The Heart's Charge

by Karen Witemeyer

  “’Cause I didn’t want him to hear what I have to say.” Rawley met Katherine’s gaze, his expression a mix of cynicism and worry that put her immediately on edge. “He’s a nice fella, and I don’t want him to feel guilty.”

  “Because you think the teacher’s involved?”

  “Didn’t ’til I heard Mr. Lopez talkin’. If Miz Gordon was so all-fired worried about us missin’ school, how come she’s never once invited me to her class? I seen her around town. Lots. Yet she’s never tried to wrangle me or any o’ my boys into goin’ to school. Never so much as talked to us. She’s been feeding Mr. Lopez a bunch of bunk.”

  Katherine’s knees wobbled at the confirmation of her suspicions. Lord, give me strength. This was no time for weakness. Children’s lives were at stake. “Are you certain Miss Gordon saw you?” She made herself ask the question even though she knew she was grasping at straws. “You are exceptionally good at avoiding being seen.”

  He gave her a look that insisted she cease insulting his intelligence. “I know boys in her class. I hang around the schoolhouse sometimes when they’re about to be let out. I been as close to her as you are to me right now, and she never said a word. But her lyin’ to Mr. Lopez ain’t what’s got me worried.”

  Katherine bit the edge of her tongue, dread sinking deeper into her belly. “No? Then what?”

  “I saw her this mornin’, talkin’ to Wallace.”

  Mark?

  “He told her about their search for Miguel Ortega. She tried to convince ’em to wait to do their searchin’ until she could talk to a friend o’ hers, but, o’ course, they didn’t. And after they rode off, she turned all her kids loose. Right in the middle of the day. I went to check it out. Caught up with Billy Fuller, who told me she had some kind of ’mergency. Sent the kids home. Not twenty minutes later, I spotted her on a horse, ridin’ out o’ town like a swarm of angry hornets was chasin’ her.” His dark-eyed gaze bored into Katherine. “She rode west.”

  The same direction Mark and Jonah had taken. If Althea was involved with the kidnappers and left to warn them, the Horsemen could have ridden straight into a trap.

  Katherine snatched Alice’s hand. “We’ve got to get back to Harmony House.”

  The girl’s eyes flew wide. Without a word, she turned her head, spit out her candy, and nodded.

  “I’ll come with ya,” Rawley said. “Help keep an eye on the place while your menfolk are away.”

  The way he said it made it sound like the men wouldn’t be coming back soon. The thought spurred Katherine into a run. Ignoring the stares her unladylike haste garnered from passersby, she raced for home, restraining her speed only enough to avoid outpacing the girl at her side.

  They had just reached the outskirts of town when a brown blur shot by them.

  All three skidded to a halt.

  “Was that . . . ?” Alice’s voice trembled as her breath huffed.

  “Mr. Jonah’s horse.” Rawley sounded shaken. Something Katherine had yet to hear from the street-toughened boy.

  But then, the sight had shaken her too. To her core. Because the saddle had been empty. A regular mount without a rider spelled trouble. But a Horseman’s mount? No minor mishap could unseat one of the famed Hanger’s Horsemen. Only true disaster could separate a cavalry officer from his horse.

  Rawley started to take off after Augustus, but Katherine shouted at him to wait.

  She frantically dug in her reticule until she found the small tablet and pencil she kept among her spare hairpins, money purse, and door key.

  “I need you to send a message to Matthew Hanger, Gringolet Farms, San Antonio,” she said as she hunkered down and scribbled the direction at the top of the small page while bracing the tablet against her knee. She paused after getting the direction down and yanked her bag from her wrist. She tossed it at Alice’s feet. “Get a dollar from my purse. Give it to Rawley.” Not bothering to look up to make sure her instructions were being carried out, she resumed her scribbling.

  Mark and Jonah in trouble.

  Come at once.

  Harmony House. Kingsland, TX.

  She tore the page from the tablet and thrust it at Rawley. “There’s a telegraph station at the depot. Have this sent immediately. If the telegraph operator doesn’t take you seriously, get Mr. Lopez to help.”

  The boy’s eyes glittered with determination. “I’ll get it sent, Miss Katherine. They won’t put me off.”

  “Thank you.” Impulsively, she grabbed Rawley by the shoulders and pressed a kiss to his forehead. “I know I can count on you.”

  The shock on the Negro boy’s face would have been comical had this been any other situation. As it was, she was glad to see the bewilderment quickly vanish beneath the hardened veneer he usually wore.

  After stuffing the money Alice handed him into his trouser pocket, Rawley offered a sharp salute, then sprinted back into the depths of town.

  Lifting silent prayers heavenward for Mark and Jonah, Katherine took up Alice’s hand again and ran for home.

  CHAPTER

  THIRTY-THREE

  With Priscilla on her lap, Quill wedged beside her on the parlor sofa, and Ted quietly building alphabet block walls at her feet, Eliza turned the page in Russell H. Conwell’s Bible Stories for Children and continued reading about a shepherd boy who became a giant killer.

  “David’s faith in God was so great,” she told the children, “that even when the king told him he was too young to help, he didn’t give up. He might not have had any experience fighting giant warriors, but he had fought lions and bears to protect his father’s sheep. He told the king, ‘The Lord that delivered me out of the paw of the lion, and out of the paw of the bear, he will deliver me out of the hand of this Philistine.’ All the fighting men of Israel were too afraid to face Goliath, but not David. He trusted God to help him.” She tapped Pris on the nose and squeezed Quill’s shoulders with the arm she’d wrapped around him earlier. “God will help you too, if you believe in him.”

  She glanced up from the book to make eye contact with Ted as well, but something other than the story had captured his attention. He launched off the carpet like a frog eager to try out a new lily pad. In his hurry to rush to the window, his foot collided with his carefully constructed wall. Blocks tumbled, but their builder paid them no mind.

  “Come back to the rug, Ted,” Eliza gently chided.

  “But a horse just ran into our yard, Miss Eliza. A big one!” He plastered his nose and palms to the glass. “It looks like Mr. Jonah’s horse, but there ain’t nobody ridin’ him.”

  Eliza dropped the book. Her throat constricted. “What?”

  Ted had to be mistaken. She’d never met a man more confident in the saddle than Jonah Brooks. Whatever horse was out there, it couldn’t be Augustus.

  Heart quaking in her chest, she unhooked her arm from around Quill’s shoulders, scooted Pris and the book onto the sofa cushion, then hurried to the window. She shoved the curtain aside and peered into the yard.

  A giant chestnut horse reared, his front hooves pawing the air. A demanding whinny carried through the window glass and turned Eliza’s blood to ice.

  Augustus. It couldn’t be.

  Yet it was.

  She dropped the curtain and ran for the front door. “Ruby! Abner!” she called, pausing at the foot of the stairs. “Something’s happened. Come watch the little ones.”

  Her skirt billowed around her legs as she spun back toward the front door. Ted beat her there, his tiny hand already reaching for the handle. Eliza jumped forward and pulled him away from the door. “No, honey. You need to stay inside.”

  Who knew what horrible danger was afoot? Anything strong enough to tear Jonah out of the saddle boded ill for the rest of them. Even so, she had to go outside. See the horse. Figure out how to help the man who had crawled under her skin and into her heart.

  The pounding of child-sized feet on the stairs announced Abner’s arrival. “I’ve got him, Miss Eliza.”

&
nbsp; Taking the boy at his word, Eliza hurried out the door and slammed it closed behind her. Augustus’s head snapped up at the sound. He snorted, tossed his mane, and charged toward the house as if he planned to race right up onto the porch.

  Eliza lunged backward against the door, biting back a scream.

  The giant warhorse did not charge onto the porch, of course. He simply eyed her from the base of the steps, pawing the dirt impatiently.

  Get ahold of yourself, Eliza. It’s just a horse. A well-trained one, at that. He won’t trample you.

  The logical arguments peeled her spine from the door and even convinced her feet to carry her to the edge of the porch. They couldn’t quite get her down the steps, however. She clung to the balustrade, her breathing rapid and shallow.

  The horse was too big. Too strong. Too . . . unpredictable. At least from the porch, she had the height advantage. And the protection of the railing. Down on the ground, she’d have neither.

  The illustration from the Bible storybook she’d been reading to the children flashed in her mind. A boy facing a giant. A boy wearing no armor except his faith. A boy who refused to let fear keep him from doing what needed to be done. The Lord had granted that boy victory.

  “God will help you too, if you believe in him.”

  The words she’d just spoken in the parlor thrust themselves into her mind in blatant challenge. Did she believe?

  “For God hath not given us the spirit of fear,” Eliza murmured, jutting her chin and releasing her grip on the balustrade, “but of power.”

  A spirit of power. She repeated the phrase in her mind with each descending step that made her smaller and the horse larger.

  A spirit of power. Coming alongside the shuddering beast, she lifted a trembling hand and placed her palm flat against Augustus’s shoulder.

  He didn’t jerk from her touch. Didn’t rear up in defiance. Just stood still. Waiting.

  Eliza ran her hand along the saddle, over the stirrups, the saddlebags, searching for some clue to explain what had happened to Jonah. Unfortunately, the only clue was the horse itself.

  As if sensing her reticence, Augustus curled his neck around and nudged her firmly with his nose. Eliza hopped back, a whimper catching in her throat.

  A spirit of power.

  Augustus followed her, stepping sideways until the empty left stirrup brushed her belly. He craned his head around again, his deep, dark eyes boring into hers. Quit being a sissy and mount, they seemed to say. I’ll take you to him.

  Lord, have mercy. She was going to have to ride this giant. If there was even the slightest chance Augustus could lead her to Jonah, she had to try.

  “Abner?” she called without looking away from the saddle looming large in front of her face.

  The parlor window scraped open behind her, confirming her assumption of having an avid audience.

  “Yes, Miss Eliza?”

  “You’re in charge until Miss Katherine gets back from town. Keep everyone inside and lock the doors.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” The window slid shut.

  Eliza took a deep breath, then reached for the saddle horn. “You’re going to have to help me, Auggie.”

  The horse snorted, probably in offense at the child’s nickname she’d given him, but Auggie sounded far less fearsome than Augustus, Roman war commander and emperor.

  “Don’t give me any sass,” she said, pretending a courage she did not feel.

  She eyed the stirrup. Raised her foot. Nope. Too high. She needed a mounting block—which, of course, she didn’t have. Botheration. The front steps would have to do.

  “This way,” she urged, tugging on the saddle horn as if she were actually strong enough to move the beast. Surprisingly, though, he complied, pivoting until his left side stood flush with the stairs. “Good boy.”

  She needed about three steps’ worth of height but could only manage two without backing too far away from the horse.

  “Steady, Auggie.”

  Hiking up her skirt and petticoats, she raised her left foot and, after a pair of unsuccessful attempts, managed to find the stirrup. Hopping on her right leg, she made a grab for the saddle and hoisted herself up and over. The most graceless mount of all time, but she was on.

  The ground seemed impossibly far away. Dizziness assailed her, but she set her jaw and focused on Auggie’s head. Get settled and get Jonah. With an awkward wiggle to adjust her seat, Eliza found the second stirrup, then took up the reins that had tangled in Auggie’s mane.

  David had a sling. She had a saddle horn. And she planned to hold on to it for all she was worth.

  “All right, Auggie. Easy now.” She clicked her tongue and tugged the reins to the right with one hand while clinging to the horn with the other.

  The moment the horse’s head faced the road, however, something shifted in him. She could feel it. Tension. Energy. Purpose.

  “Lord, please don’t let me fallllll. . . .”

  As if her prayer had been a starting gun, Augustus charged forward at the sound of her voice. Eliza’s body was thrown backward from the surge. Releasing the reins, she grabbed the saddle horn with both hands and fought to regain her balance. The horse’s raw power utterly terrified her. But, miraculously, she kept her seat.

  As Augustus churned up the road beneath her, Eliza caught a distant call—Katherine, shouting her name. Eliza made no effort to investigate, however. Staying in the saddle required every iota of concentration she possessed.

  Jonah’s eyes snapped open. Horse hooves pounded the earth, growing louder, nearer. Someone was coming. After sending Augustus home, he’d managed to drag himself off the main path and into a cluster of juniper shrubs. Taking hold of the leafy limbs he’d hacked off with his knife, he arranged them as a camouflage shield in front of his face, then drew his revolver and waited.

  Friend or foe?

  He squinted through the brush, his normally keen vision hampered by the throbbing in his head. The horse was dark. Not black, though, so probably not Ortega’s mount. The other snatcher had ridden a dun, too light for the horse cantering down the trail. Could be Augustus. Jonah’s pulse hiccupped slightly at the thought, but he tamped down the unrealistic hope. Augustus was smart, the best horse he’d ever owned, but he was just an animal. Jonah had sent him home so that Eliza or Katherine would spot the riderless mount and notify Bronson. Have the deputy organize a search party. It was too soon for a party to have formed. And that horse was traveling too fast to be carrying searchers.

  Yet the nearer the horse came, the more similarities Jonah spotted. Size, color, stride. Everything matched. Except the rider. Whoever rode the horse sat hunched so far forward that Jonah couldn’t see him past the gelding’s head. Augustus had no patience with inexperienced riders—or any riders, for that matter—so the chances of Gus and the approaching horse being one and the same were slim to none.

  Nevertheless, as the distance shrank, Jonah’s eyes grew wider. Slim odds? Paper was too thick to describe the impossibility of what he was seeing. He dropped the branches shielding his face and blinked a few times to make sure he wasn’t hallucinating.

  Eliza Southerland, a woman terrified of the smallest ponies, was riding his seventeen-hand cavalry mount.

  So stunned was he by the sight of her face bobbing up and down amidst Augustus’s flying mane that he forgot to signal his position until woman and horse shot past his hiding place.

  He whistled, then holstered his gun and crawled out from his juniper bunker, determined to stand on his own two feet before facing Eliza.

  Augustus whinnied at Jonah’s call and turned abruptly, catching his inexperienced rider unprepared. A muffled shriek, a flash of flying petticoats, and Eliza disappeared from view.

  Manly pride forgotten, Jonah scrambled forward on hands and knees. “Eliza!”

  Please, God. If she’d hit her head or twisted a leg in the fall . . .

  Heart pounding, Jonah shooed Augustus out of the way and lurched past the horse’s hooves to
reach the woman lying in a heap on the side of the path.

  “Eliza!”

  If she’d been wounded trying to help him . . . A dagger twisted in his chest, hurting more than all his injuries combined.

  He’d just reached her feet when she gasped violently.

  “Eliza!”

  She struggled to sit up. “All . . . right. Wind . . . out . . . me.”

  Thank God.

  Jonah crumpled on the ground beside her, the few reserves he’d stored up depleted once again. Eliza rolled onto her side to face him, her breathing regulating as she got her wind back.

  “Oh, Jonah.” Her voice caressed him like soft leather, exquisitely tender but with an underlying strength that made a man feel like he didn’t have to hide his vulnerabilities. “What happened to you?”

  He cocked a wry grin. “Got shot off my horse.”

  “Shot!” Her gaze raked over him until it found the bloodstains on his shoulder.

  “Just a graze. The tumble down the mountain did more damage than the bullet.” His smile faded. “It’s Wallace I’m worried about. I lost track of ’im.”

  “We’ll muster a search party,” Eliza promised. “After we get you home.”

  “I need to show ’em where to look.”

  She shook her head, and her eyes flashed fire. “You can tell them where to look. You’ll only slow them down if you try to go with them.”

  She had a point. Jonah clenched his jaw. He hated being a liability. “Better send for the captain,” he said. “He’ll want to know.”

  “Of course. But first, we have to get you home.”

  Home. Why did that word sound so much better coming from her lips than anyone else’s?

  Eliza hovered over him, sliding her arm through his and reaching around to support his back. “I’ll help you stand.”

  He nodded but didn’t move. Her face was so close. So beautiful. Her eyes radiating concern. Her chin jutting with determination. Jonah reached up and cupped her cheek.