Santa Fe Woman (9 page)

“It’ll take about three months. You have to time your trip by the grass.”

“What do you mean by the grass?” Kate said. “What does that have to do with this?”

“Your stock has to be fed. If there’s no grass, they’ll starve. So, you need to leave early spring when the grass is turning green. But before you leave you’ve got to get your wagons, your stock, your drivers, and whatever freight it is you’re going to haul out there. And I’ll tell you right now, not many first-class drivers want to risk their hides on the Santa Fe Trail. They’d rather haul freight back East without the dangers of Indians.” He suddenly looked at Leland and asked, “How much money do you have?”

Rocklin’s abrupt question disturbed them all, but Leland said, “Not enough, I suppose. We might could raise ten thousand dollars.”

“Well, you’ll need it all and then some.”

“What do we do first?” Jori asked, hating to feel helpless.

“Someone has to buy the wagons and the livestock and hire the skinners.”

“We don’t know how to do any of that,” Mark said. Despair was on his face. “I think we’re crazy to try it.”

“No, we’re not crazy,” Kate said suddenly. “God is going to be with us.”

Her words brought Rocklin’s head around. “You really believe that, ma’am?”

“I surely do. Are you a man of God?”

“I’m sorry to say I’m not.”

“Well, I’ll pray that you will be. God gave me a vision of us going on this trip, and I believe it. He’ll take care of us.”

“But we don’t know how to buy anything,” Leland said. “Rocklin, you’ll have to buy the wagons and the livestock. If you’ll tell me what we’ll need that’ll sell best in Santa Fe, I can take care of that.”

Jori suddenly said, “I’ll go with Rocklin to buy the wagons and the stock and handle the money.”

“You’ll have to tell me what to buy,” Leland said.

“Well, a wagon will hold about five thousand pounds. You don’t want to haul heavy items. They wouldn’t sell in Santa Fe anyhow.”

“Well, what would they buy?”

“Cloth and other staples, as lightweight as possible. They like cloth, and some special foods that are lightweight. I’ll help you with that.”

The enormity of the undertaking seemed to have stunned them all. Kate looked around the table and suddenly laughed. “All of us look a little bit green.”

“It’s a big thing,” Mark said biting his lip. “I’m still not sure we ought to do it.”

“I think we don’t have any choice,” Jori said abruptly.

Kate said, “You know, when you leave a place it’s best to leave it quick and be done with it.”

Rocklin suddenly smiled. He liked this woman very much. If a woman had to go on a wagon train, he knew this was the kind that would make it. She showed the signs of rough living, and he knew that she would last better than the others.

“I reckon you’re right about that. I have a friend that had dogs that had to have bobbed tails. He told me one time he heard of a fellow that used to cut off their tails an inch at a time which
would be misery for the dogs for a long time. No, better just get it all done at once.”

Jori said, “When do we start, Rocklin?” Now that it was settled she was ready to go, and she did her best to put her doubts behind her.

“We’re ready for sunup in the morning,” Rocklin said cheerfully.

He rose suddenly, saying, “I know you folks will want to talk this over a lot. It’s not too late to back out. No shame in that. It’ll be tougher than any of you think.” He turned and grinned. “How would you like to ride my big red horse, Miss Carleen?”

“Yeah!” Carleen yelled. She jumped up and dashed out of the house followed by Rocklin.

As soon as the door closed, Leland sat down and looked rather pale. “I don’t mind telling you I’m a little bit shaky about all this.”

Jori knew that she would have to be strong. “It’ll be fine, Papa,” she said. “Don’t you worry about it. Rocklin and I will start getting the wagons and the livestock. We’ll need to be out of this place pretty soon anyhow.”

“And we’ve got to go all the way to Missouri just to start,” Mark said. He rubbed his chin, and there was a doubtful look in his eye. “I wish we were there.”

Kate said nothing. She was looking at this family of hers. She knew they were soft and had never had to endure any hardship. Memories of her own childhood and early girlhood when things were harder than these soft city dwellers could imagine came to her.
Well, Lord,
she prayed silently,
You’ll just have to toughen them
up because they’ll need it before we get to Santa Fe.

A SMALL DELICATE BIRD with black and white ladder-back stripes made a syncopated sound as Jori leaned up against the rails of the corral. Ordinarily she was delighted to find a new species of bird, but she gave this one a bleak look then pressed her forehead against the top rail of the corral.
I’ve never been so tired
in my whole life.
The thought seemed to move slowly through her mind. It made her suddenly believe that her whole thought process was like a river of mud moving no more than a few feet a day.

As she leaned her forehead against the roughness of the post, she tried to think of how many days she had been doing something like this with Rocklin. It came to her that when the two of them had started out to locate mules and wagons the weather had been cold, but the days that rolled by turned into weeks and now the promise of spring was in the air. It was hot now, and the dust from the corral seemed to settle on her, coating her hair, making her eyes gritty, and even getting into her mouth. She suddenly turned her head to one side and spit in as ladylike a fashion as such an act was possible. Lifting her head wearily, she saw Rocklin walking around a large mule held by a man in the dirtiest clothes that Jori had ever seen.
How can he be interested
in another mule? We must have looked at every mule in Arkansas!
But Rocklin never seemed happy unless he had examined every point of the animals that they had seen.

Finally she saw him nod, begin speaking, and knew that he was negotiating the price for the four mules he had picked out. This debate, she knew, might go on for some time, so turning, she walked over toward the buggy, opened the top of the keg full of water, and dipped into it with a tin cup. She drank thirstily though the water was tepid and had a bitter taste to it. “We’ve got to find some better way than this to carry water,” she muttered, then put the cup back, covered the water keg, and climbed up in the seat. She was so tired she dozed off almost at once, and when the buggy suddenly swayed, she turned quickly to find Rocklin had taken his seat beside her. The fine dust from the corral coated his face, but he seemed not to notice it. “We got four fine animals,” he nodded with satisfaction.

“How many more do we have to have?”

“I reckon this will just about do it.” He made no move to pick up the lines but sat there, a loose-bodied man with the marks of hard work on his tan hands and face. She once had seen him remove his shirt, and his body was white, making his hands and face look like a pair of gloves and a mask. A fly buzzed around his head, and he brushed it away absently. “I reckon you’ve seen enough mules to do you, haven’t you, Miss Hayden?”

“Oh, for heaven sake, call me Jori!” she said. There was irritation in her voice, and she pulled her shoulders up and asked irritably, “Are we going back home now?”

“Just one more stop to make.”

“Where’s that? To look at more mules?”

“No. I heard about a good mule skinner that lives down the road a piece. Williamson said he was a dandy, and we’re short at least one skinner.”

“What about the wagons?”

“They’ll be waiting for us in Little Rock. Al Blanchard made a good deal. I trust his judgment anytime.”

“All right. Let’s go as quick as we can.”

He suddenly grinned at her and said, “You’re doing better than I figured.”

“You didn’t think I could do it?”

“Well, you’ve never done anything like it, have you?”

That was true enough,
Jori thought, but she hated to admit it. “You don’t have to worry about me on the trail if that’s what you’re thinking.”

Rocklin did not argue. He never did, Jori had noticed. He seemed fresh, and, although they had missed much sleep in their travels to find the animals and assemble a crew, he almost never seemed to be weary. Now he picked up the lines and said, “Williamson will deliver the mules to Little Rock. That was part of the deal. We don’t have time to babysit them, but they’re fine animals.”

He picked up the lines, slapped them on the team, and left at once at a fast trot. As they moved along at a brisk pace, Jori swayed back and forth, determined not to let him know that she was so tired she was almost sick. “How do you like this kind of a life, Jori?”

“I don’t like it at all. It’s something I have to do.”

He did not look at her but was watching a hawk sailing high in the sky. “There’s the fellow I admire. He’s got all the room in the world to move around in. Doesn’t have to worry about paying rent, anything like that. He’s got it made.”

She did not reply and was dozing when he surprised her by saying, “Carleen tells me you were going to get married.”

“That’s right.”

“What happened?”

“It’s a personal thing.” She was suddenly irritated. “Don’t you understand that, Rocklin? Some things are none of your business.”

“I’m just plumb nosy, I guess. Men are nosy creatures.” He grinned slyly and added innocently. “They get it from their mothers, I reckon.”

Rocklin had a way of irritating Jori although it was nothing she could put her finger on. He seemed amused at her efforts to learn about mules and about everything else that had been completely out of her sphere.

“What about you? Were you ever married?”

“Oh, that’s personal,” he said soberly.

“Yes, it is. What about this mule skinner?”

“His name is Lonnie Fortier. He comes from New Orleans, but he’s been around here for a few years.”

She asked no more questions, and half an hour later as they pulled off onto a side road, Rocklin said, “That’s the house if I got my instructions right.”

The house was little more than a shack. Smoke was curling up from a crooked stove pipe, and the yard was littered with tin cans and trash of every description. Rocklin pulled the team up and was about to get out of the wagon when two men suddenly came out.

“What do you want?” the taller of the two asked.

“Lookin’ for Lonnie Fortier. My name’s Rocklin.”

“He’s dead,” the taller man said. “I’m Dixon Bragg, and this is my brother Duke. This is our place now. He was our cousin.”

“What did you want with him?” the smaller man named Duke said.

“Wanted to hire him to do some mule skinnin’.”

“Well, he’s past all that,” Duke said. “You can move on if that’s all you want.”

The smaller man was staring at Jori. He was a sly-looking man with shifty eyes. “How are you doin’, sweetheart?”

Jori did not answer, and the large man named Dixon laughed. “That’s a pretty fancy woman you got there. She yours?”

“I’m not anybody’s,” Jori said and was instantly sorry that she had spoken.

Duke started to say something else, but suddenly a movement behind him caused him to whirl. “Get back in that house!” he yelled.

Rocklin straightened up and saw a young boy break from the house and start running desperately. The two men instantly leaped forward and grabbed him. The larger of them slapped the young fellow in the face. It was a meaty sound and knocked the boy’s hat off.

Only it was not a lad, Rocklin saw. Long black hair suddenly spilled out, and he caught a glimpse of a thin face filled with determination and fright. She fought silently, and Dixon held his hand back to slap her again.

“Hold it right there, Bragg,” Rocklin demanded.

Bragg kept hold of the girl’s arm. He whirled and said, “Git on your way!”

“Didn’t you hear me? I told you to let that girl go.”

Dixon merely cursed him, and without warning Rocklin suddenly pulled a pistol from his left side and, without appearing to aim, fired it. Dixon let out a shrill scream, and his leg suddenly collapsed.

The other Bragg started to go for his gun that he wore on his side, but Chad fired before he could. The shot plucked his hat off. “The next time I’ll shoot your eye out, Bragg.” He got down and walked over toward the two.

“You shot me in the leg!” Dixon yelled. “I’ll kill you for that!”

“Shut up,” Chad said, “or I’ll finish the job.” He turned to the girl. “What’s going on here? Who are you?”

“I’m Callie Fortier. Lonnie Fortier was my pa.”

“She’s our cousin,” Dixon Bragg said. He had gotten to his feet and looked down balefully at the wound in his leg. It was merely a flesh wound, but hatred flared in his eyes. “She stays here with us.”

“He is no blood kin to me—no!” There was a foreign flavor to the girl’s speech, Rocklin noted.

“Where’s your mother?” he asked.

“She’s dead. They came and took this place and say it’s theirs. They—they try to bother me.” She cast a look at the Braggs and said, “Let me go with you. I can’t stay with them.”

“Sure. Get your things,” Chad Rocklin said. He kept his gun down at his side.

“You can’t take that girl,” Duke Bragg said.

“You open your mouth one more time and I’ll put you down, Bragg.”

Bragg opened his mouth to speak, but something he saw in the tall man’s face stopped him. He looked down at his gun that lay in the dust, and at once Rocklin reached over and picked it up. He took the gun away from the other Bragg and tossed them into the back of the buggy. He turned then and waited. “I’ll throw the guns out when I’m a mile away from this place.”

“I’ll kill you, you can bet on it,” Duke Bragg grated.

Even as he spoke, the young woman came out. She had a bundle in her right hand. “Get in the buggy,” he said. He waited until the girl had scrambled into the backseat then got in himself. The Braggs suddenly started shouting at him, and Rocklin
laughed and fired twice. The dust blew up at the feet of the two, and they yelled and backed off. Rocklin laughed and struck the horses, who started out with a violent jerk.