Katie and the Mustang, Book 4 (6 page)

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
T
he next week or two was hard traveling, and I only got to practice on Genevieve twice more—we were all too tired to do much once we stopped for the day.
There was a hill so steep the men had to line up behind each wagon, gripping a rope, dragging their weight to hold the wagon back, to keep it from rolling out of control. Then they all had to walk back up and do it over again. It was frightening, how steep it was. Mr. Taylor said it was just called Big Hill. I would have named it something far worse if anyone had asked me. It took us all day to get everyone down it safely.
One morning after that we came upon something I knew I would remember forever. There was a long, narrow patch of steaming rocks—or so it looked from a distance. As we got closer, we could smell sulfur and phosphorus and we saw water spurting up into the air.
I walked the Mustang closer. The ground was hot in places under my feet, and the steam floated along the ground like some enchanted fog. People got buckets and tins and we all tasted the soda water—just to prove to ourselves that it was real, I guess. Who would ever have thought there was a place on earth where soda water just shot up out of the rocks?
We dragged into the grounds around Fort Hall tired and worn. It seemed as if we were tired most of the time, now. Even the Kyler girls had settled down. Their running and giggling was rare now at suppertime or any other time.
Fort Hall wasn't much compared to the other forts we had seen, but it was a place to rest, to feel a little safer than we did on our own. We had come so far without a guide of any kind, but now there were many fewer people on the trail with us, and sometimes we couldn't see anyone ahead of us at all. At the forts, there were usually several parties at once. Fort Hall was no different, and it was a comfort.
I asked everyone I met if they knew my uncle. No one had heard of him. I tried not to let it frighten me.
“Want to practice?” Miss Liddy called to me the second evening we were at Fort Hall.
“I do!” I called back.
Mrs. Kyler winked at me. “I'll finish up. You can clean up breakfast to pay me back.”
I stuck out my hand, and we shook to seal the bargain, then I ran to make sure the Mustang was all right before I went to Miss Liddy's camp.
This was the first time we had practiced where there were other people. I hadn't been up on Genevieve's back more than five minutes before I noticed that Grover was sitting a little ways off, watching. The second time I looked, three or four boys I had never seen before had joined him.
“I want to have her canter,” Miss Liddy said.
“I'm not sure I'm ready,” I began, but she interrupted me, speaking quietly to Genevieve. The mare suddenly rose beneath me as she lifted her front legs and leapt forward into a canter. I sat as steady as I could, my hands gripping her mane.
“Find the rhythm of her gait,” Miss Liddy reminded me. “It's like a rocking horse with her, almost.”
That made me smile, but a few minutes later, I realized it wasn't a joke. The big mare lifted her front legs high, then came down smoothly with every stride.
“Head up,” Miss Liddy said as Genevieve brought me around the circle again.
I lifted my head and loosened one hand from the mare's mane. Miss Liddy noticed.
“Good. Free both hands when you can. Get them up.”
I wanted to say I wasn't ready again, but I didn't. I refused to look down or to think about how far I would fall if I lost my balance.
“Breathe,” Miss Liddy reminded me. “She's going well for you. She has come to trust you. Just relax and lift your arms.”
I loosed my grip and let my arms rise. It felt wonderful, only a little scary—I was used to the position at a walk and this wasn't too much different, not really.
“Perfect!” Miss Liddy said, and I felt my cheeks flush. “Twice more around, Katie, then I'll have her halt in front of me.”
“Yes,” I called back without turning my head.
“Be ready,” Miss Liddy said. “When I tell her to stop, she'll turn to come toward the center of the circle, then she will slide to a halt, she won't drop back to a trot.”
I steadied myself and concentrated on keeping my posture correct for the next two rounds. Then, when Miss Liddy called the command to Genevieve, I leaned with the turn and curved my back slightly when I felt her stiffen her front legs to stop. I leaned forward just enough to keep my balance as she plunged to a halt. I kept my arms up and my head high, the way I had seen Miss Liddy do it.
Grover was on his feet instantly, clapping. The boys I didn't even know shouted and cheered. Mr. Le Croix, Mr. Dillard, and Mr. Swann whooped, all of them grinning. I heard a whistle from the other side of the camp and saw Mrs. Kyler waving; past her, I saw a group of folks from another wagon company. It was obvious that they had been on their way to the fort and had stopped to watch.
For some reason, all this made me feel strangely wonderful. My eyes flooded with tears and I blushed as I swung my right leg over the mare's withers and slid down from Genevieve's wide back the way Miss Liddy sometimes did—facing out, my head high and my arms out for balance.
Genevieve lowered her head, and I reached as high as I could to pat her broad jaw. Miss Liddy was grinning. “You're a natural. I thought you might be and you are.” Then she looked over my head at her companions. “If any of you have an ounce of energy, we could use traveling money.” She gestured at the crowd that had gathered to watch Genevieve and me. The men got down from the wagon bench and got out their wooden clubs.
It was amazing to watch the three men juggle—really juggle, not just their practice routines. The clubs were heavy, and still they threw them high overhead, over and over, their hands flashing too fast to follow.
They stood in a triangle and tossed the clubs back and forth in an intricate pattern that changed, then changed again. Once Mr. Le Croix ended up with all the clubs, holding them in rows beneath both arms and six in each hand. The crowd laughed when he made a face. Then he tossed the clubs back out one by one. With Mr. Dillard and Mr. Swann catching them neatly, soon they were moving in a rhythmic circle again.
“It's like magic,” Grover murmured. I nodded without looking away.
When they finished juggling, there was more applause, and I turned to see that the crowd had grown—there were at least two hundred people watching.
Miss Liddy stepped forward with Genevieve at her side. People gasped to see the big mare so obedient, so well trained, without a single strap or rope on her. Miss Liddy vaulted up and sat with her arms extended. Then, moving to music that only she and Genevieve could hear, they began their act. Miss Liddy was as graceful as anything as she rode standing up, with her arms out at shoulder level. Then she dropped down, threw one leg across Genevieve's withers, and sat sidesaddle at a canter. I stared. How could anyone balance well enough to do
that
without a saddle?
Miss Liddy rode backward, hung down to pick up a stone from the ground, then threw it into the air. Mr. Le Croix caught it and tossed it back. She stood up again, the stone in one hand. She vaulted upward suddenly and turned a flip in the air, landing on her feet.
The people cheered and clapped, making a din that brought even more of a crowd out of the fort to see what was going on.
As the crowd noise subsided, Mr. Le Croix and Mr. Dillard began shouting at each other, spitting insults back and forth. My stomach tightened until I saw the smile on Miss Liddy's face. Looking for all the world like two men about to fight, Mr. Dillard and Mr. Le Croix circled each other. The crowd stared.
Then Mr. Le Croix drew back a fist—and the motion seemed to lift him off his own feet and set him spinning. The crowd inhaled, then I heard chuckling from a few of the men.
Mr. Swann came running to help, lifting his knees high and flailing his arms. He reached out to grab Mr. Le Croix by his shoulders and stopped the spin. Mr. Le Croix doffed his hat as though he was thanking him, then ceremoniously reached out to shake his hand. The instant Mr. Swann took it, Mr. Le Croix stepped forward and somehow lifted the much-bigger Mr. Swann off the ground and flipped him over his shoulder.
The crowd roared as Mr. Swann stood up, dusting his clothes and glowering. The mock fight went on, with both men using exaggerated gestures and pretending that gentle taps sent them flying. The crowd's laughter brought more and more people to watch.
Mr. Le Croix ran at Mr.Dillard like a furious bull. At the last instant, Mr. Dillard bent forward, and Mr. LeCroix jumped to his shoulders. Mr. Le Croix raised one finger to his lips, warning the crowd not to give him away. Mr. Dillard pretended to be confused, peering in all directions to see where Mr. Le Croix had gone. The crowd laughed so long and so hard that I thought they might never stop.
Finally, the sunset pinked the sky, and Liddy and her companions lined up to bow. Before the applause died down, they walked forward into the crowd, each one carrying his hat out upside down for people to put coins into.
As I walked back to Mrs. Kyler I could hear people joking and talking. Miss Liddy and her friends had changed a glum, weary crowd into a happy one.
Once I was back at the Kylers' wagon, I let Mrs. Kyler know I was there, then I ran to the herd and found the Mustang on the edge as usual, standing quietly with Delia and Midnight. I kissed him on the forehead, then told him about riding Genevieve.
“Did you hear people cheering? The first time?” I asked him. “That was for me.”
“Katie?”
Grover's voice startled me. I turned, wondering if he was going to tease me about talking to the Mustang. He hadn't for a long time, but it probably
did
sound pretty funny to hear me talking to him like he was a person.
“Katie, do you think they would teach me?”
I looked at him. “To trick ride?”
He nodded. “Anything. I just wish I could go with them.”
It took me a few seconds to understand what he was saying. “But your family—” I began.
“I know.” He nodded. “My mother is sick a lot now. She needs my help.” He looked up at me. “And my father would never let me go, anyway,” he said. “Never.”
I had no idea what to say, but he sounded so sad that I touched his arm. “I will ask Miss Liddy.”
He looked so grateful that I felt awkward.“Grover, I don't know what they'll say, but I will ask, I promise.” He thanked me, then ran off. I stood a long time next to the Mustang wishing things were not so hard for Grover or me, or anyone else.
The next day, I asked Miss Liddy what she thought about the men teaching Grover like she was teaching me.
“He can ask them himself, Katie,” she said quietly. “I can't say what they would do. I won't put him up on Genevieve. Tell him I am sorry, but one student is all the mare and I can handle.”
I told Grover that night, and he hung his head. “She didn't say they wouldn't,” I repeated, “just that you should ask the men yourself.”
He nodded, and I wondered if he would. He was shy, especially with adults. I had seen him taking to Mrs. Kyler a few times, but to almost no one else.
We were back in salt-dry sage country right after we left Fort Hall. The ground was rockier than anywhere we had crossed yet, dark, jagged rocks that cut my feet. I started wearing the leather Indian slippers Mrs. Kyler had bought me.
They were the best shoes I had ever owned, soft enough that I could still feel the ground, but strong enough to dull the rocks' edges.
The days were hot and dusty. I practiced riding Genevieve every evening that Miss Liddy would let me. I got better, a tiny bit each time, at holding the erect posture that made her riding so beautiful.
We crossed creeks and rivers, none so big as to be very dangerous, which was such a relief. I had heard the men talking about the Columbia River, which we'd have to cross some way or another toward the end. They compared it to the Missouri in size, but rougher, with circular currents and no ferry boats except tied-together Indian canoes. I tried not to think about it.
After one river crossing—no one seemed to know the name of the river—we passed a cutoff trail, a pair of shallow-rutted tracks, heading south into the California country. It was a faint trail compared to the one we were on. I saw Mr. Silas staring down it as we rolled past.
The oxen plodded slowly forward in the midday heat, and I spotted wagons in the distance. Some had turned off for California. They were headed southwest, raising so much dust that I couldn't see how many there were.
I hadn't met anyone who was going to California and I wasn't sure what drew them there instead of Oregon. There must be some reason.
I suddenly thought about my uncle Jack. Maybe he had started out for Oregon and had gone to California instead. Maybe that's where his family was—hundreds of miles south. Would he have gone to join up and fight in the war?
The thought made my skin prickle. I didn't think he would have done that without letting my mother know, but I had to admit it was possible. It would explain the returned letter at Fort Laramie.
My eyes filled with tears. How was I supposed to know what to do? How was I supposed to find him? I stepped back and hid behind the Mustang as we walked closer to the wagons so no one would see me crying.
I had been so sure that I would find my uncle Jack in Oregon country and I still thought I would be able to. But the truth was, back home in Iowa, I had never realized how big the Oregon country was—and I had never once imagined or understood how hard or how long the journey would be.

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