full year at this spot. It was Georgia’s idea to name their little town Paradise.

  “Say, did you see our sign? How’s it look?” Mick asked. He’d come in the back door in the middle of his wife’s report.

  “ ‘Paradise’ was scratched out, and ‘Hell’ was written underneath,” Win said.

  “Vandals.” Georgia sighed and shook her head. “We find a perfect spot and give it a perfect name, and folks just can’t stand it. Jealousy . . . pure jealousy.”

  “Anyone else live here?” Jeb asked.

  The four residents glanced at one another. “No, it’s just us,” Mrs. Carter said. “Only a few unlucky prospectors lived up in the mountains when Blackie arrived, and they left with their pockets empty soon after we got here. We settled here for the business that travels through—wagon trains, mostly. What kind of work are you boys in?”

  “Nothing yet, but a friend of mine has a freight business in Denver. I think he’ll have jobs for us.”

  The mention of freighting started another brief argument between Mick and Angus about routes, and whether a regular stage and mail route could run through Paradise instead of Lyonsville, ten miles east.

  “Since most of our business comes from settlers coming through in wagon trains, I don’t know what will happen once the railroad lays track this far. We might be able to become a depot, but I doubt it. Lyonsville will get the stop, I’m betting.”

  “No one’ll take your bet, Mick, ’cause it’s a sure one,” Angus said.

  “Ben Holladay’s got his stage going through Lyonsville . . .”