A celebration to mark the trail’s halfway point starts even before the sun dips. Cay accepts an invitation to join the largest wagon circle, seventeen schooners in all. Andy and I tag along after the boys, hats low. I watch them with an ache in my heart, grieving the loss even before it happens.
Peety accepts a plate of stew with a hardy muchas gracias and compliments for the woman serving him. Andy must feel the same as me because she sits closer to Peety than normal, and even lets him steal one of her corn cakes.
Cay chats up a doe-eyed girl with a cloud of white-blond hair. All she needs is a halo. How fitting that my last memories of him will be of charming the ladies.
Somewhere behind me, West fields a volley of questions from a lad who admires our horses. I cannot watch him. Just the sound of his voice makes me giddy and tearful at the same time.
Before I turn stupid, I lean over toward Andy. “You finish,” I whisper, setting down my untouched bowl of black-eyed peas. “I’m going to start combing the crowds.”
“I’ll go.” She begins to rise, but I pull her down by the sleeve.
“You barely touched your food. I’ll be fine.”
“Lots of people here,” she says in a low voice.
“We haven’t seen a marshal since the Little Blue.”
“That’s ’cause we’ve been trying not to.”
Peety catches wind of our whispering. He moves his mouthful to his cheek. “You no like your food, chicos?”
“I was just telling Andy I need to walk off a dead leg. I won’t be long.”
I adjust my hat over my eyes and pretend to limp off, leaving Andy frowning after me.
As I finish examining a neighboring group of diners, the strains of a violin float toward me. I follow the sound.
In the middle of a circle of adults stands a girl, six or seven, fat braids like yellow bellpulls on either side of her head. She is sawing on her violin. “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.” I drop to my knees. I have only heard one little girl play the fiddle before, and that girl was me.
The simple strains of the lullaby return me to the world I used to live in, each bow stroke conjuring a memory. Father with his ear cocked as he tuned Lady Tin-Yin. The two of us flapping like herons to help me loosen my arms. Father telling me not to rush the second movement of the Vivaldi if I wanted my audience to cry.
The crowd claps, rousing me from my stupor.
When the little girl bows, I head back to the remuda. But moments later, someone tugs on the back of my shirt. The girl pans her freckled face at me, her violin tucked under her arm.
“Are you Chinese?” she asks.
“Marianne,” reprimands her father from behind her, his eyes darting about like blue minnows under the glassy pools of his spectacles. A stiff gray hat trimmed with a blue jay’s feather sits primly atop his head.
“It’s all right.” I kneel so that I’m her height. I shouldn’t socialize, but I cannot turn my back on her sweet face. “You play that fiddle quite well.”
She beams, her eyes lighting up in that way that comes natural in children.
“I bet I could give you a few pointers,” I say before I can stop myself.
The father holds out his hand. “Dr. Raymond Highwater. I think Marianne would love some instruction. She has been on her own since we left Boston.”
We sit on milk stools. Lifting my chin, I align my posture, and she copies me. One glance at her eager face puts a lump in my throat. Suddenly I’m back with one of my pupils, waiting on the edge of my seat for a flawless G to reach my ears.
Since that dark day, I have been scurrying around like an ant with no purpose after someone has stepped on its nest. Father, you told me music is a world that measures virtue by grace notes, and truth by the vibration of pitch against your soul. Will I ever find my way back there? Or is that world gone forever, now that you are no longer a part of it?
Marianne begins to play, drawing me out of my thoughts.
“Straighten your wrist. Walk on the tips of your fingers,” I instruct. “You’re making the nightingales jealous.”
I teach her “Mississippi River,” and she plays it perfectly after two tries.
“One more, just one more,” she begs.
“It’s past your bedtime,” says her father. “Mind now, and I will let you comb Jory’s tail tomorrow.”
She wraps her arms around my neck and I kiss her head. “I see you one day performing in the great concert halls of Europe.”
As Dr. Highwater settles her into their wagon, Andy appears by my side, her face crimped into a frown. She jerks her head, Let’s go, and I follow her.
The doctor calls after me. “You obviously have much skill.” He holds up the instrument. “Mind if we impose on you?”
There’s no way I can do that. “I’m sorry.”
He tucks the violin under his arm. “I understand. Quite a crowd here, probably everyone will want to come hear you. Not everyone likes the stage. Well, thank you, again.”
“Wait,” I say, my mind spinning. Mr. Trask, a clarinetist himself, heard me play on several occasions. Do I dare?
“We’re s’posed to be laying low,” Andy grumbles in my ear.
“Maybe the mouse will come out to see the cat play,” I whisper back.
Andy shakes her head. “What if the mouse turns out to be a dog?”
She is right, as always. Who knows what law enforcement or mercenaries lurk about? Even if there are none, I would not like to make a lasting impression. Still, I am so close to Mr. Trask. I can feel it in my bones. And maybe just this once, for Father, fate will look the other way. “We’ll never get to everyone,” I press. “It’s like a mass migration of buffalo here. I can knock out the pins with one ball.”
She still doesn’t look convinced. Dr. Highwater’s gray eyebrows push together.
An awkward moment passes, and I clear my throat, knowing I must give this up. If Andy knew how much losing Mr. Trask pains me, she might change her mind on letting me go with her to Harp Falls. “All right, I won’t,” I say at the same time as she throws up a hand and grumbles, “Fine, do it.”
I smile at Dr. Highwater. “I’ll do it.”
Dr. Highwater grins and hands me the fiddle. It’s too small, but I can work with that. If I had you in my arms again, Lady Tin-Yin, we’d rip up the prairie. How I miss you.
Andy stands back and crosses her arms. “I don’t like it,” she mumbles, “but I’ll keep watch.” Then she slips back into the crowd.
“We have a fiddler, folks! Make way for the fiddler!” cries Dr. Highwater.
I breathe deeply to release my butterflies, then hitch up my trousers. This is the biggest group I’ve ever performed for, and I don’t just mean the violin. But I have the boy act down by now. I stalk out toward the main bonfire where most of the pioneers are assembled.
“Look, a coolie!” someone yells. Ripples of curiosity follow me. Fingers lift like hunting rifles tracking a duck as I pass. I keep moving.
Twenty feet from the fire, I stop by a barrel, my back to an overstuffed Conestoga wagon with fruit trees poking out the rear. The violin calm washes over me, and I poise the bow.