Chapter 14
Tex had to claw his way up the canyon wall that surrounded the river. He was near done in by the time he reached the top of the gorge.
He dragged himself over the ledge, looked back and saw Stella close behind him.
She looked like she was on her last legs, except it was so steep, they were both more on their bellies than on their legs.
He slid sideways so she’d have room on the ledge, then looked at what they had to do next and was stunned into silence.
He sat unmoving while Stella reached the top and scooted far enough away from the cliff they’d just scaled to make sure a wrong move didn’t send her sliding back down to the bottom. She peered out at what lay ahead, and her mouth gaped open.
They stared blankly at mountains upon mountains—some rolling, some rocky peaks, along with trees and grass and endless wind. It all stretched as far as the eye could see.
How far into the mountains had they been swept?
He opened his mouth to talk but could not think of a single thing to say.
At least he could tell which way was which from up here and knew they needed to head north.
Only trouble was, north was a mighty long stretch to go.
West was worse. East looked nigh to impossible, but maybe it’d get them out of these hills sooner than any other direction.
Maybe they’d even cross paths with Owen.
South was back across that wild river. He dismissed it completely.
They’d burned off most of the day climbing, and now here they stood, stunned by the majestic beauty of what looked to be eternal peaks cast in a gold-and-red sunset.
Still, the beautiful view wouldn’t get them any closer to Fort Russell.
It took some effort, but finally Tex turned to look at her. “The sunset makes your pretty blond hair a glory, Stella. Like you’re wearing a halo.” He gave her a rueful smile.
Her gaze was drawn away from the sunset, which he knew for a fact wasn’t easy. The sky was bathed in red. Clouds streaked the red and gold with white, with violet cascading from the sliver of sun that still lingered on the horizon.
She smiled back in wonder, and he had to ask himself if she might never have heard a kind word from the lunkheads that made up the Duncan Gang. “It makes me inclined to trust you, and that’s probably a foolish thing to say.”
Her smile shrank away. “Are you saying you’d be a fool to trust me?”
He tried to be casual about it, but he moved a few paces away from the edge of the cliff they’d just climbed.
No sense making it easy for her to kick him over the edge.
“I didn’t say that.” Except he did, sort of.
“I just meant I’m inclined to trust you.
The foolish part is me trusting my instincts.
I tend to insist on proof and not take someone’s word for much. ”
He didn’t think she looked impressed with his fumbling explanation.
“I do trust you, Stella. Hang on a second.” He gathered some stones and fashioned an arrow pointing north. Using more stones, he shaped a T, then an S.
“You’re leaving a sign?”
“Yep. Let’s see if we can hike down this slope while heading north.” He pointed, then set off. Maybe about the time they were clinging to the side of a cliff and starving to death, she’d forget what he said. He glanced back and saw she’d fallen in behind him.
“Have you ever heard the saying ‘a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step’?” Her voice, when he wasn’t looking at her, struck him as musical.
“Nope, never heard of that one. But we don’t have to walk a thousand miles.” Unless they had to climb up and down so many mountains, it amounted to that many miles.
“Well, a journey of one hundred miles begins with a single step, too. However long our journey will be, we’ve taken the first step at least.”
Tex had to admit that was indeed true.
The sun disappeared, the sunset blazing now. A cool mountain breeze in the thin air of the high altitude made walking a pleasure.
Tex’s stomach began to growl. “We won’t be able to hike for very long.
Keep an eye out for scrub brush or a thicket of some kind where I can build a snare.
” He found a fork in the trail that headed eastward on the mountainside and decided to take it.
“We can make a slingshot using the knife and get a bird or a rabbit with that for our supper.”
They soon were walking into spindly woods that grew into more mature trees as they descended, where they came upon a spring with its cool water burbling up from the earth.
“Let’s stop here to get ourselves a drink. Then we can keep going for a while longer and hope our passing flushes out a rabbit or bird. And let’s pray we don’t disturb a grizzly or anything more than we can handle.”
Tex handed her the knife while he got a drink. When he was done, she’d found a small branch and had begun whittling away what was to be their slingshot.
“Let me work on it for a bit. Get yourself a drink.”
She handed over the knife and went to the crack in the rocks with water bubbling out of it.
With her thirst quenched, she took back over working on their weapon.
He was close to wrestling with her, as he wanted to keep working on the slingshot.
A man was supposed to do the hunting after all.
Instead, he bit down on his foolish protest and gave her back the knife and stick.
“How long do you think we rode that river?” Tex asked as he looked around from where he sat. He honestly couldn’t remember a time when he’d been this tired and this battered.
Stella paused as she considered the question.
“We made our break about midday maybe. We rode along on the river all afternoon, and I fell asleep as soon as you hauled me out of the water.” She stopped working on the slingshot and looked him in the eye.
“Thank you. I’m not sure I’d’ve gotten out of there without you.
I know I was knocked out or at least dazed more than once, and you kept my head out of the water.
” Looking serious, she reached across and took his hand.
“Sincerely, Tex, thank you. You saved my life, and I thanked you for it by waking up before you did and tying you up.” She shrugged and gave a sheepish smile. “I needed you to let me talk.”
“You did need to do that. But then you untied me and returned my knife. That went a long way toward me trusting you.”
Testing the forked stick and the strip she’d cut from her skirt, she gathered a few stones and stood.
“We slept the night through, it seems. Down in that gorge, I woke up once in the pitch-dark. Then I slept again until morning. We were a time having our little talk and climbing up the cliff, and now it’s nightfall. ”
Shaking his head, Tex said, “Owen won’t believe I’m dead until he’s seen my body, but by this time—assuming they rounded up Clive and your pa—they’ll have given up on finding me.
I doubt there’s any way over the cliff where our horses tossed us.
I reckon they’ll head for Fort Russell and come back for us—if they can get out of the mountains.
” He paused and let out a sigh. “It amounts to us being on our own with nothing but a knife and a sling. The living won’t be easy.
You’ve already proved you can light a fire.
I suppose if we take too long getting out of here, Owen and Morgan will find us and lend us a hand. ”
“How could your friends ever begin to find you out here?” she asked.
“I don’t know how, but I hope to make it as easy for them as possible. But they’re smart men and loyal saddle partners. They’ll come sure enough.”
Tex finally had some starch back in his legs. If they didn’t get to hunting soon, they’d be going without food for the night. And his belly was so empty, it thought his throat had been cut.
“Let’s go,” Stella said, straightening her back. He thought he heard a little groan come from her, but she stifled it instantly.
“If we don’t flush anything out, I can take threads from my shirt and set up a snare to catch rabbit or grouse. That way we’ll have something to eat for breakfast. Or maybe I could use the knife to make a spear to catch a fish with if we happen upon a stream or a lake.”
“Let’s also keep our eyes open for nuts and berries,” she said before setting off.
Every muscle and bone in his body ached, as hers must be aching as well. Even so, Tex had his hands full keeping up with her.
He had many worries and things pressing on him to do, but despite all that, he enjoyed walking with the beautiful Stella Duncan. He hoped it turned out she wasn’t an outlaw after all.
Delaney kept busy with supper—eating it, that is, because Boone had cooked it.
She kept busy collecting more firewood, although they probably had enough.
Jesse too had kept busy while everyone else was running after escaped prisoners.
She also tended Boone’s head, which was healing nicely with little tending required really.
All that busy didn’t make her forget she’d kissed Owen Riley.
He and Morgan and Marley had ridden off. Roz went along, of course. They’d gone off to find Tex, even though Marley had told them it would be all but impossible to find him in the mountains.
Yet having Owen out of sight did not put him out of Delaney’s mind.
She’d never been kissed before.
She’d almost never had a man pay her any attention.
And now the very first time a man had interested her, and he’d seemed interested in return, she couldn’t stop thinking about it.
She couldn’t stop wanting him to kiss her again.
She wondered what he was thinking. Besides, of course, thinking about his missing Marshal friend.
He’d gone right back to taking care of business when Morgan had shown up. She admired that about him at the same time she wished he had acted . . . different.