The Wolf Tree (26 page)

Ray turned back to Gigi. “I’m sorry, but you’ve got to do like Marisol asked. We’ll find you soon.”

Gigi stared at them. “You’ll find me in Chicago?”

“We will.” Marisol smiled, climbing up into Unole’s saddle. She held a hand out and Ray climbed on behind her.

They circled the horses around and waved to Gigi. The boy watched them with welling eyes.

The wind whipped Marisol’s long black hair about her face. She held it down as she turned back to Ray. “I hope we’re not making a mistake leaving him here.”

“Me too,” he said.

Shaking the reins, Marisol headed off into the Darkness after Redfeather, following the steamcoach as it rolled across the prairie.

16
COYOTES

S
ALLY WAS COLD
. A
ND SHE WAS TIRED
. B
UT MOSTLY
she was hungry.

The sun was setting over the prairie. She tucked into the windbreak of a hill to escape the lonely vastness. Opening
The Incunabula of Wandering
, she angled the page to catch the last red rays of sunlight.

The
Incunabula
had been enormously helpful on her journey so far. When she reached Knoxville, she decided the quickest way west would be by train. But she did not have enough money and knew that a girl riding so far by train would attract attention from the conductors and porters.

The
Incunabula
provided the answer.

She had marked the page long ago describing how agar-agar could make you completely unnoticed by those around you. It was as good as being invisible. After inquiring in
several stores, she found a pharmacist who stocked the powdered seaweed. Holding a bit in her hand and concentrating on being like a shadow, she simply walked past the ticket collector and onto the train.

But the effect was temporary, and by the time she reached Iowa City, the powers had waned. She could find no shop that sold agar-agar anywhere in the town. She had no idea how much farther she would have to go. The rabbit’s foot simply pointed toward the west. How was she to find her father? She needed another way to travel.

Again the
Incunabula
had an answer.

Sally remembered Ray using a “foot powder” charm to command a panther. Searching through the
Incunabula
, Sally found instructions for collecting the dirt where a person’s foot made an impression on the ground. Sally wandered around the town, looking for someone to try the charm on. At last she spied a tinker, with a wagon full of goods, speaking to a woman. While the tinker was busy selling the woman a skillet, Sally scooped his footprint from the dust in the street into a wide-mouthed bottle. When the little, gray-whiskered man finished his sale, Sally sidled up to him and said she needed a ride. He asked in a friendly voice where she was going. When she said west, he said he had a sister in Neligh, Nebraska, he’d been wanting to visit.

For nearly a week, she rode with him and his clattering orchestra of swinging pots and pans. Sally tried not to feel guilty about forcing the man to take her so far. After all, he had said he wanted to visit his sister—but would he have
decided to do that if Sally hadn’t trapped his footprint in the jar? She had to keep going west, and she couldn’t risk riding with a stranger without some assurance for her safety.

Once she reached Neligh and said farewell to the tinker, Sally decided against using the foot-powder charm again. Besides, the rabbit’s foot—turning slowly in her palm until the tiny claws were pointing out the direction—told her to go west. There was nothing in that direction but open prairie. She would have to walk. That’s what Ray would have done. That’s what her father would have done. If she was to be a Rambler, she would have to act like one.

Seven days later, huddled alone on the darkening prairie, she wished Ray were there to help her. She slammed the
Incunabula
closed. She could uncover lost spells and obscure charms from her father’s book. But what the
Incunabula
didn’t tell her was how to make a fire, how to find food, how to keep warm.

She was not a Rambler.

She reached into her rucksack and took out her bag of food. Only an apple, a biscuit that had gone stale, and a sliver of cheese remained. She bit into the brick-hard biscuit and chewed until her jaw felt like it would fall off. Even after she finished it, her empty stomach felt tight as a fist, but she knew she needed to save the rest of the food. Who knew how much farther she would have to go.

Shivering beneath her blanket, Sally suffered through another sleepless night.

*   *   *

She walked all day and did not see a single homestead. Nor a single tree. Where was she going? Where was her father?

The day was warm, with a blue, cloudless sky overhead. Cresting a hill, she looked to the south as she ate the last apple. She could still see the strange dark band covering the sky.

The Darkness.

She wondered about Ray and Marisol, hoping they had reached Omphalosa safely. An unpleasant knot formed in her throat. She had promised Ray to keep the rabbit’s foot safe at Shuckstack while he was away. He would be furious if he found out she had broken her promise. But wouldn’t he be happy when she found their father? That would make up for it, she assured herself.

But how was she going to reach her father anyway?

She had been in such a hurry to sneak away from Shuckstack, in such a hurry to find her father, she had overlooked the obvious question. She might be able to find her father with the rabbit’s foot, but how would she cross into the Gloaming to reach him?

The Incunabula of Wandering
, she reminded herself. The book had shown her how to do so many other things, surely it could help her reach her father. She had to find him. She had gone too far to turn back.

The rabbit’s foot still pointed to the west. She followed it all afternoon, past endless swishing grass and tumbling sun-dappled hills.

As the sun set, she ate the last of the cheese and began dreading another miserable night. “Why can’t I just find some cowboys on a cattle drive? Why can’t I find some Sioux hunting party? Why can’t I just find someone, anyone, in this horrid wasteland cooking a hot meal?”

As she shouted this, something moved in her pocket. The rabbit’s foot! Sally took it out and held it in her palm. The foot twitched slowly toward the south.

Had she gotten off course somehow? It didn’t seem likely. She had traveled halfway across the country, weeks and weeks, and the rabbit’s foot had always been pointing to the west or slightly in a northwesterly direction. And now, all of a sudden, to the south? But it wasn’t turning and pointing—it was twitching. Like it had done back when she and Ray were in the city.

She continued walking into the twilight, and the golden foot began to tremble slightly and then nearly leaped from her hand. Had she reached her father at last? She picked up her pace, stumbling as she went up and down, up and down, hill after hill. The prairie grew dark. The stars appeared. A corn-yellow half-moon rose. A coyote yapped and another answered.

Exhausted, Sally was ready to stop for the night—for the dozenth time—when she saw a glow beyond the next dune. Fire! Sally quickened her step. As she crested the rise, she could see a cook fire blazing from the dark in the wide bowl below. There was a small bundle covered with a blanket at the edge of the firelight. But no horse, no wagon, nobody.
The campsite seemed empty, except for a pot sitting on the ground with a wooden spoon protruding from beneath the lid.

Sally could smell food. Whatever it was, it smelled delicious. She didn’t really care if it wasn’t delicious. It was food, and she wanted it.

Moving closer, she peered about in the dark to see if the travelers were still there, maybe hidden somewhere out of the firelight. She saw nobody. She inched to the fireside. Her stomach whined as she lifted the lid to the pot. Beans. Her mouth watered.

As she reached for the spoon, the bundle moved. A shrill cry burst forth and the blanket rose in a whirling tangle. A hand came out from under the blanket holding a hatchet. Sally screamed and threw the lid in a hard spin. It struck with a clank, and the attacker doubled over, dropping the hatchet.

“Ouch! Hey!”

Sally scrambled to her feet, watching cautiously as the person pulled the blanket off. It was just a kid! She was no older than Sally, a black girl in several layers of tattered and patched-up dresses and shirts.

The girl winced as she touched her fingers to her cheek, a welt already rising. “That hurt!”

“Well, what were you doing hiding under there?” Sally snapped. “You scared me out of my wits!”

“This here’s my camp!” the girl said, giving Sally a fierce jut of her chin. “What’re you attacking me at my own camp for?”

“You can’t expect a person to just stand around and let herself get hacked up by some ghost-blanket-maniac.”

“You was about to eat my supper!” the girl shouted.

“I thought nobody was here,” Sally said. “Why were you hiding under that blanket anyway?”

Still rubbing her face, the girl walked back to the fireside and sat down. “I thought you was a coyote. Every night I go to sleep, there’s this coyote that keeps raiding my food. I had it with that coyote! ‘Tonight,’ I said to myself, ‘I’m going to set a trap and chop that coyote to pieces when he tries to take my supper.’”

“Sorry I ruined your plan,” Sally said. “And I’m sorry I hurt your face. I’ve barely eaten in days and I’m starving. Would you mind if I had some of your beans?”

The girl narrowed her eyes, inspecting Sally. Then she let her eyelids close. Moments passed. Was she falling asleep? Was she trying to pretend Sally wasn’t there, hoping she’d leave? Sally began to think the girl was possibly insane.

“Excuse me,” Sally said.

“I’m beholding you,” the girl said without opening her eyes.

“You’re what?”

“Hush.”

Sally waited, watching the strange girl until finally her eyes opened.

“Okay, you can have some,” she said, pushing the pot over to Sally. “I ain’t got but the one spoon. You can use it. Or your fingers if you like.”

Sally took the spoon and ate. The beans were delicious and she shoveled them into her eager mouth.

“You like them?” The girl smiled. “I’ve got corn cakes,
too.” The girl unfolded a kerchief wrapped around the cold but enticing brown cakes. They were sweet and buttery and Sally ate them with her mouth half-filled with beans.

“Where’re you come from anyway?” the girl asked.

“North Carolina.”

The girl’s eyes widened. “I ain’t so good with geography, but that’s a fierce ways off!”

“It’s been a long trip. What’s your name anyway?”

“Hethy. Hethy Smith. You?”

“Sally Cobb. Nice to meet you, Hethy.”

“Uh-huh,” Hethy said as she watched Sally finish the rest of the beans.

“Do you live nearby?” Sally asked.

“Think I’d be sleeping out here? No, I’m from Kansas.”

“Are you visiting family somewhere?”

“Nope, I got no family …” She paused, her face twisting up. “I got … no family left, I guess,” she said, and then Hethy began crying.

Sally moved closer to her, patting Hethy on the shoulder. “That’s okay. That’s okay,” she said. “Did something happen?”

Hethy wiped her face and said, “My granny, I think they killed her. I do. Them men, they was coming for her. She knew it. She told me to get. Packed my bag for me quick like and said, ‘Run, Hethy. I don’t know where to tell you to go, but just run, girl.’”

“That’s awful,” Sally said. “But maybe they didn’t—”

“They did. I know they did,” Hethy sniffed. “My granny
and I, we’re seers. Granny Sip more than me. I got a touch of the beholding. If she was living, I’d know.”

“What do you mean, ‘beholding’?”

Hethy sniffled as she said, “Granny Sip, she can’t see the future or nothing like that, but she can see the secrets in people’s hearts. Started when she was just a little girl back in Alabama. She can behold things others can’t. Heal folks, too. People used to come to her to find out if their sweetheart was doing them wrong or why their child took sick. That’s why them men done killed her. ’Cause she’s a witch, they reckoned. They said she caused the Dark that won’t never break.”