The man on the painted pony slides to the ground and with no warning yanks Wolfe from me. My arms are cramped and will not straighten, and I cannot even reach for him. The painted brave hands Wolfe to a woman, who stares at my brother with disdain. She sets him on the ground and turns away. The man calls after her, and he is angry. He picks Wolfe up again and follows her. I am encircled by women and children who tug at my clothes and pull at my hair. One woman slaps my face, and the cut beneath my eye begins to flow once more. I cover my head with my unbending arms, and I push through the crowd toward Wolfe. I hear him crying, but the sound recedes as he is carried away. I scream for him, and the Indian children throw back their little heads and howl too. I realize they are copying me, and his name is like the call of the wolves.
Then the women are moaning and crying too as the dead man is pulled from his horse, the grieving of the village rising like a sudden storm, the kind that sent the waters rushing down the Platte without warning. One of the men slides from his horse, then moves into the circle of women and children and buries his hand in my hair, yanking my head back. He turns my head this way and that, talking all the while. With the hand not gripping my hair, he parts my lips with a dirty finger, and I taste horse and blood. He cracks a knuckle against my teeth and snaps his own, as though my teeth please him. The finger that is in my mouth moves to my left eye, and he peels back my eyelid. I cry out, trying to twist away, but he seems entranced by the color of my eyes. He is showing everyone, wrenching my head, keeping my eye pinned open. A woman spits, and I am blinded by the glob of saliva. The man releases my face but not my hair, and I am dragged, stumbling, behind him, trying to keep my feet beneath me, my hands wrapped around his wrist to prevent my hair from being torn out by the roots. I can’t imagine being scalped would hurt much more.
I don’t know if anyone will come looking for me or baby Wolfe. I don’t know. John. John will come looking. I shudder, and my stomach roils again. Pa and Warren are dead. Ma. Ma is dead too. My mind goes black. Blank. I can’t think of them. I hope John doesn’t come after me. They’ll kill him. They’ll kill me too. I just hope they do it quickly.
JOHN
Naomi is wearing her moccasins. I can tell by her print. Her foot is small, and her tread is short, like she’s stumbling along. There are no footprints besides hers. The rest are horses and two mules. Trick and Tumble. A set of smaller, cloven-hoofed prints makes me think they took Gert too. I’ve lost the trail a few times and have had to circle back. I’ve lost it again and am sure I’m going the wrong way.
A flutter of white tumbles over the dry ground, and I race toward it, chasing it for half a mile before it finally presses up against the sagebrush, momentarily caught. I am screaming in frustration by the time I reach it, and my voice, raspy and raw, frightens my animals. They shimmy and sidestep, and I slide from Samson’s back, pulling the animals forward so I can snag the page I’ve chased for half an hour.
It is a sketch I’ve seen, one I admired. Bones in Boxes is written across the bottom in Naomi’s curling scrawl. I have a vision of her blood-soaked body lying somewhere in the rocks, her book lying open beside her, her pictures scattered in the wind. Then I remember the way she left a trail of pictures for me and Wyatt when we’d gone after my mules, and calm quiets my anguish. Naomi is leaving pages for me again.
NAOMI
I do not open my eyes when I hear the camp stirring, and for a moment I am still with the train, wondering if I am the last to wake. Then I remember where I am. I remember why, and I am flooded with grief so heavy I cannot take a breath. I start to wheeze, gagging and gasping, and the