I see Elam Salter and his big dun horse go straight over backward. I don’t see them land. I hear a horse scream, hear the whine of a bullet, then a soldier’s groan, a splash in the water. Hooves clatter away and up the bank. The soldiers return fire at whoever’s come on us.
The wagon’s got no way out but forward over the rocks, and the mules lurch through the water, the wagon rocking wild like a child’s toy as they scrabble up the bank to dry land. I gather Juneau Jane and Missy, hold them down flat and push my head twixt them. Splinters of wood and dust and canvas rain down.
I say my prayers, make my peace. Might be after all that’s happened, this is how it ends. Not in the swamp from a wildcat, not at the bottom of a river or on a freight wagon in the wild country, but here in this creek, waylaid for a reason I don’t know.
I lift my head enough to search with my eyes, to find Old Mister’s pistol.
Can’t let them take us alive if this is Indians or road agents, is my only thought. Heard too many stories since we been in Texas, tales of what can be done to womenfolk. Seen it, too, with Missy and Juneau Jane. Lord, give me the strength to do what’s needed, I pray. But if I find that pistol, it’s got only two shots, and there’s three of us.
Give me the strength, and the means.
Everything’s shifted and turned upside down, and the pistol is no place I can see.
Of a sudden, the air goes quiet. The gun thunder and screams stop like they started. Powder smoke hangs thick and silent and sour. The only noise is the slow groaning of a horse and the terrible death rattle of blood-smothered breath.
“Ssshhh,” I whisper to Missy and Juneau Jane. Maybe they’ll think the wagon’s empty. The thought’s gone quick as it comes. I know better.
“Come out!” a voice orders. “Some of these soldier boys might live to fight another day, you come on out peaceful.”
“Your choice,” another man says. It’s low and plain, and my ear knows it in a way that turns me cold inside, except I can’t put a place to it. Where’ve I heard that voice before? “You want four dead soldier boys, plus a dead deputy marshal on your conscience? Ends the same, either way.”
“Don’t—” one of the soldiers hollers. There’s a crack like a gourd getting split, and he goes quiet.
Juneau Jane and me look back and forth to each other. Her eyes are wide and white-edged. Her mouth trembles, but she nods. Beside me, Missy’s already getting up, I guess because the man said to. She don’t understand what’s happening.
I feel for the pistol again. Feel for it everyplace. “Coming out!” I holler. “Might be we’re shot already.” I’m scrubbing the floor with my hands. The pistol…
The pistol…
“Out now!” the man hollers. A shot fires off and tears through the canvas not a foot from our heads. The wagon jerks forward, then stops. Either somebody’s holding the mules or one’s dead in the harness.
Missy scrabbles over the gate.
“Wait,” I say, but there’s no stopping her. No finding the derringer, either. Don’t know what’ll happen now. What kind of men are these, and why do they want us?
Missy’s on her feet and moving away from the wagon by the time Juneau Jane and me get out. My mind slows, takes notice of each thing—the soldiers on their bellies, one bleeding from the leg. Blood drips from the head of the wagon driver. His eyes open and close, and open again. He tries to wake, to save hisself or us, but what can he do?
The sergeant lifts his head. “You’re interfering with a detail of the United States Cavalry in—” A pistol butt comes down hard.
Missy moans like it was her that got struck.
I glance at the one holding the pistol. He ain’t much more than a boy, might be thirteen or fourteen.
It’s then I look