He stared back at her. Was she crazy? Or was she smart, like Matthew said, and just as sane as he was?
Of course, Hitch’s family—and Celia too—wouldn’t have said sanity was his strongest point. He was a pilot after all.
But he’d seen enough of the world to know what crazy looked like. And this girl didn’t look crazy. Wild, like an unbroke filly, definitely. Maybe a little reckless, judging from the way she’d scaled J.W.’s house without a second thought. But if flying had taught him one thing, it was that reckless and crazy didn’t have to be the same thing, so long as you knew what you were capable of.
This girl wasn’t crazy. She was lost and she was scared. After last night, who wouldn’t be? There was no reason to think the guy with the flare gun wasn’t still around—and still trigger-happy. Reuniting Jael with him obviously wasn’t an option. But if Hitch could find the guy, that just might answer a lot of questions—and give him a lead on what he could do with her.
He thumped the chair back onto all fours. “Fine. I’ll take her with me. Maybe somebody’ll know where she comes from.” He stood and beckoned her to follow.
She stood up warily. “To where do you go with me?”
“To town. See if we can find somebody who can help you get home.”
Her eyes lit up at that, but then she bit her lip.
“Look,” he said. “You don’t trust me—that’s fine. I can spare you a little help if you want it. But I won’t make you say no twice.”
She shook her head, slowly. “You are Groundsman.”
“No, I ain’t.” He gave her a grin. “The sky’s my home too.”
“Then… you will be helping me to go to home?”
“Well, we’ll see if we can find somebody who can help. And I’ll get you someplace safe to stay in the meantime. Best I can do right now.”
She tucked her chin in a nod. “Then, yes.”
“All right.” He gestured her toward the door. “But I swear, if you kick me one more time, that’s it.”
She wrinkled her nose, confused, as J.W. opened the screen door for her.
“Hitch,” Matthew said—then paused a moment until she was out of earshot. “Wait just one second. Before you go on with her, there’s something you should know.” He pushed his old man’s bones up from the table and circled around. He dropped his voice. “I want you to understand me: wherever it is she’s from, I think she needs help. But… you’ve heard about the bodies, haven’t you?”
“Bodies?”
“Five so far, I think. Mostly out around Lake Minatare, a few in some pastures nearby. Nobody knows who they were. But ol’ Scottie Shepherd—you remember him?—he’s been swearing up and down he saw one fall.”
Gooseflesh creased the skin on the back of Hitch’s neck. “Fall from where?”
“That’s the sticker, ain’t it?” And just like Jael had done earlier, Matthew pointed a finger at the ceiling. “Now, you tell me. How’s that possible?”
The chill spread. “How should I know?”
“You’re a flyer. You know what’s up there.”
He shrugged. “Sky, clouds—occasionally me. C’mon, Matthew, people don’t fall out of nowhere.” He felt like he was parroting Earl’s rebuttals from last night. “They had to come from a plane.”
Matthew regarded him. He didn’t look convinced. “Her too?”
Hitch looked through the screen door to where she stood listening to J.W. going on about the drought or some such.
Part of him just wanted to say yes. Yes, she jumped from a plane. Yes, all these bodies had been chucked out of a plane.
But it wasn’t as if planes were exactly common around these parts. Before this week, there was no reason at all why pilots should be flying over Scottsbluff, Nebraska—much less tossing people out at five thousand feet.
He might have dismissed the whole notion of the bodies even having fallen at all—except for her. He’d seen her. And night flight or no night flight, he’d still swear up and down his Jenny had been the only plane out there.
So what did that leave? That she’d jumped off a cloud?
Obviously not. But maybe the question here wasn’t how, but why? Somebody’d been after her, that was clear. But again: why?
He looked at Matthew and shook his head. “You want answers that make sense? Don’t ask me. I gotta tell you, I ain’t ever seen anything like this one.”
But if he could find Jael’s attacker, that might put a period to a lot of questions. If the man was anything like her, he was going to stick out in Scottsbluff like a society grand dame at a county fair.
Six
BY THE TIME they reached town, the noon sun was pouring heat on their heads. Scottsbluff had grown considerable since Hitch left nine years ago. Main Street was still dirt, but the raised sidewalks were paved now. The rows of cottonwoods were long gone, together with the buggies. Now, dusty Model Ts chugged up and down, and a six-story brick building—Lincoln Hotel painted across its front—dominated the row of stores and cafes. They even had electric lampposts and, on one corner, a drinking fountain.
Strange how things moved on without you.
He hooked his hands in his pockets and squinted down the street. “Wouldn’t even know it’s the same town I grew up in.” He looked over his shoulder at Jael.
She was busy twisting the drinking fountain’s knob. When the water started trickling out, she laughed. Her gaze flashed up to his, delighted.
They must not have these admittedly newfangled things up on her cloud. He grinned back at her.
Just like that, her delight faltered into uncertainty. She deliberately looked away and cupped a handful of water to start cleaning the dirt from her bare feet. Matthew and J.W. hadn’t had any shoes that would fit her, so she’d walked barefoot all the way into town. The soft dirt on the roads had been easy enough on her feet, but now she was a dusty mess.
Several ladies in flower print dresses and cloche hats passed by, watching her from the corners of their eyes.
Hitch winced. “You know, maybe we should find you someplace else to do that.”
She straightened, then turned the knob once more. “Very beautiful, this thing.” It was about the first full sentence she’d said since leaving Matthew’s, despite Hitch’s best attempts to make conversation.
“Yeah, it’s pretty nifty.” He turned back up the street and surveyed his options.
“Where do you go to?” she asked.
“Have to find someplace for you to hide out, have to make some money, and then I have to hightail it back to camp. Those planes you saw go over—they’re why I’m here. There’s going to be a big airshow, like nothing anybody here has ever seen before.”
She shook her head, obviously not picking up on much of what he was saying.
He beckoned. “C’mon.”
He selected a dry-goods store—Fallon Bros.—halfway down the street. He didn’t recognize it, or the name, so maybe the folks inside wouldn’t recognize him either. All things considered, he was likely to get more for the gun from a stranger.
He pushed through the door, Jael treading softly after him. The big front room was whitewashed and airy. The shelves along the walls and the island counters down the center offered everything from ready-cut dresses to stick horses to electric fans. A modish clerk with slicked-back hair and a half apron stood behind a glass-fronted case.
Hitch pasted on a grin and approached. “Howdy. Would you be interested in swapping?”