Paint the Wind (11 page)

The rope-waving mustangers rode abreast behind the last of the captured horses until the holding pen gate was slammed shut.

“What about Artemisia and Klee?” asked Maya.

Aunt Vi continued to study the confused and anxious horses, milling in the corral. “They're missing.”

Maya blew out a sigh of relief. “That's good, right?”

Aunt Vi put her binoculars in her saddlebag. Her forehead creased with apprehension. “Maybe. Maybe not. If they'd been captured, Maya, I would have had the chance to prove that Artemisia belongs to me. She still carries the ranch brand. But now … without the protection of a stallion, she and Klee are vulnerable.…”

“What could happen to them?” asked Maya.

Aunt Vi looked at her in a way that told her the unimaginable could happen.

They didn't talk on the ride back to the trailer. Or in the truck on the way back to camp. Payton slumped against the passenger door. Aunt Vi stared straight ahead at the road. Maya leaned her head back against the seat and closed her eyes. She could not stop thinking about Artemisia and Klee, nor could she squash her overwhelming desire to get on a horse and ride out to find them.

A
RTEMISIA KNEW WHAT THE SOUND OF THE REPETITIVE
thwapping meant. It meant to run with panic within a frantic throng. It meant bloodied cannons from the crush of hooves, and lather so thick from exertion that it flung into one another's eyes
.

Artemisia's instincts had told her that Klee could not survive the fury, so she had veered away from the cloud of dust and the swath of ground that had been trampled smooth by hundreds of thundering hooves
.

They had been on their own for several days now, wandering north of the gulch toward the Sweetwater River. It was almost dark. A sage grouse flew from a clump of brush. Artemisia lifted her head in the direction of the rustle, her ears contorting
to determine the cause. The wind shifted and she smelled the mountain lion. Artemisia kept close to Klee. With her foal at her side, she galloped toward open land where she would have a chance against an attack. The mountain lion would be alone; it was a solitary creature with no need for companionship. In wide-open space, Artemisia might be able to stave off a single predator
.

Once, from a high ridge, she had watched a mountain lion stalk and kill a pronghorn. The huge cat had stayed downwind and well hidden in the brushy foothills. With its tawny belly close to the ground, it sleuthed forward. Then, it waited, patient and quiet, in the sagebrush. As the intended prey drifted closer, the cat's black-tipped ears twitched and its back swayed. It squatted onto its powerful hind legs and leaped twenty feet to the pronghorn's back. With one vicious bite on the neck, it
immobilized and killed the victim. After satisfying its hunger, the mountain lion covered what was left of the carcass with dirt and leaves to be revisited for future meals
.

Now, the scent grew stronger. A shadow shifted, and Artemisia saw the crouching lion. Her ears flattened and her nostrils flared. She clamped down her tail and squealed a terrifying warning. The cat sprang, and Artemisia felt the eerie, tingling sensation of something swooshing toward her. She reared and met the attacker with pummeling hooves
.

The surprised cat fled
.

Artemisia huddled close to Klee. With swift determination, she chose a path and led him away. They needed to leave the area
.

The mountain lion was hungry and it would stalk them again and again, until it was successful
.

M
AYA AND
P
AYTON HEARD THE DISTINCTIVE THROTTLE
of Moose's truck and raced from the river, side by side, to the campsite. Already free of the cab, Golly bounded toward the two cousins, pouncing at their feet, barking and licking their outstretched hands.

Moose and Fig climbed from the cab and moseyed forward. Moose gave Maya a side-arm hug. “Well, now, how's the frontier girl?”

Her words spewed. “We saw the wild horses. There was a roundup, but it's really called a gather, and Artemisia and Klee … Oh, Klee is Artemisia's new foal.… Well, they're missing. We looked for them all day yesterday but couldn't find them in their usual places. Aunt Vi said they could be anywhere, but we're
determined to keep looking. And guess what? I can lope, really fast.”

“Of course you can,” said Uncle Fig as he held Payton under his arm in a headlock and tousled his hair.

“C'mon, Golly,” said Payton, breaking free. “I'll show you the beaver dam near Maya's tepee.”

He ran toward the river and the dog followed, but Maya stayed back.

Aunt Vi emerged from the office tent, greeted Fig and Moose, and with her usual sense of urgency, passed supplies from the bed of the truck to any willing hands. Maya accepted a bag of groceries and walked alongside them toward the campsite.

“Is this the same girl we left out here a few weeks back?” asked Moose.

Maya smiled and nodded.

“Can't be,” said Fig. “This girl is a little taller, got more color in her face, and can lope really fast.”

“You two stop pestering,” said Aunt Vi. “Part of her is new and part of her is the same. Once I got her on a horse, she found her heart, just like her mother.”

They dropped off the bags in the pantry and headed back to the truck for another load.

“So the story you told us about the horses … that true, Maya?” asked Moose.

“Yes. I'm not lying, am I, Aunt Vi?”

“You can believe every word she says these days.”

“Vi, you think Artemisia and her colt could be along the river?” asked Fig.

They paused over the truck bed.

“I don't know,” said Aunt Vi. “I'm not sure why they weren't with the herd during the gather. Since Artemisia
was captured once before, maybe she shied at the sound of the helicopter. Months ago, I saw her band at a clearing near the river a few times, which was an odd place for them to be since it's so far from their usual range. Artemisia might migrate back there out of habit. Or she might go someplace completely different if she felt threatened.”

“Aunt Vi says that it would be hard for them to survive without the protection of a stallion,” said Maya, her voice sounding forlorn and desperate. “But now there's not that many stallions because of the gather. And horses want to be around other horses. And one of the saddest things on earth is a wild horse without a family. They just wander around, sad and lonely … until maybe something bad happens.”

“Well, then, we'd better get them back, Maya-bird,”
said Moose, handing her another bag of groceries. He turned to Aunt Vi. “That horse is branded and rightfully yours.”

“I know. If they've been taken into another band,” said Aunt Vi, “I'll leave them in the wild. But if they're struggling on their own, I'd sure like to bring them here.”

“Yes … we'd like to bring them here,” repeated Maya. “Can we go looking for them after lunch?” she asked. “Please?”

Moose looked toward The Winds and pointed. “We can … unless that weather catches up to us.”

Veiled fingers of purple and black descended from the sky. The rain pelted. Clouds flashed and tossed thunderous accusations back and forth. The plastic chairs around the campfire were moved into the kitchen tent
where the campers hunkered together. Moose and Fig dashed out to feed the horses and dig trenches to redirect encroaching puddles.

After two days of intermittent downpours, and what seemed like hundreds of card games with Payton, listening for hours to Moose read from a Louis L'Amour novel, and Uncle Fig's lessons on the Latin names of the flora and fauna of Wyoming, Maya tired of the kitchen tent.

She poked her head into the field office, where Aunt Vi was catching up on her work. “Can I come in?”

“Be my guest. I was wondering how long you'd last in there with the boys.”

Maya looked around at the haphazard untidiness. Aunt Vi sat on a folding chair at the desk. Slick-covered horse magazines littered the floor. On the canvas walls, Aunt Vi had pinned an array of photographs of the
wild horses, with their names scrawled across the borders.

“You need any help?” asked Maya.

“Make any amount of order out of this chaos and I'll be grateful. I'd love to have those boxes unpacked. I'm working on an article called ‘The Native Horse Through the Artist's Eye' for a journal, and then I need to start on my fall lesson plans for my art history classes.”

Lightning flashed and illuminated the tent. Maya held her breath until the thunder crashed around them.

Aunt Vi continued to work, unconcerned.

Maya took a deep breath and began to unpack the boxes, taking out oversize art books, one by one, smoothing her hand across each cover: John Singer Sargent, Artemisia Gentileschi, Olaf Seltzer, George Catlin, Charles Russell, N. C. Wyeth, Mary Cassatt.…

Maya smiled and examined the photos of the wild horses pinned to the walls of the tent, matching them with the corresponding art books. She studied a photo of a black stallion with a white blaze and white stockings. “Aunt Vi, this looks like the horse my father painted.”

“You're right. That's Remington. Isn't he magnificent? He's tried to steal Artemisia from Sargent's band a few times but has never succeeded. Horses have their own personalities, their own ways to get what they want.”

“Like people?” asked Maya.

“It's more the other way around. People are like horses. Sargent is more of a warrior. He doesn't hesitate to fight to get what he wants. Remington would protect his own, but his approach to getting his way is different. He's a patient opportunist, waiting until a stallion drops
his guard before moving in. I still see Remington, racing along the top of a ridge with a few bachelors. He doesn't have a mare yet. It would be nice if he was still pining for Artemisia. She and Klee could use the protection.” Aunt Vi stood and stretched. “I'm going to make a sandwich. You hungry?”

Maya shook her head. She stacked the magazines into neat piles, with their spines all facing the same direction. She aligned the books alphabetically and straightened the reports and papers. There was something satisfying in putting it all to order for Aunt Vi, and Maya found herself humming.

While sorting a stack of files, she came across a tattered envelope of photos. The contents caused her to stop and sink cross-legged to the ground. She laid the series of photographs in a line: Maya's mother with Aunt
Vi in front of a split-rail fence, their arms around each other; a four-year-old Maya holding Moose's hand and walking in the pasture; Maya and Payton on Fig's lap in a porch rocker; her mother riding Artemisia bareback, with nothing more than a rope around the horse's barrel. And a duplicate of the photo Maya had in her shoe box.

Maya gathered the pictures, tucked them inside her jacket, and dashed through the rain and mud to the kitchen tent. She found Moose reading and Uncle Fig and Payton playing checkers.

She handed the photographs to Moose. “What's that rope on Artemisia?”

He studied the photo. “Maya-bird, I'd forgotten about that. We called it a Comanche Coil. Tribes of the Great Plains Indians used this technique to ride without
a saddle or reins. They wrapped a rope around the horse in a giant belly loop, sat bareback, and tucked their knees under the rope on either side. They held on by slipping a hand underneath the rope where it crossed the withers. The American Indians were such great horsemen that they could hunt and fight wars from that position.”

Fig looked up from the checkers game. “We told your mother about the belly loop and she couldn't rest until she tried it. Ellie was fearless.”

“Like me?” asked Payton.

“No,” said Fig, grinning. “You're fearless like a bull in a china shop. Ellie was fearless but kept her wits about her. She always wanted to try something new but she thought about it carefully before she did it.”

Maya leaned on Moose's arm as he flipped through
the photographs. He reached the one of her mother on Artemisia, laughing and waving. “I remember this. Know who your mom was smiling and waving at?”

Maya shook her head.

“It was you,” said Moose. “I was holding you in my arms and a hawk flew overhead, round and round in circles. You burst out in a fit of giggles, pointing to the sky. Ellie was so tickled with your reaction that she started laughing out loud, too, and Aunt Vi took the picture.”

Maya stared at the photo. Her mother had been waving to
her? She
had been the one to make her mother so happy? A kernel of contentment planted itself in her mind. She slid away from Moose's side and pulled back the window flap on the tent. Showers swept across the campsite, but she looked beyond the curtains of water. She could already imagine Artemisia and Klee in the
corral. She would feed them and pet them. She would talk to them, too, and tell them a thousand little things. She even imagined herself riding Artemisia, like her mother had.

“When can we look for Artemisia and Klee?” she asked.

“As soon as this rain lets up, Maya,” said Moose. “And I hope it stops soon or we'll all be in the river.”

The earth sopped up the relentless water from the clouds, and the river brimmed with renewed energy. Mornings brought more riding lessons and sometimes fishing with Fig and Moose. Afternoons, Aunt Vi, Maya, and Payton took long rides to search for Artemisia and Klee. They rode for miles on one of the California pioneer trails. They paralleled an old railroad grade. They
trailered to the Elkhorn Draw and back out to the Honeycomb Buttes. At first, when they arrived back in camp without news, they remained optimistic. But after several weeks, they returned from their searches quiet and pensive.

Payton stopped going with them, preferring to stay at camp with Fig and Moose. Aunt Vi told Maya they needed to take a break from the long rides so she could catch up on her work and give the horses a rest. But Maya didn't give up hope. Every night before she went to sleep, she took out the little black stallion, swept it above her head, and whispered, “Don't worry, Artemisia. I am coming for you.”