Trail of Golden Dreams (11 page)

After she’d paid
her respects, she started a cooking fire with twigs Grey retrieved from his
saddlebags.  Apparently he’d collected them in the forest.  It was a
good thing, too, since there wasn’t a stick to be found on the barren desert
floor. 

It was a surprise
when he pulled a small pan out of his bag, as well as a tin of coffee.  He
added some water from his canteen and before long they were sipping hot
coffee.  Josie didn’t mind sharing Grey’s one tin cup, which was dented on
the side, or the fact that the coffee was as thick as mud.  It was
delicious!

Earlier, he’d shot
a jackrabbit and was now skinning it, preparing it for the spit. Her mouth was
already watering with anticipation.  She couldn’t wait to taste that moist
meat and lick the savory juice off her fingers.  It seemed like days since
she’d had a good meal.

“I was worried
when you went hunting for supper,” she admitted. “I was afraid the posse would
hear the gunshots if they’re anywhere nearby.”   She glanced over her
shoulder, still expecting the men to creep up on them.

“They’re not
following us,” Grey said, with confidence.  “I think those Apaches scared
them off.”

“You saw the
Apaches?” she asked

He jammed the
rabbit onto the spit.  “Yes, I saw them riding across the desert.  I
also saw the marshal and two of his men ride out of the canyon and head south.”

Her eyebrow
lifted.  “Where were you?”

“Hiding at the
foot of the hill.  I rode up to check on you after the gunfight was over,
but you’d gone.”

“You rode up to
check on the map, you mean.”  When he remained silent, Josie narrowed her
gaze at him.  She didn’t know whether to be angry that he’d only been
concerned about the map and not her welfare, or thankful that he hadn’t ridden
into the middle of the battle and gotten himself killed.  “Why do you
think the posse went back south?” she finally asked.

“Don’t know, but I
doubt they’ll give up so easily.  I guess they want the same thing you and
I are after, and I don’t expect they’ll stop until they get it.”

She didn’t reply,
figuring he was right. Warming her hands over the fire, she sat mesmerized as
Grey turned the spit.  The night air was chilly and she was bone tired,
but the delectable smell of the cooking meat kept her awake.  She sat
cross-legged on the ground, using her petticoats as a blanket. Her saddle was
propped beside her.  Grey eyed her from across the flickering orange
flames.

“You’re gonna ruin
those petticoats sitting on them in the dirt like that,” he said.

“Doesn’t
matter.  I don’t expect I’ll be going to any balls out here in the next
week.”

He grinned. 
“No, but you might need them once you get to San Francisco.”

She released a
sigh of contentment.  “I suppose I’ll have enough money to buy me a dozen
petticoats once I reach San Fran.”

He nodded. 
“I suppose so.  Why is getting to San Francisco so important?” He rested
back on his hands.

“Because it means
a new life.”  Her voice came out soft and dream-like.

“I understand that
part, but why San Francisco?  There are a lot of cities much closer that
you could settle in, such as Santa Fe.  It’s growing more and more every
day. You seem smart enough.  You should be able to do well there.”

Josie gave him a
sideways glance and chuckled lightly.  “If that’s a compliment, you have a
backhanded way of giving it.”  She shut her eyes.  “I want to see the
ocean.  I want to feel the cold water on my feet and smell the salt in the
air, and hear the crashing of the waves.”   Her eyelids rolled up,
and she chided him. “There’s no ocean in Santa Fe.  I thought you had some
book learning.”

“I did my
schooling,” he retorted. He checked the rabbit and declared it ready for
eating.

When Josie ripped
off her first hunk of meat with her teeth, she thought she’d died and gone to
heaven. It was amazing what a decent meal would do for a body.  Filling
her stomach put her in a better mood than she’d been of late.  “This is
real good, Mr. Paladin.  Thank you for shooting it and cooking it, too.”

Grey gnawed at a
leg, savoring a mouthful, before answering.  “Look, you don’t have to call
me Mr. Paladin.  My name’s Grey.  I’d prefer it if you call me
that.  We’re close to the same age, I reckon.”

“Alright, if you
insist.”  She wasn’t eager to argue anymore that night.  “How old are
you, Grey?”

“Twenty-three. 
How old are you?”

“Nineteen.”

He stared at her
for a while, like he was thinking something over, but no more words were
exchanged until they’d cleaned the rabbit down to the bones.

When she was
satiated, Josie leaned against her saddle and gazed into the night sky. 
It was full of twinkling, pulsating white stars.  “It sure is a big sky,
isn’t it?”

“Yep.”

She wrapped her
arms around herself to ward off the chill and continued to imagine. 
“Grey?”

“What?”

She glanced over
to see he was cleaning his gun. “Do you ever think about all the people in the
world who are sitting under this same sky, right now, at this very moment, just
like we are?  There must be millions—no
billions
of folks wishing
upon the same stars.”

His gaze slowly traveled
to the sky.  Josie waited for him to say something, but his lips didn’t
move. The fire leaped and danced across his cut features, causing his face to
glow more handsome than ever.  As she stared, she recognized the pallor of
sadness that played across his features. Pain and questioning filled his dark
eyes.  “Grey?  Are you alright?” she asked, treading gently.

After a moment, he
met her gaze across the flames.  “Yeah,” he finally answered, short and
sweet.  He tossed some more twigs onto the fire and then got up and
disappeared for a few minutes.  When he returned, he stood over Josie.

“Here, this will
keep you warm while you sleep.” She accepted the striped horse blanket he’d
bundled himself in when they spent the previous night in the cave.

“What will you do
for warmth?” 

“I’ve got my
jacket.  I’m used to sleeping out of doors.” After he sauntered back to
his spot on the other side of the fire, he lay against his saddle and stretched
his long legs out in front of him.  Josie watched him tip his hat down
over his eyes and then clasp his hands behind his neck.  “Better catch
some shut-eye,” he told her.  “We’ll ride before the sun rises in the
morning.”

She knew he couldn’t
see her nod in acknowledgement, but it was all she could muster at that
moment.  The kind gesture of sharing his blanket was totally
unexpected.  She sat silent, listening to the swishing of their animals’
tails.  After a few minutes, she finally found her voice. “Good night,
Grey.”

His response was a
loud snort.  The man was fast asleep.

Chapter Eight

The next morning,
Grey knelt beside Josie jiggling her arm.  He’d been watching her sleep
for a couple of minutes and hated to wake her, but they had to get going. He’d
already saddled Lightning and fed him and her mule some grain. 

In the pale light
of the fading moon, her face was as close to angelic as any he’d seen, even
with the dirt smudging her cheeks.  Bundled up in his blanket, she looked
as toasty as a warm biscuit.  As if on cue, his stomach growled at the
thought of breakfast.  He had two cold biscuits left in his pouch. 
One for each of them.  That would have to do.

First thing he’d
done after he rose was to check his pockets, and was relieved to find the map
was still tucked inside.  Maybe Miss Sticky Fingers had learned her lesson
about that, he thought smugly.  His gun had not been touched either. 
He patted the cold, hard steel at his hip.

Just as he was
about to shake her again, Josie moaned and mumbled something.
She’s talking
in her sleep.
Bending down, he put his ear to her mouth and heard the
whisper of a name…
Grey
.

He jumped like he’d
touched a hot stove and bumped her arm.  Josie’s eyes flew open, and he
felt the barrel of her derringer push into his gut.
Click
went the cock
of the hammer. He didn’t dare move—only breathed, and slid a glance her
way.  Her deep blue eyes stared back at him, but he wasn’t sure if she was
fully awake or still half asleep.  One thing was certain, however. 
Her reactions were good. 

“Josie, it’s me,
Grey,” he said quietly.  One wrong move and his intestines would become
ground sausage.

“Huh?”  She
blinked twice.

In a stronger,
firmer voice, he issued a command.  “Josie, wake up and remove your gun
from my belly.”

“What?”  Her
eyes enlarged.  She gazed at the derringer pressed against him, and her
cheeks flushed pink with embarrassment.  “Grey!  I’m so sorry.” 
She pulled the gun away and scooted up.

“Uncock that
thing,” he demanded, scowling.

She did. 
Then she crawled out from under the blanket and stuck the gun into her pants
pocket.

“You could have
killed me,” he grumbled, as he lifted her saddle off the ground. He carried it
to her mule and slung it over Traveler’s back.

Josie rubbed
circles over her eyes with her fists and matched his scowl.  “You should
know better than to sneak up on a person like that.  I have an itchy
finger out here on this open land.  What were you doing in my face,
anyway?”  She stretched and yawned.

Grey refused to
look at her.  Why had she been whispering his name?  He didn’t know
what to make of it. One thing was certain though.  There was no way he
would tell her she’d been talking in her sleep. “I was trying to wake you up,”
he answered. “You sleep like a log.  I told you last night we were going
to start out early.”  He tightened the cinch under the mule’s belly and
checked Josie’s stirrups.

When he bent for
the bridle, she marched over and said, “I can saddle my own animal.  Give
me that.”   She grabbed the bridle from his hand and fit the bit into
Traveler’s mouth.  “My mule doesn’t want you fishing around in his
mouth.  He doesn’t know where your fingers have been.”

Grey shook his
head and rolled his eyes.  He sauntered over to Lightning and stroked his
nose.  “Try to do a woman a favor…If you have to make water, go and do it
now,” he said, over his shoulder.  “We need to head out.  I woke with
a bad feeling this morning.”

“What kind of
feeling?” she asked, as she traipsed toward the cemetery.  She eased the
broken gate open and hurried to hide behind the largest tombstone and then
peeked around it to make sure he wasn’t looking.  He chuckled.  It
had to be a difficult task, being a female making water while wearing pants,
but apparently she’d figured it out.  A few minutes later, she returned
with dry britches.

“What kind of bad
feeling?” she repeated, as she approached.

“There’s no time
for questions.  Let’s get on the road.  Here’s breakfast.  You
can eat on the run.”  He tossed her the cold biscuit and mounted his
horse.

“Wait a minute!”
She ran back to where she’d slept and gathered the striped blanket into her
arms.  “Don’t forget this,” she said, handing it to him.  “Thanks for
letting me use it last night.”

“Sure.”  He
rolled up the blanket and tied it behind his saddle.  Out of the corner of
his eye, he watched as Josie stepped into the stirrup and settled into her
saddle.  She knew how to sit a seat, and she was a good rider. 
Surprisingly, there hadn’t been one complaint from her so far.  He watched
her bite into the biscuit and then feed a small piece to the mule.  The
girl liked to eat, and so did her animal.  He grinned, despite himself.

“Got your gun?” he
asked.

“Of course. 
It’s right here.”  She patted her pocket, where the derringer was
stashed.  “I
always
know where my weapon is.”  She grinned
like the cat that had swallowed the canary.  Her comment was an obvious
dig at him, since she’d easily stolen the gun right out from under his nose
before.  “You got the map?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Okay.  Then
let’s ride.”

* * * *

They rode hard all
day, stopping only once to give the animals and themselves a short rest.
Luckily, they’d come upon a wash at the base of a rocky hill where the animals
could be refreshed and they could refill their canteens and splash their faces
with cool water.  It was like a magical oasis in the middle of a blazing
hellhole.

Grey didn’t allow
them to stay long, however.  Although there’d been no sign of the marshal
and his posse, the bad feeling continued to haunt him. All morning he’d
constantly looked over his shoulder and watched for tracks on the ground ahead.
Josie knew it was better to be safe than sorry.  She was glad to be riding
with him.  He was handy to have around.  He knew how to track, shoot,
hunt, and cook, and he carried the only coffee and morsels of food between
them.  She would have starved if not for him. 

They sat next to
the puny stream and shared some dried fruit and a bit of salt pork that he’d
been saving back.  He pulled the map out of his pocket and said, “We’ll
ride just past this mountain here and stop for the day.”  He pointed to
the picture of the upside down V Josie’s pa had drawn. “Do you suppose that’s Gallinas
Peak?”

“That’s what I was
thinking.  It’s been years since I’ve been this way.  Last time I
traveled this road, I was with both Ma and Pa, but I didn’t pay attention to
the route.  I was young at the time.”

Grey stood up and
brushed off his pants.  “We’re going to start getting into some green
territory soon, where we’ll be able to water our animals properly. I’m guessing
we can ride another eight miles or so, then we’ll find a place to camp for the
night.  We need to push it and try to put in twenty miles a day.  Can
you handle it?”  His dark eyes probed her.