“’Night, Amanda.”
“Goodnight, Gran’papa,” came a small voice.
“That sounded like you got a Lucas critter in there with you, Amanda.”
“It is me, Gran’papa!” and the little youngster giggled.
“Shshsh!” he hissed with a finger at his lips. “You can’t stay quiet in there so your pa can sleep, I’ll come drag you out here with me.”
This time the little boy’s voice came out a delicate whisper, “I’ll be quiet. Promise. Don’t take me away—I wanna stay with my hurt pa.”
“’Night, son.”
He had dropped the cover sheet and was turning away when Amanda’s voice drifted softly one more time through the back pucker hole. “Thank you, Pa. Thank you for saving Roman for us.”
“Thank you, Gran’papa,” said that dear little voice.
He stood there, feeling the tears course down his wrinkled, scarred cheeks. It was almost enough to fill a man’s heart to overflowing, listening to those quiet voices caress him in the still of that starlit night. That’s what a man counted on his family for.
Late on the evening of that second day of goading the very most from Roman’s docile oxen, they had managed to straggle into the wagon camp on the headwaters of a narrow stream draining the northwest end of the rocky Bear River Divide.* Three times that second day they had stopped just long enough to swap out the tired team for a fresh pair of the beasts. Midmorning. Noon. And again in midafternoon they made another rotation … desperately attempting to cover in faster time the same ground the train had crossed. Bass didn’t know a damn thing about these dull-witted brutes, but he was sure they could make up more than the time they lost during the many changes with stronger, fresher animals setting the pace. His gamble paid off as they pushed each team to their lumbering limit through that second hot and waterless day.
When the first emigrants on the outskirts of camp spotted the Burwell wagon swaying down the long slope toward the grassy, lush camping ground, Bass watched them turn and hold up hands to their mouths—shouting for the others to look on their back trail. The sun had already set, but it was still light enough to recognize the faces of friends and allies as the families came streaming out of that orderly camp, racing for the lone wagon and that dusty menagerie walking or riding on both sides of the rumbling wagon. Behind them came the extra, weary oxen, a few head of Roman’s mules, and those packhorses—the whole herd of stock tended by young Lemuel and Flea.
Men whipped hats off their heads as they came rushing forward, waving them back and forth aloft, while women and girls came lurching up the long slope, their graceful movement hampered by the long, layered impediments of skirts and petticoats that easily tangled between their legs or snagged on the calf-high sage.
“Lookit that, will you?” Shad said, his cracked lips crusted with a coating of fine dust. “This here family’s got some good friends.”
“Lord’s sake! Wh-where you been for two days?” hollered the one named Pruett, the first to reach the yoke.
Licking his bleeding lips, Titus jabbed his thumb back to the wagon. “Didn’t that bastard Hargrove tell you folks nothing o’ what happened to Roman?”
Fenton lunged up at Pruett’s elbow and said, “We didn’t know a thing till after we was in camp more than an hour or so last night.”
“Any one of you ask after the Burwells?” Shadrach inquired.
Iverson peered at the wagon while he answered the horsemen, “Goodell was the first. I s’pose we all figured the wagon was way back in line till none of us could remember seeing any of you making camp.”
Ryder spoke up, “That’s when Carter an’ me rode a circuit round the camping ground to have ourselves a look.”
“Didn’t find you,” Dahlmer confessed. “We knowed something bad had come of it.”
Titus squinted into the mid-distance, looking for some sign of the train captain or his hired horsemen. “Something bad did come of it—”
“Everyone alive?” Truell asked as he trudged past the trappers and was about to reach the front of the wagon box.
“Barely,” Sweete replied.
“We’ll have some company soon,” Titus announced from his perch.
The emigrants hushed and turned to find Hargrove and four of his men emerging from the center of the encampment on horseback.
Hoyt Bingham turned back to look up at Bass. “Hargrove said it was likely you’d not find Roman alive.”
“Did he now?”
Bingham nodded. “Figured a rattler got him when he was out looking for a milk cow what wandered off.”
“That so.” Nodding slightly, Scratch kept his eyes on the approach of those five horsemen as he said, “It were a snake that bit Roman. Fact be, least three of ’em.”
“Three snakes?” shrieked Murray.
“Two-legged ones,” Titus explained. “Near beat the man to death, then strung ’im up to a tree—fixin’ to let the desert finish him off the rest of the way.”
The crowd of women, children, and those men murmured a moment, then fell silent. It was quiet enough to hear the gentle breeze waft through the sage and dwarf yellow pine, to hear the clop of those horses’ hooves as the riders plodded up the slope behind their leader. The emigrants parted for Hargrove and the quartet.
The wagon captain took off his hat, his face grave with worry as his eyes settled on Bass. “Burwell? Is he—”
“He’s alive,” Titus interrupted. “More today than he was yestiddy mornin’ when you rode off with your train.”
Hargrove slammed the hat back down on his head. “I had every faith in the world that you’d find him out looking for his cow and that you’d be right behind us.”
“You an’ these here spineless back-shooters knowed good an’ well we wouldn’t find Roman Burwell out looking for his cow, Hargrove.”
For an instant the man’s eyes glared into the old trapper’s. “Perhaps you can explain your allegations to me later, in private … so that we don’t ruin this group’s celebration at your return to the fold!” He tore the big hat from his head again and whipped it around in the air, shouting, “This is glorious news! The Burwells have rejoined us!”
At that moment Amanda appeared at the front of the wagon, her hands gripping the backboard of the seat so tightly her knuckles were white.
“Hargrove!” she screamed accusingly. “You nearly killed my Roman!”
His mouth hung open a moment as the crowd watched in stunned silence. “I only did what any good wagon captain would have done, Mrs. Burwell,” he explained in the most syrupy of tones. “How was I to know that your husband would not be collected within minutes of our departure and you would catch up to us by midday, by last night’s camp at the latest?”
Scratch could see his daughter was near to tears as he urged his horse to the wagon.
She said, “Y-you didn’t give a good goddamn for us, Hargrove! Didn’t send no one back to see about us!”
Standing in the stirrups and reaching out, Scratch grabbed one of her rough, callused hands. “Hush now, daughter. We’ll see to his bunch later.”
“Thank you, sir,” Hargrove exclaimed in his booming voice. “Yes, Amanda—we’ll all see to this matter later. For now, just knowing your husband and family are safe is cause to celebrate! I say we ask the musicians in this outfit to bring out their instruments straightaway!”
The crowd turned back to look at the gray-headed horseman who took off his big hat and wiped the back of a hand across his brow just below the faded, sweat-soaked bandanna. Bass quickly flicked his eyes to Shad, then turned back to the ousted wagon boss.
“Awright, Hargrove,” he said as Amanda disappeared into the wagon, “I say let’s do make us a lot of noise tonight!”