The crudity jarred him, and he released her. They were screaming at each other. He'd never screamed at anyone in his life. But he wanted to yell and shake her and make her see sense. "I'm not letting you starve in the wilderness, and that's final," he responded gruffly, not knowing how else to say it.
A distant cry of "Janice!" broke off into a wail of terror, shattering the thick silence between them.
They both ran for the door. Janice slipped through first, arriving just in time to see two men on horses riding headlong down the hill and around the bend, bearing a screaming Betsy with them.
"Stephen!" she cried in outrage. Then she picked up her skirts and ran after them.
Chapter 33
"Betsy!" Janice's anguished cries rang off the distant hills, echoing in the wind. The first few flakes of snow blew from the thick, scudding clouds overhead.
Peter threw his saddle on his horse and jerked the girth straps around. Realizing she couldn't chase the horses down the hillside, Janice ran back to the house and grabbed Peter's heavy fleece-lined jacket and the pistols and rifle Townsend had carried in with the saddlebags. Peter was already climbing into the saddle when she returned with them.
He shrugged the coat on, leaned over to give her a kiss, and accepted the weapons. "I'll catch up with them. There's only one trail out of here."
He was barely strong enough to sit in the saddle, and he meant to chase down a mountain after two desperate men. Janice wished she knew how to ride so she could be the one to go, but she could see the sense in not arguing the point.
She screamed inside as she watched him leave. She would scream out loud if she didn't fear giving Peter cause to doubt her sanity. She wanted to scream and scream and bring the mountains tumbling and send the clouds whirling. Why was God tormenting her like this? Why did He make her so helpless?
She had to stand here watching her ill husband ride out after a man who wasn't worth the polish for Peter's boot. How could she have been so blind when she was young? Why was she still so helpless? She had spent years teaching herself to handle anything and everything that came her way with unruffled efficiency. And now here she was again, left terrified by the same man who had put her in that position once before. She wanted to grab the shotgun and ride out after him. This time, she would kill him.
But she couldn't do any of those things. Trudging back to the cabin, Janice dug out her warmest clothes and began to dress. If only one trail left here, she could follow it. She wouldn't sit here and do nothing while Betsy was being kidnapped. She wondered who the second man was, but she didn't really want to know. All she wanted was Betsy and Peter back again.
The old shotgun Martin had given her rested next to the bags of gold. Gold. Stephen would listen to the sound of gold. She may not have understood him very well at fifteen, but she was ten years older now and wiser to the ways of mankind. Stephen would take gold in exchange for his daughter.
The bags were too heavy for her to carry. Glancing around, she remembered the loose stones she'd had to push back into the fireplace. Wiggling the rocks, she found several more. Gritting her teeth and praying the whole chimney didn't fall on her head, she pried a hole behind the dying fire. Stamping out the last embers she dragged the bags across the packed earth beneath the grate and shoved them into the hole. She filled her pockets with lumps of rock from the last bag, then shoved it too into the hole. She hadn't realized gold looked like lumps of rock. She certainly hoped Peter and his partner knew what they were doing. Feeling the weight loading her down, she hurriedly replaced the loose stones, scuffed up the dirt, and replaced the ashes and burned wood. The fireplace looked the same as it ever had.
She packed every spare bit of food she could find into a burlap sack. Then wrapping a shawl around her head and donning her heavy mantle, she picked up the shotgun and the sack of food and left the cabin. With only one road down the mountain, she would have to come across Peter and Betsy sometime. She hoped it would be to find them coming home, but she didn't mean to leave them out there alone.
The snow fell heavier as she trudged along the path the horses had taken. It had snowed often enough in Ohio. She had walked to work every day, even with gray sheets of ice beating against her. She had slogged through filthy mush in thin shoes with holes in the bottom. She hadn't had to suffer that since she moved to Texas and she couldn't say she missed it, but she knew how to do it. And this time, she had good strong leather ankle boots without holes in the soles.
The going was easy at first. She could even catch sight of the trail of hoofs racing down the mountain. She wasn't an expert at tracking so she couldn't tell one set of prints from the other and most of them just looked like smeared mud, but she was reassured that she was going the right way.
But as the snow came down harder, the tracks disappeared beneath a layer of white. Everything disappeared beneath a layer of white. She couldn't even be certain of the road, such as it was. She kept to the widest space between trees and scrub and prayed.
Whenever she left the protection of the trees, the wind howled around her, searching for openings in her layers of clothing. Her toes and fingers turned numb first. Her nose didn't grow numb. It hurt. She wrapped the shawl around the lower half of her face, but the icy particles flying from the sky stung like a swarm of bees. The snow she knew had never been like this.
She didn't consider turning back. There was nothing back up that road for her. Her life was ahead, down the mountain. She didn't know how she could help, but she meant to be there in case she was needed.
When she thought it might be noon, she stopped beneath the overhanging branches of an evergreen and brought out a piece of cheese and bread and gnawed on them for a while. She couldn't remember how long it had taken to ride this trail from town in a wagon. Surely going down it on horseback would be faster. Maybe Peter and Betsy were already holed up in the general store with Henry and Gladys, cheerfully sitting by the fire and drinking hot chocolate. She hoped so. Peter was too ill to be out in this storm for long, and Betsy had never been healthy enough to stay out in the cold. They needed warmth and nutrition.
She conserved most of her supplies just in case. Fate had never been particularly kind to her or her loved ones. She would hope they were safe, but she would plan for the worst.
The snow gave no evidence of stopping as Janice trudged through drifts up to her knees. She had difficulty dragging her soaked skirts and petticoats through the drifts and tried to work around them, but she feared stepping into deeper holes if she wandered too far off the course she hoped was the road.
She tried to calculate in her mind how many miles she could walk in an hour and how many hours she had been out here. Hadn't Martin said it was less than ten miles to town? Surely she could walk that before the light faded entirely. She threw a doubtful look to the lead sky. It would be dark early.
She comforted herself with the fact that there wasn't any sign of Betsy and Peter. Surely Peter had realized they would have to stay in town until the snow stopped. He would probably be furious when she showed up. He had actually shouted at her this morning. He would shout even louder when she walked into town. But try as she might, she would never make one of those humble wives who sat beside the fireside waiting for their husbands to provide.
Her ears were numb. She could barely move her frozen feet. The wind seemed to laugh as it whipped down the mountainside and froze her skirt to her legs. And though the snow grew less as she came off the highest elevation, the sky grew gradually darker. She was going to be out here on the mountain in the dark.
She thought she heard the howl of a wolf. Her fingers could barely hold the shotgun, but she forced them into position on the trigger. She scanned the landscape ahead, seeing only gray shapes that could be anything rising out of the thin layer of white. She waited for a shape to move, and to her surprise, one did. She froze beside the nearest tree trunk and watched until it moved again.
She had little or no protection. She had left the mountain and had
reached the rolling hillside where scrub and rocks covered the landscape. Did wolves roam the over this terrain?
If that was a wolf, it was an injured one. The gray shape seemed to hump over and try to rise again. Janice felt her mouth go dry and her throat close up. The movement was only too human.
If it was Stephen or his crony out there, she ought to let hem die. She wanted them to die. But they could tell her where to find Betsy. She had to know.
She approached cautiously, holding the shotgun the way she'd been taught. The shape almost made it to its feet, staggered, and fell again with a low moan. That was when Janice lowered the shotgun and felt all her hopes dry up and blow away with the wind. That moan had to be Peter's.
She ran as best as she could in wet skirts and shoes, her petticoats catching at her legs and the icy wind searing her lungs. She nearly fell down beside him, sliding and grabbing at his shoulders as he struggled to his feet. They both tumbled to the ground, and Janice wrapped her arms around him and fought the sobs welling up inside her.
"My God, Jenny." Peter caught her close and held her, repeating her name over and over as if she were a dream that the sound made real.
"What happened? Where's your horse? Where's Betsy?" Fighting her fears, Janice struggled to free herself, struggled to get them on their feet. She was wet to the bone, and so was he. They would freeze out here on the mountainside if they didn't get moving.
"They shot at me, winged the horse." Using her shoulders, Peter fought to find his feet. He coughed, a racking cough that came from the lungs. Janice held him, terrified, familiar with that sound. People died from coughs like that. She shuddered and held him as he swayed slightly once he reached his feet.
"The horse reared and I lost my seat. I'm sorry, Jenny. I just couldn't hold on. And I didn't dare shoot back." Keeping his arm around her shoulders, he started moving down the hillside. "We have to get out of this cold. What in hell are you doing here?"
He didn't have the strength to yell at her. Janice couldn't even smile at this consolation. She was too paralyzed with fear. Out of instinct, she reached for her bag of supplies. With numb fingers, she produced the hunk of cheese and offered it to him.
He didn't seem much interested in the food. She suspected if her fingers could feel, she would find him burning with fever. He had ridden out into a storm like a madman with no thought to himself. She wanted to weep for his foolish bravery. She wanted to weep for her foolishness in allowing him to go. She wanted to weep for a life gone mad.
Instead, she forced him to eat the cheese and tried to act as anchor for his swaying steps. He was heavy and she was exhausted. When she stumbled, he caught her. She liked it better with Peter by her side, however. She wasn't as afraid of the little things, like the shape of that rock ahead or the darkness slowly consuming them. She didn't want to die, but if she had to, she didn't want to be alone.
But she couldn't die and leave Betsy motherless. They had to live. She didn't think she could do it without Peter. His cough kept her preoccupied. His arm around her kept her warm inside. His reassurances that they were on the right road, that they were almost there, kept her going. She surrendered herself entirely to his care, going where he led, hearing only what he said, feeling only the weight of his arm around her. The rest of the world ceased to exist.
* * *
"There's a light just ahead, Jenny. We're going to make it." Peter squeezed her shoulders. "I couldn't have done it without you."
She couldn't have done it without him, either, but she hadn't the breath left to tell him. It hurt just to breathe. Her feet felt like lumps of lead. The darkness was so thick around her that she would never have been able to move forward had it not been for Peter's sense of direction. She might have wandered around out here forever. Even now, she couldn't see the light he did. She clung to his waist and let him guide her.
The tilted shape of a shack on the outskirts of town emerged from the darkness. There wasn't a light in it, but Janice was ready to stop there, out of the howling wind. Peter forced her to go on.
"Not here. Just a little farther. You have to have a fire, Janice. We have to get warm. And they may have news of Betsy. Someone had to see them."
His words were warm against her ear. They seeped down inside her, giving her strength to manage a few more steps. She wanted to rip off her hampering skirts. They weren't of any use to her anymore. They only weighed her down. But she dragged them a little farther, forcing one foot in front of the other.
Peter coughed harder now, but he had the strength and the stubborn tenacity to keep her going, to push her forward. He practically carried her by the time they reached the overhang of the general store. Light came from the living quarters at the rear of the store, but neither of them had the strength to go around. Peter pounded on the door, then reached for the latch. They practically fell through when the door opened.
"Land sakes! What you all doin' out in this?" Henry's laconic voice almost evinced a small amount of excitement as he lifted his lantern to examine the intruders.
"Mulloney," Peter gasped between coughs, staggering to keep his feet. "My wife, Janice. Horse threw me."
That highly expurgated version was sufficient to gain them entrance. Slamming the door against the wind Henry led the way through the cluttered shelves of merchandise to the rear door. Janice hadn't realized how much she had been leaning into the wind until it was suddenly taken away from her. She lurched forward, almost coming unbalanced. Her skirts tangled around her, and she tripped. Peter kept a firm grip on her and held her upright.
She wasn't certain how she made it to the back room and the fire. Her mind was as numb as the rest of her. She didn't know how long she drifted in this comatose state before she gradually became aware of the crackling flames as more than a source of warmth, hearing the voices around her, recognizing Peter's hacking cough.
"The stage left at noon," someone was saying. Janice forced her mind to focus on the voice. Gladys. She remembered the fat woman with the bad disposition.
A low rumble followed. She couldn't distinguish the words, but the sound rippled through her. Peter. She closed her eyes and let herself ride on the sound of his voice. Peter. Warmth seeped around the place where her heart should be. Peter would find Betsy. She didn't know how she knew that. It was a foolish thought. He was ill. He had no horse. But she drifted on the sound of his voice and didn't attempt to arouse herself again.
She wasn't even aware when Henry and Gladys left the room. She only knew the comforting fingers finding her buttons, stripping back the damp cloth, peeling off the layers that kept her chilled and shivering. A hot mug was shoved into her hands, and she forced it to her lips, sipping slowly until the heat swirled in her stomach She tasted whiskey in it. She hated the taste of whiskey. She drank it anyway, because it was warm.
"Stand up and let me pull off these skirts, Jenny," the voice was saying. A blanket had already miraculously appeared around her shoulders.
She couldn't remember the last time someone had taken care of her. Surely her mother must have done it sometime in the distant past, but she couldn't remember. She stood obediently and allowed the filthy, sodden skirts and petticoats to fall to the floor. She shivered as a draft hit her bare legs, but a quilt was quickly pulled around her, a warm quilt, one that had baked by the fire. She sighed in relief.
"Let me see your toes, Jenny."
That sounded vaguely obscene, but obligingly she held out her leather-clad feet. He struggled with the wet laces and finally cut them free. She could scarcely feel her feet when he pulled off her fallen stockings. Still sipping her drink, she looked with curiosity at the blue toes he uncovered.
Strong, capable hands rubbed at them, and she felt a painful tingling. She tried to jerk away, but he wouldn't let go.
"I think they'll be all right. At least you had sense to put on warm stockings. What in hell did you think you were doing walking down that mountain?"
She couldn't tell if he was angry with her
or not. It didn't matter. She just wanted to sleep. She pushed her hair out of her eyes and tried to concentrate. Peter still wore his wet clothes.
"Get those off," she murmured, swaying where she sat.
He looked vaguely startled as he glanced up from her toes to see her face. When he saw the direction of her gaze, he grinned feebly. "Yes, ma'am," he agreed, without the teasing reply he might have given upon another occasion.
She gathered her blanket and quilt around her and watched as Peter stripped to the skin and dried off with another blanket. He might have lost weight, but he was still an imposing sight to behold. She sighed in wonder, closed her eyes, and nearly toppled into the fire before he caught her.
"Our gracious hosts allowed that we could sleep in front of the fire. It isn't much of a bed, but we'll be warm. Come here, Jenny. Let me hold you."
She didn't object but curled up against his nakedness and allowed him to make a bed and covers of the quilt and blankets. It felt right to have his nakedness against hers, his warmth feeding hers. For the first time, she truly felt married, knew what it was to be a part of another person besides herself. It felt good.
As she slipped into unconsciousness, Peter lay awake behind her, trying to keep his cough from waking her.
The stage had left at noon with Betsy and her kidnappers on it. It wouldn't run again until the roads cleared, which could be next week or next spring.
How could he tell Janice that Betsy was gone?
Chapter 34
"What is she doing?" Stephen nodded his head toward the child rummaging around in the cold ashes of the prior night's fire. The hotel was a dismal one, and no one had come around this morning to relight the kindling.
"Told her she could look for a charcoal stick if she wanted. It keeps her happy." Bobby Fairweather sipped at his beer and ignored the greasy bacon that was his breakfast.
A few minutes later the child was happily ensconced at a table by the window, drawing on the back of an old wanted poster she'd found nailed to the wall. Somehow, she had managed to comb out the worst of the snarls in her curls, and she looked more like a fairy child than a human perched daintily at the edge of the splintery chair.
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