Outlawed(65)

When, finally, just as the sun crested the mountains and cast its lemony light across the bunkhouse steps, Cassie came down from the orchard with the Kid by her side, Agnes Rose and I rushed to greet them with questions and offers on our lips.

“Are you all right?” Agnes Rose asked. “Kid, you scared us.”

“I’ll get a horse ready,” I said. “Kid, which one do you want to ride?”

“I’m all right, Agnes,” the Kid said in a clear but quiet voice. “Doc, Cassie will get my horse ready. You have your own work to do.”

“Tell the others the Kid and I went on a trail ride,” Cassie said. “If they ask where, say you don’t know. I’ll explain everything when I get back.”

If Cassie expected that this would satisfy the rest of the gang, she was mistaken. As soon as the others woke—first Texas, to look after the horses, then Elzy, startled to find Cassie’s bunk empty, then Lo, and finally News—each wanted to know where the Kid was, and once they found no answers forthcoming, a general confusion bordering on panic settled over the bunkhouse, which Agnes Rose and I were powerless to defuse.

“I knew it,” Texas said. “Is the Kid sick, Doc? Is it serious?”

“What about the job?” Lo asked. “We’ve been rushing it too much. If the Kid’s not right, we should wait until the fall at least, maybe longer.”

“We can’t delay the job,” News said. “Doc can help the Kid, right Doc?”

By the time Cassie returned at high noon, hollow-eyed with worry and lack of sleep, both Agnes Rose and I had invented tasks outdoors to avoid the increasingly insistent questioning of our compatriots. I was gathering mint when she rode up, and so when she called us all to the bunkhouse moments later, I still carried a basket full of fragrant, dew-flecked leaves.

“First,” Cassie said to the assembled company, “the Kid is going to be all right. There’s no immediate danger.”

“What happened?” Lo interrupted. “Where is the Kid now?”

Cassie held her hand up.

“Let me finish,” she said. “The Kid is going to be all right, but the Kid is very ill right now. It’s an ailment that, frankly, I don’t pretend to understand, but it’s something that the Kid anticipated and made a plan for, out of concern for all of us.”

“What’s the plan?” News asked.

“The only treatments for this illness are rest and time,” Cassie said. “So the Kid will be resting somewhere safe until it passes.”

“Where?” Elzy asked. “When can we visit?”

“The Kid has asked for complete solitude for the time being,” Cassie said, “and so I’ve been instructed not to reveal the place. Rest assured that the Kid will have everything necessary for a swift recovery.”

For a moment everyone talked at once. Only Lark was quiet, looking at me with confusion. I squeezed his hand, a promise of a future explanation.

It was Lo who finally broke through the din: “We should call off the job,” she said. “Who knows how long until the Kid will be well again?”

Cassie nodded and took a slow breath.

“The Kid knew that some of you would be worried about the job, and asked me to pass along a message to everyone: the Kid has complete confidence in all of us, and knows that even without one of our number, we will succeed.”

Again the bunkhouse grew loud with competing voices. Again Lo spoke over everyone.

Elzy had been looking out the window, avoiding Cassie’s eyes, and when she spoke, her voice was quiet but hard. “Cass,” she said, “your loyalty to the Kid isn’t a good reason to put us all in danger. Why don’t we just wait until the Kid recovers?”

“You know I’d like to,” Cassie said, “but our time is running out. Remember, the bank president comes back in June, and then the vault will be guarded again.”

Lo opened her mouth, shut it, then opened it again. “Cass,” she said, “you know as well as I do this job never made any sense for us. We’re not bankers, we’re not landlords. We came here to get away from those kinds of people. Mother of God, running a town? I can’t imagine anything worse. And now’s our chance to reconsider. If we let the moment pass while the Kid recovers, the Kid could never blame us.”

“We don’t need to argue,” News said. “Let’s have a vote. The Kid would respect that, no matter what we decide.”

“You’re right,” Cassie said. “All those in favor of sticking with the plan, raise a hand.”

Cassie lifted her own hand, and News and Agnes Rose and I followed. Texas raised a hand too.

Lo shook her head.

“Good luck to you,” she said. “I hope you don’t get shot in the street in Fiddleback, or strung up in the town square. And if by some miracle you succeed, I hope you make Fiddleback into a paradise, I really do.”

She pulled her rucksack from under her cot.

“Where are you going?” Texas asked.

Lo shrugged.

“I was on my own before I came here. I’ll be on my own again. I’ll be all right. Don’t forget, I taught every single one of you how to hide.”

Elzy followed Lo to the door.

“Lo, wait,” she said. “You can’t just leave.”