touch of God, as you have just seen,” the young man told the confused, edgy mob. “I will take care of the girl.” He tugged Juliana toward the canvas flaps that served as the backdrop of the stage.
“Don’t you take that witch out of this tent!” the preacher shouted. “She’ll use her devilry on you!”
The assistant gave Juliana a long look. The crowd, emboldened by the preacher’s words, advanced on her again.
“We ought to run,” the assistant whispered to her.
They dashed away through the canvas curtain into the dim area behind the stage, where a number of preachers and their supporting performers had crowded to escape the rain. The snake handlers were still there, kneeling on the dirt floor and praying, their snakes rattling and hissing inside the basket. They looked up as Juliana and the preacher’s assistant leaped over the stage’s back steps, landed in the muddy dirt, and ran out of the tent into the rainy night.
A few trucks and automobiles were parked behind the tent, as well as a number of wagons, their horses hitched under tent tops to keep them out of the rain.
He led her into the horse tent and drew a knife from his boot. He cut free one horse after another as they moved down the temporary hitching rail. The crowd burst out through the back flaps of the tent, shouting and looking for them.
“What are you doing?” Juliana asked, as he cut free yet another horse. “We have to run!”
“Then let’s run.” He climbed up onto a tall brown horse, then held out his hands. “Hurry!”
She hesitated. She couldn’t risk her legs touching the horse, or she would poison the poor creature.
The mob shouted and ran towards them.
“Now!” the young man said. “Or they’ll kill us both.”
“Give me that knife!” Juliana didn’t wait, but snatched it from the sheath in his boot. While the mob approached, she sliced the bottom hem of her dress at the front and back, and then she ripped the dress all the way up to her waist.
“Now, what are you doing?” he asked.
“Protecting the horse.” She sheathed the knife, took pins from her hair, and fixed the torn sides of her dress around her legs like breeches. Then, finally, she let him grab her hands and haul her up, and she slid into the saddle behind him.
“Take those reins,” he said, pointing at a horse to her left. She grabbed the horse’s reins, knowing there was no time to ask why.
They rode off, flanked by an extra horse on either side. The preacher’s assistant held the reins of the horse on their right. He yelled at the other horses, trying to get them to follow, and a couple of confused-looking horses actually did trot after them.
She looked back over her shoulder as they rode out of the horse tent. The loose, wandering horses were slowing the crowd’s pursuit.
They turned onto the muddy road, riding north along the Mississippi River, toward St. Louis. The two extra horses they’d captured galloped alongside them, making annoyed sounds at being woken and forced to run in the rain. Two additional horses followed at a distance, not eager to run but apparently not wanting to miss the party, either.
She heard the sounds of engines cranking.
“Maybe we should have taken one of those cars instead!” Juliana shouted to be heard over the pounding rain and the commotion behind them.
“Those can’t go anywhere but roads. We wouldn’t be able to escape. Drop those reins!”
Juliana released her captured horse, and so did he. He shouted “Yah!” at them a few times, and then turned and rode off along what looked like a muddy deer path into the woods. No truck or car could follow them here.
He slowed a little when they were out of sight of the road. “Any luck, they’ll follow those other horses down the road before they figure out they’ve lost us.”
“Where does this trail go?” she asked.
“I wouldn’t know, we’re just passing through town.”
“Where are you from? Do you have a name?”
“I do.” He leaned forward and shouted, “Yah!” The horse picked up speed, galloping away from the trouble behind them.
Juliana held tight to the boy’s waist. Her fingers wanted to trace the shape of the muscle under his shirt, and she let them explore as much as she dared.
As they rode through the rain, under the bright harvest moon, she couldn’t help noticing how she felt bounding against him again and again with each stride of the horse’s leg, with