“Well, apologies for startling you,” Jesse says as we climb outta the river, wring our undergarments, and start pulling on dry layers. “We had a notion you’d be back in Phoenix this time of year.”
“Usually am, but I’s feeling lucky. Decided to stay longer this season.” Waltz pauses and squints at the boys. “Which means you didn’t come all this way just for a visit.”
“We’re passing through,” I says. “I’m Kate Thompson. My pa were friends with Abe too.”
Waltz gives me a little hat tip. “Passing through just means planning to squat in my house, don’t it?”
Jesse smiles. “Guilty.”
“Well, yer lucky you caught me. I’m heading back to Phoenix in a few days. I ain’t got a roof big enough for the lot of you, but yer welcome to stay the night outside. Rest and have a bite to eat. Just trapped a beaver this morning.” His gaze trails to our mounts. “Say, where’s yer fourth?”
“Behind you,” Lil says, stepping silent as a deer through the tall grass.
Waltz yelps, jumping damn near outta his skin. “You don’t go sneaking up on a man like that!” he snaps. “’Specially one with a loaded gun.”
“Apache are good at sneaking,” she says. There’s a hint of a smile on her lips, and I catch her eyes darting to Jesse. There and back. So fast, it’s like it barely happened. She heard him last night, what he said to me as she cleaned in the Salt. It’s like she’s everywhere, that girl. In the earth and the sky and the dry Arizona air.
I remind myself to never cross her.
Waltz don’t seem too pleased ’bout the fact that an Indian’s part of our group, but he shows us to his place after a bit of grumbling. His house, if it can be called that, sits beyond the small butte, just as Lil suspected. The whole thing don’t look much larger than Silver’s stall; a one-room home for sure, made of rock and packed mud, with a shoddy roof that tilts uneven, almost like it wants to rest ’gainst the rocky alcove the house is set into.
Inside, things look just as weary. A grass-stuffed mattress ’gainst the far wall. One window and a lone table and chair. Prospecting gear seems to fill every last inch of the place.
“You ever find anything in these mountains?” I ask him.
“Nah, but I’s heard talk these parts are rich with gold. Can’t help coming back every season.”
I look at his leathered skin and stern features, the stubborn light in his pale eyes. “Ain’t you a little old to be prospecting?”
“Age is just a number, and old’s in yer head. I’s mined all over this damn Territory. California, too. The work ain’t killed me yet, nor the Indians, so I figure that means I ain’t supposed to quit.”
There’s that odd lilt to his voice again—certain words pronounced different than how I’d say ’em.
“Say, Waltz?”
“Jacob,” he corrects. “Jacob Waltz.”
“You ain’t from round here, are you?”
“Germany,” he answers. “I been on American soil thirty-eight years now, and been a citizen for sixteen. But don’t let my youthful looks fool you. I’m as old as yer guessing.”
He gets a smile outta me with that.
As Lil starts a fire and the men prep the meat for dinner, I step away to tend to the horses. They’re down near the water, grazing where Waltz’s mare is kept company by a stout gray burro. Mutt’s there too, lounging round like the lazy oaf he is. At this hour, Waltz’s temporary homestead is draped in shadow, the sun having dipped behind the butte, and there’s something peaceful ’bout the place.
I gather up Silver’s reins and lead her over to a short tree. I secure her for the night and pull off her saddle, then repeat the process with the others. I reckon we’ll be sleeping where Lil’s making the fire, and the thought of lugging the saddles there—even though it ain’t terribly far—smarts. I’m starting to feel all this travel in my lower back and rump. My hips are achy too, my thighs weary from sitting in a saddle day after day. And even though the wound on my shoulder’s nearly healed, I feel the weight of the gear there more than in my ankle.
Grumbling to myself, I turn for the house and find Will blocking my way. I’m so startled, I nearly drop the saddle.
“Damn, you scared me,” I says, bracing it ’gainst my thigh. “You practicing sneaking like Lil?”
His mouth don’t even twitch outta its current scowl. “Whatever’s going on with you and Jesse’s gotta stop,” he says.
“There ain’t nothing going on.”
“Don’t play with me, Kate. I ain’t in the mood.”
“And neither am I. This saddle ain’t made of feathers.” I try to walk past him and he sidesteps, blocking my way again. “Will, I ain’t got time for this.”
“Don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking ’bout,” he growls.
“Well, I don’t!”
“He ain’t thinking straight,” Will says, waving an arm toward the house. “It’s bad enough he’s set on going after the same gold a gang of outlaws wants, that we struck this deal with you, but now—”
“Oh, in tarnation, you two are both adults. You wanna walk, convince yer brother you both should walk. We can break the deal. I got Lil to help me now. I’ll find Rose with or without yous. But you ain’t getting those maps from me if you back out.”
“We ain’t gonna back out. I hate it, but Jesse’s right. We need the money, even if half his reason for going after it is tied up in the past. But now this.” He jerks his chin at me. “You getting in his head . . . It’s too much. It’s complicating things and it ain’t gonna go smooth.”
“I ain’t done nothing, Will.”
“See, but you did. Jesse’s focused. He’s smart. He don’t spend time on things that are distractions. He ain’t like me in that regard. But once Jesse’s heart starts drifting—even the tiniest bit—he goes and gets himself blessedly in over his head, cobweb tangled, lost without a compass. I seen it before with Maggie, and I sure as hell can recognize it when it starts up again.”
The saddle’s beginning to feel like it’s bearing a rider in my hands. I can’t hold it no more. Not with what Will’s implying.
His glare at Jesse while swimming makes sense now. Will’s picked up on a change in Jesse. He’s seeing exactly what Lil’s already told me, only Will don’t seem to find it amusing.
“I ain’t got no control over what Jesse thinks,” I says as evenly as possible. “If’n you got issues with where his head’s at, maybe you should talk to him ’stead of jawing to me.”
I try to shove by Will again, and he grabs the meaty part of my arm, stopping me cold. “Don’t encourage it, Kate. Don’t smile or joke or ask him for another shooting lesson. I can see you ain’t interested—you been on a mission that ain’t had nothing to do with us since day one—so how’s ’bout you make that clear to Jesse before he goes sinking any deeper.”
He drops my arm and walks off toward the others, whistling, like our exchange were over the weather.