The Whippoorwill Trilogy - Sharon Sala Page 0,165

her way.

Suddenly her hand was enveloped in one much larger and stronger. She felt the brush of hair against her arm and knew it was not her own. She opened her mouth, then immediately shut it when his hand touched her face. She felt a fingertip tracing the path that her tears had made earlier and knew that he’d seen her cry.

“I don’t ever do that,” she said.

He took her fingers, put them back onto the leaves and then touched her eyes once more.

“You want me to put some more on my eyes? Is that it?” Quickly, she grabbed some leaves and began scrubbing them against her eyes. Each time that she did, she felt relief from the swelling until the misery was almost gone. She looked up again, and this time saw more than daylight.

His expression was motionless, his eyes hooded and dark. His shoulders were broad—his belly flat. He sat the paint horse as if they were one and the same, while wearing nothing but a feather in his hair, a breechclout and leggings, and moccasins on his feet. She should have been scared out of her mind. Instead, she felt an odd sort of empathy.

He touched his eyes once, then pointed at hers and suddenly she understood. He knew how she felt.

She held out her hand, showing him the leaves.

“Thank you,” she said, and touched her eyes, then her heart.

He stared at her for a moment, letting his gaze wander over her nudity without lust or shame then nodded.

Suddenly, his gaze slid from her to the creek behind her.

Letty turned. Eulis must be coming.

He grabbed the reins and turned his pony to the East.

There was a moment when their gazes met again, this time in a silent acknowledgment of what had transpired, and then he kicked his horse in the flanks and was gone.

It wasn’t until he disappeared that Letty started to shake.

“Lord, Lord, this is twice in my life that you’ve saved me from murdering Indians.”

Then she scrambled through the brush and into the creek just in time to see Eulis coming through the trees.

She turned once, looking behind her to make sure the Indian was gone, and then shivered. It dawned on her that, until she’d seen him, she’d not been afraid. She wondered what God was trying to tell her with that encounter, and then said a mute prayer of thanksgiving that the Indian had left her with her hair on her head and—she silently added—the ability to see.

“Hey, Letty, your eyes opened up some, didn’t they?” Eulis said, as he helped her out of the creek and up the bank.

“Yeah, probably the cold water,” Letty said, and then wondered why she didn’t tell Eulis the truth.

There could be a whole band of Indians just over the hill waiting to swoop down on them and do them in, just like the ones who’d killed her father. But that didn’t fit the gentleness of the man as he’d led her out of the creek, or the leaves he had given her that led to the blessed relief to her swollen and burning eyes. She touched her face where he’d traced the paths of her tears and shuddered, too miserable and confused to figure everything out.

Eulis walked just a bit in front of her so as not to be staring rudely at her nudity, which would have been impossible to ignore.

“I didn’t plan on you bein’ able to see, so I already laid out some dry clothes for you. If I picked the wrong stuff, you just trade for what you need.”

“Whatever you laid out will be fine,” Letty said, still holding her wet bloomers against her breasts.

Eulis scratched at his whiskered cheeks as he nodded. When they got to Dripping Springs, he was going to need a good bath and shave, too. A few moments later they reached the campsite.

Letty grabbed her clothes and slipped behind a bush then began to dress.

Eulis politely kept his back turned as she put on her clothes, although he couldn’t, for the life of him, figure out why it now mattered to be modest. Before, when she hadn’t been able to see, she hadn’t cared a bit. Now, because she could see again, she was hiding in bushes. If he lived to be a hundred he would never be able to figure out women.

“Hey, Letty. I saved you some meat and johnnycake. Reckon you’re up to eatin’ a bite before we set out?”

Letty’s stomach rumbled. She was hungry and