The stallion startled then obeyed. My stomach tossed as Papa pushed the horse into a gallop. A thin branch whipped against my ear. I cried out and pressed my hand against the wound, but Papa didn’t slow as the branches lashed at us.
My throat went tight with fear. I wanted to hide my face against the horse’s neck, but my father’s arms prevented that. So I twisted my fingers around thick chunks of mane and ducked down, eyes shut tight. I prayed a litany that no one heard. And just when I thought we’d ride straight into oblivion, Caractacus swerved with an alarmed whinny.
A second horse answered. Papa pulled up on the reins, bringing us up hard. In fear and confusion, I raised my head too fast, then swooned. Before I knew what had happened, my body slammed to the ground, knocking awareness into me once again. I’d fallen and there’d been no one to catch me. . . .
That was the source of my shock. Unlike the day the rattlesnake made Caractacus rear up, my father hadn’t kept from me from falling. He hadn’t been able.
A voice sounded from above, calling my name. I rolled onto my back. Gray light filtered down through gloomy trees towering high above. Then a warm hand smoothed my ear where I had been slashed by the branch.
“Patsy, are you injured?” I blinked. It wasn’t my father who had dismounted to attend to me; it was William Short. “Patsy, say something. Are you hurt?”
“Yes,” I whispered. “I think so.”
The young man’s green eyes stared down at me. “You’re bleeding.” He took a kerchief from inside his coat and pressed it into my hand. I accepted the fine linen square and sat up as Mr. Short glanced over his shoulder. “Mr. Jefferson, have you come to harm?”
Papa didn’t answer.
Mr. Short tried again. “Mr. Jefferson, I fear your daughter is concussed.”
Papa’s blank stare betrayed that he couldn’t hear—that he wasn’t even with us. Papa was still in the jaws of his grief, caught in the madness I couldn’t bear for anyone else to discover. I tried to rise, to go to him, but Mr. Short stopped me with a warm hand upon my arm. “Get your head about you, Patsy. I’ll fetch some water.” From the saddlebag of his own mount, Mr. Short withdrew a flask and brought it to me. I wiped my mud-smeared hands on one of the few clean spots on my skirt. What a sight I made, and in front of Mr. Short. Mama would’ve scolded me, but, then, she’d never scold me again for anything. . . .
I took the water. Cool and clean, it eased the constriction of my throat. With sagging shoulders, I held the flask out to him. “I’m sorry. I’ve muddied the pewter.”
Mr. Short smiled. “Pay it no mind. It’s but a little dirt. Can you stand?”
I nodded and my gaze flicked to Papa, whose eyes were still blank and distant, his hands twitching on the reins like he was restless to move on. When Mr. Short helped me up from the ground, Papa seemed to remember himself at last. “Come, Patsy,” he said, his voice hoarse and strained.
It always sounded that way after one of his secret outbursts, but I think, too, he was ashamed anyone else had seen him this way.
Perhaps Mr. Short was right to say that I was concussed, because when I stepped toward Caractacus, I stumbled. Mr. Short steadied me with his hand at my elbow, then bade me to lean on him. “Mr. Jefferson. If you’ll allow me, I’ll see your daughter to Monticello.”
Papa stared a long minute, his dulled blue eyes moving back and forth between us like we were a puzzle to decipher. Seeing the mud on my dress, as if he’d only just realized that I’d fallen, a flush crept up Papa’s neck. “Yes,” he finally murmured, his hands lifting the reins. “Yes, of course.”
“No!” I cried. The thought of Papa wandering alone filled me with icy dread. In his madness, what would he do?
Mr. Short squeezed my other hand. “Come along, Patsy.”
“But, Papa—”
“Go with William,” Papa said, his voice cracking. “It’s for the best. He can take care of you.”
“But you’ll be home for supper?” I searched my father’s eyes for a promise.
Papa pressed his lips into a thin line and looked away. “I’ll be home.”
I reached for Caractacus and stroked the stallion, as much to reassure him as myself. “Take care of him,” I whispered. The horse nickered and pressed his big, regal face against mine. It was all the reassurance I had that someone, or something, would look after Papa in my stead.
Papa tugged the reins and turned about, forcing Mr. Short to huff out a breath. “Mr. Jefferson? Your daughter—” My father had already wheeled his horse around, but Mr. Short shouted after him, more fiercely. “Mr. Jefferson!”
The young man’s tone caught Papa’s attention. My father brought the stallion around, almost warily. I remember now that in that moment, William’s hand trembled where it rested atop mine, a small show of nerves.
“Mr. Jefferson, it didn’t—” Short broke off, swallowing hard on a wavering voice. “This loss didn’t happen only to you, sir.”