© 2017 by Susan Page Davis
ISBN 978-1-68322-007-7
Adobe Digital Edition (.epub) 978-1-68322-295-8
Kindle and MobiPocket Edition (.prc) 978-1-68322-296-5
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission of the publisher.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any similarity to actual people, organizations, and/or events is purely coincidental.
All scripture quotations are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.
Series Design: Kirk DouPonce, DogEared Design
Model Image: Susan Fox/ Trevillion Images
For more information about Susan Page Davis, please access the author’s website at the following Internet address: www.susanpagedavis.com
Published by Barbour Books, an imprint of Barbour Publishing, Inc., P.O. Box 719, Uhrichsville, OH 44683, www.barbourbooks.com
Our mission is to publish and distribute inspirational products offering exceptional value and biblical encouragement to the masses.
Printed in the United States of America.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Epilogue
Chapter One
April 28, 1861
Tucson, New Mexico Territory
You get out there, and I mean now.” Uncle Silas glared at Carmela, his white eyebrows nearly meeting over his thin nose. “I don’t think I can do it.” Her voice broke.
“Of course you can. You had it word-perfect last night.”
Her breath came in shallow gasps. She brushed back a strand of hair with a hot, moist hand. Carmela was frightened. Ma and Pa would never have made her do anything like this. But they were gone now, and Uncle Silas was in charge.
She peeked around the doorjamb. The large room was filled with noisy people, all except for the clear space at the front, where she was supposed to go and stand.
“It’s all men,” she choked.
“No, it’s not.”
She peeked again and spotted a few women with their hair piled on top of their heads or hanging down in braids. A few ranchers and merchants had brought their wives, but by far the majority of the people packed in were men.
One woman seated between two men in the front row wore a bright yellow dress with a plunging neckline. The stage driver had told her uncle that Tucson was home to about eight hundred people, and more than half of them were Mexicans. But this territory was part of the United States now, so more and more Americans were moving in. She wondered if every single American in Tucson had turned out for this performance.
“I’ll go out and introduce you again,” Uncle Silas said. “Then you’d better come out.”
His menacing voice made Carmela shudder. She supposed she would have to do it. He had said they would earn some money tonight and that it was a way for her to repay him for coming all the way from Massachusetts to fetch her.
The army captain and his wife who had housed her for nearly two months at Fort Yuma after her parents died were complete strangers, and yet they had been kinder than Uncle Silas when he arrived to take her home.
He strode out before the crowd that had jammed into the biggest saloon in Tucson—the largest space they had available indoors.
“Ladies and gents,” he said, holding up a hand. The assembly quieted. “I think you will understand my niece’s reticence. It is only a few weeks since she was rescued from her ordeal among the savages, and she has not met a crowd this large or been expected to tell her story to half so many people.” He always said that, although it was a lie. Carmela’s parents had died nearly three years ago.
“I ask you to hold your applause and remain quiet,” Uncle Silas went on, “not only so that you can hear her soft voice but so that you don’t frighten her. Remember, she is not used to loud noise. After what she went through, yelling and clapping might sound to her like an approaching battle. I have assured her you mean her no harm, so please give her your attention but restrain your enthusiasm. Without further ado, Miss Carmela Wade.”
She pulled in a deep breath and stepped into the doorway. A smattering of controlled applause greeted her. She walked slowly across to stand beside Uncle Silas. The room grew very quiet. She could hear their breathing. A hundred or more eager faces gazed at her, hungrily taking in every detail of her simple dress, leather leggings, and braided hair, but especially the ugly black and blue designs on her face. She could see pity in their eyes. A few women’s faces convulsed as though the sight of her revolted them.
Uncle Silas put his hand on her back and pressed against the layers of her clothing.
“H–hello,” she said.
A great sigh went up from the audience.
“Go on, my dear,” Uncle Silas murmured.
She shot him a quick glance. My dear? She didn’t think he considered her dear, unless it was for the money he hoped she would earn tonight.
He nodded and smiled encouragingly. She looked away, toward the woman in the daring yellow dress. Her black-rimmed blue eyes surveyed Carmela eagerly.
“I …” Carmela choked in another breath, trying to remember the new, more elaborate script he had given her to memorize. “I was with my parents, going across … to California. We had been with some others, but they went off on a different road. My father said we could make it the rest of the way ourselves. We were nearly there … he said. I don’t know how far we had to go.”
The people had relaxed on the benches and chairs, as though settling in for a good tale. She hoped she could remember it all. At the same time, she wanted to scrub it from her mind and run out the back way.
Lies, all of it.
Carmela didn’t think she would mind speaking to crowds so much if what she said to them were true. She hated being the center of attention, with the bright lanterns shining in her eyes and the people staring at her, then opening her mouth to lie.
The people smelled. The fumes of liquor assaulted her, and the whole place reeked of sweat. This rough border town was full of men—rugged, rude, and in some cases half-drunk. She spotted another woman, brightly dressed, with raven hair and dark eyes. Her gown was of shiny red material, with black lace at the throat and wrists. She was wedged in between two men, and both of them were staring at her.
The pressure from Uncle Silas’s hand on her back increased. He was poking his fingertips into her spine.
Carmela opened her mouth and continued the story, all of it false, about her family’s trek across the desert, being separated from their traveling companions, and being ambushed at night by a pack of howling savages. As long as she kept speaking, Uncle Silas left her alone.
Her chest hurt with each breath, but once she got into the next part, about life in the Indian tribe, it was easier. She pretended she was telling a story and that no one really believed it was true. She told about th
e plants she had helped gather for food and how the woman in whose tent she slept gave her only small portions to eat and whipped her if she did not work fast enough. She hated accusing someone of evil they didn’t actually do—but the Indian woman wasn’t real, so perhaps it wasn’t too vile of her.
“One day a small group of soldiers came to the village.” The audience was silent, waiting for her next words. She tried to remember the story she had memorized. She didn’t like this part. “As always when strangers came to the camp, the savages hid me. But it was too late. One of the soldiers had seen me.”
The crowd listened eagerly as she recounted the tale of her rescue. Her voice choked as she told of her joy at being returned, tempered by the sorrow of knowing her parents had been murdered by the vicious Indians. Her face felt hot, and she wanted to bathe it in cool water. And she wished she could scrub off the horrid ink markings Uncle Silas had so painstakingly drawn on her chin and jaw. At first she hadn’t believed they would get away with this, or why Uncle Silas would want to. But it had been more than two years since he arranged her first speaking engagement, and she knew he wouldn’t let her stop now that her speeches were a paying enterprise.
When she finished her recital and said, “Thank you,” tears streamed down her cheeks. The people applauded enthusiastically. Some of the women, and a few of the brawny men, wiped their eyes. Her uncle came to stand by her and held up both hands. The room seemed to shrink and press in on her.
“Thank you, kind people,” Uncle Silas said. “I’ve heard my niece tell the story of her ordeal many times, but it still moves me.”
He allowed questions for about fifteen minutes, and Carmela had to respond to them. This part frightened her, because she had no idea what they would ask. For the most part, people wanted more details about the ambush and her time in captivity. She tried to make it sound as realistic as she could, but she had to invent some details about the work the imaginary Indians had forced her to do and the living arrangements she supposedly had with a Mojave family.
“What did you use to tan the deerskins?” one man called out.
“I—I don’t know.” She glanced at Uncle Silas.
“Most likely it was brains,” he said. “Isn’t that what the savages usually do?”
Brains? Really? Whose brains? Carmela thought she would be sick. Uncle Silas would probably make her learn all the details about that next.
“Did the redskins hurt you bad?” the woman in yellow asked.
Uncle Silas said firmly, “My niece suffered wounds as well as many indignities and humiliations. We ask that you not press her too closely for details. There are things she needs to forget.”
Carmela knew her cheeks were flaming.
Finally it was over. She turned and walked quickly out the back door of the saloon. Her uncle had told her to stay with him through the final applause, but she couldn’t stand to be in there another minute.
The cool night air helped some, but her lungs still felt squeezed. She flopped down on the wooden steps in the shadow of the building and sobbed. How could Uncle Silas say such things about her and make her say them, too? It wasn’t true, any of it, but she couldn’t deny it. If she didn’t say her piece word-perfect and reply to the people’s questions with the answers he had formulated, she would pay dearly for it later.
Her tears came faster, and she put her head down, burying her face in her skirt, and wept.
Hesitant footsteps jerked her upright.
“Are you all right, miss?”
He was a boy, not much older than she was, standing in the alley between the saloon and the mercantile next door. His pale hair gleamed in the moonlight, almost white, and curly.
She sniffed and wiped her face with her sleeve. “Yes, thank you.”
“Are you sure?” He stepped closer. “You’re her, aren’t you?”
“Wh–what?”
“You’re that girl that the Indians stole. I saw the handbills, but my brother wouldn’t give me a dime to go and listen to you.”
Fresh tears bathed Carmela’s face. “I’m glad he didn’t.”
“Why? Don’t you want people to come to the show?”
She shook her head vehemently. “I wish there wasn’t any show.”
“Do you not like speaking to people?”
“It’s awful.”
“Why did you do it, then?”
“I have to,” Carmela blurted, before she thought of the consequences.
The boy frowned and peered closely at her. “Here.” He thrust a crumpled handkerchief into her hand.
She hauled in a ragged breath. “Thanks.”
“My name’s Will.”
She wiped her face and looked up at him. “I’m Carmela.”
“Can I help you somehow?”
She shook her head. “No one can help.”
“Why not?”
Carmela looked over her shoulder at the closed door behind her. She was forbidden to speak to anyone about her circumstances, but she would explode if something didn’t change. Uncle Silas had told her that he was now her legal guardian. Unless a miracle happened, she would have to answer to him until she was twenty-one—another seven years.
“My parents are dead, and my uncle—he’s in charge of me. I have to do what he says.”
“Even if you don’t want to?”
She sobbed and clutched the handkerchief to her mouth. She gave a quick nod.
Will stood before her, shifting from one foot to another. “Look, I’m going to get my brother. Wait here. He can do something.”
“No, don’t do that. He couldn’t possibly—”
“He’s a deputy marshal.”
Carmela stared at him. Could a deputy marshal get her out of this mess? She doubted it. Uncle Silas avoided lawmen whenever possible. She had a vague idea that what she and her uncle were doing was illegal. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“You wait.”
Will turned and ran up the alley then dashed around the corner of the building. As he ran, the door behind Carmela opened. She knew without looking that Uncle Silas stood in the doorway. She could smell his hair pomade and feel his displeasure.
“There you are. Come on. We have to get our things. We have a stagecoach to catch. We’ll do this again in the next sizable town.”
Carmela’s heart sank. He had made her tell the story in every town they stopped at on this never-ending journey. The white-haired boy and his brother could do nothing.
Freeland McKay ducked as the drunken man swung at him. He let the cowboy windmill around and gave him a push toward the saloon door. The man sprawled over one of the poker tables. The four men who had been sitting around it grabbed their drinks and stood hastily, moving toward a corner of the room.
As Freeland stepped over and cuffed the drunk’s hands behind his back, the man moaned and began to struggle.
“Take it easy, Burle,” Freeland said. “I’ve got a nice quiet place for you to take a nap. Let’s go.” He hauled the man to his feet and marched him toward the swinging doors.
“Thanks, Deputy,” the bartender called.
“Anytime.”
The prisoner stumbled as he lurched onto the sidewalk outside, and Freeland grabbed his arm to steady him. “This way.”
“Free! I need you.”
He turned toward the voice. His kid brother, Will, charged across the street and bounded onto the boardwalk. “Come quick!”
“What is it?” Freeland held firmly to the prisoner’s forearm.
“The girl at the Green Bottle—the one who spoke tonight. She’s crying.” Will gulped in a quick breath.
“Crying? What about?”
“I’m not sure, but she said her uncle makes her do stuff she doesn’t like.”
Freeland frowned at him. “What kind of stuff?”
“Make speeches, mostly. At least I think so.”
“Did he strike her?”
“I don’t know. Don’t think so. But I told her you could help
.”
“You want me to go talk to a girl who’s crying? And nobody’s hurt or anything?”
“Well …” The boy eyed him anxiously in the lamplight spilling from the saloon door behind Freeland. “She was awful upset.”
“Was anyone else upset?”
“I didn’t see anyone else.”
“Hey, take these things off me,” the prisoner yelled, jerking away from Freeland.
“Burle, take it easy,” Freeland said.
Instead, the hefty man lurched down the sidewalk and fell flat on his face. A string of profanity issued from his mouth.
“Will, I need to get this man over to the jail,” Freeland said. “Once I’ve got him locked up, maybe I can go with you and see what this business is all about.”
“But she might be gone. He’ll make her go inside. Please, you have to come now.”
Freeland stopped and glared at his brother. “I can’t. This is serious business. You run ahead and open the jail door.”
Will opened his mouth as if to argue but then turned and raced down the boardwalk. Burle had risen and lumbered down into the street, and Freeland went after him.
“Come on, fella. This way.”
Ten minutes later, the drunk was sleeping on the cot in the jail’s one cell, with the handcuffs removed and the door securely locked. Will waited impatiently near Freeland’s desk.
“All right,” Freeland said. “Show me where you found this girl.”
Will raced ahead and across the street, dodging around the people streaming from la Botella Verde. Freeland quickened his pace and followed him around to the back of the building. Will had pulled up short at the rear entrance.
“She was right here,” he panted. “She was sitting on the steps, crying her eyes out.”
No weeping girl sat there now. Freeland sighed and tried the back door, but it was locked. He knocked briskly, and a moment later the door opened.
“Oh hi, Marshal,” said Stanley Dittmer, who had booked the performance and hoped to build a theater in town soon. He was dressed in his best clothes, as though the saloon were a fine concert hall. “Can I help you?”
“Where’s the girl who spoke tonight?”
“She and her uncle left ten minutes ago. They were going on toward California tonight.”
My Heart Belongs in the Superstition Mountains Page 1
