Under Starry Skies (3 page)

Now the older O’Donnell sister, Tye decided as he stole a quick look at Abigail perched beside Maria on the trunk, was a woman he would have liked to throttle if he were a man who leaned toward violence. Thanks to her brazen enterprising nature, he had lost his chance of gaining possession of the dang mailbag. And it was the sole reason he had gone to Canon City. He needed to get his hands on the U.S. mail headed to Golden. He should have never lingered on the riverbank to stretch his aching leg.

Several miles downstream, his friend, Brett Trumble, was waiting and counting on him to have the bag on board. He swore softly to himself. Tarnation and damnation! Why in heaven’s name had he promised he would help him intercept it? Why couldn’t he mind his own business? Why couldn’t he say no? He removed his hat and wiped the sweat beading on his forehead with the back of his hand. Because Brett was a good friend—and because Brett was in jeopardy of having a record of desertion slapped on his good-looking head along with a humiliating dishonorable discharge which would mar his flawless military career.

Brett’s father, Aaron Trumble, would never understand the letter from the U.S. government was a mistake, a misunderstanding. Nor would the town of Golden ever let Captain Brett Trumble have a moment’s peace if they thought he was a traitor and deserter. Most of all, Tye owed Brett. They were best friends. In addition, he had saved Tye’s life a few years back when they had come upon a rogue band of aggravated Indians with no sense of humor. The Indians had wanted his horse, his hide, and his gun. What they got was some buckshot in their scrawny backsides instead.

His wandering thoughts were interrupted by Abigail. “In all fairness, Mr. Ashmore, there’s something I need to tell you.” The tone of her voice held an uneasy, apprehensive quality.

Tye jabbed his pole into the muddy river bottom to discourage the boat from drifting toward the right riverbank. They would make better time in the swift, strong current in the middle where the river needed little assistance from him. “What’s that?” He turned to face her.

“We’re not carrying crystal and bone china.”

Tye glanced at the two crates for a second and then met her gaze with a cautious one of his own. Warning bells began to jingle inside his head. What was under the tightly bound crates? Why had Swamp earlier shown distrust of mere china and crystal? “What
are
we toting?”

“Explosives for the Henderson Mining Camp near Cripple Creek.” The words slipped out so innocently, so nonchalantly, she sounded as if she was picking her favorite flavor at an ice cream social.

It took barely a second for the words to register. He almost dropped his pole in the water. “Nitroglycerin? We’re toting nitroglycerin? On
this
boat?”

Abigail nodded.

“Why? Why in tarnation are we hauling explosives?” It was a strain for him to remain calm. Now a million thoughts tumbled around in his head at one time. If any one of those bottles had a mind of its own, it would blow them clean out of the water.

He looked over at Amos whose face was as white as fresh Georgia cotton. “Please tell me she’s a little possessed and this is a bad dream?”

“Yes, sir, sometimes I think she is, and no, sir, it’s not a bad dream. It’s a downright frightful one.”

Tye moved to the crates, withdrew a sharp knife from his buckskin boot, and carefully sliced through the maze of twine covering one of the crates like a fish net. He peeled back a corner of the stiff canvas cover and lifted the lid high enough to peer inside.

“Confound it! You fool woman! Whatever possessed you to decide to transport explosives?”

He stormed to the back of the boat and grabbed for Abigail, but she was quicker and she stood, defiantly crossing her arms at her chest, eluding his grasp. His voice rose to a shout. “Again, Miss O’Donnell, I’m asking why you agreed to transport explosives?” He stared at her with narrowed eyes. When she didn’t respond, he blew out an exhausted breath of air. He turned to Maria and glared at her. “And you, Miss…Miss Schoolmarm, did you know about this, too? A sensible man would heave the lot of you overboard this very minute and let you swim with the fish and river rats!”

Distraught, Maria scrambled off the trunk, her face ashen, her mud brown eyes full of fear. “No. Oh-hh, please, no,” she choked out. “I had no idea there were explosives in those crates. Abigail never told me.” She laid a trembling hand on his arm. “Please, please don’t hurt her! It’s not her fault. We have barely a penny to our name. We’re poorer than church mice.”

“You won’t need a penny or a name if this boat blows sky high.” He gestured to the coffins. “We’ll beat your dear dead cousins on their journey to meet the Almighty!” With lips thinned in anger, he removed his hat and ran his fingers through his hair. Behind him, sensing danger, Swamp rose from his spot and growled low. Tye turned, signaled, and the dog dropped in his place. Moving to the front of the boat, he recovered his pole. He had to think this madness through, and he had to do it quickly. Less than a few miles downstream, Brett Trumble was waiting to hold up the boat and grab the mail. If he fired even one single errant shot, they would all be dead in a bare second.

Tye glanced at Maria. She was still quivering, gnawing on her lower lip. Abigail, however, was cool, aloof, without a sign of fear marring her delicate blonde features. She stood in a defiant stance and was as unremorseful as a fencepost.

“How much money did the fool dispatcher offer you?” He blew out another exhausted breath of air.

“Ten dollars a crate.”

“You, Miss O’Donnell, have been sorely hoodwinked. Most river boat operators would have asked twice the amount!”

“I had no choice. I would have taken any price the station master offered, just to get us to Pueblo.”

“You certainly don’t place much value on our hides, do you?” He scanned the contents heaped on the boat. Somehow, he had to warn Brett about the nitroglycerin. He knew the man all too well. Once he discovered passengers on board, he’d want to make a spectacle of robbing the mail. Brett had a swashbuckling way about him. The last thing Tye needed was for him to announce himself with a flourish, waving a gun, and firing theatrical errant shots like a blithering idiot.

Tye snatched the pole from Amos’s hands and turned, confronting both women. “Have either of you a white towel or apron, or perhaps a petticoat stashed in those trunks?”

Maria spoke first, her voice faltering, “No, no, just some old dresses and books.”

“What about you?” His eyes came to rest on Abigail.

She shook her head. “Why do we need something white? What are you planning to do?”

He glared at her. “I’m trying to save our hides and keep us alive. We have dangerous cargo. We need to fashion a makeshift flag to alert others to be cautious.”

“What on earth for? Why all the fuss?” Abigail didn’t try to disguise her annoyance. She flapped both her hands in the air and waved them at the riverbanks. “Do you see even a hint of civilization out here? We’re in the wilderness, Mr. Ashmore, for heaven’s sake. Stark, uninhabited wilderness. Who are you expecting? A few wild ducks to attack us?”

It took all of Tye’s patience not to curse aloud. The last thing he wanted to do was to divulge information about Brett. “There are dozens of scalawags underfoot who ply this river, Miss O’Donnell, just hoping to steal goods and their next meal rather than work for it. This is rough territory out here.”

Maria’s face blanched even whiter, and she shuddered. She looked like she was about to pass out. “Are we going to sink? Are we going to die?” Her eyes filled with tears as she nervously wrung her hands and stared at him with a desperate hopeless expression.

Aware he had frightened her, Tye felt a pang of regret. He shook his head and lowered his voice. “No, hopefully not, but we need to take precautions.”

“You…you can have the petticoat I’m wearing.” She plucked at her skirt with her thumb and forefinger.

Tye whirled on Abigail instead. “How generous of your sister, Miss Abigail, don’t you think?”

Unflinching, hands on her hips, Abigail stared back at him with equal disdain.

He waved his fingers in a beckoning gesture. “Since Maria came up with the idea, it’s only fair you lend a hand and give up
yours
instead—after all, it was
you
who got us into this miserable mishap.”

“Now just a second!”

“Come, come, Abigail, we must all learn to sacrifice for the common good.”

She snorted, but turned her back, hiked up her skirt, and untied the petticoat ribbons. It fell to her feet in a white heap, and she stepped out of it. Scooping it up, she flung the delicate confection at him. He deftly caught it and tied it to the pole, propping it between the two coffins. It fluttered in the soft autumn breeze.

“You don’t honestly believe a person would attack this boat, do you?” Abigail’s blue eyes flashed cold like a winter sky. “Who would be crazy enough to want two coffins, two women, or the U.S. mail?”

Tye ignored her. Fool woman. Even without Brett downstream about to launch his ruse, they could be blown to human splinters. He silently prayed whoever packed the bottles, packed them well and spared no straw. One jagged rock or one floating tree limb could jar the boat and excite the unstable liquid inside the bottles. His gaze circled the group. “Many a man, down on his luck, has been known to rob, just to scavenge for any little articles which could net him a decent meal or a bottle of whiskey,” he explained. “Now, ladies, sit down, remain seated, and don’t move no matter what happens, hear me?”

He took up his pole and dug it into the swirling water. Amos moved forward to stand beside him. “How the devil did you ever get tied up with the likes of those two?” Tye gestured with his head to the back of the boat but kept his eyes keenly trained on the current ahead, looking for any floating debris.

“Their father, sir—”

“Don’t call me sir,” he snapped, still disgruntled.

“Mister—”

“No mister, either. It’s Ashmore or Tye.”

“You’re a rancher?” Amos asked.

Tye nodded. “I once lived in Virginia on a farm, then came west before the war with my father, three brothers, and a sister. I thought it was the longest, most miserable trek I’d ever experienced in my life. Now I’m only praying I get forty miles to Pueblo in one piece. Hell, I could sure use a stiff drink of whiskey.”

The black man stared curiously at him a moment and chuckled lowly. “Maria and Abigail’s father was a small storekeeper in New York. When their mother died from pneumonia, he asked me to help him with the household and a small orchard he tended. When he decided to try his hand in Utah, he asked me again to help with the move and his new store. ’Course when the War broke out, the store’s profits went downhill fast. Mr. O’Donnell was a kind gent. Much too kind and generous. He let people run up some mighty big bills. Said the War was hurtin’ everyone, and he didn’t want no starving children on his conscience. God rest his soul! He gave to others and left his two daughters near destitute. When Miss Maria decided to take a job in Golden and convinced her sister to relocate too, the least I could do was accompany them. Not safe for young ladies to travel alone these days.”

“And Joshua and Adam?”

“Who?” Amos looked confused. “Oh, yes, Cousins Joshua and Adam. The coffins,” he stammered. “Pity them, sir…I mean, Tye. These cousins died unfortunate deaths in a mine accident, but their last wishes were to be laid next to kin.”

Tye’s forehead wrinkled. “I thought Abigail said they died in a wagon mishap.”

The old man’s eyes grew round as saucers. “Oh, yes. Yes…you’re right.”

Tye looked at him curiously. “Well, let’s hope we don’t accompany them to their resting place.”

Both men fell silent, lost in their own thoughts as they watched the shore where aspen grew thick, spilling their leaves into the dark water like floating gold coins. Tye carefully guided the straying boat into the current as they rounded a bend in the river. Despite the pleasant day, Tye was still irritated. He removed his hat and pushed his fingers again through his damp hair. He was sweating enough to raise the river level an extra inch. By now Brett Trumble had checked at the station and inquired about the mail and was probably waiting somewhere along the riverbank downstream. Why, oh why, did he ever agree to Brett’s shenanigans? All he wanted was to be left alone, to be a common rancher, to be tending the cattle with his brothers. In peace. But even Brett wouldn’t leave him to his dreams. Gently, yet persistently, Brett was hounding him to become a scout for the army, especially since he had a talent for speaking many of the local Indian languages. Tye rubbed his right leg, stiff and sore from being broken when he fell underneath an Indian pony he was trying to break a few months back. Luckily, his brother, Flint, had dragged him away from the bucking bronc or he might be dead, just like the two corpses onboard.

His eyes fell to the mailbag at Abigail’s feet. Brett had recently received word the final batch of discharge and war-related papers had been released by the army, and his papers could possibly be inside the bag. But Brett’s papers wouldn’t read the way he would have liked. Crazy Brett had left his credentials with a Union soldier when he sneaked behind enemy lines in civilian clothes to spy on the Southern ranks. When a Northern detachment finally recaptured the Southern unit and the captain had been caught with them, his papers couldn’t be located. The Northern soldier holding his papers had been killed and sent home in a lowly pine box. Brett’s papers were never found among his belongings. For almost a decade now, Brett had been petitioning the U.S. government to take him off a list that threatened to mar a flawless military career and list him as a deserter and traitor.

Tye was so absorbed in his thoughts, he neglected to see the small skiff dart out of a stand of scrub oak along the riverbank behind them and glide silently and swiftly to the side of the flatboat.

“Look! A thief!” Maria screamed, jumping up.

Tye whirled about as Brett’s small boat plunged swiftly through the water and drew up beside them.