Where the Lost Wander(78)

I don’t know if anyone will come looking for me or baby Wolfe. I don’t know. John. John will come looking. I shudder, and my stomach roils again. Pa and Warren are dead. Ma. Ma is dead too. My mind goes black. Blank. I can’t think of them. I hope John doesn’t come after me. They’ll kill him. They’ll kill me too. I just hope they do it quickly.





JOHN


Naomi is wearing her moccasins. I can tell by her print. Her foot is small, and her tread is short, like she’s stumbling along. There are no footprints besides hers. The rest are horses and two mules. Trick and Tumble. A set of smaller, cloven-hoofed prints makes me think they took Gert too. I’ve lost the trail a few times and have had to circle back. I’ve lost it again and am sure I’m going the wrong way.

A flutter of white tumbles over the dry ground, and I race toward it, chasing it for half a mile before it finally presses up against the sagebrush, momentarily caught. I am screaming in frustration by the time I reach it, and my voice, raspy and raw, frightens my animals. They shimmy and sidestep, and I slide from Samson’s back, pulling the animals forward so I can snag the page I’ve chased for half an hour.

It is a sketch I’ve seen, one I admired. Bones in Boxes is written across the bottom in Naomi’s curling scrawl. I have a vision of her blood-soaked body lying somewhere in the rocks, her book lying open beside her, her pictures scattered in the wind. Then I remember the way she left a trail of pictures for me and Wyatt when we’d gone after my mules, and calm quiets my anguish. Naomi is leaving pages for me again.





NAOMI


I do not open my eyes when I hear the camp stirring, and for a moment I am still with the train, wondering if I am the last to wake. Then I remember where I am. I remember why, and I am flooded with grief so heavy I cannot take a breath. I start to wheeze, gagging and gasping, and the dog I spent the night beside begins to nuzzle the juncture of my thighs, where the blood of my menses has seeped through my dress. I kick him away, giving up my pretense of sleep, and roll to my side, tucking my legs to my chest. Another nudge in my side. Thinking it is the dog, I swat at it and touch someone’s leg instead.

She looms above me, the old woman, her face so worn and brown she looks like she is made of tree bark. She peers at me, deep-set eyes black and shining, and beckons me to follow. I duck out of the lodge and flinch against the rising sun. They are breaking camp. Children are running, the men are gathering the horses, and women are packing. The other shelters have all been brought down, and the fires have been doused. They are leaving in a rush, and many stare, but no one stops me. It was much the same the night before. The man who dragged me by the hair took me into his lodge. He shoved me in a corner with a mangy dog and growled something I couldn’t understand. The old woman brought me water and a blanket. I drank, and then I slept.

Now she urges me down toward the stream. She is small, a full head shorter than I am, but her grip on my arm is firm, and I don’t know what else to do but obey. And I am thirsty. I move downstream, the old woman watching me from the banks. I set my satchel with my book of pictures, still hanging around my neck, on a rock and remove my stockings and my moccasins and sit, fully clothed, in the creek. The water engulfs me to my chin. I scrub at the soiled fabric between my legs and pull the rags free from the pockets in my dress, rinsing them too. The water is cold and the morning young, and I shiver and quake as I try to wash as best I can. I consider escape, floating away with the current. I look at the old woman; she stares back at me. A wisp of her gray hair waves goodbye, and I wonder if she knows my thoughts. Then a child cries, and I am ashamed. I cannot leave without Wolfe. I rise, water sluicing from my dress, and hobble back to shore, my tender feet curling around the slick stones.

I cannot ask her where Wolfe is. Instead, I mime a baby in my arms. The old woman doesn’t react, and I try harder, tapping my chest and cradling an invisible infant. She says something I don’t understand, says it again louder, then breaks the circle of my arms, forcing them to my sides, shaking her head. I fear she is trying to tell me what I already know. Wolfe is no longer mine.

I try to tell her my name. “Nay-oh-mee,” I say slowly, patting my chest. “Naomi.”

She grunts, and I say it again, desperate. “Naomi.”

“Nayohmee,” she repeats, running all the sounds together.

“Yes,” I say and nod. “Yes. Naomi Lowry.” Naomi May Lowry. I blink back sudden tears.

She pats her own chest and says something I can’t even decipher enough to repeat. I shake my head, helpless. I can’t even make out the first sound. Softer than a p, harder than a b.

She says her name again.

“Beeya?” I attempt, but my voice trails off, unsure of the rest.

“Beeya,” she repeats, satisfied. “Nayohmee,” she says and touches my chest. She bends and picks up my leather satchel and looks inside. She pulls the book out, and a few loose drawings tumble free. The leather string I keep wrapped around the pages is undone. I am lucky the book is even inside. I must have shoved it into my satchel without tying it when I stooped down next to Gert to feed Wyatt. Not at the river . . . but before. Before.

Beeya wants to see what’s inside. Shivering and afraid she will take it, I open it. Wyatt grins up at me, fully fleshed in a thousand lines.

I shut the book again. I am too wet to tuck it away, and Beeya reaches for it, not understanding my agony. I crouch and begin to put on my moccasins, my fingers stiff and uncooperative, my stockings so filthy I consider abandoning them. Beeya is sifting through my pages, hissing and moaning, and I pray she will not destroy my book.