Kaki Warner (12 page)

“Hell, I know that.” Jackson wrestled with his anger a moment longer, then gave it up. “I know you have feelings for her. But every time she goes through this, it’s like losing Hannah all over again. It’s killing her. You’re killing her, Hobart, with your wild theories and false hopes. She can’t take it anymore.”

“I know.” Regret lodged like a fist in his throat. He looked past Jackson at the darkened house and wondered if Lacy was watching from behind the drooping curtains. The need to see her one more time was a fire in his belly. But he doubted she would open the door to him, much less listen to what he had to say.

“Tell her I’m sorry, Tom. And that I won’t bother her anymore.” Blindly, he turned away.

“Wait.” Jackson pulled something from his saddlebag and held it out.

Miss Peep.

Daniel stared at the battered rag doll and wanted to howl, hit something, remake the past. “She doesn’t want it?” he asked, taking it in shaking hands.

“She said to give it to you. I don’t know how or why she can still care after all she’s been through, but she thinks you may need it.”

Daniel carefully tucked the doll under his jacket, then looked at Lacy’s brother. “You tell her I won’t bring it back without Hannah.”

***

At noon, McMillan bellowed out of the barred window of the guardhouse, announcing to Daniel, and anyone else in hearing distance, that he was awake. And hungry.

Daniel finished his midday rations, filled an extra plate, checked his coat pockets for the cup and bottle of Red Eye Whiskey he’d bought at double its worth from an enterprising trooper, then rose and went to chat with the prisoner.

It was a good thing he was locked up. The man would have been an intimidating figure on any account, but hungover, he was downright fearsome.

“Good afternoon, Mr. McMillan,” Daniel said pleasantly through the bars.

“Bugger off,” the prisoner growled, rolling his
r
in a thick Scottish brogue.

“You don’t want your lunch?”

McMillan scowled at the plate, then at Daniel, his hazel eyes sunken in a ruddy face surrounded by a mane of wiry red hair. Daniel guessed half of it was from his head and the other half from his chin, but it was hard to tell. He wore leather trousers that hung raggedly over the tops of fur-lined boots, and a long stained leather tunic held together by a variety of patches, some of which still had fur. He smelled worse than a buffalo skinner’s hide wagon.

“Give it over, then.”

Daniel slid the plate under the barred door, then straightened.

McMillan picked it up. He sniffed it, then glared at Daniel. “Who are you?”

“Daniel Hobart.”

“Ever heard of a spoon, Daniel Hobart?”

“Prisoners aren’t allowed utensils.”

Muttering under his breath, McMillan began shoveling food into his mouth with his fingers, his gaze never leaving Daniel. “Wha’ happened to yer face?”

“Tunnel explosion.”

“Looks like the ass end of an Irishman’s sporran.”

“I didn’t know a sporran had an ass end.”

“Aye. ’Tis the Irishman wearing it.” Pleased with his wit, the trapper gave a braying laugh that spewed chunks of beans into the air.

Daniel stepped back a pace. “I hear you know everything there is to know about these mountains.”

“So I do.”

Daniel told him about Hannah. “She went missing out of Volker’s Crossing a year ago this month.”

“I dinna have her. I like my girlies at least twelve. Squaws, mostly. They dinna talk as much as whites.” That braying laugh again.

Daniel refrained from reaching through the bars and grabbing his throat. “Have you seen her?”

“Maybe.”

“Where?”

The trapper dropped his empty plate to the floor and licked his fingers clean. Then, apparently feeling more sociable now that he’d been fed, he bared a snaggle of front teeth that pointed every which way but up. “Got anything to drink, lad?”

“Sure.” Daniel pulled the cup and bottle of whiskey from his pockets. But instead of handing them through the bars, he set them on the floor just beyond the prisoner’s reach. “Where?” he asked again.

McMillan whined and scratched and stared longingly at the bottle. Daniel had seen similar antics in Roscoe at dinnertime. “I know of only one blonde bairn,” he finally said. “Lives in a wee cabin up Copper Creek. Now give it over.”

Daniel uncorked the bottle, poured a half inch into the cup, and passed it through the bars. “Lives with who?”

The Scotsman emptied the cup, shuddered, then held it out for more. “Her ma and pa and grandma. At least, she did last time I was through there in the fall.”

Daniel refilled the cup and passed it over. “No other children?”

“One. Died. Drowned or something. Made the ma daft, so it did.” A loud slurp, then the trapper dragged a filthy sleeve over his dripping mouth and thrust the cup through the bars. “More this time, if you would, lad.”

Daniel poured. “Crazy how?”

This time, McMillan drank slowly, belching between each sip. “I passed by their place no’ long after the wee lass died. Saw her ma screeching and wailing and running through the woods like a wild savage. Bluidy loopers, she was.”

“Then what happened?”

McMillan laughed out a blast of vaporous breath. “Then they got the wee blonde lass for Christmas. Aye, that quieted the ma down right enough, so it did.”

Daniel took a deep breath, tried to slow the pounding of his heart. His hand shook so bad the bottle rattled against the cup when he poured out the last of the whiskey. But instead of passing it through the bars, he set it on the floor and pulled a scrap of paper and stub of pencil from his pocket. He handed them to McMillan.

“Draw exactly where this cabin is on Copper Creek,” he said, and didn’t relinquish the cup until McMillan did.

***

That night, Daniel and Roscoe returned to the empty house, preferring a hard pallet by the fire to an army cot that was half a foot too short and smelled like tobacco smoke and sweat. Earlier, he had shown Mueller the crude map McMillan had drawn, hoping the sergeant could verify it was somewhat accurate. The soldier was familiar with Copper Creek where it emptied into the Frio River, but had never ridden up into the canyon that shared its name.

“Hard country, though. I know that much. And winter’s a bad time to head into these mountains.”

Folding up the map, Daniel slipped it into his pocket. “I’ve got no choice.”

“Then I hope this good weather continues for you.”

The next morning, Daniel rose before dawn, gave Merlin and Roscoe extra rations for the hard run to Volker’s Crossing, then went to the mess hall for breakfast. By the time he’d eaten and paid the quartermaster for his and his animals’ keep, the bugler was sounding the call to colors in the crisp morning air.

Despite clouds rolling out of the west, the weather held, and he rode into Volker’s Crossing an hour past dark, tired, hungry, and cold. After stabling Merlin and Roscoe at the livery, he went to the cantina, hoping for a hot meal and additional information about the Copper Creek area.

Instead, he got a plate of cold beans, corn cakes, and scrambled eggs, a few stares, and a dubious offer from a redheaded whore with a walleye and no front teeth. He ate the meal but declined the company, and preferring quiet solitude to the noisy rooms at the cantina, returned to the livery, where he paid the hostler his dime and bedded down with Roscoe in the stall next to Merlin’s.

Just after dawn, he was waiting on the boardwalk for the store to open.

“You’re back,” the shopkeeper said, moving past Daniel to toss a bucket of ashes into the street. “Still nothing on the girl?”

Daniel shook his head.

“The others didn’t seem hopeful, either.”

Assuming he meant Lacy and Jackson, Daniel asked when they’d come through . . . although what he wanted to ask was how Lacy was holding up.

“Rode in night before last, and out the next morning.” He nodded at Merlin, who stood saddled and waiting at the rail. “Looks like you’re moving fast, too.”

“If the weather lets me.” Following the old man toward the back of the store, Daniel asked if he knew anything about a family living up on Copper Creek. According to McMillan’s map, the turnoff to the canyon was only five miles north of the trading post. It was conceivable that anybody living up there would come to Volker’s Crossing for supplies now and again.

“Steffen Reinhardt.” Picking up an open bag of potatoes almost as big as he was, the storekeeper poured them into a wide-mouthed barrel on the back wall. “The whole family used to come every month or so, but since their daughter drowned in the creek summer before last, it’s only been him.”

Daniel’s heart quickened. This had to be the family McMillan had told him about. “They speak German?”

“Not to me. But Reinhardt was pretty chatty with those Mennonites who came through last year.”

Excitement surged through him. Reinhardt had lost a daughter eighteen months ago. Six months later, Hannah had disappeared from Volker’s Crossing while he was in town. Shortly after, McMillan saw a blonde girl at the man’s cabin. Reinhardt spoke German and probably had an accent that would sound funny to a six-year-old.

It all fit.
Jesus.

“You here to buy or gab?”

“What?”

“I sell. You buy. That’s the way this works.” Wadding up the empty burlap bag, the storekeeper stuffed it under his arm. “So what do you want to buy?”

“Ponchos.”

“This way.”

The surge of excitement became a flood as Daniel followed him toward the dry goods section in the back corner. Reinhardt had her. He was sure of it. Hannah was no more than ten miles away from where Daniel stood right now.

Holy Christ.
He’d found her.

“Wool or canvas?”

“Ah . . . both.”

The old man slapped the ponchos against Daniel’s chest. “Anything else?”

Befuddled, Daniel blinked at the cloth in his arms. Then grinning, he took a leap of faith. “Got any warm coats and scarves and mittens for kids?”

A few minutes later, in addition to the dry goods and two blankets, he dumped onto the counter a bag of grain, a can of peaches, jerky, beans, fatback, an onion—and, as an afterthought, a sack of taffy and two strings of rock candy. He just hoped Merlin would be able to carry it all.

The old man studied him as he counted out the change. “You think Reinhardt’s got the girl?”

“Maybe.”

“He’s a good man.” A pause, then the storekeeper added, “But I’d keep an eye on the wife.”

Daniel frowned. “How so?”

“She was wound tighter than a dollar watch before she lost her kid. From what Reinhardt said last time he was in, it sounds like she’s gotten worse since.”

Excitement faded under a chill of fear. Was he finally getting close to Hannah only to find that he’d arrived too late?

Driven by a new urgency, Daniel headed north along the Frio River. The road had been traveled enough to pack down the snow, so he made good time, and an hour later reached the turnoff into Copper Creek Canyon. If McMillan’s map was correct, the Reinhardt cabin was less than five miles ahead. Winter days didn’t last long in these mountains, but if he pushed, he figured he could ride in, get Hannah, and ride back out while it was still daylight.

But getting there wasn’t as easy as he had hoped.

It was apparent Reinhardt hadn’t ridden in or out of the canyon for several weeks. No horse or wagon tracks cut the deep drifts, and there was so much snow in places, Daniel had trouble following the trail. Finally, he dismounted and put on his snowshoes, hoping if he went first, it would be easier for the animals to follow in his tracks.

It was hard going, but he plowed on, keeping the fast-moving creek on his left, until finally, just as the sun started its slow downward slide toward the western ridges, he caught the scent of wood smoke in the early afternoon air.

***

“I’ve made a terrible mistake,” Lacy said.

Tom looked over at her, his face showing the strain of the hard ride from Fort Middleton. “About what?”

“Daniel.” Just saying his name brought a catch to her throat. To buy time to regain her composure, she reached down and fussed with her horse’s mane.

They were on the last leg of the ride to New Hope. But instead of feeling relieved to put this latest disappointment behind her, with every hour and every mile away from Jasper Lake and Daniel, her regrets had grown.

“I shouldn’t have sent him away. I thought I would feel better if I blamed him for what happened, but I don’t. He believed as much as I did.”

“You’re not still thinking Hannah’s alive, are you?”

Wouldn’t she always? Until she laid her daughter to rest, that hope would persist. But this was different. “This isn’t about Hannah, Tom. It’s about me.”

His usual scowl deepened, and it struck her that somewhere over the last horrid year, he had lost his smile. When had they all become so bereft of joy?

They rode in silence for a time while she struggled to put words to the emotions churning inside. For the last months, she had viewed the world through a fog of pain. But since Jasper Lake, something had shifted in her mind. She was beginning to see beyond that unending anguish now, and what she saw stretching ahead were endless, bleak, lonely years.

Except for one tiny glimmer that lit the way.

Daniel.

Could Tom understand that? He and her late husband had been close friends for most of their lives. Could he allow that loyalty to shift to Daniel?

“I know you loved Pete,” she said, ending the long silence. “I did, too. I loved being married to him—the hard work, the laughter, having him beside me at night. Losing all that was like losing a limb. But Hannah was even worse. Like having a piece of my heart torn out.” She gave her brother a sad smile. “I wouldn’t have survived it without you. I hope you know that.”

Tom shrugged and looked away. “You’re my baby sister.”

A simple answer for a complicated relationship. Yet it said it all.

“But Daniel,” she went on, “that’s my own doing. I didn’t lose him. I sent him away. I brought this new pain on myself.” She felt emotion rise in her throat and tamped it back down. Ever since Daniel came into her life, she felt like a part of her had come alive again. The numbness was fading. She cried, she smiled, she yelled . . . she
felt
again. She wanted that passion back.