Katie and the Mustang, Book 4 (4 page)

I didn't know what to say to that, so I didn't say anything.

“Can I pat him?”

I held the Mustang's lead rope tightly and nodded. “Just come up slow.”

Grover walked toward us, and the Mustang stood still, then let Grover pat his neck. Grover backed away, smiling, another thin, awkward little smile.

I looked past him at the slough and remembered. I pointed. “There's a skim of ice on that water. The ground is frozen, too.”

His face went tight; he thought I was baiting him. It was a hundred degrees out, easy, the heat distorting the very air. “There is,” I said quickly, “there is. Just come look.” I led the Mustang back to the slough.

Grover touched the water and looked up at me, grinning. “No one will believe us.”

We gathered up as much of the ice as we could carry and tried to get it back to show Mrs. Kyler. It melted halfway back, all but a sliver or two. But that was enough to get them to follow us. Most of the party came to look, drinking the cold water out of cupped hands, splashing their heat-flushed faces.

This was the oddest place I had ever been; impossible things had happened here. There was ice on the water in late July, and Grover Heldon had turned out to be sad, not mean.

CHAPTER FOUR

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A
week after Grover killed the snake, we started the long climb over South Pass. The name had made me picture a narrow gorge or a steep-sided valley that curved between the high, jagged peaks. But it wasn't like that at all.

South Pass was
miles
wide. It was like a giant hand had smoothed out the mountains the way a woman would smooth the soil in her kitchen garden before she planted beet seed.

For a while, we could see peaks in every direction, and the air got thin because we were so high, people said. I noticed it some. I got out of breath quicker when the Mustang and I ran to catch up to the wagons, and at night I was so tired I felt sick.

Now that I wasn't afraid of Grover anymore, I began to notice how seldom he was with his own parents. He helped Andrew Kyler herd the stock most days, and when he wasn't doing that, he'd walk with the Taylors and help count the wheel turns to figure how many miles we had come, or he'd just walk by himself.

“We left the United States today,” Mr. Taylor announced when the slow upgrade of South Pass leveled, then started downward.

Mr. Kyler rubbed his chin. “Are we past the divide?”

Mr. Taylor nodded. “Highest point is behind us now.”

I wasn't sure what they were talking about at first, but, listening, I figured it out pretty quickly.

The Continental Divide was the high land that separated the rivers. In many places, it was a band of sky-piercing mountain peaks. Here it was a gentler slope. But the result was the same; rain that fell on the east side flowed east. Rain on the west side would run into the creeks and rivers that flowed west.

But no one in our party cared much about that part. This was what mattered to all of us: The Continental Divide was the boundary of Oregon country. So even though we still had a thousand miles to travel, we were in Oregon already. We all cheered and whooped that night, our voices rising with the campfire sparks into the dark sky. I have never seen stars as bright as they were in the Rocky Mountains.

The days passed, blurring as they often did as we traveled. We filled our water barrels from cold, clear creeks and walked through cooler, sweet-scented air. I had never seen a mountain before, nor a forest that went on for miles, so the whole place was like a magical land to me.

On the far side of the pass, we came to the Green River crossing. There were ferries, and we took one, each wagon paying the astounding price of sixteen dollars! It was outrageous—a man could buy an ox for that—but the river was deep, rocky, and swift, and no one counted a life cheaper than sixteen dollars. Everyone had heard too many stories of Green River drownings to try to save money.

After we crossed, we followed the parties we could see in the distance ahead and turned southwest for a time, heading through barren hills toward Fort Bridger. I will never forget that part of our journey because a wonderful thing happened. Miss Liddy and her partners began to practice their show every evening that they had the strength to do so.

The first evening, they caught us all off guard. The sound of Miss Liddy laughing as loud and hearty as any man ever did made Mrs. Kyler and me turn to look. Miss Liddy was sprawled on the ground.

“Oh dear,” Mrs. Kyler said. “Is she all right?”

I nodded. “She's laughing. I think she just stumbled or something and...” I trailed off because I noticed the big mare cantering away—no, not really away. She was cantering in a circle. Miss Liddy stood up, brushing off her trousers. She whistled and the mare slowed, then stopped and turned to face her. As usual, there was no tack at all on the mare. Miss Liddy made a gesture with her right hand, and the mare cantered back toward her again. “That'll teach me to keep up my work better!” Miss Liddy called to the men.

Mrs. Kyler and I were nearly done cleaning up supper and we stood side by side, neither of us speaking as the mare passed Miss Liddy and Miss Liddy whirled to run along beside her, leaping onto her back.

I blinked, not quite sure how it had happened. Miss Liddy had been on the ground one second, then, the next, she was riding, her knees bent at a hard angle, her bare feet set firmly on the mare's broad back—standing up.

The mare had a slow, collected canter, and she veered into in a wide, easy circle. Miss Liddy stood for a long moment, then dropped to her knees, straddling the mare, but with her legs bent backward so she was more or less kneeling. Then she stood again, spreading her hands wide, gathering herself. All at once she leapt backward, turned a summerset in midair, and landed on her feet.

There was a scattering of applause, and I realized we weren't the only ones watching. Miss Liddy bowed grandly and called out, for all to hear, “Thank you all very much. You're all welcome to come to our first show in Oregon City. I make all my mistakes in practice, of course.”

Everyone laughed. I grinned at Mrs. Kyler, then turned to watch Miss Liddy go through the routine a second time. I was breathless. It was like watching an eagle fly high like they do sometimes, without flapping its wings. It looked impossible. I had never seen anything so wonderful in my life.

The next evening, we rushed around and finished our chores, both of us keeping one eye on Miss Liddy's wagons. She rode the big mare for a while more, practicing the summerset a few more times, then Mr. Le Croix took a turn.

He didn't do the summerset trick. He rode backward and sideways and leaned down off the mare to pick up a stone off the ground. He turned on his side and pretended to be asleep while the big, wide-backed mare cantered in her smooth, balanced way.

While Mr. Le Croix rode the mare, I saw Miss Liddy standing with Mr. Dillard and Mr. Swann. The men were holding odd club-shaped objects that made no sense until they began to toss them up in the air.

“That's called juggling,” Mrs. Kyler said in a hushed voice, as though she might somehow startle the men if she spoke too loudly. “Have you ever seen it before?”

I shook my head, then realized she wasn't looking at me, she was staring at Mr. Swann and Mr. Dillard as the wooden clubs flashed between them, faster and faster.

“No,” I whispered, astounded. How did people learn to do such things? Who in the world had ever figured out how to do it in the first place?

Mr. Swann changed the rhythm, and Mr. Dillard followed perfectly. They reached high above their heads, then low, then spun around between catches. It was beautiful, like a dance. Mr.LeCroix dismounted and went to watch them.

Mr. Swann shouted a warning and threw Mr. Le Croix a club. In an eyeblink, the men were standing in a triangle, the clubs going round from one to the next. They each did tricks of their own, spinning, catching the clubs behind their backs, all without missing, even once.

I exhaled, feeling something I had never felt before. I didn't just want to watch all the amazing things Miss Liddy and her friends could do, I wanted to learn
how
.

I began to time my chores, rushing through supper cleanup, doing more than my usual share, just to be sure to be finished by the time Miss Liddy and the others began their evening practice. I wasn't the only one. By the second week, most of the party was hurrying through their evening work. On days when the road was rough or the weather turned bad and Miss Liddy and her friends decided not to practice, there was a dimming of spirits in every camp.

One morning, just before we reached Fort Bridger, I took the Mustang out to graze early, as usual. Without thinking much about it, my sleepy thoughts still circling aimlessly, I led him toward the rear of the wagon line. I had seen patches of good grass a ways back up the trail. I knew I would have time to let him graze before the Kylers were packed and ready to leave.

As we passed the last wagon, Miss Liddy's big mare whickered, and the Mustang answered her. His whinny brought answering nickers from Delia and Midnight, too. I smiled and patted his neck. “You're so handsome that all the lady horses think you're grand,” I told him. He tossed his head and pranced a few paces.

“Morning!” Miss Liddy called. “Off to find grass for him?”

“I am,” I called back without moving any closer. Then I realized that I was standing fifty feet from her for no good reason. There hadn't been fever among her party or ours for all this time, and I was still acting as though I had to stay clear of her.

Then I realized something else. No one else was. I was the only one still behaving as though it was dangerous to be around Liddy and her friends.

Mrs. Craggett and Mrs. Taylor and the younger Kyler wives still barely spoke to them—not even Polly's mother. The rest of them had given her heck for speaking up that first day. But it had nothing to do with being afraid of fever.

I walked forward a few steps, and the Mustang moved with me. “It's so wonderful, the way you can ride,” I called.

Miss Liddy smiled so broadly that it was as though the whole morning had brightened, ahead of sunrise. “Thank you, Katie!”

“Is it hard? It looks impossible.” I walked a little closer so she could lower her voice.

“I remember the first time I saw someone trick ride,” she said. “I was as amazed as you are.” She pushed her hair back from her face. “I can tell you this. The only thing better than seeing it is doing it.”

“Would you teach me?” The words were out of my mouth before I knew I was going to ask.

Miss Liddy frowned, and my heart sank.

“I know it would be an imposition,” I said quickly. “None of us has but barely enough time to sleep as it is, and they say the worst part of the journey is ahead of us and—”

“No, it isn't any of that,” she interrupted, raising one hand to stop me. “It is just dangerous, and I can't think why you would want to risk it. You are almost certainly going to end up with your uncle or the Kylers on a farm, and trick riding will be the last thing you need to know.”

I had no answer for that, even though I searched hard inside myself to find one. “I don't care,” I finally said. “I just want to learn.”

She digested that for a long moment, then pointed at the Mustang. “On him?”

I was stunned to silence; I hadn't for one second thought about riding the Mustang. “No,” I said quietly. “I don't want to ride him.”

Miss Liddy tipped her head to one side.

I took a long breath, fighting the strange flood of feelings inside myself. “I don't think he would want me to ride him,” I said finally.

“Are you scared that he wouldn't let you?” she asked me in a gentler voice.

I nodded. I had never managed to explain it to myself, but she was right. I was afraid. What if he tried to buck me off, what if he shied and tried to get away? He trusted me. We were friends, but my trying to ride him could change that.

“Well,” Miss Liddy said, “it's up to you. Can you finish chores a half hour earlier than usual?”

It took me a few seconds to take in what she had said. Then I nodded so hard I could feel my hair swing against my back.

Miss Liddy smiled. “Give me a few days. I'll let you know when we can start.”