Soul Catcher (61 page)

^{"Here, let me do that," Rosetta said, taking the cloth from him. "Gimme that bottle of yours."}

^{He handed her the flask of laudanum, and she uncorked it and poured a little on the cloth. As she worked on him, washing away blood that had crusted at the edges of the wound, he watched her. Her long, slender hands moving expertly. He could still remember the feel of her skin and her smell as he lay next to her the previous night. He thought of what Brown had told him: that he'd been a foolish man to have done nothing. He'd felt he'd done the right thing, the decent thing, despite the fact that his body had told him otherwise. Now he wasn't so sure. Maybe he was just a fool.}

^{"It comin' along just fine," she said, dabbing at the wound. "You just gotta make sure you don't go gettin' yourself shot up no more."}

^{"I'll try my best not to."}

^{Cain took the bottle of laudanum from her and had a sip. He hadn't had any in a while and he appreciated the way the liquid warmed and filled his chest.}

^{"You know that stuff gonna kill you one a these days," she warned.}

^{"If it's not by a bullet," he said offhandedly.}

^{"A bullet's faster."}

^{"What are you so concerned for?"}

^{"Somebody gotta be, since you so all-fired-up to kill yourself."}

^{"Why don't you let me worry about that?"}

^{"You ain't doin' such a good job keepin' yourself in one piece, Cain. Remember, Maddy put me in charge of seein' that you stay out of trouble," she said, smiling playfully.}

^{He started to move before she was finished, and she said, "Hold your horses. I ain't done yet."}

^{She ran her finger down the scar over his chest. "Where you get this one?"}

^{"That was from a runaway, too."}

^{"Serves you right. You ever think you picked the wrong line of work, Cain."}

^{He looked at her and smiled. "It has occurred to me."}

^{Then she put on a fresh bandage and tied it around his torso.}

^{Later, as they were eating lunch, Rosetta was chewing a piece of jerked beef when she stopped suddenly and sat up straight, her ear pitched, as if listening for some distant sound. The expression she wore was a mixture of concern and delight.}

^{"Oh my," she said.}

^"What?"

^{"Just felt this little one move," she said, rubbing her stomach in small circles. "This chile kicks harder'n a mule. Funny, most the time he so quiet, I almost forget about him."}

^{"How far along are you?" he asked.}

^{He saw a change come over her eyes. Perhaps it was the attempt to avoid thinking back to the night of the child's conception, and he regretted having asked her.}

^{"Five months, near as I can tell."}

^{"What're you going to name it?"}

^{"Bad luck be namin' a child 'fore it's even born. Besides, what if it's not a male child?" She took another bite of food and fell silent for a time. "What you think Eberly'll do?" It was, Cain noted, the first time she hadn't called him Mister Eberly.}

^{"What can he do?"}

^{"You don't know him," Rosetta said, wagging her head.}

^{"We're a long way from Richmond."}

^{"He ain't the sort of man to take no without a fight."}

^{"You let me worry about him."}

^{As he reached out to cut a piece of cheese, Rosetta took hold of his hand. She glanced down at it, turned it palm up, staring at it as if it were something of sudden interest.}

^{"What?" he asked.}

^{She put her own hand next to his. "Funny," she said. "Our palms ain't so different in color."}

^{He looked instead at her face.}

^{"You ever wonder, Cain, why all this fuss on account of one person's skin being lighter than another's?"}

^{"It's not that simple." He thought of what his father had told him about slavery, about being a southerner, about the honor of one's race. He thought about everything he'd been taught growing up. He thought of what he had seen in the eyes of slaves and in the eyes of masters, too. "It has to do with money and owning things. Nobody likes to give up what's theirs, and they'll fight like hell to keep it. Like with my horse. And I suppose it's got something to do with what people are used to. They like things the way they've always been. They don't like to change." As he spoke, Rosetta continued to hold his hand, to run her thumb along the creases in his palm, as if she were reading it.}

^{"Fear, too, I reckon," he said.}

^{She snorted disdainfully. "What white folks got to be 'fraid of?"}

^{"You. What we've done to you. What you'd do to us if you ever got the chance."}

^{When he'd finished, Rosetta screwed up her mouth.}

^{"I have to go pee," she said.}

^{She headed out behind the abandoned structure. Maybe it was the talk of her being pregnant, but Cain noticed, for the first time, how she was beginning to walk differently now. More slowly, not so much tentatively as with the motion of one who carried something of priceless value, her feet spread out and her arms a bit more out to the sides for ballast, with a heft in her hips she had not had before. Yet the change, he admitted to himself, made her all the more lovely. She still had the grace and power of a mare about to foal. He marveled at her. Watching her lifted his heart, made him feel lighter, less earth-bound than he could ever recall feeling.}

^{While she was gone, he started to saddle the horses. He thought of Eberly again, and his good mood quickly darkened. The old man would never give her up, he knew. He'd use all of his money and his power and his connections to hunt her down, to search for her--and Cain, too, for that matter. Only a bullet would stop him. After all those years of being the hunter, Cain knew he would now be the hunted.}

^{A half-dozen riders approached from the east. They were the same ones that had passed them earlier in the day. Cain removed the leather loop holding down the hammer of his gun.}

^{"How do," said one of them, nodding to Cain. He was an older man, in his fifties, with a dark, wispy beard, the sallow complexion of one used to the night, and small glistening-black eyes like a raccoon. Hanging from the pommel of his saddle were a pair of shackles. "We're looking for a runaway," the man said. "Young nigger gal."}

^{Cain gave a furtive glance toward the woods and, in a voice that was almost a shout, said, "Haven't seen any niggers in these parts."}

^{"You sound pretty sure, fellow."}

^{"I am," he cried.}

^{"Hell, you don't have to yell," the old man replied. "I ain't deaf. You by yourself?" He glanced at the other horse, the saddle on the ground. Cain followed the man's gaze as it took in the gelding, then glanced back into the woods behind Cain.}

^{"Yes," he said, continuing to saddle Hermes.}

^{"What's the other horse for?"}

^{"I'm fixing to sell it."}

^{"Saddle, too?"}

^{"Everything. Why, you looking to buy?"}

^{"No, just curious. Where you headed?" the old man asked.}

^"West."

^{"Just west?"}

^{"That's about the size of it," Cain replied.}

^{"Where you comin' from?" asked one of the others, a jowly man wearing a red cap that resembled a fez.}

^{"I don't reckon that's any of your business," Cain replied.}

^{"You wouldn't be on the run from the law, would you?"}

^{"I've told you all I'm going to tell you." Cain stopped readying the horse and turned and stared at the man.}

^{"We're patrollers hired by the county, and we have the right to ask you any damn thing we want to," said the jowly man.}

^{"Is that so?"}

^{Finally, the old man interrupted. "That'll be enough, Earl. Thank you for your time, mister," he said to Cain. "If you see any niggers fitting that description, you contact the sheriff."}

^{"I'll be sure to," Cain replied. "By the way, you know the name of the runaway?"}

^{The man shook his head. With that, they spurred their horses and galloped off toward the west.}

^{Cain wondered how they'd tracked them this far west. Perhaps the sheriff back in Hagerstown had told them Cain had a runaway with him that belonged to Eberly. Or maybe it was the little crookback, who would, of course, be looking to pay him back any way he could. Whatever it was, they were now on his trail. Only when they were gone a while did Rosetta emerge from behind the house.}

^{"What did they want?" she asked.}

^{"They were looking for a runaway girl."}

^{She gave him a nervous look. "They say who?"}

^{Cain shook his head.}

^{"We ought to get off the main road for a while, though," he said.}

^{Chapter 21.}

^{I
f they were on his trail, he would need to lose them, so they cut into the woods to the south, rode through a dense hardwood forest just beginning to leaf out in the fine spring weather. They passed between alder and beech, tulip tree and ash and hickory, oak and maple. The sweet fragrance of wildflowers hung thickly in the warm May air: elderberry and honeysuckle, dogwood and mountain laurel, jack-in-the-pulpit, wild columbine, and pink lady's slipper. He made zigzagging lines across creeks and over sharp ridges, skirting narrow ravines two hundred feet above surging mountain rivers. Sometimes they had to wade through swamps, other times negotiate bramble thickets so tightly packed they had to dismount and walk their horses.}

^{At dusk, they pitched camp beside a waterfall surrounded by cedar trees, which exuded a strong, resiny smell. For supper, Rosetta fried up some fish and corn pone, and with the flour and peaches and lard she made a peach pie. Cain ate like a man condemned.}

^{"That was good," he said, rubbing his belly.}

^{"I guess so. You had three pieces," she said with a smile.}

^{"Where did you learn to fashion a pie like that?"}

^{"My mother. She was a good cook. She made all of Eberly's meals. He said she was the best cook in Henrico County."}

^{Cain hesitated before asking, "You never heard from her again?"}

^{She shook her head. "I heard she was sold to a cotton farmer down in Georgia. Don't know for sure, though."}

^{Later, as the mountain night turned cool, they sat close about the fire, Cain on one side, Rosetta on the other, trying to draw such warmth as they could from it. Overhead, the night sky was frantic with stars, while somewhere off in the distance came the piercing howl of a wolf. His leg ached fiercely from the cold. The pain there had been overshadowed of late by the wound in his side, but now that that was on the mend, the leg, like a willful child, began calling for his attention. He'd finished the laudanum a while back and so took a long drink of whiskey.}