Where the Lost Wander_ A Novel - Amy Harmon Page 0,5

and that is all. His willing commentary surprises me.

“They signed on with Abbott’s company, so you’ll be able to keep an eye on their . . . mules . . . if you’re concerned,” he adds.

I nod, stifling my reaction. Grant Abbott is Jennie’s brother—a man who fancies himself a mountain man, though he’s never spent much time trapping. He went all the way to California in ’49 and didn’t have much luck striking it rich. He’s been back and forth three times to the Oregon Territory and has finally decided the emigrant boom pays better than furs or panning for gold. Plus, the man just can’t keep still. He’s convinced me to travel with him as far as Fort Kearny; I’ve driven mules to Fort Kearny, just below the Platte, half a dozen times. Every time I make the trek, I think about continuing west, and every time, I return to St. Joe and my father’s house.

If I go with a train, I don’t need to hire a hand to help me with the mules, and Grant Abbott will pay me to carry a gun and assist where necessary; having a few mules at his disposal doesn’t hurt either. The numbers in the company provide safety and support, even though it’ll slow me down considerably. I’ve never had any trouble. I’m good with the animals; I keep to myself; I work hard. I’m just a mule skinner, and if I look a little different, no one has ever made a big issue of it. I was called a “filthy Injun” once by a man who never washed, but he died from cholera two days later, too lazy to walk upstream for clean water.

“You ready?” my father asks. He knows that I am. The mules Captain Dempsey requested have been corralled separately so they aren’t sold, and they’ve been fitted and fed, their packs—including my gear—readied for the journey.

I raise the packages in my arms. “I just have to stow these. Shirts and trousers. Good for trade.”

“Cloth’s a whole lot more comfortable than buckskin,” my father says. He is talkative today. I hardly know what to think. “Jennie wanted me to remind you to go home for a haircut,” he adds.

“I’ll go right now,” I say, agreeable. Jennie worries about things like that. When my hair grows long, I look more like a Pawnee than a Lowry, and I make people nervous. I keep it tamed and cut short. It hasn’t been long since I was a child. When I first came to live with my father, Jennie did her best to untangle my hair but ended up cutting it instead. The curls never came back. For a long time, I was convinced they followed my mother when I could not.

Jennie has asked me to call her Mother, but I can’t. I know it is not Jennie’s pride that seeks the title or even her shame. It is simply easier on us all for people to think I am hers because I am his. Jennie is fair, but her hair is a deep brown and her eyes too. People in St. Joe just assume I favor her instead of my father, though I am considerably darker than she is. That, or they don’t ask. The girls—my half sisters—have my father’s blue eyes, and their hair is several shades lighter than Jennie’s. I call Jennie by her name when no one is around. When others are near, I simply call her ma’am or nothing at all. To call her Mother would be to deny the Pawnee girl with the heavy hair and the crooked smile.

My mother turns and begins to walk away, telling me to stay.

I hurry after her. She pushes me back, her thin arms firm and her face set, jaw jutting out in warning. Her eyes are fierce. I’ve seen that look before, many times, and I know she will not yield, but I don’t care. I remain beside her. My mother walks back to the man who has followed us from the house, her hand tangled in the mess of my hair. She points at him. She points at me. She tries to walk away again, and when I trail after her, she sits, folding her legs, her hands on her knees, eyes forward. I sit beside her. We sit this way all night, my mother pretending I am not beside her. She is ill. Her breathing rattles like the medicine man’s shaker, and her skin burns when