Midnight Rider (13 page)

“Why do they all live together? I thought Indians lived in their own separate tribes.”

“Before the time of the missions, they did. Most ranged no more than a hundred square miles. For the most part, their way of life was destroyed when the mission fathers arrived. Do not misunderstand me. The padres' intentions were good. They believed the Indians would profit by their association with the church. They would learn to grow their own food, to build small
rancherias
of their own, and their souls would be saved. Unfortunately, they never adjusted to such a life, and they were susceptible to every sort of disease. Most of them died.”

She felt a wave of pity. “And these?”

“When the mission system was destroyed, the Indians were given grants of land, but eventually they lost it. They were easily cheated. They were not allowed to testify in court, which meant they had no way to defend themselves. They went to work on the ranchos but now even that way of life will not support them. The old ways have flickered to life. The different tribes have banded together in small groups like these throughout the mountains.”

“I heard my uncle talking about them once. He says they raid the nearby ranchos and murder innocent people.”

Sitting in front of him on the horse, she felt the bunching of muscles in his arms as he shrugged his broad shoulders. It made something flutter in her stomach.

“They are bitter,” he said. “Sometimes they lash out. Just like the rest of us, they are fighting to survive.”

Just like I am,
Carly thought, but she said nothing more. They continued down the hill and into the center of the village, but only an old woman and two young men came forward to greet them. The men wore beards and mustaches, and something that looked like an oversized rabbit-skin diaper. They wore hair nets made of milkweed fiber, while the women wore loose-fitting chemises that came only midway to their knees.

“For thousands of years they went naked,” the don said with a hint of amusement at the surprised look on her face. “The small bit of clothing they wear now is a legacy of the missions.”

He leaned forward, helping Carly slide down from the horse, then he gracefully swung down himself. “Where is Lena?” he asked the stoop-shouldered old woman. “Trah-ush-nah and the others?”

She answered in the Spanish she had learned at the mission. “There is a terrible sickness. It has raged for more than a week. It kills without mercy. You should not be here.”

The don's face went tense. “Smallpox?” he asked.

The woman shook her head. “The disease they call measles. It has already taken four of the old ones. All of the men and most of the women are sick. There is no one to tend them or the children.”

“It is late in the year for measles. You are sure that is what it is?”

“I have seen it at the mission. I have had it myself.”

A little of his tension eased. “I will return to the stronghold, see how many among my people have already had the sickness. I will send what help I can.”

His hands encircled Carly's waist. He started to lift her back up in the saddle, but she pulled herself free of his grasp.

“I had the measles when I was a child. I can stay and help them.”

Something flickered in the depths of his eyes. “Caring for those who are sick is not a pleasant task,
chica.
”

“I'm no stranger to unpleasantness. And I've cared for sick people before.”

“Si,”
he said softly. “I thought that perhaps you had.”

She looked at him strangely, wondering how he could possibly know that she had cared for her mother and those in the mine patch who had fallen sick with the cholera. It was a terrible time, one that made her stomach churn just to think of it. She had worked until she could scarcely stay on her feet, but she hadn't been able to save her mother. Four women, two men, and three children had died, and she had been left all alone. Carly forced the memory away.

“Still,” he said, “leaving you here is not a good idea. You are only just recovered from a fever yourself.”

“I feel fine,” she argued. “I have for days. I want to stay.”

He took in her determined expression, the way her feet were planted so solidly apart, and finally gave in. “
Esta bien.
I will leave you then, but I want your word you will not try to escape. You would only get lost in the woods, and there are many dangers out there—snakes and mountain lions, huge grizzly bears big enough to track a man for prey.” He tipped her chin with his fingers. “Do I have your word?”

Her eyes went wide. “Would you actually accept it?”

He smiled. “
Si,
but I also believe you are smart enough to know that without preparation you would not get far away. And as I said, your life would be in grave danger.”

He was right, she knew. For a moment she had actually believed he would trust her word that she would stay. For some strange reason it would have pleased her, even if she might have considered running away.

“As you say, Don Ramon, I would be foolish to try to escape.”

The don merely nodded. For a moment it seemed he had sensed her disappointment, that he understood her feelings. She didn't like the way he so easily read her thoughts. Turning away from him, Carly swung her attention to the aging Indian woman.

“Where is Lena?” she asked. “She is the healer, is she not?”

“Come. I will show you.”

Carly turned to Ramon. “You had better not come back with the others. It won't help anyone if you get sick, too.”

He smiled that devastating smile that made her heartbeat quicken. “I have also had the measles,
chica.
I will get what supplies we can spare and return.”

Carly just stared at him. What kind of an outlaw would help a bunch of sick Indians? No matter how she tried, she couldn't seem to understand him. Wordlessly, she turned away, following the stoop-shouldered old Indian into one of the dome-shaped huts.

A few feet inside the low round door, a slender woman knelt on the woven reed carpet, dabbing some sort of paste on the stomach of a fussy child. Baskets of seeds, roots, and dried fish sat in one corner, and deer and bearskin blankets formed several more pallets on the floor.

“Lena?” Carly asked, and the slender woman turned. Her features were fine, her brows sleek and arching, her cheekbones well defined. Dark smudges of exhaustion formed hollows beneath her eyes.

“You are the Spaniard's woman from the camp,” she said.

“I'm the woman you helped when I was sick,” Carly corrected, ignoring an odd rush of heat. “I hope in return that I can help you. Tell me what I can do.”

For the next several hours, she worked beside Lena caring for the people of the village. She spooned in life-giving liquids to fight the dehydration and used the icy water from the stream, the last of the snowpack melting in the mountains, to bathe their faces and fight the raging fevers. They suffered a dry, racking cough and a burning rash that began at the hairline and neck and spread down over their bodies.

Lena brewed a tea of dried boxwood root for the fever and Carly held wooden bowls of the bitter brew to their lips. She helped Lena boil dried cloverleaves into a thick, sticky syrup for their coughs and made an ointment of three-leafed nightshade and lard to spread over the rash.

Ramon returned with blankets and food, with Pedro Sanchez and three of the women: Tomasina Gutierrez, the blacksmith's wife; Ramon's housekeeper, Florentia; and a busty, robust woman named Serafina Gomez. All of them worked tirelessly.

And so did Don Ramon.

They labored late into the evening, the women tending the sick, the men helping with the heavy tasks of lifting the patients, chopping wood, fueling fires, and tending the horses. Earlier in the day, they'd made forays into the woods to hunt for game, rabbits mostly, which were dressed and thrown into large iron cooking pots, along with wild onions and herbs.

Sometime during the hours after midnight, Ramon appeared in one of the huts beside her.

“You have done enough for today,” he said. “You will rest now. Come with me.” He caught her arm, but she pulled away and knelt once more beside the boy stretched out on the woven reed mat. He looked no more than thirteen, a gangly youth who smiled in spite of his illness.

“I can't leave yet. Lena's brother, Shaw-shuck, Two Hawks, he needs this tea to bring down his fever. He's burning up. He—”

Ramon took the wooden bowl from her weary, trembling hands. “I will see to the boy.” Setting the bowl aside, he pulled her to her feet. “You need to rest … at least for a while.”

“But—”

“I promise to see that the boy gets the tea.” Drawing her out through the small, low opening of the hut, the don steadied her as she swayed against him, her legs a little shaky from kneeling for so long. He swore softly, fluently, then lifted her into his arms and started walking toward the rear of the village.

“I-I'm all right now, really I am. You can put me down.”

“Hush. Do as I say and put your arms around my neck. I should not have let you stay. You are barely recovered from your own bout of sickness.”

“I'm just tired, is all. Florentia and the others, they're just as tired as I am.” But she did as he said, clinging to his neck to steady herself as he strode determinedly along. She tried not to notice the thick bands of muscle brushing against her breasts or the sinews in his neck that tightened at the touch of her hand.

He stopped at the edge of the woods and knelt beneath a secluded pine tree, its boughs a canopy of green above them. A few feet away, a small fire flickered in the quiet darkness, and under the tree, a bedroll had been unfurled. The don carefully placed her atop it.

“You must sleep for a while. You will be no use to anyone if you become ill.”

“What about the others?”

“Pedro will see they have a place to rest.”

“What about you? You've been working all day, too. Surely you're just as tired as I am.”

He smiled, a flash of white reflected in the light of the fire. “As I said before, I am a man. It is different for me.”

Maybe it was, but she didn't believe it. He was stronger, perhaps more determined. Whatever the case, as the moments ticked past and she lay on the bedroll, her eyelids grew heavy and she no longer cared. Soon she fell asleep but during the night she grew fitful, tossing and turning, dreaming of her mother and the ravaging, ugly death from the cholera she had battled in the mine patch. Then something warm curled around her, something solid and strong that laid her memories to rest, and finally she slept soundly.

In the morning she awoke to find herself nestled in the strong, solid arms of the don.

Carly hissed in a breath, her heart slamming hard against the wall of her chest. She tried to move, but her hair had come loose from its braid and was trapped under a broad, powerful shoulder. One of his hard-muscled thighs rode high between her legs and her bottom pressed intimately into his groin.

Dear God! Her heartbeat quickened even more, began to trip loudly in her ears. His breath fanned the back of her neck, moving tendrils of hair beside her ear. The muscles in his thigh felt rock hard where they pressed so embarrassingly against her. Carly squirmed, trying to free herself without waking him, trying to ignore the spiraling warmth in her stomach, the weakness that slid through her limbs.

“It would be better,
querida,
” he said softly, “if just now you did not move in quite such a manner.”

Carly went stock still. For the first time she noticed that he was aroused, that against her bottom, the hard male ridge of his desire throbbed with purpose at the front of his breeches. Naive though she might be, she knew what that purpose was.

“I-I … how did we … why are you…?”

“Hush. There is no need to be afraid. You were having trouble sleeping, that is all. Close your eyes now and go back to sleep. Morning will come soon enough.”

Carly swallowed hard, squeezing her eyelids shut as he adjusted himself to a less intimate position, but his arms remained locked around her. She tried to relax, to control the tension rippling through her body, but there was no way she could possibly go to sleep.

Not with him still holding her. Not with his beautiful mouth just inches away from her ear.

The Spaniard sighed and released his hold, then tossed back his blanket and gracefully rolled to his feet. “Perhaps you are right after all. In a few more minutes the sun will be cresting the horizon. There are others to consider, and work that must be done. I will make us some coffee.”

She shoved her sleep-tangled hair back from her face. “Thank you.” But her mouth was so dry the words stuck in her throat and she wasn't sure he heard them.

They worked through the day and night for the next two days. Two of Carly's patients died, but the boy, Two Hawks, would live. He was twelve years old, she learned from Lena, a handsome youth with high cheekbones and coarse, straight black hair. He was a smiling boy, one the don seemed as taken with as she. Carly would never forget the sight of the tall handsome Spaniard kneeling beside the boy, the lad's head cradled in his lap as he held a bowl of broth against the boy's parched lips.

Each night she had slept beside the don, not as close as before, but near enough she could have reached out and touched him. He had been there each morning when she awakened, watching her with an oddly protective light in his eyes. Yesterday he seemed edgy and began to grow distant. Last night he hadn't joined her until late in the evening. This morning when she awakened, the Spaniard was already gone.

*   *   *

Ramon watched the girl walking through the camp toward the healer. Her face looked pale, her clothes were dirty and wrinkled, her hair slightly mussed, and yet she did not complain. For the past three days, she had worked ceaselessly, doing whatever was required of her, no matter how unpleasant the task. She was nothing like the woman he had once believed her to be, selfish and uncaring, concerned only with money and the luxuries it could bring.