Well Traveled

by Margaret Mills

  Gideon glanced to Jed then said, “If it’s not too much bother, I think we could stand to eat, ma’am. But if you’d rather not have us messing up your kitchen at a time like this, we have cold biscuits and jerky. We’d thank you for the use of your barn, though, and of your well, if it’s not too much trouble.”

  She stared at him, her eyes glittering in the lantern light. “I… the children—”

  “I’ll take ’em out some stew, Ma,” George said, “and help ’em settle in with the horse.”

  She swallowed and looked at her son. “All right then,” she agreed.

  Gideon walked them back to the house, as she’d agreed to let them keep the lantern for the night. The moon wasn’t much past new, a thin crescent that had been fattening up bit by bit each day. Jed rounded up Star, and he was already at the barn, rubbing her down with a handful of hay in the sliver of moonlight when Gideon made his way back. Star had gotten used to Jed, and for all his comments about the horse, Gideon had the sense that Jed had grown fond of her.

  He took over and dug out her curry comb, brushing her down while Jed took the lantern into the barn and used some of the hay to set a stall for her. By the time she was settled, George was coming in with a basket and a second lantern. “Ma sent some bread, too—it’s a little old, but you can dunk it in the stew, and it’s good enough.” He set the basket on the ground to one side and held up the lantern, looking around. “There’s more hay in the loft,” he said, his eyes drawn to the hole in the corner that the fire had caused. “They took most of our cows and the mules,” he said absently. “They stayed here for almost two days after they shot Pa and Uncle Tolen. They ate everything we had in the house, all Ma’s bread except what she had hid away, all our meat and the vegetables she’d been storing up for winter. They slept in Pa’s bed, too, not all at once, but, well….”

  Gideon swallowed as the boy’s voice trailed off, understanding more now than he’d wanted to.

  Behind him, Jed made a noise, a low, hard sound that Gideon had never heard before. He turned and what he saw so surprised him that he took a step back. Jed’s face, normally so calm and still, was drawn back in an expression that Gideon could only call fury, his eyes lit with a rage so deep that they seemed to glow.

  “Jed,” he said, keeping his voice low. “You want something to eat?”

  Jed’s head turned so fast that his hair swished, and George jumped a little. That seemed to get Jed’s attention, and he drew a sharp breath, and Gideon watched him force himself to relax. The light in his eyes, though, was still bright, and he was still looking at Gideon as he asked, “Boy, have you eaten?”

  George shifted and for a second, Gideon wondered if they’d have the same problem they’d had on the porch.

  But after a space, George said, “Yeah, thanks. Ma had me feed the kids while she was out putting Pa to rights.” He said it so matter-of-factly that Gideon’s heart broke.

  Jed set to working off some of his anger by setting up a makeshift table using a couple of sawhorses and a board. He pulled over some hay bales, too, that Gideon thought might serve later as a bed for them. He wasn’t feeling too comfortable about sleeping in the loft, not with the big hole in the corner of the barn and no idea of how much other damage the raiders had done to it.

  “You know any of these men?” Gideon asked as he opened up the basket and set to serving stew for himself and Jed.

  George walked over to the stall, watching Star. “Uncle Tolen told Pa that there was raiders moving around the county—he’d heard tell of ’em when he was in Sutter Creek a few weeks back. We didn’t think much on it, though—didn’t think we had nothing no one would want.” He turned and looked at Gideon, his hands deep in his pockets. “Ma ain’t done nothing but cry since they left. She ain’t been able to leave the house. I was trying to figure how I was going to get to town and get some help, but I didn’t want to leave Sarah and Lizbeth here alone with Ma.”

  Gideon nodded. “I’ll ride in tomorrow,” he said, taking one of the bowls of stew over to a bale and sitting down. “Jed can stay around, make sure there’s no trouble ’til I get back with someone. There a marshal around these parts?”

  “In Sutter Creek,” George said. He turned his head, looking at Jed who was finally settling down. “Where’d you learn to do that thing you did?” he asked.

  It didn’t seem to Gideon that Jed had noticed the boy, but Jed answered calmly, his anger seemingly gone. “Among my people, it is a sort of game we learn as children. But it can be dangerous if you do not know when to do it.”

  “If I’d been able to do it,” George started, but Jed held up one hand, cutting him off.

  “You would have done nothing but give us another grave to dig,” Jed said with a bluntness that unsettled Gideon. But before he could object, Jed went on, his tone softer. “And your mother would have more to mourn. We will try to get back what we can of your lost cattle. You will need them before winter sets in.”

  George looked back at Star, trying to hide his quivering chin. “That’d be mighty nice of you.”

  Jed set about getting his food and didn’t answer, not that Gideon had expected him to. George stood staring at Star, and after a while, when Gideon’s hunger had cooled, he called out, “Star? Say howdy.”

  Star’s head came up, and she looked over the stall door at him, then stretched her neck out and bumped her muzzle against George’s head. George gasped and out of the corner of his eye, Gideon saw Jed shake his head. But a soft smile touched Jed’s face for a few seconds, and Gideon appreciated it.

  He had Star do a couple of her easy tricks—pawing the floor to do her counting, holding out her front leg to shake George’s hand, then dropping to her front knees in a bow. George’s face lit up in a smile that was the sort a kid should have, and it made Gideon feel better to know he’d brought some joy to the boy.

  He was thinking about bringing Star out of her stall and showing off some of her more elaborate poses, when Mrs. Hennessey called from the house. There was enough fear in her voice that Gideon stepped out of the barn, catching up one of the lanterns as he did. “He’s all right, Mrs. Hennessey!” he called. “I’ll walk him up to the house.”

  She had the rifle at her side when they arrived, but it wasn’t pointed at him, and even in the faint light, he could see the lines of stress and worry on her face.

  When he got back to the barn, Jed had drawn them a bucket of water, and he was cleaning up. Gideon knew his friend would find the stream tomorrow and get what he considered a proper bath, but for tonight, just getting the dirt and sweat off was enough.

  They slept close but not together. There was no conversation about it—hell, there was no talk at all. Jed made up a bed from loose hay and Gideon did the same, both of them exhausted from the toll of the day.

  Gideon went to sleep fast and hard, but he woke before dawn to a cold, dark barn and no Indian friend. It took him a few seconds to remember where he was and what was happening, a few more seconds to consider whether he was annoyed that Jed was up already, then longer still to decide that he had to piss more than sleep. It was too cold to try to make it to the outhouse, which was on the far side of the house, so he walked out to the edge of the fence line, shivering so bad that he almost didn’t manage to get started. He was halfway through, too far gone to be able to stop, when he realized that someone was watching him.

  “Mornin’,” he said, turning his hips a little further away.

  “Mornin’,” the voice said—not Jed’s, and Gideon jerked so hard he almost splattered his boots.

  After he swallowed back a couple of real good curses, he turned his head to glare through the dark at George. “You don’t sneak up on a man when he’s in the middle of this! What are you doing up, George?” he asked as he shook it off, tucked himself away, and buttoned up. “It’s too damned cold and dark to be starting the day yet.”

  George was standing between him and the meadow, outlined by the faint remnants of stars, and Gideon cou
ld just barely make out the boy’s shoulder as it rose in a shrug. “Couldn’t sleep,” he said, sounding old and tired.

  Gideon sighed. “How old are you, anyway?”

  “Eleven.”

  Damn. He’d been helping the show when he was that age, already skilled with horses and at taking down and putting up the equipment they used—rope stalls and steel poles, tents for some of the side shows. “Your ma all right?”

  “Yeah,” George said sadly, then added, “I think, anyway. She was crying in her sleep, some—we all been sleepin’ in the bed with her, to help her not feel so lonely….” His voice trailed off, and he swallowed, loud enough for Gideon to hear.

  “You’re a good boy, George,” Gideon said, meaning it.

  “Where’s your Injun friend?”

  Gideon frowned in the dark. “You been spyin’, kid?” he demanded, as annoyed as he was afraid of the idea. If they’d been curled up together… if they’d been curled up together, George would’ve thought they were keeping each other warm.

  “No!” George answered, rancor in his voice. “It’s our barn! I just—” He stopped. “I wanted to know if y’all were still here, or if you’d taken off. Didn’t see him or you, but when I saw your horse I knew you couldn’t’ve gone far.” The admiration in George’s voice was familiar to Gideon, so he just nodded and reached a careful hand to George’s shoulder, using it to steer him back toward the hole in the barn wall.

  “Let’s get her fed, then, and find Jed.” With the lantern lit it was easier to know just how gone Jed was: his blanket was rolled up and set beside his pack, and his coat, rifle, and spare ammunition were gone. “Looks like he’s out to scare up some food for us,” Gideon said, but the knot of worry in his gut didn’t agree with him. Not at all. “When did them bad men leave, George?” he asked.

  “Few hours before you and Jed came in,” George said, and his voice was tight in his throat. “You think they got your friend?”

  “Nah,” Gideon said, forcing more certainty into his voice than he felt. “Jed’s real smart in the wild.” When George shot him a worried look, he amended, “I guess I worried a little that they’d run across him out there, but there’s no call for it. I’ve seen Jed sneak up on a flock of wild turkeys, get himself within ten feet of ’em before he even raised his rifle to shoot one. Ain’t no way a group of men riding loud is going to surprise him.”

  George chewed on his fat bottom lip for a second before he nodded, clearly wanting to believe, so Gideon clapped his hands together and put on the best performance he ever had, for an audience of one. “So it looks like we’ve got some work to do! First thing, if you’ve got any grain around here, I’d surely like to ask for some for Star. We’ve been moving fast, and she’s lost some weight.” She had, and Gideon had hated to see it. She needed to get fed up, and it wasn’t like these folks had anything left to save feed for.

  “We did,” George said, trotting up toward the barn’s front corner, where big wooden boxes with hinged lids were built in against the wall. He opened the first and pitched half-over into it, his feet kicking up in the air and the seat of his britches sticking up over the edge. “Still some here!” he called, his voice muffled from inside the box, and Gideon snickered in spite of himself. Kids. It reminded him of his own younger sisters, who weren’t much older than George and were just as full of fun. George wriggled up with a scoop full and fished a turned-over bucket from the corner, emptying the scoop into it and diving back in for another. “I fed the mules and milked the cows with my daddy,” he said. “I c’n take good care of your horse, Mister Makepeace.”

  “Thanks, George. And call me Gideon.”

  George nodded and trotted down the barn hall toward Star’s stall. Gideon followed him, sure that Star wouldn’t jump but wanting to watch over her, just in case the kid was boasting. But George slowed as he neared the stall, and called out quietly before he slid over a hay bale and let himself inside. Gideon leaned over the rail and watched. George had some time around animals, enough that he didn’t turn his back on a horse he didn’t know, and he raised a hand to shove her head away when she tried to push her muzzle into the pail. He emptied the oats into the trough and trotted back out to fetch up flakes of scattered hay, climbing up the stall’s boards this time to just dump it over.

  Gideon chuckled when most of it flitted down onto Star’s head, but she’d get to it. “We’ll get her watered after, and see if we can’t set the corral to rights.”

  “Nothing to keep in anymore,” George said forlornly.

  “You never know, kid,” Gideon replied, trying to be cheerful. “We might scare up your stock yet.”

  Outside a rooster crowed, and Gideon blinked. “Sounds like they didn’t take everything,” he said. “Let’s go see what we can find.”

  George escorted him up to the house, where lamps burned and a fire was already started in the hearth. The morning chill didn’t merit the blaze that burned, but a look at Mrs. Hennessey told him she’d be cold inside for a while, yet.

  “Mister Makepeace,” she said from the floor. She was on her knees, mopping up something that had spilled on the wood, and a quick glance told Gideon she’d been working for a while: staples, what was left of them, sat in bags and tins, piled on the kitchen work counter, and the place had the smell of lye to it. It seemed she was determined to scrub the stench of destruction out of her home, and Gideon thought maybe that was a good sign. At the very least, it looked like the worst of the shock had worn off her, and she was making good use of her nervous energy, putting her home back in order.

  “Ma’am. George and me heard a rooster crow, reckon it’s yours?”

  “Nobody else for two miles,” she said faintly. “It must be.”

  “If you’ve got any corn around, I expect we can coax it back. Maybe gather up them that was killed and dress them out?”

  “Yes, I… yes.” She blinked still-puffy eyes and rose stiffly to her feet. Gideon felt the rage tighten his skin, thinking on what made her so stiff and sore. The bruises looked worse this morning, but he didn’t know if that was just the shadows from the fire or that they’d been that new. If he and Jed had moved any faster, maybe they’d have chased off the raiders before they could go and do all the damage they’d done. Or, as Jed had said, maybe there’d just be more bodies to bury.

  He didn’t waste time on might-have-beens. “Jed’s gone,” he said gently. “I reckon he went hunting, trying to scare up a bit more food for you and your kids. If you’ve got corn….”

  “George,” she said firmly, “go out to the coop and see what those demons left behind. Whatever’s dead but eatable, gather it up and pluck it, you know how to do that.”

  “Yes’m,” George said, but he hesitated, shooting a nervous look Gideon’s way. Gideon just nodded to him, thinking maybe he wanted a man to do the telling, but George frowned and planted his feet more firmly. “I’ll wait for Mister Makepeace,” he said, and Gideon realized that George didn’t want a strange man around his ma right now.

  The thought tightened his throat, and he squatted down so he’d be on George’s eye level. “Ain’t nothing gonna happen to your ma if I can stop it, George,” he said soberly. “Just like, if you could’ve stopped it, you would’ve.”

  George’s eyes, so like his mother’s, filled with tears for the first time since Gideon had met the boy. “But I couldn’t stop ’em!” The tears overflowed, spilling down his cheeks. “They said they’d kill Sarah and Lizbeth, and me, too, if I—”

  Mrs. Hennessey ran to her son and dropped beside him, gathering him up close. “You did just the right thing,” she said, with all the stress and strain and love a mother had to offer. “You stayed alive for me, and you kept the youngsters alive. Boy, if you hadn’t done that, I’m sure I’d have taken that gun of your uncle’s and followed you, you hear?”

  They held each other tightly, and Gideon thought about the sons of bitches who’d come through this place and left ruin in their wake. If he ever caught u
p to them, he thought he could kill them. He’d never killed a man before, but he’d never had such a good reason to before, either.

  “Mrs. Hennessey?” he asked, then asked again, until her head swung around toward him. “Your young’uns usually do the feeding, right?”

  She nodded, tears streaming down her face, still holding her eldest tightly.

  “You mind if I let ’em show me how it goes? Let you and George here have a little time to get things settled?”

  “That’s—that—” she closed her eyes and swallowed. “Sarah, Lizbeth,” she called. The two had been blubbering by the work table, holding on to each other, but they both nodded behind her back. “You go with Mister Makepeace, show him how you can feed the chickens by yourselves. George and I’ll be out in a minute.”

  “But the chickens are all….” Sarah started, pulling her thumb out of her mouth to do so.

  “There’s likely a few left in the trees,” Gideon said, “or the cock wouldn’t’ve crowed.” He knew next to nothing about what a rooster would or wouldn’t do, but he wanted mother and son to have a moment’s peace. “Let’s go see if we can tempt them home where they belong.”

  He herded them out the back door, watching them toddle down the stairs and thinking again of his twin baby sisters, and wondered where they’d been stuck while those men had been here at the house. Seemed like George was more of a man than he realized yet, if he’d helped to keep his little sisters alive.

  He kept up a cheery monologue while they fished corn out of a bin and scattered it around on the ground, making clucking calls, and it seemed like only a few seconds before a banty rooster and four hens came flapping in from the nearby trees to peck at the ground. “There, y’see?” Gideon said, more pleased by the scene than he ought to be. “There’s four hens to be laying eggs for you and a rooster to cook if you need.”

  The kids just nodded before they turned to start picking up what mess they could. They sealed the corn bin and tugged on the coop’s wire fencing, and Gideon let them until he heard the door slam back at the house and saw Mrs. Hennessey with her son, standing on the porch.