Winter's Camp. Jodi Thomas
James watched as the old buffalo hunter walked over to talk to the Apache chief. He pointed at the woman, then pointed at James, and the whole tribe laughed.
Finally, Two Fingers pulled out the watch James had carried with him since the day his father had been killed.
He remembered the ranger who had stepped in after the gunfight that had caught James’s father unprepared. The lawman had collected his father’s belongings and made sure he and his mother were on the next stage to Houston. As the ranger had said farewell, he’d told James’s mother to put her money in a bank the minute she reached Houston and then he’d handed James the watch.
Two Fingers walked toward him carrying the stick the old woman had used to hit the mud woman. “Well, if I weren’t the best trader in the south, this wouldn’t have happened. They took the watch for her and threw in this stick. Apparently the only way to get her to move is to hit her.”
James took the branch and stared at the woman still looking with dead eyes at the dirt.
“We’d better ride,” Two Fingers said. “Trust me, you don’t want to be here much longer.”
Handing Two Fingers the reins to one of the packhorses, James approached the woman with his horse and the other mustang he’d bought.
She didn’t look up, not even when he stood two feet in front of her.
For the first time he noticed how small she was, barely over five feet. With the mud and the blanket she’d looked rounded, but up close he saw her hands and arms were so thin they were almost birdlike.
He lifted the stick.
She raised her head and waited for the blow.
He took the branch in both hands and broke it across his knee. For an instant he thought he saw a hint of surprise flash in her eyes.
“If you’ll come with me, I swear I’ll never raise a weapon or my hand against you. It seems you’ve been lost for a long time. I’ll do my best to get you back to your people. I’m not looking for a slave or a wife. I want to help you.”
She showed no sign of understanding a word he’d said.
He reached down and took her hand. For a moment all he did was brush off the dried mud. Even with the dusting of dirt over her skin he could see the bruises. “It’s time to go,” he said as he turned, tugging her hand gently.
To his surprise, she followed.
When he lifted her up onto the mustang, she pulled her hand from his and dug her fingers into the horse’s mane. He knew without asking that she wouldn’t fall off during the ride.
“You’re going to be all right, Little Dove,” he said, knowing she probably wouldn’t understand.
The gash on her wrist he had noticed earlier was still bleeding. He pulled off his bandanna and wrapped it around the wound wondering how many others were on her body.
When Two Fingers joined them, James whispered, “We ride out with her between us.”
“Why? You think she’ll bolt?”
“No,” James answered. “Because she’s the most precious cargo we carry.”
MILLIE WATCHED THE MAN carefully. He was tall and lean with a strength about him. His words sounded familiar, as if she had once understood them a lifetime ago.
Of late she paid little attention to what was going on around her but she knew all the people came to the canyon to trade, and she seemed to be one of the things traded. It did not matter. She had been traded before. Only, no one had ever put her on a horse.
She had been twelve when the Comanche had taken her from her home. She’d been too much of a woman to be adopted into the tribe and too much of a child for any brave to claim her. Three summers later they’d traded her to an Apache tribe and given her to the chief’s blind mother. The old woman had kept her tied to her camp by a long rope. When she’d needed her, she tugged on the rope. The old woman had been neither cruel nor kind. Millie had quickly learned that she was nothing.
When the old woman had died the next winter, she’d been traded again. These past two winters with the woman and the stick had been the worst. Millie knew she wouldn’t have lasted much longer. Stick Woman had grown tired of having her around and begun to hit harder every day.
Now, at eighteen, Millie faced another change. In her life change meant things usually got worse, never better. This man of the canyon looked strong enough to kill her with one blow.
Not that it mattered. Nothing mattered anymore. Days passed, seasons passed. That whole first year she’d thought her father would come for her, but he hadn’t. She remembered seeing her mother dead, facedown in the mud the day the Comanche rode onto their farm. Mother was dead and Father never found her. How could he? She moved from tribe to tribe like something worthless shuffled off. After a few years, she’d given up hope and tried to forget about her life before. It was too painful to remember.
The dark-skinned man with only two fingers on one of his hands frowned at her as they rode out of the clearing. The other man with hair the color of the yellow walls of the canyon, talked as if trying to tell her something. She did not care where they were going. Away could be no worse.
Her new owner smiled at her now and then when he said something, but she didn’t know how to answer. For as long as she could remember, any sound she’d made had caused someone in the tribe to hit her.
Slowly, the canyon man’s words settled her. He never yelled. He was not young. The sun had wrinkled the corners of his eyes. But he was not old, either, because he had all his teeth and rode with the skill of one who had been born to ride.
They were long onto the plain flatland when they stopped to camp. The tall man lifted her down from the horse carefully as if he thought he might hurt her. He looked worried, as though he feared she might try to bolt. He could not know that running had been beaten out of her years ago.
She stood still and silent in the dark as he built a fire. When he moved her close to the fire, he tried to pull off her blanket, but she held tight. To her surprise, he laughed and gently pushed her to the ground closer to the fire.
The men talked a language she had not heard in years. Words drifted around her, reminding her of another life. The canyon man gave her food. She watched him eat his and followed suit.
“Spoon,” he said, holding up the tool he ate with. “Cup.”
The dark-skinned man in buckskins shook his head at the canyon man, but he watched her as though considering roasting her on the fire. She did not like the way the man breathed through his mouth as he glared at her.
“Cup,” Canyon Man said again as he caught her attention.
She didn’t answer, but she stored the knowledge away.
“James,” he said as he patted his chest. “I’m James.”
She looked away. Inside her mind she’d remembered her other name before the Apache and Comanche called her names. Sometimes all that kept her sane was whispering Millie in her mind.
Millie, she thought as she patted her chest. I’m Millie. But she didn’t trust this man enough to say her secret word aloud.
The dark-skinned man never spoke to her. He curled up in the shadows to sleep, but James stayed by the fire, his hand resting on his weapon.
Millie watched him until he fell asleep, then she moved closer so that her blanket almost touched his. She didn’t sleep for a long while, waiting to be beaten and made to move away from the fire.
Finally he rolled over and looked at her, saying words she didn’t understand. His hand reached across the dried grass and patted her mud-covered fingers.
Millie