Like a River Glorious (13 page)

My limbs buzz, and the sky feels wide open, like it's beckoning for me to spread my arms and fly right up to that glowing moon.

“Can you sleep on horseback?” Dilley asks.

“Huh? Horse. Of course. Of course I can sleep on a horse.” I giggle.

Dilley scowls. “All right, men, get some of this juice into those two. Then we'll mount up and get out of here. We're still too close to their mining camp.”

“Where we going, Frank?” I ask, and it's the last thing I say before falling to my knees while a hole of blackest night sucks away the moon.

I
wake to the swaying jolt of Peony's steps. I'm bent over her neck, hands tied behind my back. My shoulders ache from the strain, like they're being pulled from their sockets. Rope digs into my thighs. I'm tied to my saddle.

Confused, I blink against the too-bright daylight. I don't have a saddle. I lost it in the fire.

Just in front of Peony and me is a large roan rump, muscles working with each step, tail flicking back and forth. The rider—dark and cloaked, maybe the ghostly man from last night—rides bareback. It must be his saddle we've borrowed.

My throat aches with the need for cool, clear water. I've lost my hat somehow, and even though the air is chilly, the sun beats down on my back and neck. Straining against the ropes, I twist as best I can, trying to spot Jefferson and Tom. There. Sorry plods along two horses back, and Jefferson is slumped over her withers. When he shifts in his seat, it feels like my heart starts beating again.

Apollo walks behind Sorry, with Tom in a similar state—bound, listless, barely awake.

Those slimy snakes drugged all three of us. I don't know much about laudanum, but I remember giving the Major a fair bit, right before we cut off his leg. He was conscious again after only a few hours, and I didn't swallow that much more than he did. Of course, I'm a slip of a girl compared to him, so maybe the laudanum would have a greater effect on me.

Even so, we can't have been traveling more than a day. We're still near enough to our camp that if we escaped, we might be able to navigate our way home.

I wriggle against my bonds to test them and instantly regret it. My skin is already raw, the rope digging a line of bright pain into my wrists, and my hands ache with cramps. Disappointment is like a rock in my gut. There'll be no escaping unless I can convince Frank to untie me, and he's already proved immune to my appeals.

Peony nickers, sensing that I'm awake.

“Everything's going to be okay, sweet girl,” I whisper. “I promise.”

“Look who just woke up!” Dilley crows from somewhere off to my right.

The ghostly man reigns in his horse and turns it around. Peony stops short to keep from colliding with it, and I'm jolted forward against the rope.

He clicks to his roan and trots toward me until our horses are neck to neck. His face is still shadowed by his cowl, but I can make out pale lips so full they'd be the envy of any lady if
not for the wicked scar slashing diagonally across them.

“Time for some more juice,” Dilley says, and the ghostly man reaches beneath his cloak and retrieves the bottle. It's already half empty, and the liquid is sickly brown in the sunlight. How much did they force into Jefferson and Tom?

“Please!” I say. “No more. I'll cooperate. I just need some water. . . .”

My pleas fall on deaf ears. The ghostly man unstoppers the bottle, grabs my face with a huge hand, and tips it to my lips.

It goes down a little easier this time, because my traitor tongue and throat don't realize it's not fit to drink, so eager are they for water.

The ghostly man grunts in satisfaction, then continues down the line to tend to Jeff and Tom.

The bright sunlight is suddenly pulsing. The air isn't chilly at all. I was wrong about that. It's as warm and fine as a summer's day.

My limbs go slack. I let myself fall back against Peony's neck. “I love you, Peony.”

I don't know how long we travel. Days, I suspect, because sometimes it's dark when I wake, and I'm on the ground, tied to a tree instead of a horse. I'm always glad to wake into the dark, because it's softer on my aching eyes, which are as dry as a desert.

My belly roils with nausea, and my very bones groan with pain. Dilley feeds us hardtack and coffee, but what I need is
water. One night after we've made camp, I vomit it all up into the dirt.

Dilley's solution is to force more laudanum into me, and it's glorious. I swallow it eagerly, even though I know it will be worse when I wake, even though my tongue is thick and my lips splitting from thirst. It's just like when we crossed the desert into California; if we don't get real water soon, we'll die.

It's morning. I stir long enough to realize the Missouri men are packing up camp. Jefferson and Tom are already tied to their saddles, listing sideways in their drug-induced hazes. I pretend to be asleep still, so the ghostly man won't come chasing after me with another dose so soon.

How much laudanum have I had? Too much, for sure and certain. A girl's head was not meant to feel this god-awful. My bowels cramp like everything inside is as dry as a summer gourd. My muscles ache and my wrists are rope charred and my fingers tingle with numbness.

Quietly, carefully, I take stock of my surroundings. Fewer pines, more oaks. Rolling hills smothered in golden grass. We've come west a ways, well out of the mountains. The river is nowhere to be seen.

We could be anywhere, I realize with a sinking heart. And maybe we've only traveled for a few days, but I haven't been conscious often enough to be sure. Maybe it's been a week. Maybe longer.

The ghostly man approaches. He grabs me by the armpits and yanks me up.

“Wait!” I cry out. “I need water. Jeff and Tom, too.”

He ignores me, dragging me toward Peony, who is already saddled up. An arrow of panic pierces my heart. Have they been taking care of her? Have they watered and fed her properly? Rubbed her down? Checked her hooves? How do they know the new saddle isn't giving her a rub?

“Please!” I try again. “My uncle wants me alive, right?”

He pauses, and I take the opportunity to get my feet under me. My legs are so wobbly that even if I got out of these bonds, I'm not sure I could escape.

“My uncle needs me,” I gasp out, suddenly grateful for this pounding headache because it cuts through the opium haze and helps my mind work. “He needs me alive and hale. If harm comes to me, there'll be hell to pay, and you know it.”

The ghostly man's gaze sweeps the camp until he finds Dilley, who nods once.

All of a sudden, he lets go and strides away. My wobbly legs give out, and I drop like a stone into the dirt.

He returns moments later with a canteen, which he lifts to my lips, and sweet mother of Moses, it's the coolest, clearest, most wonderful water I ever drank in my life.

I force myself to slow down. No sense drinking it only to toss it back up again. So I take a breath. Another sip. Another breath.

“Now Jefferson and Tom.”

“Your lover boys are leverage,” Dilley says. “To keep you cooperative. Nothing more. So I don't give a rat's furry arse if they die of thirst.”

I glare at him. “If they die, you'll have no leverage at all.”

He ponders that a moment.

“She's right,” says Jonas Waters, sauntering over. He looks me up and down in a way that sends a shiver spider-crawling down my spine. “Frank, she don't look so good, to be honest.”

“Fine,” Dilley says. “Water for Bigler and Kingfisher, too, but don't take too long about it.”

I'm careful not to show even the smallest bit of relief. It's my only victory since we've been captured, and I won't risk him taking it away.

The ghostly man gives Tom and Jeff water, who gulp it down like dogs at a pond.

Then he returns to me. “Time for your breakfast, boy!” Dilley calls out, laughing.

As the ghostly man tips the laudanum to my lips, I realize that I've yet to hear him speak a single word.

The moon is a glowing orb in the velvety sky, and a lonely owls echoes low and soft as we reach our destination. My mind is fogged with laudanum, so I can't see much, just the shapes of buildings, a few tents, the whitish expanse of a steep cliff side. I should mark my surroundings better. I should look for exits, weaknesses, but I can't make myself focus, and after a moment, I don't even care. Dear Lord, I'm weary. If I could just close my eyes and sleep for a week . . .

“I told you to bring just the girl,” says a low, slick voice. I know that voice. A dart of fear penetrates the fog of my mind.

“You hired me for my improvisational nature, sir,” Frank
Dilley says. “We couldn't have these boys running back to everyone, telling how the girl was taken, now could we? Besides, the girl cares for them. Especially that one right there. She'll do whatever you want, so long as they're around.”

“I see.” A pause. I can't see the speaker in the dark. Not sure I want to.

Warm, strong fingers tip my chin up, and I roll my eyes around, trying to focus, but I can't do it for all the gold in California. It's so much easier to just close them.

“Is she drunk?” the familiar voice asks. He sounds like he's fit to smash someone's nose. I just hope it's not mine.

“We gave her some poppy juice so she wouldn't make a fuss.”

“What?”

“She'll be fine.”

“Laudanum is a dangerous—”

“I
know
this girl. We were six months crossing the continent together. She may be uppity and irksome, but she's clever as a fox and good with a gun. I wasn't going to take any chances.”

Another pause. “If she is damaged in any way, I'll skin you alive and throw you in a bear cage.”

Frank must believe it, because his voice is tremulous when he says, “We did our jobs, just as you asked. The girl is fine. I promise.”

“We'll see. Tie up the boys behind the stable. Girl goes in the cabin. Second bedroom.”

Peony lurches forward. After a short distance, the ropes tying me down are loosened, and strong hands grab my waist and slide me from my horse. I'm half dragged, half carried
across a porch, through a doorway, and into a dark place that smells of fresh-chopped wood and linseed oil and dried tobacco.

That tobacco smell. Sweet, and a little bit spicy. Familiar.

Someone guides me to a bed and pushes me down until I'm lying on a straw tick. A bit of straw pokes at my armpit, but I don't care because it's a bed. Not hard ground or muddy ground or rocky ground. A real bed.

No one bothers to untie my wrists, which niggles at my brain. Something is wrong. And Jefferson . . . The fog takes over. I sink into the prickly mattress, and then I keep sinking, so deep it feels like darkness swallows me whole.

I wake to the smell of frying eggs and tobacco smoke. Sun shines through a single east-facing window. It's too, too bright, like a spear of light lancing my mind. In fact, my whole head feels like it's going to split open.

My belly roils with nausea. I try to sit up, and the binds on my wrist tighten, bringing more pain. Blinking to clear my vision, I stare at the rope. It leads to the footboard.

I'm tied to the bed.

Using the rope, I pull myself forward on the mattress, scanning the floor for a slop bucket, a wash bin, anything I can use to throw up in. My stomach lurches, and I pause to breathe deeply through my nose, willing things to calm down.

I'm in a small room with log walls and plank floors. Beside my small bed is a nightstand, displaying an issue of
Godey's Lady's Book
and a lantern. Along the other side of the room is
a set of four empty shelves. Next to it is a doorway. A patchwork quilt hangs in the doorway like a curtain.

The quilt curtain is whisked aside, and a tiny lady in strange clothing barrels through, carrying a breakfast tray. Steam curls up from two fried eggs, a mess of bacon, a fluffy round biscuit, and a tin cup full of hot coffee.

It's too rich, too much, and I bend over and vomit onto the floor.

Frank Dilley didn't give me near enough food and water, so there's not a lot inside me, and it's over quick. My face burns, and I'm about to apologize, but the lady's hand darts out quick as a snake to mop my mouth and chin with a handkerchief.

“Thank you,” I manage, looking up at her.

She's Chinese. Her eyes are different from mine, but they're not squeezed shut like in all the newspaper drawings. She has shining black hair pulled into a single thick braid down her back. The skin of her face looks as soft as a cloud. No, she's wearing some kind of powder to make it appear so. Still, her skin doesn't seem the least bit yellow to me, any more than the Indians I've seen appeared red.

“My name is Lee,” I say. “Thank you for bringing me breakfast. I'm sorry I . . . made such a mess.”

She gazes at me as if taking my measure, and I realize that she's just a girl, no older than I am.

She carefully skirts the puddle on the floor and sets the tray on my bed. Then she points at her chest and says, “Mary.”

“Nice to meet you, Mary. Do you work for my uncle? Hiram Westfall?” Now that I'm awake and alert, the laudanum no
longer swimming in my blood, I'm sure I remember his voice. His scent.

The girl's gaze drops to the rope at my wrists, or maybe the sticky, raw skin beneath. She frowns slightly. A flurry of speech comes out of her mouth, but I have no idea what she's saying.

“I'm sorry. I don't speak Chinese.”

Mary points to the puddle, says something else, and walks away. Her bright blue tunic drapes softly over wide pants, and her platform shoes make a steady
clump-clump
sound as she goes. The quilt curtain swishes closed behind her.

I stare after her, wondering what to do. Eat some of this breakfast, maybe. I'm weak from my journey with Dilley and his men, and I'll need a store of strength for whatever's ahead. But the puddle on the floor smells something awful, and my belly is still churning like a fish in a trap. Maybe the coffee is a good starting place.

My bonds force me to grab the cup with both hands. I sip carefully at first, wary of putting too much in my stomach. It seems to go down okay, so I sip a little more.

Once I have some food in me, I need to think about escape. No, first I need to find out where Jefferson and Tom are. A vague memory from last night indicates they might be in a stable.