Every Hidden Thing (16 page)

He was a talker, my father. Could spin a story any which way. But even by his standards, this was a stupendous performance.

“You wanted a flier, so you stole his,” I insisted.

“He
owed
me a specimen after the New Jersey marl pits!”

“Ah, here we go.”

“At least one! I'm setting things
right
. He wouldn't even be here if it weren't for me—and Ned's lead. He's brought more men and money than I could ever muster, and there shouldn't be any doubt, Samuel, in your mind about his intentions. He means to strip me of as many finds as possible. No, I'll go further. He means to
destroy
me.”

I thought of Cartland humiliating him onstage in Philadelphia. Spying on him through the postmaster. Blocking my father's publications. The word “destroy” didn't seem so far-fetched right now.

I could tell my father what I knew. If I did, he'd at least find another journal and get his finds published faster. But everything else would come out about me and Rachel. And right now I
wasn't even sure I wanted to help him. I was angry and disgusted by what he'd done, how he was trying to justify it. Even angrier that he'd bashed up things with Rachel. His greed had pushed her away from me. She didn't even love me, and now she doubted my honesty.

“It's not right,” I said to him. “It's shameful!”

He turned to me, such fury in his eyes.

“Watch how you speak to me,” he said coldly. “This has nothing to do with you. This affects only me and my future.”

Heat pulsed at my temples. “Maybe having a thief for a father affects my future too!”

His shoulders tensed. For a second I thought he'd strike me. Instead he turned and walked off. As if
I'd
done something that needed punishing.

I wasn't telling him anything about Cartland. I wouldn't help him. Like he said, it had nothing to do with me. He and Cartland could fight their own battles. Let the best scoundrel win.

I
SET OUT EARLY, THE EARTH AND GRASS STILL
sleepy, exhaling their night sweetness into the air before the heat came. The sun sent its light long, changing everything. The dullest tree trunk, the plainest leaves, the pebbly ground, even my own skin became luminous and charged with beauty. It never lasted long enough, this amazing light.

I was trying hard not to think about Samuel, which only meant that his face and voice flickered constantly in the background of my mind. I'd slept poorly.

On a rise I spotted some figures on a distant butte and was quite certain it was Ethan Withrow and his men. I raised a hand to them, and one of them waved back. I wondered how much luck they'd been having.

Then we were back down into the defiles and onto a new stretch of badlands we hadn't prospected yet. Two soldiers were
with us now, because we were farther from camp. In the saddle, Daniel Simpson made jerky map notations and took compass readings as we went along. Would Sam be able to find me this far out?

We picketed our horses near some grass and went on by foot, scrabbling up a hill to get our bearings. Once you were out of the maze of defiles, the badlands looked almost orderly. I caught myself looking for him.

On the butte's flat top we discussed how to divide up the terrain for prospecting. I walked off toward the east side and started looking for the easiest place to scramble down into the narrow valley. Sunlight was spreading down the slope, making the sage and the stone glow.

There was a chain of massive, clumped boulders that would make good steps. And then I just stopped, because I realized I wasn't looking at boulders but at the biggest vertebrae I'd ever seen.

It was four days before I found her, she was so far out. I wondered if she was trying to avoid me. There were more people with her than usual, including soldiers. I'd found a good hiding place atop a nearby butte. The narrow valley made it impossible for me to sneak close enough to toss a pebble at her. She was crouched down with her hammer and awl. Hadn't looked up once in the whole time I'd been watching.

And the bones—

Magnificent. So big you couldn't miss them. Great hunks
weathered out, definitely vertebrae, and a couple massive thigh bones. I felt weak with desire. The Black Beauty? Had they found it? Crickets settled near me and deafened me. Mosquitoes feasted on me despite the bacon grease. I didn't care. Their bites didn't itch as much anymore. I waited almost an hour before Rachel walked away from the others, in search of privacy.

I scrambled backward down the far side of the slope. I stood, realized too late my right foot had fallen asleep. Staggered, fell, and rolled down the hill. Got up streaked with dust and lurched on like a hunchback. When I found her, she was seated primly on a rock, about to pull down her underpants. She gasped when she saw me.

“Just me,” I said.

“I thought you were some crazy hermit.”

I brushed myself off a bit. “You've got quite a find there.”

She looked wary. Did she think I was here to spy?

“My father did it,” I blurted, eager to get all this out of the way. “He stole from your quarry.”

She nodded silently. No surprise, but no gloating.

“I had nothing to do with it. I've been trying to figure out some way of proving it to you, but I can't. So I just hope you believe me.”

“I do,” she said.

My head tipped forward in surprise. “Really?”

“Yes. I'm choosing to trust you.”

She made it sound like a cool, unemotional decision. I felt a bit uneasy, but I figured I should be grateful.

She said, “I really do need to have some privacy.”

“Oh. Right.” I walked off a bit, back turned.

“Could you go a bit farther, please?”

“Should I find myself a little hermit cave?”

I walked on, and that seemed to satisfy her.

“Did you have a good look at the quarry?” she asked. She didn't sound suspicious, just excited.

“It's incredible,” I said. “They're huge!”

“The vertebrae were just sitting there! They're not in the best of condition, but just
seeing
them! You can come back now.”

I turned to see her eyes bright and lively. “The femur was the size of my father. Stand it on end and you'd think it was a tree trunk!”

She told me what else they'd uncovered. In my imagination the creature grew and grew—and my relief grew too. This dinosaur was too big for the
rex
my father had calculated. So maybe this thing wasn't the
rex
, just . . . My spirits sagged. Just the
biggest
dinosaur yet. And it belonged to Cartland.

“Tell me what you've found,” she said.

“Do you think you could love me?” I blurted.

The light in her eyes dimmed. She came close and put her hands lightly on my shoulders. “I don't know what I feel. Things take a long time for me, and I'm confused. I just want to dig right now and give my full attention to that.”

“Can you actually do that?”

She nodded. “Mostly, yes. When I'm working, I don't think of much else.”

I nodded, dejected. “I can't. I've been a terrible fossil hunter this past week. If I found the
rex
's skull, I'd probably just trip over it and keep going. Too distracted.”

She smiled faintly. “You are a veritable fount of emotion.”

I felt like I was being mocked. I stepped away from her. “At least I
have
emotions.”

“I can't say what I don't feel.”

It hurt me so much to hear this, I barely knew what I was saying next.

“I would've thought you'd be grateful—”

“Grateful?” she said, eyebrows lifting. “You mean because you're so charming and handsome and I'm so plain?”

“Yes!” I wanted to see her eyes brim. I wanted to see that I could hurt her.

“I know I'm plain,” she said. “This is hardly new or upsetting to me.”

She was like a fortress. Impenetrable. It made me even more furious.

“Your heart's made of the same substance as your teeth!”

She stared back at me, and I wondered if she was going to lash out finally.

“And yet,” she said, “you've managed to burrow your way inside like a clever fox.”

This stopped me. “Was that romantic?”

“My heart is
not
made of enamel,” she said, frowning.

“You said something romantic to me!”

“Not really.”

But she couldn't stop her smile, and there was color deepening in her cheeks.

“You're ridiculous,” she said. “You look like you've won some huge victory.”

That was exactly how I felt. I went to her and kissed her. After a moment she drew back and said, “Listen, I meant what I said. I just want to concentrate on this dig for a while. It's really exciting.”

I nodded, said nothing.

“You'd be excited too. It's a new species! Isn't that why we both came? To pursue our passions? When I saw those bones . . . my heart
thrilled
at it.”

Thrilled. I was jealous of her find, of everything that pulled her attention away from me.

“And that's what I want to think of,” she said. “I worked hard to get here, Samuel—”

“Me too!”

“I know. So let's make the most of it. We're only here for a couple of months. Let's not waste it.”

She was right. Of course she was right. Didn't make me feel one bit better. Just like a scolded child.

“I'm not going to waste it,” I told her.

“This expedition might convince my father to let me go to university.”

I grimaced. “My father wants me to go, and I don't even want to.”

“Then you're an idiot,” she said, her anger startling me.
Now
she was angry. “How lucky you can just throw away an opportunity
I might never get. All you care about is whether
I'm
thinking enough about
you
!”

I stared at her furious face and felt frozen. Didn't know what to do or say. I must've looked pathetic, because her expression softened and she came close and put her arms around me.

“I care about a lot of things,” I said to the top of her head. “I've wanted to find the
rex
since the moment I touched its tooth. I've got a lot of fire in me for that. I just care about you more.”

She kissed me. “If you care about me, it's probably best you don't come round for a bit. Father thinks this could take us weeks to dig out, and starting tomorrow, practically everyone's working here.”

“I don't want to go that long without seeing you.”

“Me neither,” she said. “But it'll be too risky.”

“I'm still going to try,” I said stubbornly.

“All right. But just don't be hurt if I can't get away safely to meet you.”

I shrugged and lied. “I won't be.”

“I can't get caught, Sam. He'll send me back home.”

“I don't want that to happen to you. I'll be careful.”

We kissed again, and she told me she had to go. I wanted to tell her I loved her, but I didn't. Maybe I didn't have the courage. Maybe I still wanted to hurt her. I watched her as she walked away without looking back.

Thunder woke me.

I poked my head from the tent. Lightning made blinding
fissures in the night. The thunder tolled like colossal church bells that had burst from their towers and were cartwheeling straight for us—no buildings or streets or trees to stop them. In the flashes of lightning, the rain writhed like twisting serpents.

It was terrifying, and I loved it. The calamity of it. I completely understood how the Pawnee could believe their great spirit had sent a flood to wash away the world. The wind pummeled the tent, and I heard the pegs straining.

It had been over a week since I'd seen Sam. When I was at work, my mind was focused, but on my way to and from the quarry, I'd look for him in the hills and ravines.

He hadn't called me plain—but he didn't disagree when I had. That night I'd cried in my tent and told myself he was a conceited ass. I'd wanted to put him inside one of my killing jars. I'd keep him all bottled up, perfectly preserved so I could look at his beautiful face and body, and he'd never say anything hurtful or stupid again.

Could I ever love him? He made being in love look so miserable, and like so much
work
. Such a distraction from what I wanted most to be doing right now.

The storm was still directly overhead, its claps so loud I had to put my hands over my ears. The horses neighed, and I heard the shouts of soldiers, lashing things down and telling one another to stay low. I heard Papa bellowing at his students to get back inside. There was a searing crack, and I saw a great cottonwood near the river cleaved in two.

My face and the collar of my nightgown were soaked. I was
more frightened and thrilled than ever before in my life.

And I realized that, more than anything, I wanted to be seeing this with Samuel. To have him beside me, his shoulder against mine, peering out into this wild world, where everything was being broken down, and built anew.

It was still drizzling the next morning. Too wet to prospect or quarry. The clay in the rock made it slippery as soap.

We cleared space inside the covered wagon so we could work out of the rain. We had a couple bones from our latest quarry, and I got busy chipping away the matrix, working like I always worked these days, which meant thinking about Rachel.

“He's made a big find,” Father was saying. “I saw it two days ago in passing. They've got enough vertebrae for the keel of a schooner.”

“Wouldn't be surprised if Cartland set a night sentry,” I said. Scoundrel that he was, I didn't want my father getting shot in the dark.

“I have no designs on it.” Glumly he added, “He'll have to build a new hall at his university to house it. No doubt named after him.”

“It's not the
rex
,” I said. “Sounds too big.”

“Yes,” he agreed, “something that size couldn't be a predator. Too slow. Ours is a predator.”

It could still be ours. Even though Cartland might have the upper hand right now. Even though there were only three of us, looking in a sea of surfaces. I'd find it. Despite everything, that fire had not gone out.

I worked on mechanically. I'd tried to see her again. Once I'd waited for hours and had to leave without getting a chance; another time I couldn't even get close to the quarry, there were so many people and horses coming and going.

After lunch it stopped raining. Hitch tended to the horses. In the soft dirt near our cookstove I took a stick and made a four-by-four grid. Wrote some random letters inside the boxes. I hoped to quiet my mind, have a few minutes without her. Foolish. Every word led me back to her.

Dear.
My dear Rachel. I'm sorry I called you plain. You aren't.

Head.
I sometimes think your head is firmly, resolutely above your heart.

Order.
Something I cannot do with my mind at the moment.

Her.
A pronoun I use all the time now.