The Captive Heart (15 page)

El Pantera's eyes sparkled in the freshening firelight, and his lips curled as he hissed, “Would you ruin my prize, Ramirez?”

The weasel tried to crab backward, to put some distance between himself and the glowing spear, but El Pantera planted a foot in his middle and held him down. Rachel found it hard to breathe with the bandit on top of her and her mouth plugged. She shifted a little and somehow managed to fill her lungs.

Rubbing a still-smoking jaw, the weasel's voice came out high-pitched and quivering, pleading for his life.

“I would have done her no harm, my captain. I only wanted—”

The burning branch inched closer and cut off his words. He squirmed in terror.

El Pantera seethed, his white eye glowing in the firelight. “Do you know what your moment of fun would do to the price of this girl when she is sold?
Do you?
”

The weasel's head vibrated, a quick and fearful no.

“I thought not. You nearly cost me a lot of money, Ramirez. You are a short-sighted fool, and if you cost me money,
fool
, it will cost you your life. Are you prepared to die for this girl?”

The smoldering spear inched closer as he spoke, and even Rachel shrank from the mental picture of what might be about to happen to the weasel. The terror in his eyes told her he saw the same picture.

“No, my captain.” It was a hoarse whisper.

El Pantera wavered, then casually tossed the branch into the fire. With one hand he reached down and grabbed the smaller man by the collar and flung him into the darkness. The weasel hit the ground with a grunt and rolled, then skittered off toward the trees like a wounded spider.

El Pantera knelt down and untied the bandanna, pulled the rag from her mouth.

“Are you . . . unharmed?”

She nodded. “Sí.”

“Get some sleep,” he said, then rose and walked away.

She waited several minutes, afraid to move, afraid to breathe, afraid some new horror might descend upon her. Finally, when all was quiet, she rolled over and scooted up to the scrubby pine sapling to relieve the pressure of the handcuffs. Her hands were numb. Curling herself into a ball at the base of the tree, she pulled her hair about her face and tried to make herself small. She fervently wished she could just disappear.

Thoughts of home flooded her mind. She saw Jake's smiling eyes and prayed again that he would not come after her. He would never fight these men; he would only try to reason with them, and then they would kill him. Her mother's face came to her, praying, agonizing, perhaps never knowing what had become of her daughter.

Rachel wept softly in the darkness and prayed for Aaron, that by some miracle he might live. Then she wept and prayed for someone to find Ada and Little Amos before it was too late. When the red streaks of dawn stretched over the mountaintops she cried and begged for a swift end to deliver her from the coming evil, and for Gott to give her poor mother a measure of peace.

Chapter 21

A
da awoke with a chill. Pitch-black. Clouds covered the moon and she couldn't see her own hands. Something had awakened her, but she didn't know what it was. At night the fog came in a dark red tide, creeping in from the edges of her eyes and bringing the hum with it. She wrapped her arms around herself and started to rock. Something was not right. Her memory worked well enough, or so it seemed. Spurred by throbbing knees and a hundred dire pains from torn feet to skinned elbows, her plight showed itself to her right away. She knew she was lost, and she remembered why. But something else was wrong, and it refused to be coaxed to the front of her mind.

The air was perfectly still, as if the world held its breath. Total silence, total blackness. The unknown surrounded her. She began to rock harder until a little squeak of a sound came to her, faint and distant.

She stopped rocking and listened. There it was again, like a baby crying, far away. It was only then that she realized her arms were wrapped tight about her and there was no child in them.

Little Amos!

The cry came again, piercing the red hum.

To her right, somewhere. She turned her head, listening, and when it came again she knew the direction. Pushing herself to her feet she forgot to be afraid—until she found that she couldn't walk. There was no ground, no sky, no rocks or trees, no stars. Only black space, the whole world a yawning pit of unknown, waiting to swallow her, to throw her off a cliff. Ada tried to take a step, but she couldn't make her foot go down without knowing what lay beneath it. Holding her arms out in front of her, she tried sliding her feet so they stayed in contact with the earth, though her head felt vulnerable. Her eyes widened, yet there was only blackness and she didn't know what demons might dive at her like bats. Afraid to stay and afraid to go, she stood still until the red hum swelled and she began to hyperventilate.

Again she heard the baby's cry, fainter this time but still in the same direction. From the distance behind her, she heard the yip of a coyote and a chill ran down her spine. Coyotes steal babies and
eat
them.

She couldn't let that happen. Slowly, groping with splayed fingers, she knelt down until she found the ground. Lowering herself onto her hands and knees, she began to crawl. It was easier with her hands because she could feel her way. Crawling, she ignored the complaints of her battered knees and inched her way toward the sound. The going was slow and painful, but she would not stop. The coyote yipped again, and was answered by another, closer. Still, she did not stop.

She might have crawled for hours, she didn't know, but his cries kept getting louder until finally she was near enough to hear Little Amos whimpering right there in front of her. She reached out, expecting to touch his warm little body, but her hand landed on nothing. He was right there—
somewhere
. She could hear him breathing, yet her hand landed on thin air. She drew her hand back and slid it forward from her knee, keeping contact with the rock. Her fingers found the edge of a little drop-off. Lying flat on her belly, she reached down into the blackness beyond the lip. Her hand, groping, touched the cloth of his coat and her fist closed about it.

Hoisting Little Amos over the lip of the rock, she gathered him to her breast and wrapped her coat around him, rocking, moaning.

He smelled. Ada knew what that was—she'd smelled it often enough through a lifetime of babies, but her mother always fixed it. Mamm always knew what to do.

But Mamm was not here. Mamm was far away, and she was probably asleep. Still, Ada had seen it enough times to memorize it, so she decided to fix it herself, even if she couldn't see. First, she took off his coat and spread it out like a blanket. When she went to smooth out the coat, her hand found a lump and fished in his pocket to see what it was.

The harmonica. She stuck it in the pocket of her dress and laid Amos down on his back. In total darkness her hands pulled his suspenders down, took off his pants. She folded the diaper and used it to wipe him, the way she had seen her mother do a million times.

The coyote yipped again.
Much
closer. Another one answered from a different direction. Ada dropped the diaper and snatched up the baby. The clouds parted and a half-moon began to cast a dim light over the rocky landscape. Swaying and moaning, hugging the child, now she could see shapes moving in the dark, hear the clicking of toenails against rock.

There were more than two, and they were circling her.

She was surrounded. There was nowhere to run.

One of them stopped, a faint patch of blackness only slightly darker than the bare rock around it. She would not have known it was there at all if she hadn't seen it moving. The silhouette narrowed, turning, creeping straight toward her.

Ada whimpered and closed her eyes, dreading what was about to come. She squeezed Little Amos tight.

“Shhhh, little one. Gott knows.”

Because of Little Amos her own fears remained in check and she didn't go away from herself. It was because of him that she thought of the harmonica. The harmonica was happy, and it loved him. It would ease his fears until the last. She pulled it from her pocket, put it to her lips, and blew.

There was a sudden flurry as a coyote scrambled. He had been right in front of her, only a step or two away, and she heard toenails skittering on rock as the dark shape beat a quick retreat. She blew again, louder. The shadow withdrew further, turned broadside to her, and stood watching from a distance.

Little Amos giggled and tried to take the harmonica. Snatching it from him, Ada blew it again. Honking. She had no idea how to make a tune on the instrument, nor did she care. She merely put it to her mouth and blew as hard as she could, over and over.

Every time the coyotes started to circle, closing in on her, she blew the harmonica. For a long time it worked and they stayed away, but then they seemed to grow accustomed to it. They learned that the noise did them no harm and they began to ignore it, once again trotting steadily in an ever-closing circle. They wanted Little Amos.

Again, her hope faded. She could see them now, approaching cautiously, haltingly, sniffing, and the red fog nearly closed off her sight. One of the coyotes dashed in and danced away with the dirty diaper, and then two others merged with his shadow and fought over it. The three growled at each other, tugged and ripped at the diaper until finally one of them slung it to the side. Abandoning it, they turned back toward Ada.

But beyond the coyotes, she caught a glimpse of a larger shadow, rushing as silent as an owl in flight, low across the rock behind the coyotes. The quiet was shattered by a coyote yelp that merged with a chilling scream, the beginning of a great snarling, snapping racket. The coyotes darted away from her, silhouettes dashing toward the fight.

They were all gone. All of them. She knew they weren't far away, for her head rattled with the clamor of a furious battle just a stone's throw from where she sat, but at least for the moment they were not watching
her
.

Clutching Little Amos, she pushed herself to her feet and moved away, tiptoeing at first, then running. There was nothing to follow. She had forgotten the wagon tracks and would not have seen them anyway in the dark. She just ran.

And ran.

When she was out of breath, she slowed to a walk, panting, listening for the coyotes. She could no longer hear them. Afraid to sit down and rest for fear the coyotes would come again, she kept staggering forward.

Keep moving
, her inner voice repeated.
Find Mary.

She felt she had walked far enough to be back in Ohio. Her breath returned, but her arms ached from carrying Little Amos, and they began to droop. Just when she thought she could go no farther, she heard that scream again, echoing from canyon walls. It was far behind her now, yet the sound still curdled her spine and put the spurs to her. On legs driven by terror, looking back over her shoulder, she ran headlong into something that did not yield.

It knocked her backward and she fell heavily. When she rolled over and sat up, gathering the crying child against her, she looked up to see a Mexican standing in front of her. In the pale moonlight he was no more than a blackness, an uncertain silhouette like the coyotes, but she could make out the shape of a sombrero on his head. One hand was on his hip, the other pointed to her right.

She blinked and stared, shushing the baby.

The Mexican didn't move. As her eyes adjusted she saw him a little better and thought maybe it was not a man after all. Slowly, holding Little Amos, she rose and crept closer to the Mexican. An arm's length away, she began to think maybe he was a tree.

Her shaking, probing hand found the rough surface of a shattered pine with a broken flap of bark lying across the top that in the dark, in silhouette, might look a little like a sombrero. The arms were all that was left of the tree's dry, broken limbs. Hitching Little Amos higher on her shoulder, she started to go around the tree, but her toe caught on a rock and kicked it loose.

The rock bounced once . . . and disappeared. Silence, as if it had vanished. Leaning over, holding on to the limb for support, she saw that the dead tree clung to the very edge of a sheer cliff. She couldn't see the bottom, but she could tell it was a long way down.

Ada backed away and sat heavily on the ground, staring, trembling.

This tree was her friend. She didn't question it, or even think about it. She simply accepted that the tree had kept her from running over the cliff. If she had run off the cliff, Little Amos would have gotten hurt and she would be in trouble. The tree had stopped her. He had saved her from trouble because he chose to, because he wanted to. He was her friend.

“Thank you,” she mumbled, because her mother had taught her to say it.

When she tried to gather up Little Amos to walk some more she found her arms too tired and achy to hold him. She couldn't even lift him. Lying on her side, she drew him into her coat, for his skin felt cold. Ada had no idea where his coat and pants had gone, but now the child was wearing only a shirt, and his legs were freezing.

Little Amos wouldn't stop shivering, even inside her coat. When Ada was cold her mamm always wrapped her in a blanket. She needed a blanket for Little Amos.

In a rare blinding flash of inspiration she sat up and started tearing the skirt from her dress. Underneath it she still wore a heavy cotton slip, so she could tear off the skirt without having to “run around naked.” She'd never quite understood why, but Mamm didn't like it when she ran around naked. The dress was old, the seam frayed, so her skirt tore off easily. Sitting spraddle-legged on the rock, she laid Amos in the middle of the cloth, bound it around him several times and then drew him up against her, inside her coat again.

But her arms gave out quickly, exhausted from hours of carrying the thirty-pound child. She laid him down in her lap and let her weary arms fall limp at her sides. He seemed content, though he still shivered a little. But as he lay there, she noticed the pointed corners of the dark torn cloth against the white cotton of her slip, and it was as if they called to her.

She had seen native women carry their babies in bundles like this without using their hands. They tied the corners of a blanket together and hung the bundle around their necks.

She tried it. She fought with the loose corners for a long time, trying to figure out how to make a knot like the native women, but she couldn't do it. When she had given up and sat slumped over with her eyes closed, puffing in frustration, her hands returned to the cloth all by themselves. She had forgotten what her hands knew. Long ago her hands had learned to tie her shoes, but only if she didn't think about it. She kept her eyes closed tight, thinking only of shoes, and when she opened them again, the cloth was knotted.

She stuck her head through the hole and tested the knot with her neck.

It held.

Slowly, for she was bone-weary and hurting in every joint and pore, she stumbled to her feet, groaning. Little Amos hung nicely against her belly. Fastening her coat around him as best she could, she grinned proudly at the little round face peeking out at her.

It was his face that reminded Ada of her mission. Though her memory was porous and most things eventually fell through the holes, looking at Little Amos summoned one last clear purpose.

Find Mary.

But there was a sheer cliff in front of her. She couldn't go any farther; she must turn one way or the other. But which way led to Mary? Ada had no idea where she was, let alone which direction she needed to go.

Lost and confused, she stared blankly at the gnarled, broken tree for a minute before her mind once again conjured a sombrero on his head, arms at his sides, and she remembered that the tree was her friend. His arm had been pointing to the right the whole time, waiting patiently for her to notice.

Smiling broadly, she blew her friend a twisted note on the harmonica, then waved goodbye and staggered off to the right.