Gunman and the Angel

by George Snyder

  Dressed for dinner, Dan wore his dandy, dude suit he’d taken to North Carolina, having had his bath. The ladies wore their finest; even the shapeless gown of Sleepy Sue fit in with hotel guests. Jenny looked small and fragile and complemented the tight waist and bodice of her bright-green dress. Her dark hair was down to the middle of her back, which made her look ten years younger.

  But Mandy shined so bright not one gaze from male eyes passed by her without a stare. Her dress was yellow and showed a daring view of her throat. She wore a yellow ribbon around her neck. Her brown-copper hair drawn together at her cute ears and curled down her back. She did not look like a girl – she looked like a woman.

  With a feeling of pride and alert awareness, Dan hoped he wouldn’t have to fight his way out of the restaurant to keep her by his side. That was how it was when a man escorted a beautiful woman – and Dan had three – well, at least two, but certainly one of outstanding beauty.

  As a uniformed waiter escorted them to the table, a handsome young gambler turned from the bar and said, ‘Well, hello.’

  Mandy flashed him a wide smile, ‘Well, goodbye.’ She hugged closer to Dan’s arm.

  The hotel had somehow found a bottle of Riesling wine. The meal was a steak fillet so tender it could be cut with the edge of a fork. A salad and a baked potato from Idaho came with the steak, smothered in chives and butter.

  Jenny’s glance darted left and right, through the lobby, at the restaurant table. ‘The man with the comment at Mandy looked at me. He knew me. He had the look. Maybe I can’t do this. Men travel, and they talk. Maybe I can’t get away from it.’

  Sleepy Sue covered Jenny’s hand with her own. ‘We’ll do it, honey. Once we get to Sacramento, it won’t matter.’

  Sleepy Sue’s dough face had transformed since she’d hooked up with Jenny. Dan saw it. She looked soft and gentle, and caring, and no question she was devoted.

  ‘Sue’s right,’ Dan said. ‘He was just some stranger.’

  Jenny blinked as if holding back tears. ‘The past is always there, ready to ambush you. It never leaves.’

  Mandy took a sip of Riesling. ‘Are you sure you remember where your little girl is?’

  ‘Trudy,’ Jenny said, nodding.

  Dan said, ‘Do you know the father?’

  Jenny shook her head.

  Mandy glanced at Dan. She turned to Jenny. ‘How old is she?’

  Sleepy Sue said, ‘Seven.’

  ‘Will she be up for the trip?’

  Jenny Troup looked around the table, her eyes red rimmed. ‘We’ll be together. She was five when I left her. I promise you we’ll never be apart again.’

  ‘We roll for Santa Fe in the morning,’ Dan Quint said.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  The first week in May, under clear sky they saw the Santa Fe peaks first, still with a dusting of snow on top. They came upon clusters of clay houses and sod dugouts surrounding haciendas. The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe railroad strung from Kansas City across Kansas and Colorado, through Raton Pass into New Mexico straight to Santa Fe, then westward. Wagons moved along streets between stores while churches with crosses above sharp-peaked roofs dominated, both in presence and in rules.

  Jenny twitched and blinked and squeezed her hands together. She was quiet and nervous. Entering the town, she moved her head as though trying to see everything at once. She wore her plain, blue dress for the trail.

  On Mesa, riding next to the buckboard, Dan said, ‘You want to clean up or change?’

  Jenny’s hands were shaking. ‘I . . . don’t know. Dan, I don’t know. I just don’t know.’

  Sleepy Sue reined in the old gray and the gelding.

  Dan turned to face Jenny. ‘We can get rooms. How do you know where she is?’

  ‘I got a map. My sister married a Navajo. They got two kids of their own. They don’t have much money. They scratch-farm around their sod house. I sent them some money when I could.’ The words came out clipped, anxious, without confidence.

  Dan nodded. ‘We’ll clean up, get something to eat and head on out there.’

  ‘All of us?’ Mandy asked.

  Dan turned to Jenny. ‘You want us with you or not?’

  Jenny looked at each of them then locked on Dan. ‘You’re our leader. I don’t think I can handle the rig by myself. I want Sue with me. Dan, I’m scared. What if she don’t know me, or like me, or what if she won’t come with me? Is it too much for you and Mandy to come along?’ Her hands started shaking again.

  Dan nodded. ‘All of us then. Let’s move along so we can get out there before dark.’

  Vegetable greens grew beside fifteen rows of corn in front of the earth and clay house – a box with a slanted sod roof. A room extension had been built on the west side. Window openings held no glass. The whole structure looked no bigger than twenty feet one end to another, including the addition. A Navajo man stood among the corn rows watching them approach. His face held no expression. Two boys about eight and a girl slightly younger ran around the house. The boys looked Navajo, with cotton shirts and buckskin pants and moccasins. The girl wore a yellow calico dress and sandals and brightened the day with glowing, white hair bouncing to her waist. She squealed as the boys caught her. All three stopped and gawked at the approaching wagon and two riders. The boys turned to stare at the girl. They said something that could not be heard at the wagon. The girl started walking slowly to the wagon. Her blue eyes went from face to face. She looked at the three chickens with tied legs in the back of the wagon.

  She looked at Jenny Troup.

  Jenny climbed down from the wagon. She twisted her hands together and rubbed them up and down the front of her blue dress. ‘Trudy?’ she said.

  The girl cocked her head to the side and squinted up against a setting sun.

  The Navajo man moved along the corn to the front door of the hut. He continued to watch them without expression.

  A woman came to the door. She wore a short, buckskin skirt to her knees and white cotton blouse with her shining, black hair tied at her neck. It reached the hem of the skirt. She carried features similar to Jenny, as did the girl. Her light-brown eyes sat in spider-web wrinkles. She had lines on each side of her mouth and around her neck. Her hands looked rough with the texture of bark.

  Dan sat on Mesa. No invitation had been offered.

  Jenny knelt in front of the girl. ‘Do you remember me, Trudy?’

  The girl blinked. ‘You’re my mama, come to take me with you. I been waitin’.’

  ‘Are you ready to come with me?’

  The girl nodded. ‘I been waitin’. I been waitin’ and waitin’ forever, Mama.’ She looked up at Dan. ‘Who are they?’

  ‘Friends of mine.’ Jenny leaned forward. ‘Trudy, do you have a hug anywhere there inside you?’

  Trudy leaped forward and threw her little arms around Jenny’s neck. Jenny clutched at her, kissed her neck and her face, tears wetting the side of the girl’s face. ‘Oh, my darling girl,’ she whimpered. ‘We’ll be together always now.’

  Trudy kissed her mama’s cheek and hugged her tight. ‘I been waitin’ so long I thought you stopped loving me.’

  ‘I wrote you letters, sweetie.’

  ‘That ain’t the same as touching you.’

  Jenny squeezed her tight. ‘No, my love, it isn’t.’

  The Navajo man walked forward, still without expression. ‘Step on down,’ he said to Dan.

  ‘Lord, yes,’ the woman at the door said. ‘Please, come inside, have some coffee.’

  Dan swung down from the saddle. He faced the Navajo. ‘Them chickens is for you.’

  ‘Obliged.’

  ‘You got yourself a good growing garden here.’

  The Navajo walked to the back of the wagon and pulled the chickens. He untied them and set them free to scatter and peck the ground. In a low voice, he said, ‘You take away our little girl – you cut out a piece of my family.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Cut out a piece of
my heart.’ His voice broke. ‘My woman will take it hard. She will weep for a week. My boys will be sad.’

  ‘That’s the way of it.’

  ‘Trudy has been our only little girl.’

  ‘It has to go like this. They’re mama and daughter.’

  ‘Does Jenny have a man to help her?’

  ‘She has friends.’

  Mandy had swung down from Rowdy and knelt beside Jenny to chat with the little girl, Trudy. Sleepy Sue stayed on the wagon seat, the reins still in her hands. Jenny took Trudy’s hand. She and Mandy headed for the door.

  Jenny turned back to the wagon. ‘Sue, get down from there and come in for some coffee.’

  Sleepy Sue sighed. She dropped the reins and with effort, stepped her bulk down from the wagon seat.

  Dan watched her as she passed him. ‘You aren’t losing her, Sue.’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘Gather the girl to you. Make it the three of you.’

  ‘I’ll try, Dan.’ She put her hand on Dan’s arm. ‘Don’t you and Mandy go, please. When you’re married stick with us, keep us together.’

  ‘I ain’t sure about that.’

  ‘Please.’

  ‘Sue?’ Jenny called from the house. ‘Get in here and introduce yourself.’

  When Sleepy Sue had gone into the house, the Navajo man said, ‘Congratulations, you get married. You not marry Jenny, do you?’

  ‘Nope, I marry the one too beautiful, the woman too good for me.’

  The Los Cerrillos Hotel made all the wedding arrangements – the decorated room, guitar music – they even baked the cake. Attending were Jenny’s sister, Kate, her husband, the Navajo, Whip, the two boys, Jenny and Trudy and Sleepy Sue. Jenny was Maid of Honor for Mandy.

  Dan did the ceremony without a Best Man.

  It took two days of arguments to convince Sleepy Sue and Jenny that with the little girl they should take the train to Sacramento, not the wagon. The Sierra Nevada would be too rough, even in summer. They sold the old buckboard and the gray. Jenny and Sleepy Sue cried so deep they got little Trudy to start. But they boarded the train and eventually rolled west.

  Dan used the gelding for a pack horse. He rode Mesa, Mandy was on Rowdy. It was a fine day the first week of June when Mr and Mrs. Quint rode out of Santa Fe, Dan thinking about those years on the trail when Mandy was a girl, then a woman – now he was happy to be riding for the tall mountains to trail camp with his beautiful, shiny, loving new wife.

  He had no idea what waited for them in Washington Territory. It was bound to be something.